Once on the north shore Alec walked cautiously, keeping his head down and staying off the major streets as he worked through the city to the cathedral neighborhood. The streets seemed busy, but several shop fronts were closed and people’s appearances seemed shabby compared to his memory. Alec noticed groups of men with swords borne ostentatiously who cleared the roads as they walked, and he stepped aside to let one such group pass by him.
When he got to the market, he found the proctor and paid his fee to set up, then laid a blanket in the shadow of the cathedral gate and placed several samples of his inventory out for sale. They were plants, roots, leaves, and stems, that he knew he could use for healing purposes, and some of which were edible as well.
Few people stopped by to look at Alec’s offerings, which were mainly items foreign to the people of Oyster Bay, and he made few sales, which suited him. He wanted time to sit and watch and listen, so that he could learn what was happening.
The rest of the morning passed by peacefully, until at midday he watched with great interest as a procession draped in royal purple proceeded up the boulevard on the far side of the square.
“Who are they?” he asked his neighbor, a woodcarver who sold trinkets and household items. They’d exchanged some pleasantries regarding the foreign nature of Alec’s goods.
“They are the lords who fancy they run the Dominion now,” Credel informed him. “Since you’re from so far south you probably don’t know. They’re the third group to succeed to power since the king was killed. Of course the real power sits up on the ingenairii hill, letting this faction or that, depending on the day’s man with an ego or a grudge, sit as the ‘protector of the crown.’”
“Who specifically are they?” Alec asked, hungry for information.
“Well, the strongest of them seems to be Elgin, the son of the Duke of Goldenfields. He’s survived the last change of power and been among the winners of late. He’s nimble, or shifty, depending on how you look at it, I suppose,” Credel said.
“He’s brought in his buddy Brahnam, who no one fancies is bright enough to threaten their power, but who is a master at being a bully and braggart,” the vendor continued.
“The nobles and the merchants have killed off a fair number of one another, and the ingenairii have done the same twice now,” he added.
“Which ingenairii are left?” Alec asked.
“That’s the right question to ask, youngster,” Credel said, looking at Alec shrewdly. “We’ve lost many of the useful ones, the stone and earth and water workers. The fire and warriors are on top now, of the ones that are here. Oh, that’s been a mess!” he seemed to muse to himself as he thought out loud. “So many of them left the city when the troubles started, which was the right thing to do. But then a fair number returned for no reason that I can fathom, and those poor lambs ended up paying for it.”
“What’s going to happen? How will it all end?” Alec queried, wondering what the everyday people of the city thought about the fratricidal feuds at the top of the society.
“Lad, you’re full of questions,” Credel sadly murmured. “I wish folks would have asked those questions at the start of all this mayhem. We’ve lost so much and so many now for naught.
“But it seems to me,” he ventured, taking Alec into his confidence, “Elgin must be close to having enough ingenairii support that he’s going to claim the crown for his own. He couldn’t murder his own father to become Duke of Goldenfields, although it wasn’t for lack of trying. But he may succeed in grabbing this bigger chair. With the Dominion now in tatters, I’m not sure what good it will do him, to always be looking at the ingenairii in the shadows behind him, but he’ll have a crown.”
The pageant of pretenders to the power stopped at the far corner of the market and turned towards the merchants around Credel and Alec.
“Oh, that’s right, it’s a feast day today; I’d forgotten. They’re going to come for a blessing in the cathedral,” Alec’s neighbor told him.
Alec felt his blood boiling at the sight of the two men he detested, Elgin more than anyone else in the Dominion. He remembered the coldblooded conversation Elgin had with Alec when he had been escorted away from the palace in Goldenfields at the end of his aborted coup. The fratricidal heir had casually admitted his efforts to kill his own betrothed, Noranda Locksfort, the girl who Alec had once wanted for his own. Alec had been ready to kill him then too, but had been ambushed and gone down.
