Demontech: Onslaught

by David Sherman

  Haft pulled the chest out and flipped up its lid. It was filled with small belongings. There was a set of clothes, a bit newer and less often repaired than what the old man had been wearing. A hairbrush, a small box of antique jewelry—“Put it back,” Spinner said—a pocked and ragged-edge stone of unknown origin, a religious medallion, a calfskin-covered book, and a few other objects. The last two objects were of more interest than the rest. One was a miniature painting of a young man and woman lovingly looking at each other.

  Spinner indicated the miniature and said, “If that’s him and his bride, he’s come down a long way.” Portraits, especially those as exquisitely executed as the miniature, were costly.

  Haft nodded agreement. He was glad Spinner made him put back the jewelry. “How will he buy food for us?” he wondered.

  “We’ll pay him,” Spinner said, and tapped the purse at his belt.

  They stared at the other item for a long moment. It was a blue, gold, and red ribbon with a clasp in back, designed to be worn hanging around the neck. A medallion in the form of a five-pointed star with a goddess’s head embossed in its center dangled from a padded knot in the ribbon’s front. It was the Order of Honor—the highest Frangerian military decoration.

  “He was a Marine?” Haft asked.

  Spinner shook his head. “He would have been before Lord Gunny came. We were called ‘Frangerian Sea Soldiers’ then, not ‘Marines.’ ” He looked again at the medal. “If he was, he was a hero.”

  Reverently, they repacked the chest. Spinner regretted the lie he’d told the old man about them being a reconnaissance, but knew no way to back away from it.

  Spinner sat on the chest, and Haft settled a haunch onto the table. They held their weapons in their hands—just in case—and waited.

  In moments the door opened again and the old man scurried in with a steaming tray. A wide-eyed urchin of about ten or eleven inched in behind him carrying a brimming pitcher. Her bare feet were filthy and her hair was matted, but she was otherwise as clean as a girl fresh from the bath, and her dress was of fine material and not anywhere threadbare or patched.

  Haft moved out of the way so the old man could put the tray on the table. “My great-granddaughter,” the old man said as the girl put the pitcher next to the tray. Then he noticed the chest was pulled out and pain flickered across his face.

  “It’s all there,” Spinner reassured him. “We disturbed nothing.” He stood and bowed. “You honor us with your aid.”

  “My lord,” the old man said, returning the bow.

  “What were you called?”

  The old man looked at him for a long moment before replying in a soft voice, “They called me Tiger.”

  “Tiger, they call me Spinner and him Haft.”

  The old man snuffled and brushed the back of a hand across his eyes. Then he removed the cover from the tray.

  Haft and Spinner salivated at the aroma of the stew that was exposed in two bowls. The loaf of bread between the bowls smelled freshly baked. The old man pulled a pair of spoons from somewhere within his garments and handed them over. The girl retrieved two cups from somewhere and carefully filled them from the pitcher. In a short while the food was gone to the last drop of sauce and last crumb of bread, and the pitcher was down to the dregs. Haft leaned back and belched contentedly.

  “Thank you, Tiger. We needed that,” Spinner said politely.

  The old man’s great-granddaughter looked at them more wide-eyed than before.

  The old man bobbed his head several times. “I am glad to do whatever I can to help you rid my city of them. Now you can rest until nightfall.”

  “What are they doing out there now?” Haft asked.

  “There is a citywide manhunt,” the old man said, glee lighting his face. “Early this morning a large raiding party struck at several of the ships they occupy in the harbor and killed twenty of them, including a general or an admiral.”

  “Really?” Haft asked innocently.

  The old man bobbed his head vigorously. “That’s what people on the street are saying.” He looked at them conspiratorially and dropped his voice. “Personally, I think that’s an exaggeration. Had there been such a raid, surely we would have heard the sounds of the battle. Certainly there would have been spontaneous attacks on them as a result of the raid.”

