Warlord

by Jennifer Fallon

  Damin grinned. “The same could be said for the Sisters of the Blade in Medalon, your highness. Who goes first?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I will beat you either way.”

  “Really?”

  “As I said, I am a master.”

  “You seem to be a master of a lot of things, Kraig.”

  The Denikan nodded solemnly. “I am.”

  There wasn’t much he could say to that so Damin scooped up the seeds from the bowl closest to him and began to distribute them according to Kraig’s instructions, wondering how long it would be before Narvell sent somebody looking for him.

  And what the reaction was going to be when he sent back a message saying he was too busy to attend the meeting because he was playing with his court’esa.

  CHAPTER 34

  Finding intelligence about the Hythrun wasn’t as simple as Brak had hoped. There was as much rumour doing the rounds in Cabradell as there was useful information and no way to tell the difference. It wasn’t troop numbers they were after. Any man with ten fingers and ten toes could count the troops massing around Cabradell well enough to report back to Axelle Regis. Real intelligence involved things that were going to happen, not things that already had.

  Such information wasn’t easy to come by, however. Since arriving in Cabradell they’d drunk in so many taverns as they listened to one useless rumour after another that Brak was starting to fear he might inadvertently turn poor Ollie into a drunkard. He was tempted to make his way up to the palace, sit himself down under a nice shady tree somewhere and scan the minds of anybody he could reach, to find out for certain what was happening. Brak was reluctant to cheat like that, though. For one thing, he would never be able to explain the source of his intelligence without admitting how he got it, which also meant admitting who he was. The other reason was simply pig-headedness. This was a human war and nobody, particularly Hablet of Fardohnya, deserved an unfair advantage.

  Zegarnald was obviously going to get his war, but Brak had no intention of making it easier for him.

  And then, just when they were on the verge of returning to Fardohnya empty-handed, they stumbled upon a man who was in a position to give them real information, not just speculation or wild guesses. Brak met him in a tavern not far from the north gate of the city, the gate closest to the palace. The palace itself was located about a half mile outside the city walls on a small hill overlooking the Cabradell Valley.

  He was a nobleman. An officer under Lord Hawksword’s command with the Elasapine troops and his name was Stefan Warhaft.

  Lord Warhaft, it seemed, had good cause to drown his sorrows. This was the man the old apothecary in Urso had spoken of. The man whose wife had caught the eye of the High Prince’s heir and had her stolen from him without so much as a by-your-leave. The man was depressed, angry and anxious to tell his tale to any soul willing to listen. Brak and Ollie bought him ale and offered a sympathetic ear. That was all Warhaft was looking for.

  According to Warhaft, it wasn’t just Damin Wolfblade at fault, it was his half-brother, Narvell Hawksword, who started it all.

  If Warhaft was to be believed, the Hawksword boy had arrived in Zadenka some months ago to wait out the plague and—being a typical descendant of that useless pervert, Lernen Wolfblade—decided to relieve his boredom with Warhaft’s wife. When Lord Warhaft learned of the affair, he was justifiably outraged and took it upon himself to correct his wife’s foolish ways which, Brak assumed, meant that he’d beaten the poor girl senseless. Aided by some renegade member of the Sorcerers’ Collective, she’d run away (understandably, in Brak’s opinion), straight into the arms of her lover, who unfortunately was in the company of his older brother—the High Prince’s heir—by the time Warhaft caught up with her.

  Warhaft gripped his tankard until his knuckles turned white as he related his tale.

  “What happened then?” Brak asked.

  “Well, his royal bloody highness gets involved, of course!” Warhaft growled, taking a good swallow of his ale. “And who do you think he sided with? The cheating slut’s husband? Her rightful master? Or his slimy, two-faced, wife-stealing brother?”

  “I’m guessing the slimy, two-faced, wife-stealing brother.”

  “The bastard!” Ollie exclaimed in disgust.

  Brak frowned at the lad, wishing he’d either leave, have a bath, or move downwind. The young bandit had taken his advice about horses and the plague quite literally. In his desperation to avoid the disease, he’d taken to smearing horse dung on his bare arms when they first arrived in the city.