“Credel, take my things for me. I’ll be back here in three days to reclaim them,” Alec said, standing up with a hasty resolve to act. He was breaking his own planned strategy of remaining unnoticed, but his emotions were pushing ahead too fast for his mind to keep up.
“Where are you going?” the woodcarver asked.
“I’m going to get rid of the pretenders,” Alec said. He knew his impulse could lead to unforeseen consequences, but he felt compelled to take action when his targets were coming right at him.
Alec walked back into the crowd and waited until the haughty riders drew closer, then stepped out in front of the very gate of the cathedral as the horses approached. He kept his head bowed, his face hidden from view.
The horses clattered up to within a few feet of Alec. “Commoner give way,” the lead bodyguard snapped. “Let your betters pass by or suffer the consequences.
Alec looked up at the guard, then looked past him at Elgin, who was turned towards Brahnam in conversation. Alec wanted Elgin to know who was here to kill him.
“Elgin,” he called, then repeated the name loudly, screaming it. Brahnam and Elgin looked up, Brahnam without recognition, Elgin with a blank look that turned to surprise and then fear as he saw past the long hair and dirty clothes to recognize the eyes of his bitter enemy.
“Kill him, kill him, kill him!” Elgin shouted. “All of you now!”
But it was already too late. Alec swept his sword up at the throat of the lead guard and then worked around to two of the guards on the right. He was moving with the speed and sureness of a warrior ingenaire, striking down the bodyguards around Elgin and his friend.
With five of the guards down and two others running away, Alec reached up and pulled Branham down, stabbing his thigh. Only Elgin was on a horse now, and screams were breaking out in the nearby crowd as various people were simultaneously running towards and away from the bloodshed. “You will be the witness and the messenger,” Alec said, turning to Branham. “You’ll be allowed to live just a little longer to deliver the message.”
“Elgin, you are sentenced to death,” Alec called out loudly enough for the bystanders to hear.
“Who are you to pass judgment?” Elgin asked with contempt.
“I am under the orders of the last heir of the House of Tarnum, the successor to King Gildevny, and I am your death,” Alec proclaimed, feeling as though his words could carry to Ingenairii Hill itself. “The crown shall not be yours,” and with that he drew his sword back and thrust it into the chest of Elgin.
Chapter 29 – A Lesson From Irena
Alec looked around at the crowd that had witnessed his bloody attack. He bent and wiped his sword on Branham’s cloak before he sheathed it, then pulled one of the dead soldiers from his saddle and climbed up on the horse. He turned the steed and rode out of the market and through a meandering maze of streets until he was sure no one was following him. He stopped and dismounted in front of a stable yard, removed the saddle and bridle from the horse, then started walking away from the animal, heading back towards his inn across the river.
He thought about his impetuous move as he casually strolled along the street. He hadn’t expected such a chance for action to come to him so quickly, and so he had reacted instinctively. He knew there were others who he needed to find and slay. More than the revenge, Alec wanted to find the crown and seize it, removing it from the danger of being assumed by a pretender, and letting him decide whether the proper candidate was in line to become king. Word of his actions today was undoubtedly spreading rapidl
y already.
His wandering brought him to the river, and he paused. The sun was high overhead, reminding him it was only midday. If he returned to his inn he would spend the afternoon idly sitting without anything to do.
The other options he had included going to Ingenairii Hill. That would have been risky if he had tried it before he killed Elgin; now it would be ludicrous, with the alarm raised about his murderous return.
Slightly less challenging would be a return to the palace. Without a king on the throne perhaps security would be weak. He hoped many of the Guards who served there were likely to approve of Alec’s attacks.
Alec turned and started walking towards the palace. He stopped at a slop shop to buy a black cape that replaced the brown travel cape he had worn during the battle in the cathedral’s market square. He added a nondescript hat to help improve his simple disguise, then continued on to the palace grounds.
Alec stood down the road from the palace entrance he had formerly used, and watched the passage of people in and out of the palace grounds. He didn’t recognize any of the people who passed through the entry, or the guards who kept a lackadaisical eye on the traffic. Finally gathering his courage, Alec casually walked down the street and into the gateway of the palace grounds, without challenge from the uniformed men at the gate.
