by GJ Kelly
Hellin drew in a breath, and wiped her eyes on a small white handkerchief. "The emissary of Ramoth alone keeps my father from death. All healers who have been summoned are at a loss. No healing art can save Juria, save that of the Emissary in Castle Town. If you kill him, you kill my father too!"
Gawain studied the woman in front of him. That she was telling the truth was evident. Whether there was indeed truth within that truth remained to be seen.
"And the whitebeards, what say they?" he asked, unable to disguise his loathing of all wizards.
"They too are powerless, and know not the nature of my father's illness."
"Powerless is indeed a word I would use in the same breath as 'wizard'. Yet they can make nothing of the cure this filthy Emissary peddles?"
"The cure is kept with him. A green liquid, in a phial, which he administers once each week. Without it, my father succumbs to terrible convulsions, and has to be carried to his bed like a child. He is wasting away before our very eyes, and the only relief to be had is from this Emissary's medicine."
Gawain gazed off into the distance. Justice and vengeance, he knew, could be every bit as cruel as duty, and honour.
"You will honour my command? Now that you know the reason for it?" she asked, as regally as possible, but the plea was clear in her eyes.
Gawain remembered the day of his Banishment, when his mother had said "Your brother shall be king," and Kevyn had replied "Not for some considerable time, I hope!” None could imagine a day so dread as the death of their father.
"Yes," he lied. "For Juria, I shall."
The relief that flooded through the young woman was so obvious it was like a signal to the lancers behind her, and there was a sighing of leather and a clinking of tackle as riders relaxed in their saddles. For the briefest moment, Gawain actually thought she might reach out her arms and hug him…
Instead she smiled weakly, and said "Thank you, Longsword. Speed your journeys."
Gawain bowed, his face expressionless, and watched as she returned to the line with her escort.
Jerryn dismounted behind him, and Gawain turned.
"You have done a noble thing this day, Serre. I hope none of us live to regret such nobility."
"When did Juria fall ill?" Gawain asked quietly, intensely.
Jerryn frowned. "Some time past. Not long after we received news from Callodon that the tower in the castletown there had been razed, and a longsword warrior was scything Ramoths like a reaper in the fields. Why ask you?"
"Why have you not?"
Jerryn frowned. But movement behind Gawain caught his eye, and he suddenly held out his hand. "The Crown is preparing to leave. I must rejoin the column. Honour to you, Longsword. Would that I did not have duty, and could join you on your quest. These Ramoths took from me a sister, and I would see them all burn."
"Where is your sister, friend Jerryn, at the tower in Castle Town?"
The officer's eyes clouded with grief. "No. She is gone. She and her husband raised beef, and took two fine bulls and six milk cows to Raheen, hoping to trade for a breeding pair of Raheen horses. They did not return."
"Then you have my sorrow for your loss, and my arm, friend Jerryn."
Jerryn nodded, and mounted, and within moments was hurrying back to the column. Gawain watched them go, noting that Hellin of Juria looked back at him twice as they cantered away.
"Hai, Gwyn." He called softly, and waited for his horse to pad quietly up beside him. "Eat your fill of this lush grass, you ugly nag. It'll be a slow ride to the Castle Town, I need time to think."
Two days south of the castletown the land was broken by the vineyards that produced the famed Jurian brandy so warming in winter. Gawain had made his decision, and drawn up his plans. He would have to leave Gwyn outside the walled town, and enter by stealth in darkness. If he were seen by any guardsmen, it would not go well for any on both sides.
What he did not expect to see coming towards him on the rutted track that ran between the vineyards was the familiar figure of a robed and near shaven-headed wizard, riding a tired horse far too quickly for the heat of the day. Gawain's hand reached up, and brushed the hilt of the longsword, as if to ensure that it was still there. It was, as ever.
"Longsword!" Allazar announced, reining in.
"Whitebeard. Do you detest horses so much you would kill them thus?"
Allazar looked puzzled for a moment, and then took in the sweat that teemed from his steed. He quickly dismounted, and Gawain did likewise.