  Brak had convinced him eventually that it was the general smell of horses and not necessarily their excrement that deterred the fleas, so now he wore an old horse blanket he’d traded for his warm fur coat, preferring to be cold rather than infected. But he still wore the unmistakable aroma of a stable about him, which was rather unpleasant, particularly if one was trying to eat.

  Warhaft didn’t seem to notice the smell, though, so Brak said nothing and turned his attention back to the unhappy nobleman.

  “But surely even a prince couldn’t just take your wife from you like that?” Brak asked.

  “Oh, no, he’s too sly to openly flout the law. He dug up some thousand-year-old statute that allows him to place my wife in the custody of the bloody Sorcerers’ Collective until the High Prince makes a ruling, can you believe it?” The man emptied his tankard in a swallow and slammed it down on the table. “And of course, the bastard who stole her from my house just happens to be another Wolfblade cousin-bymarriage apparently, who conveniently just happens to belong to the Sorcerers’ Collective. So now I’m stuck in the war camp and my whore of a wife is strutting about the Cabradell palace like she owns it, probably spreading her favours around between both the Wolfblade brothers and all their damned cousins, for all I know.”

  “That’s appalling!” Ollie agreed. “More ale?”

  Warhaft thrust his tankard forward. Ollie filled it from the jug on the table and then waved to the barkeep to bring more. Brak wondered what sort of nightmare offspring Lernen Wolfblade was planning to unleash on the world. Having heard Wrayan Lightfinger go on endlessly about what a fine job Marla was doing raising her sons a few years ago, he reasoned either Warhaft was lying or Wrayan was blind.

  “A man shouldn’t have to go to war with something like that hanging over him,” Brak sympathised.

  “War? What bloody war?” he complained. “It’s not going to be much of a war with Lernen Wolfblade in command. That’s assuming these rumours about the Fardohnyans massing for an invasion aren’t just an excuse young Wolfblade thought up to gather up his army and go whoring around the countryside. Did you hear what he did in Krakandar?”

  “Not.”

  “Ripped his uncle’s throat out with his bare hands and left him for dead, they say. It’s a miracle the man is still alive.”

  “Surely not!” Ollie gasped.

  Warhaft nodded eagerly, warming to his attentive audience. “They had an argument over another girl, I hear. Young Wolfblade has a temper you wouldn’t credit. The man’s an animal when he’s enraged. Which is why I didn’t call him out over Kendra,” he added hastily.

  “Perfectly understandable!” Ollie agreed.

  I’m going to have to talk to this boy about accepting everything he hears without question, Brak decided. He didn’t doubt for a moment there was a kernel of truth in Stefan Warhaft’s tale, but he could read between the lines well enough to appreciate that it wasn’t quite so black and white as the man would have them believe.

  “You said Lernen Wolfblade was in command?” Brak reminded him, hoping to get the conversation back where he wanted it. “Is the High Prince here in Cabradell, too?”

  “He’s on his way,” Warhaft confirmed. “We got the news a few days ago that he’d decided to lead the troops himself. And he’s bringing the rest of our forces from the southern provinces with him, according to Damin Wolfblade.”

  Brak forced himself not to smile
. Zegarnald wasn’t going to get much of a war with that idiot Lernen Wolfblade in charge of the Hythrun defences.

  Warhaft chuckled nastily and added, “The only good thing about that useless prick Lernen Wolfblade being on his way was his nephew’s reaction to the news. Apparently, he was ropable.” The man smiled unpleasantly. “I’d have paid good money to see that.”

  “Do you think he’ll make trouble?” Ollie asked.

  “He certainly objected loudly enough, I’m told!” Warhaft laughed. “Not that it’ll do him any good. He’s too young to lead us anyway. Not even twenty-five until the end of summer. To be honest, I’ll follow Lernen Wolfblade to the very gates of the deepest of the seven hells if it means I get to watch that arrogant, jumped-up nephew of his grinding his teeth in frustration over it.”