Once inside, Alec’s pace unconsciously slowed as he was overcome with memories of the happier months he had spent visiting the palace. He remembered the time in the garden when he had met Noranda, walking with Elgin, her betrothed at the time. Alec had been with Nathaniel, his friend from Rubicon’s home.
Alec turned aside and found those same gardens, and entered them to walk. The grounds were in a state of decay, though Alec didn’t know whether that was simply the result of winter’s cold hibernation or due to neglect in the midst of the rebellion.
He sat in a sunny nook, sitting on a cool stone bench, thinking about the way the palace used to be. He wondered how many of the Palace Guard members who he had trusted were still in service at the palace.
A cloud passed in front of the sun, casting a chill, its dark shadow breaking his thoughts as he worked through the roster of names he remembered from when he had practiced swordsmanship with them daily.
Deciding that he needed to move on, Alec left the garden and walked cautiously towards the armory. No one accosted him though he passed a few men in the armory yard. When he arrived at the door he opened it cautiously and peered inside, hoping that he would be able to find Bannis the master armsman, who he believed would still be his friend amidst all the unsavory changes that had taken place.
No one was visible on the practice floor, and Alec wandered incautiously over to the stands. There had been a time when those stands had filled with an audience that came to watch him compete. He remembered the pleasure the Guard members had taken at having viewers, even though some had come to place wagers on the results of the practice contests; Alec remembered his astonishment when Noranda had told him that one afternoon.
He sat in the very spot where she had sat and watched him work against the best swordsmen from the Guard. The last time he had seen her fully alive, they had spoken at that seat.
He had been so much in love with her, and then even when the companionship with Bethany had drawn his affections away, some part of him had felt that in the end he would come back to Noranda, heal her, and love her devotedly once again. That had seemed ordained, until a holy vision had said that he would not marry her, that her mission was something else.
“You look like a fellow who used to come here all the time,” Alec jumped at the voice speaking directly beside him. He’d been so absorbed in self-pity he’d not heard Bannis walk up to him. “He was a great swordsman, but he’s gone now. It’s a good thing, too. If I found him here I’d have to report him.”
Alec started to jump up to hug Bannis, the head armsman of the facility, until he realized the warning that was in the speaker’s words. “Was he a good person?” Alec asked.
“He seemed better than most of those who are in power today,” Bannis allowed with a slight grin.
“There are a smaller number of those as of today, I hear,” Alec said. “Someone came out of the street crowd with a sword and killed Elgin and most of his body guards. I’ll bet he’s going to go after more of them.”
“If he’s going after that crowd…” Bannis began.
“I think he wants to kill everyone responsible for the death of the king,” Alec interrupted.
He’ll need to go after Brahnam, Krauss and Wingler Houses from the east, Munsun from down south, and Bahyt,” Bannis said, matter-of-factly naming the conspirators he knew. “Plus those from Ingenairii Hill.”
“He might even want to take the crown so no usurper can wear it, if he knew where it was,” Alec responded.
Bannis’s eyes grew wide at the suggestion. After a pregnant pause, he replied, “That would mean going to the cathedral and taking it from the alter in the Morn Rise Chapel, where it’s sitting under guard. The different factions don’t trust each other, so they all keep an eye on it; there’re probably four or more sword-bearers there at any one time.”
“I knew a number of good men and women in the Palace Guard once upon a time,” Alec spoke. “Are many of them still around?”
“Too many have been killed of late – some caught in the middle of others’ battles, some just accidentally, a few finding old scores being settled. But there are many of the best sort still minding the store here at the Palace, trying to stay out of harm’s way and hoping that some miracle will deliver the right kind of ruler to the throne soon.”
“That’s encouraging to hear,” Alec said. He stood up to prepare to leave. “I’ve finished my rest. I’ll leave you now, and hope that we’ll see each other again in happy circumstances.”