"There is a stream through the vines, take it there." Gawain commanded, all his Raheen senses recoiling in disgust at the poor treatment the animal had received.
"I had to find you." Allazar said, as if defending his own poor judgement, "And one horse is small price to pay for finding you so quickly."
"I have no time for whitebeard mumblings and warnings. And if this warning concerns Juria's Crown, and what might ensue when I slay the Ramoth emissary in Castle Town, you have half killed this once-fine beast for nothing."
Allazar frowned. "I know nothing of Juria. All was well when last I visited the court."
"So," Gawain said, pushing Allazar aside to unsaddle the poor animal at the edge of the stream, "It was you the princess Hellin spoke of when she told of a wizard who spoke persuasively some time past."
"I have spoken thus, and was travelling on to Mornland, and Threlland, and would have journeyed to Arrun also."
"Kind of you to prepare the way for my coming." Gawain sneered, "Since now every kingdom guard is on the alert for one of my description."
"You need not fear guardsmen, Longsword. It is Morloch you must fear from this day forth."
"Morloch!" Gawain laughed, mirthlessly. "I go to him willingly. All he has to do is wait a while and he can greet me personally. And I him."
"He does not wait. Nor does he intend to greet you, nor allow you to set foot on the farak gorin or the Dragon's Teeth beyond."
Allazar spoke with a curious command and such earnest severity that Gawain paused from rubbing down the near-exhausted animal, and looked up.
"He told you this, I suppose."
"In a manner of speaking. Morloch is weak, his powers at a low ebb after smiting Raheen with his foul Breath. But weak though he may be, he still has power. Your relentless destruction of the Ramoth emissaries, and your relentless journey north, threaten Morloch. The more Ramoths you destroy, the more hope you bring to ordinary people. They become stronger, when they see how weak the Ramoth are against a single warrior."
"Good. Then I may speed my journey to the Teeth and leave these vile towers to ordinary men-at-arms."
"No. Stronger the people may be. Warriors they are not. I am but one man too, and few will pay me any heed when so many of my brethren gainsay me at court."
"Whitebeard politics do not concern me, Allazar. I have no sympathy for you, or any of your kind."
"I require no sympathy. I suspect you do not, too. But the paths we both walk have a similar purpose. Friends we may never be, Longsword, but we both hope to see the end of this Ramoth curse, and that makes us allies, however reluctant."
"I require allies as much as I require your sympathy, wizard. If that's all you've come to tell me, then by rights I should cut you down for this poor horse's needless suffering."
"Morloch is sending Black Riders against you."
"Let them come, and save your sympathy and warnings for the mercenaries foolish enough to take coin in order to face my blade. They will not live to spend it."
"They are not mercenaries, Longsword. These creatures are born of Morloch. Black Riders, once men, now filled with dark wizardry. They are men no more, but relentless creatures of death. And they have but one purpose. Your destruction. He is loosing them like dogs upon you, and already they come."
"If they were once men, then they can die like men. Dark wizardry or not, nothing is immortal."
"True. But like you, Longsword, they do not fear death. Nor do they live. They have no need
of life, and exist for one purpose, and one purpose only. And they will not stop coming."
"Then by Dwarfspit and Elve's Blood, let them come. With luck they'll fight better than the living do. I grow tired of testing my blade against inferior skill."
"Bluster. You know your skill, and have no need to test it."
Gawain let Allazar's horse go, cooling in the breeze and drinking its fill. "And what of your skill, Allazar? What of the whitebeards? You say we share a purpose to rid the land of the Ramoths, yet what do you and your lacklustre do-nothing brethren actually do, to this end?"
"We are forbidden to use our powers against the races of man. We may not kill by such means."
"Then curse you all. If the Ramoths offend you as much as you claim, then pick up a sword and start hacking, and by your example lead other men to do likewise!"
Allazar stepped back a pace away from the anger that flared so suddenly in the young man, as Gawain continued to rage:
"You sicken me, all of you. You come from who knows where, mumbling in your beards, reading your great books of prophecy, gazing at the stars and painting strange symbols on the ground around you. You slither like snakes into all the kingdoms, and with soft words and obscure rites you connive your way to Kings' Councils…yet what do you do for men? Nothing.
