Tales of the Far Wanderers

by David Welch

  Kamith smiled at that.

  “Can you take me there?” she asked.

  “No!” Aela barked, shaking her head furiously. “No. Not with the armies there. They’ve already taken two girls from the village, when they were out gathering. If they get me—”

  “I understand,” Kamith said. “Can you tell me where this passage is?”

  “Better,” she said, and she pulled out a piece of vellum from a bundle nearby. She pulled a sliver of charcoal from her fire and began drawing. Minutes later, she’d mapped out the landscape around the keep, marking her secret.

  “Here,” she said, pointing. “Go here and find a large boulder, next to an elm tree. Above the boulder, prod the ground; you will find the entrance.”

  Kamith took the map, rolling it carefully so she didn’t smudge the charcoal. She dug into the pouch at her waist and dropped two silver coins into the woman’s hand. Aela’s eyes lit up at the sight.

  “Thank you!” the woman cried.

  “No,” Kamith said. “It is I who must thank you.”

  ***

  Nightfall came, and the king remained alive, but barely. Gunnar had taken up position in one of the bartizans on the rooftop. The small towers were only ten feet high and jutted out over the corner of the keep, but they were as close as you could come to privacy. A wooden door closed behind him but didn’t latch. Arrowslits, larger ones than usual, surrounded him. A small aperture, about as wide as his hand, lay beneath him, should he need to shoot downwards at an approaching enemy.

  His head rested back against the stone of the small chamber. Through one of the arrowslits, he could see a patch of the night sky, clear and brightened by a full, silvery moon. The crackle of hundreds of fires rose from the enemy camp, a constant reminder of their presence.

  It could take weeks, maybe months, to starve the keep out, but with only forty-two men left to defend the place, it might be worth it to storm the place and suffer the casualties. Ythell was a usurper. He’d most likely have other enemies waiting to challenge him back across the river in Starth. Every day he spent here was a day they could rally their forces and make a move, and they always made moves. Gunnar had watched the succession of the last King of Harmon and the bloodshed the new king had needed to employ to bring some of his lords to heel. Gunnar had been in the armies that had spread that blood across the land, all because his ‘lord’ had been the new king’s brother.

  He supposed he could take some comfort in the thought of a storming. At least they wouldn’t starve to death. A quick death in battle beat painful lingering.

  Suddenly, the door to the bartizan opened. A small figure dashed in, leaping over his folded legs to loom over him. By the light of the candle in her hands, Gunnar could see it was Turee. She put a finger to her lips and placed the candle in a nearby sconce.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked.

  She answered by opening her robe. The garment fluttered to the floor, revealing a long, lean, entirely naked body.

  “Shhh,” she said in the most aggressive Trade Tongue Gunnar had ever heard. “I’m doing you.”

  He groaned, images of himself being hacked to death by the king’s guards flashing through his mind. She simply stood before him, running her hands up and down her hips and thighs. She was undoubtedly a beautiful girl, with firm breasts, round hips, and a flat stomach, but she was still a teenager, and he loved another.

  “Put your robe back on,” he commanded gruffly.

  “I have seen sixteen winters. I’m marrying age. I’m not some girl,” she declared. “You will enjoy this.”

  “You do know there are soldiers on the roof? You don’t think they’ll hear me fucking the king’s daughter?”

  “I ordered them off,” she declared. “They won’t touch me, and I need a man.”

  “You’re too young,” he said with a wave.

  “My stable boy says otherwise,” she countered.

  “Well, congratulations,” Gunnar returned. “Must be all grown up.”

  “Listen, outlander. I am a princess and I order you to—”

  “Don’t,” he said sternly. “I am not your subject, and from the looks of things, you won’t be a princess for long. Go watch over your father.”

  She crouched low, straddling him, pressing her breasts hard against his chest. Gunnar felt himself stir and thanked the Gods Above he still wore his chain-mail.

  “Please,” she pleaded. “Just once. Once more before…”

  He could see tears forming at the corners of her eyes. The confident young woman vanished, replaced by a terrified girl.

