Beyond the Pale

by Mark Anthony

  On the other side of the wolfish man stood a knight. He was tall and rangy, with amazingly broad shoulders, clad in a mail shirt, and with a sword belted at his hip. His thinning blond hair fell about his shoulders. The fourth member of the party stood behind the three. He seemed out of place compared to the others. He was tall enough—though not so tall as the knight—but slouched inside his baggy tunic. His beard was unkempt, his sandy hair shaggy, and he wore a glum look on his face. Grace supposed he was their servingman, though he looked rather disheveled for such.

  Aryn leaned toward Grace. “Look, it’s the king’s nephew.”

  “Which one?” Grace said, even as she guessed the answer. The fierce profile was a dead giveaway. Although he was as light as Boreas was dark, and not as handsome, the knight was obviously related to the king of Calavan.

  “The fair one,” Aryn said. “His name is Beltan. I remember him from when I was a girl. He’s as tall as I thought.” The baroness chewed her lip. “Although he has less hair, I think. And more scars. At any rate, Beltan is the bastard son of Beldreas, Boreas’s elder brother, who was king of Calavan.”

  Grace was taken aback by the matter-of-fact tone with which Aryn spoke the word bastard. However, this was a world where heritage and nobility went hand in hand with rank and power. To the baroness it was not an insult, merely a statement.

  “What happened to Beldreas?” Grace said.

  Aryn’s usually cheerful face fell solemn. “He was murdered seven years ago in this very hall. It was an awful time for Calavan, for the line of succession was not clear. Even though he is a bastard, Beltan might well have made a play for the throne, but he swore a vow to Vathris never to rest until he found his father’s murderer, so the throne went to Boreas, who was Beldreas’s younger brother.”

  Grace studied the rawboned knight. Furrows were etched into his high forehead, far too deep for one who was certainly no older than herself. “Did he ever find him? His father’s killer, I mean.”

  “I’m afraid not. I’ve heard it said he still quests so, even to this day.”

  Grace shook her head. Why was it so hard for the living to forget the dead? I’m sure the dead have no problem forgetting us. However, she did not speak these words. “Who are the others?” she said instead.

  “The dark-haired man is the bard Falken Blackhand,” Aryn said. “And next to him is the Lady Melia. I’ve never seen them before, but I’ve heard stories.”

  Stories? Grace started to say, but before she could form the word she felt a light tap on her shoulder.

  “Come,” Durge said in a quiet voice.

  “Where are we going?” Grace had almost forgotten about the Embarran, he had stood so stonily behind them.

  “I want to introduce you to the bard.”

  Aryn’s mouth dropped open, and she turned toward Durge. “You know Falken Blackhand?”

  Durge nodded. “I traveled with Falken once. But that was long ago, when I was young and frivolous.”

  Grace clenched her jaw shut. It’s not funny, Grace. It’s not even remotely funny.

  “He won’t remember who I am, of course,” the knight said. “I imagine he’ll just stare at me blankly, then tell me to be off. But it wouldn’t be polite if I didn’t try.”

  Aryn seemed not to hear these words and only stared at the knight. Durge led the way across the hall toward the curious travelers. As they drew near, Lord Alerain made a neat bow toward Falken, Melia, and Beltan.

  “I will have chambers readied for you at once, my lady, my lord, and your old chamber for you, Lord Beltan.”

  “Thank you, Lord Alerain,” the Lady Melia said.

  The king’s seneschal hurried off, and Grace examined the travelers with scientific interest. Beltan was royalty, and it was clear from Lord Alerain’s deference that the bard Falken and the Lady Melia were important personages as well, though exactly what their rank and position was Grace didn’t know. Their servingman—he wore wire spectacles, she saw now, which seemed odd for some reason—skulked behind the three. He kicked at the rushes that covered the floor with mud-caked boots, shoulders hunched inside his tunic. Shouldn’t he have been seeing to the needs of his masters?

  Durge hesitated, then cleared his throat, stepped forward, and spoke in a gruff tone. “Lord Falken, I’m sure you could never remember me, but I—”

  The bard spun around, and his wolfish face—a moment before lined and weary—was bright and youthful. “By Olrig! Durge!” Falken clapped the knight’s shoulder with his bare hand, then winced.