  Why bother with an invasion, Zegamald? Brak wondered silently. At this rate they’ll tear themselves to pieces. You don’t need Hablet for the job.

  “Is he bringing many troops?” Brak enquired.

  Warhaft shrugged disinterestedly. “A couple of thousand from Pentamor and Greenharbour, I hear. And Cyrus Eaglespike is right behind him with another three thousand from Dregian. Lady Lionsclaw’s brother is supposed to be sending us reinforcements from Izcomdar, too, and Wolfblade claims he had another twenty-five centuries of Raiders on their way from Krakandar, but we’ve seen no sign of them yet.”

  Brak did a quick mental calculation. With the five thousand troops already here in Cabradell, maybe half that many again from Sunrise added to the mix, only another five thousand on the way and the vague possibility of reinforcements from Izcomdar and Krakandar, it meant the Hythrun had been able to muster less than fifteen thousand men. For the first time, Brak began to fully appreciate the effect the plague must have had on Hythria. Each province should have been able to muster twenty thousand men on its own.

  Even more concerning was the thought Hablet had already gathered twice that number in Qorinipor, nearly two months ago. There was no telling what the final number was by now, or what he’d mustered on the coast at Tambay’s Seat in the interim.

  “Well,” Brak said, topping up Warhaft’s tankard, “this whole ridiculous rumour about the Fardohnyans invading Hythria is probably a load of horseshit, anyway. By the sound of it, I reckon you were right the first time, my lord. It’s just young Wolfblade looking for an excuse to go whoring around the countryside, throwing his weight around.”

  “Aye,” the disgruntled nobleman agreed. “Has a taste for the high life, does Lernen’s heir, just like his uncle. Still it’s all right if you know how to pander to him. Lady Lionsclaw just gave him a gift to keep him occupied, did you hear? Three … three, mind you … Denikan court’esa. A matched trio they are—a man and two women. They’re priceless. I’ll give Tejay Lionsclaw one thing—she knows how to stay in his good graces. Still, I suppose that’s because he was fostered with her father as a boy. She probably learned how to manage him then.” Warhaft took another long swallow and then stared at the bottom of his tankard with a frown when he realised it was empty. “Anyway, I doubt we’ll have to worry about him too much when we finally engage the enemy. I hear he’s planning to take his court’esa with him when we move out. No doubt he’ll be too busy with them and that whoring wife of mine to actually contribute anything useful to the battle.”

  Brak refilled his tankard, shaking his head sympathetically. “Sounds truly dreadful.”

  “You’ve no idea what it’s like having a Wolfblade in command.”

  “It must be terrible,” Ollie agreed. “But what sort of things does he do?”

  Brak sighed. Don’t be subtle about it, Ollie, he lamented silently. Come right out and tell the man we’re pumping him for information.

  Fortunately, Warhaft didn’t seem to notice. “I’ll give you a good example,” he offered drunkenly. “Called us all to a meeting the other day, he did, and then kept us all waiting for an hour or more. And do you know why?”

  “Why?” Ollie asked breathlessly.

  “I’ll tell you why! The stupid prick was fooling around with his new toys! Arrogant little bastard even sent a message back telling us to wait for him. Said he was ‘playing’ with his court’esa and we’d just have to wait until he was done.”

  Ollie was disgusted. “That’s just … wrong.”

  Brak looked at the lad askance, wondering if perhaps it wasn’t high time he took him aside and explained a few home truths about Hablet to the young man. The Wolfblades might be a degenerate lot, but there was probably much less blood on their hands than on the hands of Ollie’s precious Fardohnyan king.

  “It’s a truly sad state of affairs,” Brak agreed, emptying the jug into Warhaft’s tankard. “It’s a good thing we’re headed in the opposite direction.”

  “I wouldn’t worry too much, my friend,” Warhaft predicted grimly. “With a Wolfblade in command of Hythria’s defence, we’ll all be kissing the hem of Hablet’s cloak before the end of summer. You mark my words.”