  Spinner nodded gravely. “I agree that such a raid would have caused more interest when it happened. And if a general or an admiral was killed, the Jokapcul would be murdering people wholesale on the streets.”

  “So it was you who went aboard a ship and killed a couple of them?” The old man’s eyes twinkled.

  Haft opened his mouth to admit it, but Spinner spoke first.

  “I told you before, we are a reconnaissance. Reconnaissance teams avoid fighting if possible so no one knows they are there.”

  The old man nodded knowingly. “Yes, you said that. It is said they have hanged twenty of their prisoners in reprisal. They are not soldiers, they are beasts. Soldiers do not murder prisoners.”

  Shooing the girl ahead of him, he went to the door. “You rest now, I will return later to lead you out of here.” Then they were gone and Spinner and Haft were alone.

  “He took off before I could give him money for the food,” Spinner said, looking around the barren room again. “I’m sure he couldn’t afford to buy it.” He fished a gold coin out of his purse and put it on the table.

  Haft thought of the young girl, how her clothes contrasted with her feet and hair, and agreed. He added a gold piece to Spinner’s.

  “We’re going to be traveling at night at first,” Spinner said. “So we should get some sleep today. I’ll take first watch. I’ll wake you in a couple of hours.” He got off the chest long enough to open it and take out the book, then settled down to read away the time until Haft’s watch.

  Haft looked at the book and wondered what he was going to do to keep from getting bored during his watch—he read well enough, but it wasn’t something he enjoyed. Then he lay on the pallet of rags-over-pine-boughs and, in the manner of soldiers of all armies, was asleep in minutes.

  It was dark by the time the old man returned. He gave them a sack that contained cheese, bread, and a sausage. “You have not eaten in many hours and you have far to go tonight. You will need this,” he said. “Now follow me.” He said nothing about the coins on the table.

  In the narrow spaces that framed their route, they couldn’t see enough of the night sky to tell whether there was a moon out. Still, all three managed to move as silently as spirits through the night. Nearly blind as they were, not knowing where they were going, or even where they were, Spinner and Haft couldn’t tell how long the journey took. It felt like a long time before the old man finally stopped next to a drop.

  “Here is a tunnel,” he whispered. “It leads to a canal on the other side of the wall. A long time ago, when I was a boy, the canal brought fresh water from a forest stream into the city. Now we have sufficient wells inside the walls, so the canal is no longer needed and is dry. The grating is gone from both ends of the tunnel. You can get out here and follow the canal all the way to the forest. When you reach the forest, you will be in the Duchy of Bostia. From there you can find your own way back to your army.” Fumbling in the darkness, the old man found each of their hands and squeezed them. “Go in safety,” he said. “The people of New Bally will rise up and fight alongside you when you come back with your army.”

  “We thank you, old friend,” Spinner replied, and squeezed the old man’s hand as hard as he dared. “Remain in safety.”

  Haft hugged him. “We’ll be back. We’ll drive them out. We will see you again then, and you will dine richly on our treat.”

  The two Marines went down into the tunnel, and moments later were beyond the city walls. In another twenty minutes they were inside the forest and heading rapidly away from New Bally on the first leg of their journey back to Frangeria. They didn’t know how they were going to get there or what they would p
ass through in between, but they were safer than they had been. Haft wondered why he had promised the old man they’d return.

  The Jokapcul invaders didn’t pause following their conquest of New Bally. A state of war existed with the Duchy of Bostia as soon as they had captured the regiments guarding the landward approaches to the freeport. Before dusk of the first day, a large element of the Jokapcul force pressed inland. The kamazai who was the General Commanding of the Jokapcul forces left a lesser kamazai, one more adept at civil administration than at command of warriors, in charge in New Bally and went with his forces deep into the duchy.

  Lord Lackland, half bastard fourth son of Good King Honritu of Matilda, Defender of the Northern Marches and Guardian of the Western Coast, went with the invading forces, eager to see the booty that would put an end to the hated nickname “Lackland” and leave him once again the “Dark Prince.”