  Durge’s expression was at once concerned. “Falken, are you all right?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.” The bard shook his hand. “I just wish you knights would learn to warn the rest of us when you’re wearing a mail shirt beneath your cloak and tabard.”

  Durge eyed the bard’s hand. “I imagine you’ve crippled it permanently. You’ll never play the lute again.”

  Falken frowned at the Embarran knight. “What kind of talk is that? I thought you had forsworn the ways of your countrymen, Durge. You were a man of good cheer, last I knew.”

  Now it was Grace’s turn to stare at Durge.

  He shifted from foot to foot. “I was a boy when you knew me, Lord Falken, my mustaches barely begun. I am a man well past his middle years now.”

  A sadness crept into Falken’s expression, and he gazed at the knight, as if just now noticing Durge’s deeply chiseled face and the gray that streaked his hair. “Of course,” the bard said. “Of course, I forget. It must be over twenty years.”

  Grace thought this response odd. She had seen elderly people similarly struck by the passage of time, but surely Falken was of an age with Durge, who could not have been more than forty-five. That was hardly old. Except in this world it is, Grace. You yourself are middle-aged here, and you’re only thirty. No wonder Aryn thinks Durge is so old. To her, at nineteen, he’s ancient.

  Now Falken’s smile returned, and if it was not as bright as before, it was at least as fond. He gripped the Embarran knight’s hand. “All the same, it is good to see you again, Durge.”

  The dark-haired knight nodded. “And you as well, Falken.”

  Falken turned toward his companions. “Everyone, this is Lord Durge of Embarr. Durge, this is Lady Melia, and this is Beltan of Calavan.”

  Melia curtsied, and Beltan gave a broad grin. Grace gasped, for when he smiled the knight was every bit as handsome as his uncle.

  “I’ve heard of the earl of Stonebreak,” Beltan said. “Your skill with the Embarran greatsword precedes you, my lord.”

  Durge took a step back. “I’m sure the stories must be in error, my lord.”

  Melia lifted the hem of her gown and glided forward. She nodded toward Aryn and Grace. “And who are your companions, Lord Durge?”

  Though Melia was small—even tiny—for the second time next to another Grace felt like a girl. Only it was not the same as when she had stood next to Kyrene. Melia did not make her feel inadequate, only that there was far more to the world, to life, and to experience than she could possibly imagine.

  Durge cleared his throat. “This is Her Highness, Aryn, the Baroness of Elsandry, and ward to King Boreas.”

  Melia smiled at the young baroness and nodded in greeting, and Aryn responded with an elegant curtsy Grace could never hope to duplicate.

  “So,” Beltan said, his blue eyes dancing, “the mischievous girl I remember has grown into a pretty young woman. King Boreas is right. I do need to visit more often.”

  Aryn blushed and bowed her head, but her smile was unmistakable. Grace knew at once she liked the rangy blond knight, bastard or not.

  “And this,” Durge said, “is Her Radiance, Grace, the Duchess of Beckett.”

  Melia’s amber eyes flashed. “Beckett? I’ve never heard of a duchy called Beckett.”

  A spike of panic pierced Grace’s chest. “It’s very far away,” she blurted.

  Melia nodded. “Yes, of course it is.” Her eyes locked on to Grace, and Grac
e had the terrible sensation she was transparent, that the Lady Melia could gaze inside her and see every secret, every hope, every fear Grace was trying to hide, fluttering like moths trapped inside a bell jar.

  Grace lifted a hand to her throat. It was hard to breathe. The air in the great hall was suffocating. Melia’s servingman stood just behind the lady. Grace glanced at him, and caught his gray eyes behind the wire-rimmed spectacles. “Please,” she said. “Could you bring me a cup of wine?”

  He stared at her like she had just asked him to jump from the highest tower in the castle.

  “What?” he said.

  Grace was taken aback. None of the servants in Calavere would dare show such rudeness. “Wine,” she said. “It’s on the table over there. Could you bring me a cup? Please.”