  “Before what?”

  “Before my brother comes,” she said.

  “You’re afraid he’ll do to you what he did to those women?” Gunnar asked.

  “He’ll do worse,” she replied. “He wants me.”

  The word didn’t register at first, then Gunnar shook his head as if to drive the idea away.

  “What?”

  “He wants me. And my mother. He told me weeks ago, before he rebelled. He said my mother was a whore for sleeping with my father when he was still married to his mother, that I’m a worthless bastard, and that when he was King, he’d keep us to be his playthings.”

  Gunnar swallowed hard.

  “But-but he’s your brother…” he stammered.

  “Half-brother, and he doesn’t care. He said because my mother was a mistress, I wasn’t family. He said he was going to whelp bastards on me until I died in childbirth!”

  The tears flowed freely. Turee grabbed his chain-mail, her head falling to his chest as she wept. Gunnar wrapped one arm around her and struggled in the tight space to get to his feet. He lifted her along with him.

  “I, I don’t—” he began.

  “Please,” she whispered.

  “I have a woman,” he said.

  Her hand dropped low, feeling his maleness bulge against the chain-mail.

  “You’ll never see her again,” she said. “We’re trapped—”

  The door flew open. Kerensa stood in the doorway, arms folded across her chest.

  “Gods Above!” Gunnar swore.

  “Turee, go to your chamber,” the queen ordered.

  The girl opened her mouth to argue but then thought better of it. She grabbed her robe and strode naked across the roof.

  “Look, I didn’t touch her. She barged in here—”

  “I know,” Kerensa said firmly. “Trust me, I know. She has done this before.” The queen sighed and turned after her departing daughter. “And cover up!”

  Gunnar stepped out of the bartizan onto the flat roof. He and the queen stood alone in the moonlight.

  “She is… passionate,” Kerensa said.

  “That’s one way of describing it,” Gunnar noted.

  “I know,” Kerensa conceded. “I have spoken to her hundreds of times. Grounded her, taken away her things, even threatened to thrash her, but she… she likes men. Her father spoiled her when she was little, treated her like a royal child, and then she became a princess and it just got worse.”

  The queen stalked up to the hoardings and leaned over the edge, looking out over the distant ribbon of the Mother River. Gunnar moved beside her. The legends of his people said that the world was divided in three; that the Spine of the World, amidst which sat his childhood home, was one dividing line and that the Mother River was the other. It ran from the top of the world to the bottom, emptying, he had heard, in a warm southern sea where lizards grew to the size of dogs. The great river glistened in the silver shine of the moon, oblivious to the war raging on its banks.

  “Turee told me something,” Gunnar admitted. “She said Ythell… wanted you, and her.”

  “He does,” the queen replied gravely. She turned to face him, her beauty wondrous in the silvery glow of the bright night. “I wasn’t always a queen,” she said. “I used to be a chambermaid in the palace.”

  Gunnar knew instantly where this was going.

  “One day, when I wasn
’t much older than Turee, the king took me to his bed. Then he did it again, and again, until it was almost every day. He started talking to me, and I to him, in private, where he didn’t have to worry about politics or wars or the court. He gave me Turee,” she said. Her face took on a wistful look, then soured. “And two others who did not make it out of childhood.”

  “I’m sorry,” Gunnar said automatically.

  “Thank you. After his wife, Ythell’s mother, died, he didn’t marry again. His councilors told him to. Starth is not the most powerful of the kingdoms near the Freshwater Seas. The Bailor to the north have more troops, and the Mancera to the east are richer. They said it would be good to marry into their houses and form alliances, but he refused. He moved me into his private quarters. Then, a year ago, he married me.”

  Gunnar’s eyes widened.

  “I know,” she said, reading his expression. “Quite the controversy, a king marrying his ‘whore’. But he was already growing weak, and he said he had no more time for the games men play. It caused unrest amongst the lords. Were he the man he was when I first met him, he would’ve crushed it and ruled as he saw fit, but he was too tired. Too sick. His armies began rebelling, factions started clamoring for the throne, none more powerful than Ythell, his rightful heir.”