  “Did you hear what Warhaft said?” Ollie gushed as they headed back to their lodgings later that evening. The young Fardohnyan was fairly bouncing up and down with the news the Hythrun baron had shared with them.

  “I heard.”

  “Should we send a message home? Let them know what we’ve learned?”

  “That’s what we came here for.”

  “When do we leave?”

  “You can leave in the morning.”

  Ollie stopped and stared at Brak with concern. “What about you?”

  “I think I’ll hang around until Lernen gets here and then follow you later. General Regis would probably appreciate final numbers once they’re all mustered.”

  The lad thought about Brak’s suggestion and then nodded. “That’s probably a good idea. What shall I tell him?”

  “‘That the Hythrun know he’s coming. That they’ve been able to muster less than fifteen thousand men. And that the High Prince of Hythria is in command of their army, assisted by his nephew, who doesn’t appear to be much more sensible than his uncle.”

  Ollie grinned. “It’s going to be a pushover, this war, isn’t it?”

  “War is never a pushover, Ollie,” Brak told him as he turned into the street where their lodgings were located. “And I hope you never have to find that out the hard way.”

  CHAPTER 35

  Marla returned from the palace quite late and sent for Wrayan almost as soon as she got home. Kalan had gone to visit Rodja and Selena, so except for the slaves, they were effectively alone in the house. Once she realised there was little chance of Kalan walking in on them by accident again (however innocently they were behaving) the princess seemed to relax a little. She offered Wrayan a seat on the cushions but remained standing, pacing the room as if she was too restless to stand still.

  “I had a visitor today at the palace.”

  Wrayan poured wine for himself and Marla and handed her a cup. She accepted it absently, as she continued to pace the tiles. “Anyone I know?”

  “I’m not certain.”

  He waited expectantly.

  “Galon Miar,” the princess said, after a long moment.

  Wrayan frowned as he realised where he’d heard of him. “I know that name.”

  “I thought you might.”

  Unlike the Thieves’ Guild, which tended to have its own independent chapter in every city of note in the same way the other trade guilds did, the Assassins’ Guild had only one chapter based here in the capital with tentacles that reached into every strata of Hythrun society. Despite his relative isolation in Krakandar these past twenty years, even Wrayan knew of Galon Miar.

  “I hope you know what you’re doing, your highness. Not even you should play games with the Assassins’ Guild.”

  She shrugged and sipped her cup of wine. “Galon Miar strikes me as nothing more than an over-confident, ambitious social climber trying to sleep his way to power.”

  “That man is a trained killer, your highness, and far smar
ter than you give him credit for. He was being spoken of as the next Raven long before he hopped into Alija Eaglespike’s bed. I’d be very, very careful, if I were you. Particularly if he’s wrapped up in Alija’s schemes.”

  “Do you think a man like that might actually feel something for Alija?”

  Wrayan shook his head. “I know his type. He likes powerful women and he likes beautiful women, but the Galon Miars of this world would never risk falling in love with either one of them. It compromises his professional ethics to do anything so human. But that doesn’t stop him from lusting after women like her. Or you for that matter.”

  Marla suddenly coughed, choking on her wine, and then stared at him so hard, Wrayan wondered if he’d inadvertently stumbled onto something the princess hadn’t been planning to share with him.

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” Marla sounded as if she was trying to convince herself as much as Wrayan. “I’ve barely spared the man a civil word the whole time I’ve known him.”

  “Which probably makes you all the more attractive to him.” Wrayan sipped his wine thoughtfully. “Sort of leaves you wondering why he set his cap at Alija, rather than you, come to think of it.”

  Marla was silent for an awkwardly long time then she suddenly turned and stared at Wrayan. “What would you say if I told you he has?”

  “Set his cap at you?” he asked, and then added without hesitation, “I’d suggest that you run like hell.”

  “You never complained when I told you I was thinking of marrying a common spice merchant.”

  “Ruxton Tirstone didn’t kill people for a living.”

  Marla smiled. “You’ve obviously never spoken to any of his competitors.”