  FIRST INTERLUDE

  THE DARK PRINCE

  The Early History of Lord Lackland:

  A Speculation

  by Scholar Munch Mu’sk

  Professor of Far Western Studies

  University of the Great Rift

  (excerpted from The Proceedings of the Association of Anthropological Scholars of Obscure Cultures, Vol. 57, No. 6)

  It was the custom in the Kingdom of Matilda for a king to have three sons. The first son became king in his turn. The second son was bequeathed the title Prince of Easterwood, and upon the death or abdication of his special uncle, the second son of his father’s father, was given the Easterwood lands and the title Earl of Easterwood, Defender of the North and the East. Easterwood was the northern and easternmost portion of Matilda, and guarded the mountainous kingdom from raids and wars with the giants of the High Steppes, and from the strange denizens of the Land of the Night Forest. The third son was trained from infancy in the art of arms, and became commander of the armies of Matilda upon the death or retirement of his special uncle, the third son of his father’s father.

  No king of Matilda ever sired a fourth son. That was against custom, for there was nothing of princely value left to bequeath to a fourth son: no crown, no border marches, no army. A fourth son, custom averred, could only lead to civil war, or some other serious disorder.

  It was also the custom in Matilda that while the queen was the king’s only wife, she was not his only woman. Matilda wasn’t the only land in the two continents where a king or a regent-prince or a duke had more than one woman. But that form of polygamy was conducted openly in Matilda, whereas in the other kingdoms, principalities, and duchies, the concubines of the ruler were strictly back-bedroom affairs, never openly acknowledged. In Matilda, if the queen was barren or if she could not give birth to the requisite three sons, the king still needed three sons from his own loins. While one suspects there were other reasons why a King of Matilda might consort with a woman not his wife, they needn’t concern us here. But, if a son had to come from another woman’s womb, in Matilda it was thought best that the other woman should also be the king’s woman. Even if that son was not born from the womb of the queen, that son by another woman would be presented to the kingdom as the queen’s own. Any other children the king’s other women might have, well, they weren’t the queen’s, and thus had no standing in matters of succession, and were never acknowledged to be born to the king. Except . . .

  The queen of Good King Honritu, Defender of the Northern Marches and Guardian of the Western Coast, died not long after birthing her third son. The king, naturally, some said, took solace during his time of mourning in the arms of his favorite among his concubines. Some said he celebrated the death of his queen in those arms—but nothing was done to those who so impugned the character of their king, so long as they did it quietly. That was one of the reasons King Honritu was given the sobriquet “Good”: he allowed his people the freedom to openly speak their minds—provided they did so discreetly. Two or three nobles who were heard to grumble about the king’s dalliance during his time of mourning were beheaded, which quelled further aristocratic grumbling. At the same time, two or three commoners who impugned the king’s character too loudly were hanged. Many Matildans regretted the loss of the commoners but none blamed their king; those who were hanged should have known better than to speak their displeasure so loudly.

  Good King Honritu waited a decent interval before having his favorite concubine appear at his side in public: at first only occasionally, then more frequently, and at last constantly. Then he waited until the hints—and they were only hints—of muttering among the nobles ended; the nobles remembered too well the beheadings and none wished to add themselves to that number. He waited a bit longer, until the commoners cheered his favorite when they saw her. Only then did Good King Honritu proclaim the royal nuptials.

  By that time his seed had germinated within his new queen, sprouted, and the sprout spawned. This wasn’t a problem in and of itself, certainly not if the spawn was a daughter. Even if the spawn was a son, that could be dealt with in any number of ways—most of which had nothing to do with burying the get to avoid admitting to the birth. Truth to tell, down the generations, one or another King of Matilda had in fact sired a fourth son upon his queen, occasionally even more. When that happened, the superfluous sons were simply given over to the motherhood of one of the king’s concubines, who raised them as her own. So there had never been any problem of a fourth prince in any generation of Matilda’s royal house. Until . . .