  She spat out the last few words, turning to glare at the distant camp of her stepson.

  “He hates me for loving his father while he was still married to his mother. He hates me for being common. And he hates Turee because her father truly loves her, while, to Ythell, she’s just a bastard he had with some tramp.”

  “And he means to keep you as concubines to punish you?” Gunnar asked.

  “Punish? No, hurt. Ythell’s never been a good person. Dark things eat at his soul. He likes hurting women. When he was still a teenager and living in the palace, I would walk by his room while doing my duties and hear screams from the girls he brought to his bed. If he gets his hands on us…”

  She choked back a sob and turned away from Ythell’s camp, back to the long river.

  “But Turee is his sister!” Gunnar said. “How—”

  “He was fifteen when Turee was born,” Kerensa explained. “He never knew her as anything other than some chambermaid’s bastard. He doesn’t see her as a sister, even if he knows her to be one. He sees her as a woman, and as my daughter. He sees her as a way to hurt me.”

  “Gods Above,” he said again.

  “I hope your gods are listening,” she said. “Our spirits don’t seem to be.”

  A long silence passed between them, the wind tousling the queen’s hair. Gunnar couldn’t help but think that she was too young to be facing death, but he realized it didn’t really matter. He was a handful of winters younger and was now staring it in the face as readily as she.

  “I want you to promise me something,” she said. “I can’t trust the guards to do it. They’ve sworn oaths to protect us.” A dark feeling crept into Gunnar’s chest. “If they win, if they break into the keep, you have to keep them from taking Turee alive,” she said gravely, staring hard into his eyes. “By whatever means necessary.”

  Gunnar’s fist tightened, the queen’s meaning all too clear.

  “I don’t kill the innocent,” Gunnar replied.

  “There are things worse than death,” said Kerensa.

  “Hell, why don’t I promise to kill you, too!” Gunnar barked, throwing up his hands in frustration.

  “You don’t have to worry about that,” Kerensa declared. Her hands reached into the wide sleeves of her dress and pulled out a six-inch dagger. Gunnar shook his head in disbelief and Kerensa slipped the dagger back into its hidden sheath.

  “She is too young to do it herself,” Kerensa declared. “She’s young and full of life. For all of her fear of her brother, she has no idea how bad he will make it.”

  “I said I’d fight with you,” Gunnar said. “And I’ll fight to protect your daughter. That I can swear.”

  Kerensa sighed and nodded her head in resignation.

  “I understand,” she said. “And I think my daughter, for once, showed good taste in choosing a man.” Gunnar rolled his eyes. “Whoever is out there who owns your heart is a lucky woman,” the queen continued.

  Gunnar froze. The queen smiled and laid her hand on his forearm.

  “I know men, outlander,” she said with a smile. “You don’t turn down somebody as beautiful as my daughter unless there is someone else. Someone you would never hurt. Good night, Gunnar of the Tarn.”

  She slipped from the roof. Gunnar found himself, once again, mercifully alone.

  ***

  Dawn wasn’t long away, but Kamith didn’t want to wait, and she made her way through the woods in the early morning dim. Her armor weighed her down as she climbed the steep slope, and she moved slowly to keep the rings from making too much noise. Ideally, she would have left it behind, but she had no idea what she’d find in the keep. Most of the black-coated soldiers were still encamped outside the ruined gate, but some had been forming up near the entrance, preparing. If they attacked and succeeded, she might not get another chance.

  Thankful as she was for Aela’s help, she cursed the woman for not mentioning that the large elm and the boulder were atop a small cliff. It wasn’t huge, maybe fifteen feet tall, but it meant going around and scaling a steep slope that was nearly a cliff itself. Her hands reached for roots and tree trunks as she went, straining as they pulled her body up the hill. Her feet slipped time and again on leaf litter, which coated the forest floor under her feet. Every time they slipped, and debris tumbled down the slope, she stopped to make sure nobody had heard her.