  The man grimaced at her. “I’m not a servant, you know.”

  Melia turned her gaze on him. “Then why don’t you be a gentleman, Travis?”

  The sandy-haired man gaped at Melia, opened his mouth, then seemed to think better of it. He turned to retrieve the wine, though none too quickly, and he grumbled as he went.

  Inwardly Grace groaned. Once again she had misread another, and to disastrous result. There was a long and awkward moment of silence. At last Aryn made a valiant attempt at a smile.

  “Welcome to Calavere, everyone,” she said.

  65.

  “You can set those over there, Travis,” Melia said.

  Travis dropped the heavy saddlebags on the floor of the chamber. He straightened, and his back made a peculiar noise, something akin to an especially energetic horse prancing on a field of crystal.

  Falken frowned at the saddlebags. “Did you break something, Travis?”

  “Not in those,” he said through clenched teeth.

  At Melia’s request he had carried the saddlebags from the castle’s stable, down a long corridor, and up a spiral staircase that had turned him around so many times stepping off it was like stepping off the Tilt-A-Whirl at Elitch Gardens.

  “Now, don’t forget the four you left at the bottom of the stairs,” Melia said in a pleasant tone.

  Travis shot Melia a wounded look. “You’re punishing me, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, dear, but only because I care about you.”

  Travis groaned as he headed for the door. It wasn’t his fault the woman in the great hall had been so rude. He didn’t mind getting her a cup of wine, but the way she had looked at him—like an object, not a person—even the crassest tourists in the Mine Shaft Saloon had never talked to him like that.

  Beltan strode into the room, a pair of bulging saddlebags in each hand. He swung them up with ease and set them on a sideboard, then looked around.

  “Is that everything?” He dusted off his hands. “That wasn’t hard at all.”

  Travis stared at the knight. There were times when he liked Beltan just a little bit less than others. Still, he was grateful he didn’t have to make another trip down the stairs. He never had been able to ride the Tilt-A-Whirl twice without losing his cotton candy.

  “Well, Melia.” Falken set the case that contained his lute on the window ledge. “What do you think of the king of Calavan’s hospitality?”

  Melia circled the room, her kirtle trailing the rough carpets on the floor. The chamber the king’s seneschal, Alerain, had led them to was large enough for them all to gather in at once. Tapestries draped the walls, their colors deep with smoke and time, and helped to stave off the chill along with the fire crackling on the hearth. A side door led to a smaller bedchamber that would grant Melia a degree of privacy.

  “Well, it’s not the largest chamber in the castle,” Melia said. She sat in a plump chair by the fireplace, and a smile coiled about her lips. “But I’ll manage.”

  Falken lifted his lute from its case and strummed a melancholy chord. “The world will be ever grateful for your sacrifices, Melia.”

  “Well, I should certainly hope so.”

  Travis folded his cloak and set it on one of the two narrow beds in the main room, where he and Falken were to sleep, then sat beside it. Molten sunlight spilled through the chamber’s window. He counted five stone towers through the rippled glass, sharp against the sky, and knew that was only half of what Calavere had to offer. Riding toward the castle, it had loomed high on its hill, so craggy it had reminded him of the mountains of Colorado. He had felt a pang of loss then and had faced into the wind, as he always did when thinking about his home.

  Everyone in Castle City has probably forgotten you by now, Travis. Maybe you should forget, too. He sighed and gazed at the high battlements. In all, Calavere made King Kel’s fortress look like a rubble heap.

  “Don’t worry about those, Beltan,” Melia said in a bright voice. “Travis volunteered to unpack them.”

  Travis looked up. “I don’t remember saying that.”

  Melia’s eyelids descended halfway. “Try very hard.”

  Travis gulped. “Oh. I think it’s coming back to me.”

  “I knew it would, dear.”

  Travis knelt beside the saddlebags. It had been a long journey from the tower of the Runebinders. As he pulled blankets, extra garments, and the remnants of foodstuffs from the bags, the leagues rolled by again in his mind.