  Unfortunately for Good King Honritu, his new queen wanted to keep her firstborn, and Good King Honritu, Defender of the Northern Marches and Guardian of the Western Coast, was too smitten with his second queen to deny her anything. So, what was to be done with this child? The queen certainly could not have a son who was not acknowledged as the king’s.

  Overruling his councilors, Honritu reasoned that this fourth son was a “half bastard” and therefore out of the line of succession. The councilors begged to know what a half bastard was, as they’d never heard of any such thing. The king explained that since the fourth son was conceived and born out of wedlock, he was a bastard. However, since the king was his father and was married to the boy’s mother, he was only half a bastard, with no more right of succession than a complete bastard. The councilors grumbled that one was either a complete bastard or not a bastard at all, and at any rate, that reasoning begged the question. The king, as kings are wont to do, prevailed.

  But no one had given a thought to what it would be like to be the fourth son of the King of Matilda. No one gave a care to how it would feel to grow up being universally known as a half bastard. Anyone should have known that a boy raised as a prince but with nothing to succeed to would risk growing bent. But no one paid it mind. Needless to say, nearly all were surprised when the half bastard fourth son became the Dark Prince, so called for his black moods and his red temper.

  The half bastard found the “Dark Prince” an acceptable name, even a grand one. But what he was called by his childhood playmates, his siblings, the nobles, and—worst of all—by his own father, was Lackland. “Lackland” was not an acceptable name to the Dark Prince.

  Lackland rankled. Lackland seethed. Lackland envied. Lackland hated. Lackland desired vengeance.

  The Dark Prince swore that the mocking use of the scurrilous name would not go unpunished.

  There was no royal crown for the Dark Prince to inherit. No Earl of Easterwood for him to become. No armies for the Dark Prince to command. The Dark Prince must remain Lackland for so long as he lived. Or at least for so long as he lived in Matilda.

  The Dark Prince planned, but not in hopeless scheming. He knew of the raids the Jokapcul were conducting against the mainland. He understood why those raids were little enough successful that they were considered no more than nuisances, and minor nuisances at that, even with the demons the Jokapcul commanded.

  He took to studying seacraft and sea craft, magicians and the control of demons. He did not undertake the study of seacraft and sea craft in order to b
ecome a shipwright or a sailor, nor did he study magicians and demons for the purpose of practicing the arcane art himself. He studied the former in order to acquire knowledge tradable to those who had only fishing craft. He studied the latter in order to learn how to gain control over the practitioners of magic.

  A day came when a Jokapcul knight was captured during another nuisance raid and was held captive in the king’s keep. The Dark Prince quietly visited the captive on a number of occasions, conversing with him in order to ascertain that his understanding of why the Jokapcul raids were merely nuisances was correct and that his understanding of how to make them more serious was equally accurate. Then, one night, he slew the soldier standing guard outside the captive’s cell and freed him. Together, they slipped out of the palace, out of the city, all the way to the harbor. There they boarded a small ship that carried them across the sea to the Jokapcul Islands, where the knight got word to the High Shoton of Jokapcul that a parley was requested. This High Shoton was the first shoton in all of Jokapcul history to rule all of the clans and all of the islands of the nation. He agreed to the meeting, at which he listened intently to all the Dark Prince had to say. Then he smiled slyly and agreed to the Dark Prince’s plan.

  The High Shoton called the Dark Prince “Lackland.” So did his councilors, his kamazai, and his generals.

  The Dark Prince smiled tightly, but objected not a whit to what he was being called. One day, he swore, the barbarians would regret ever using that name. And when that day came, the Dark Prince, Lackland no more, king—nay, emperor!—of the largest and mightiest realm ever known, would gloat over the corpse of the High Shoton.