"What did you do for Raheen? Nothing. So many of you, so many mumbling whitebeards. And when one of your own, from his nest of vipers beyond the Teeth, raises his hand against the races of man, what do you do? Nothing.
"You may be forbidden to kill men, whitebeard, but where was all your magic when wizardry was called down upon Raheen? Morloch kills by the thousands, yet you sit idly by, and mumble, and advise Kings to do nothing."
Gawain turned on his heel, and gazed away across the vineyards.
"You do not know, you cannot know, what we do." Allazar said softly.
"I have eyes. I see you do nothing.” He turned, and glowered at the wizard. "From where I stand, from what my eyes have seen, for all the whitebeard robes and chanting and ritual, it is only the lack of bells and snakes that separates you from the Ramoths. At least they are honest in their intent."
Allazar looked stunned. "You think this? In truth?"
Gawain stared back, no need of a reply.
"Are we truly regarded thus?" Allazar gasped aloud, though the question was not intended for Gawain. His answer had already been given.
"Prove me wrong, whitebeard. Go to Juria's Castle Town. Wait for me there. You know my destination as well as I."
With that, Gawain mounted Gwyn, and with a final disparaging look at the wizard, whose anguish was clear to see, they ambled back to the track, and began their slow progress north.
A short distance from the town's high walls, Gawain took a room at an inn, and waited for nightfall. Gwyn was safely stabled, though she clearly did not appreciate being abandoned by her mount in such rude surroundings.
When darkness fell, Gawain took his darkcloths from his pack, and dressed quickly and deliberately, and standing in front of a polished mirror in the lamplight, he smiled to himself. Only his eyes were visible, peeping through a slit in the cloth wound around his head. The rest was blackness. He blew out the lamp, and looked to the mirror again. Nothing, even after waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dark.
With weapons in place, he slipped from the inn, and made his way to the walls, unseen. Like most castle towns, the walls, and indeed the castle and Keep within, were built long ago, in less peaceful times. The mortar that bound the blocks of stone together was crumbling; countless years of wind and rain, ice and snow, and the heat of summer, had taken their toll. Climbing the wall was easy.
At the top, Gawain paused a while, listening for the booted footfalls of a solitary guardsman to fade, before he heaved himself up and over the parapet. Torches flickered at intervals along the wall, and he flitted silently from the shadows of one to the other. In little time, a very little time, he was well within the town, and moving quickly through the shadows between buildings.
If all castle towns were this easy to penetrate, it was a wonder that Morloch had not sent assassins to kill all the Crowns, and replace them with Ramoth emissaries…it could be done in a single night, Gawain had no doubt.
The Ramoth Tower loomed high, higher even than the Keep a short distance away. Gawain grimaced. How Juria had permitted its construction so close to hearth and home, the Court, the centre of the kingdom, Gawain did not know.
What concerned him most was the sight that met his eyes when he climbed a nearby roof to remind himself of the compound's layout. He'd visited Juria before. Before Raheen. But with the emissaries knowing of his approach, he had to check to be sure that his plans would work.
He didn't expect to see Jurian Household Guard patrolling the perimeter, practically side by side with the Ramoth mercenaries.
A noise from below caught his attention, and he looked down. Allazar, in dark robes but with his head bare, stood in the shadows beneath him. The pale head, to Gawain at least, seemed to gleam like a beacon in the night, and he cursed the wizard's incompetence. Then his eyes widened, as Allazar's hands began to make curious movements, and the wizard seemed to be enveloped in darkness, as if fading from view.
Gawain climbed down from the wall, slipped around the building, and slid along the wall to the spot he knew Allazar occupied. Knowing he was there, he could see him. He doubted any casual glance would reveal the man, even with his head bared.
"You came.” Gawain whispered.
Allazar started, and gasped. "Longsword? You see me?"
"I do.” But then Gawain was forced to admit "But only because I know you to be here."