  They had not stayed long in the vale of the White Tower. The morning after the attack of the wraithlings, Melia still had been wan and chilled, but she least of all had not wished to linger in that place. They had packed their things in the steely light before dawn and had ridden from the vale. Travis had cast one last glance over his shoulder at the ruin. It had shone like bones in the half-light: a tomb to bury the folly of those already centuries dead. He had shivered, then they had rounded the spur of a ridge, and the remains of the tower had been lost from view.

  They had ridden hard through southern Eredane. For speed’s sake they had kept to the Queen’s Way, but not without caution. Beltan continually scouted ahead, and more than once the knight had come pounding back toward them on his roan charger to warn that a group of Raven cultists approached. Each time they had fled the road to hide in a bramble thicket, or behind a knoll, or under the arch of an old Tarrasian bridge.

  One time the cultists had been mere moments away, and there had been nowhere to seek cover, only bare plains for a league in either direction. In sharp words they dared not question, Melia had instructed them to stand perfectly still beside the road and to hold tight to the bridles of their horses. She had made a series of odd motions with her hands, splaying them out flat, and moving them in a single plane before her.

  The Raven cultists had come into view, marching down the Queen’s Way. It was the largest such procession they had seen, nearly a hundred, all clad in robes of black, the wing of the Raven drawn in ash on their foreheads. Queer words tumbled from their lips, and Travis had realized it was a prayer.

  “breathe the wind

  walk the fire

  Raven be your master

  chain the flesh

  free the heart

  Raven flies forever”

  As the cultists passed, Travis had clenched his jaw to keep from screaming. He was sure that one of them would turn to stare at him at any moment. The mask of dull-eyed complacence would twist into one of madness and rage, and the cultist would shriek, pointing an accusing finger at him, marking him as the man who had burned one of their own.

  And what will you do then, Travis? Set that one on fire, too? Why stop there? Why not burn up the whole lot of them?

  However, the cultists had marched by with their strange, lurching cadence, gazes blank and fixed ahead. Whatever Melia had done with her hands, it had worked.

  That was the last they had seen of the Raven Cult. The next morning a great plateau had thrust up before them. The Fal Erenn, the Dawning Fells, bordered the highlands to the east, and to the west and south Travis had glimpsed a line of mist-gray peaks, which Falken named the Fal Sinfath, the Gloaming Fells. With no other route available, the Queen’s Way had cut into the s
teep side of the plateau. The horses had labored to carry the travelers up the incline, and Travis had marveled at the way the ancient Tarrasian engineers had carved the narrow road from sheer rock. It might have been a thousand years old, but it had looked as solid as any paved mountain pass in Colorado.

  While the others had ridden cautiously here, Travis had pushed his shaggy gelding ahead despite Falken’s admonitions. Mountains didn’t frighten Travis. They were dangerous, yes, and he had known people who had died on them. If you tried to fight a mountain, you would surely lose, but if you gave yourself to it, sacrificed some of your own blood and sweat, then the mountain would bear you to the sky.

  When they had reached the top, the land they found was not much like Colorado. This was the Dominion of Galt, situated in the highlands between Eredane and Calavan. It was a small and stark land, all sharp edges and treacherous crevices. As they rode south they had passed few villages, and these had been as hard and uninviting as the stone from which they were hewn. Few crops grew in this land, and the main livestock was a kind of wiry goat. What the animals found to eat among the tumbled boulders Travis didn’t know.

  Although the landscape of Galt was harsh, its people could not have been more different. The travelers did not camp—the night wind would have scoured them from the ground if they hadn’t frozen first—so they had stayed in taverns three nights in a row. At each one the people had been kind, red-faced, and of good humor. The food they had served had been scant and simple, but it was served generously and alongside large tankards of ale. Travis had sipped his tentatively at first, then had joined Beltan in taking large gulps. Unlike the not-quite-oatmeal he had drunk elsewhere, the brews of Galt were brown, rich, and smooth as molasses.

  They were also of a strength he had never encountered before, as he had discovered upon waking that first morning in Galt.

  “I remember my first tankard of Galtish ale,” Beltan had said with a grin, standing over his bed. “Feels like dark elfs are digging their newest mine inside your skull, doesn’t it?”