Bannis thrust his hand into Alec’s and pumped it vigorously. “I hope so, too. There is someone I know who would make the right champion to clean out this stable’s foulness.”
Alec returned the handshake warmly and left without saying anything else. He walked cautiously through the palace grounds until he found a side gate and left quietly. He knew where the mansions of most of the regicide plotters lived, and he intended to visit as many as possible tonight. Taking on the warrior and fire ingenairii was another matter though, and he wasn’t sure how to fight those battles.
He didn’t want to have to kill anyone on the grounds of Ingenairii Hill, and he wasn’t sure he could stand up alone against any concentrated attack by numerous other ingenairii. Prudence and emotion battled one another in his mind, as he considered whether to take the easier revenge now and leave the difficult part for some future opportunity.
Alec walked up the roads to the northern part of Oyster Bay where three of the conspirators, Krauss, Munsun, and Bahyt kept large homes in the suburbs of the capitol. By late afternoon Alec was sitting in the hayloft of the stables at Bahyt’s residence, the northernmost of his targets. He rested and resolved himself to carry out the series of executions he was planning as justice for the death of the king.
As sunset occurred Alec began to grow anxious to start his activities. When darkness fell completely Alec climbed down from the loft and avoided the grooms, then entered the kitchen.
“We don’t let beggars in the kitchen,” a stout cook told him, as the heads of two other servants turned to watch.
“Where is Bahyt, the master of this house?” Alec asked, trying not to sound threatening.
“There are no strangers allowed in here, I’m sorry,” the cook repeated.
Alec ignored the cook and walked over to one of the other servants. He pulled out his sword. “Take me to Bahyt,” he ordered.
The girl shrieked, and the cook bellowed loudly for a guard. Alec grabbed the girl’s arm and dragged her through a doorway that led to a narrow hallway. “You need to take me to Bahyt, now. Which way?” Alec asked. The girl pointed at the back stairway, and Alec pulled her with him up the stairs. He heard sh
outing downstairs and knew that the guards in the house were now on alert.
“Don’t hurt me, please sir,” the girl squeaked with fear.
Alec looked at her thin face, eyes brimming with tears. He imagined seeing Bethany in such a circumstance, and felt embarrassed by his actions. “Where is the master’s room?” he asked.
“That door,” she pointed at the third door.
“Go back to the kitchen,” he told her, and without a backward look he crossed the hallway and opened the door. Inside Bahyt and a butler were engaged in dressing Bahyt for an evening dinner. “Leave us,” Alec told the butler, looking at Bayht.
“Go on, Loosa,” Bahyt said. “Shall I draw my sword?” he asked as the servant left, motioning across the room to where his weapon was on a table.
“By all means,” Alec agreed. He watched Bahyt stroll slowly across the room as shouts grew louder in the hallway, and realized Bahyt had delayed in hope of rescue.
“Why are you here?”
Alec looked at the man born to noble life. “You plotted to kill a king,” he replied.
The door burst open behind him and he quickly moved to a position to face the three new men in the room as well as Bahyt.
“Kill this man,” Bahyt ordered, holding his own sword in front of him.
Alec moved without ingenaire abilities towards the three guards, keeping himself between Bahyt and the door. Alec engaged the three men in a fierce battle, but he aimed only to disarm them, keeping his eye on his target. After a fierce battle that lasted for long minutes, Alec won his way free and turned on Bahyt.
“The old man couldn’t govern, didn’t use his power. He was in the way of better things,” Bahyt said as Alec approached him. Without a word in response, Alec pierced Bahyt’s chest with his blade, killing him.
Alec felt a grim sense of satisfaction in the deed. “Are you happy, Enguerrand?” he asked quietly, ignoring the wounded guards who were still alive on the floor. Alec walked out of the door to the hallway, where several servants were gathered. He stopped and re-entered the room, then went to the window, dropped to the first floor roof, and thence to the ground.
The Loss of Power: Goldenfields and Bondell Page 34