"What now?"
"Now I must gain entry to the tower, and you also."
"I?” Allazar sounded terrified. "If Ramoth's Eye sees me…"
"Be quiet, whitebeard. I must think. I cannot slay the Jurian Guard."
"I cannot harm them." Allazar answered the unspoken question.
Gawain made a slight noise, indicating his disgust. "Useless. Stay here until I signal you to come. You will enter the tower with me."
Gawain slipped away, leaving the shaken Allazar in the shadows. It took an hour to circle around the tower, when he suddenly caught sight of an opportunity that might spare the Jurian guardsmen. An erect figure strode purposefully from the Keep towards the tower, and spoke with one of the guardsmen. It was an officer, making his rounds, and the officer wore the familiar colours of a Captain in the Royal Jurian Guard.
It was Jerryn, and Gawain pondered a moment before moving away through the shadows…
Jerryn gasped and his hand reached for his knife when Gawain clamped his hand around the officer's mouth and dragged him into the darkness between a row of dwellings.
"Peace, Jerryn, it is I, Longsword. My word to you, peace, if you do not call out."
Jerryn nodded once, and let go of the knife's hilt. Gawain slowly released his grip.
"You told the Crown this tower would be spared!" Jerryn hissed.
"It may yet be. With your help, friend Jerryn. The Crown may be saved, and the Ramoth destroyed also."
"How so?" Jerryn gasped, "And what must I do? I have a duty!"
Gawain briefly outlined his plan, and after a few moments, Jerryn reached out his hand. "I shall help, Longsword, for the Crown, and for my sister. My word on it. It shall be as you say."
Gawain accepted the hand, and then watched as Jerryn straightened his tunic, and strode out into the street again, towards the tower and its long huts. He watched as the officer approached the Jurian guardsmen, gave his orders, and waited.
A short time later, the Jurian guards that had been patrolling the tower's perimeter were assembled, and marching under their sergeant's command back towards the Keep, their onerous duty relieved for the night. Most were smiling happily as their booted feet crunched in step across the cobbles towards their barracks.
Jerryn walked slowly back towards the Keep, and never cast so much
as a glance towards the shadows where he thought Gawain yet lurked.
But Gawain had already circled to the rear of the tower and cut the throat of the first Ramoth sentry.
From his vantage point in the shadows, Allazar watched with rising horror as time after time, a black shadow loomed up behind a sentry and felled him, silently. Never had such cold murder been seen in the land outside of foulest brigandry.
In no time at all, it seemed, the shade was beckoning, and Allazar knew his time had come. With a final glance around the silent and empty compound, and a last look to the parapet of the Keep for watchful guards, Allazar hurried briskly across the open space to the base of the tower.
"Stay silent, and stay behind me. Or your life."
Allazar nodded hurriedly, and Gawain eased open the low door in the base of the tower for the second time, stooping and stepping over the body of the mercenary on the threshold. Allazar followed close at heel, and pushed the door closed.
Gawain indicated that the wizard should hang back, and then began his ascent up the spiral staircase. This was the tallest tower yet, and it took some time to make his way to the top, testing each step to ensure that no creaking boards would announce his presence. None did.
It was the darkest hour when he reached the top, that darkest of hours, when death stalks the unwary in their beds. Gawain stalked silently in through the arched doorway, despatched the single acolyte sitting asleep beside the entrance, and then crept cautiously to the shrouded bed.
He stood in the darkness, short sword in hand, listening intently. Breathing. One person breathing. He quietly parted the curtains, eyed the sleeping man on the bed with loathing, and then brought the flat of his blade hard down across the emissary's forehead and nose.
Then he slipped the eye-amulet from around the unconscious man's neck, and ground it under his heel.
"You can come in now, whitebeard." Gawain said quietly.
Allazar crept through the doorway, eyed the dead acolyte without feeling, and then strode across the room to stare down at the emissary.
"Have you killed him?"
"Not yet. But he's not going to wake up for some time. Take down these curtains, we'll use them to bind him. I want him hanging from that cross-beam when he opens his eyes."