  At the summit of the cliff, she paused, resting against a small oak for a minute, catching her breath. Then, she made her way along the cliff, making sure to keep at least three trees between her and the edge. It wasn’t just for safety. The cliff faced east, into Starth. If the attacking army had any supporters across the river, and if they had a spyglass, they might see her. How they’d contact the soldiers above, she didn’t know, but there was no use taking chances.

  Fifty feet of trekking brought her to a tall elm tree next to a large boulder. She pulled her sword and started probing the ground. The blade would sink into the earth an inch or two and then stop. Dozens of prods brought nothing, and sweat beaded from her forehead despite the cool spring air.

  She silently cursed the Gods Above as she worked, but kept at it. Finally, the sword sank and kept sinking. It tore through something, descended several inches, then stuck into something wooden. Kamith pulled back her curved blade, ripping away a leaf-covered piece of leather weighted down by small rocks. A small, circular, wooden hatch, three feet across, lay before her, sunken a few inches beneath the soil. The wood was rotten and old. It squeaked as she pulled, the hinges rusty from years of neglect.

  She froze, listening, making sure nobody had heard. The lines of the siege were less than three hundred feet away. The cliff lay not far from where she’d first crept the night before, looking for a gap. No footfalls came her way, no shouts filled the air. Safe, she slid through the narrow hatch and into the passage. Into darkness.

  ***

  They stood in the great hall, Gunnar and Yestin, staring out of an arrowslit at the advancing foe. They had built ladders and now marched slowly into the bailey, their shields above their heads to protect from arrows.

  Gunnar sighed. It certainly seemed to be shaping up to be the shortest siege he’d ever seen.

  “Yestin, before all the chaos starts, I wanted to ask you something,” Gunnar said.

  “Yes?” the hawk-faced commander replied.

  “If the Mother River is Starth’s eastern border, why did you build a keep on its western shore?”

  Yestin laughed, the first time Gunnar had seen the man do so.

  “The king’s great-uncle, Wella IV, decided he wanted to expand west of the river. He crossed and marched on the Wandering Star barbarians. They sat on their horses and fired arrows, and
then ran away when he drew near. Our horses were too heavily armored to catch them, and their arrows could not penetrate our armor, so Wella burned one of their villages and returned, the barbarians mocking him the whole way. He grew so angry that, the next year, he crossed again, built this fortress, and said Starth would remain west of the river until the earth itself crumbled to dust.”

  Gunnar nodded. Yestin laughed again.

  “And he was right. The barbarians do not know siegecraft. The keep has stood, and its garrisons have done more trading with the barbarians than fighting,” Yestin said. “It takes real men of Starth to break this place.”

  “I’ve noticed,” Gunnar griped.

  Rocks poured down from the hoardings above, smashing shields and skulls as the attackers approached the wall. Arrows rained down, wounding and killing, but not stopping them. The wide ladder went up against the door. Men scrambled up with a short log. Leather had been looped around it to form grips. At the top of the wider ladder, two men stood side by side and swung.

  The log slammed against the heavy oak door, but it held. The log slammed again, and a rock from above smashed into the helmet of one of the swingers, sending him plummeting twenty feet to the ground. Another darted up, the people behind them struggling and angling to get their shields up, over the man’s head.

  The small ram kept swinging, the weight and force cracking the door a little at a time. Soldiers filled the great hall, ready to rush in when the door failed. Outside, three more men fell from the ladder, struck by rocks and arrows, but others moved into their places. The ram continued. Archers scrambled onto the outer wall, firing towards the roof of the keep, desperately trying to drive back the defending bowmen.

  The hinges gave way, and the shattered door flew back across the small passage. The defenders watched it clatter down the spiral stairwell. Then they charged.

  The attackers had barely gotten into the passage when Yestin’s men struck, metal smashing against metal as armored men fought with only inches to spare. Gunnar couldn’t see quite what was happening; he could only see bodies piling up. The attackers could only send two up the ladder at a time, and those pairs fell quickly, but they kept coming.