Uabhar ignored the presence of his eldest son, focusing his scrutiny on Ronin. ‘Do you have quarrel with my procedures?’ he barked.
The younger prince waited a moment before replying, ‘You are my sovereign and sire.’
‘Precisely. And all that I do, I do that the dynasty of Ó Maoldúin may prosper. You are second in line to the throne, an heir of this dynasty.’
‘As one of your heirs,’ Ronin said, leaving his seat and kneeling in homage to his father, ‘I ask you, as before, for your leave to join the ranks and fight for Slievmordhu.’
‘And as before I refuse the request. It is because you are one of my successors that I will not allow you to ride out to war, you understand? My sons will not risk their lives. It is for the ordinary soldiery to become spear fodder.’
Up jumped Ronin, overturning the chair. ‘You tie our hands no matter which way we turn!’ he cried despairingly. ‘You refuse to let us fight, you refuse to allow us any part in the decision-making, you refuse to hearken to our counsel!’
This was too much for Kieran. From infancy he had been schooled to loathe his father’s wrath, and to go to any lengths to appease it. His reaction was reflexive, rather than calculated. ‘How can you, in good conscience, address our father with such discourtesy?’ he loudly reprimanded his brother. ‘Obedience and loyalty above all! Recollect yourself!’
‘Be silent, sirrah!’ The king rounded on his eldest son. ‘Do not presume to speak on my behalf!’ Embarrassed and shocked that he was perceived to have erred, the crown prince bowed low and apologised. Returning his attention to Ronin, Uabhar said smoothly and with ominous civility, ‘Prithee, give me your counsel now, my son. I would fain be privy to what discomposes you.’
‘Already you know what troubles me, Father!’ the young man said in agitation. ‘A wickedness is on the way and the weathermasters, our best defenders, are betrayed. It is we who betrayed them, while they were unarmed, and guests beneath our roof! If the weathermasters still live you must set them free.’
‘They live not.’
Ronin doubled over, as if his father had punched him just beneath the ribs. A sickly pallor washed over him as if he had taken ill, and he mumbled strings of phrases under his breath, one after the other. His elder brother sat down quickly upon the lid of an ark as if his knees had given way beneath him. Kieran passed one hand across his brow, wiping off sudden beads of cold sweat.
‘Truth will out,’ said Uabhar. ‘Eventually it will become common knowledge, in any case, that the weathermasters are slain. Why should I not be the one to reveal it to you? I have nothing to hide! I remain as guileless as always. Leave off your prayers to the Fates, Ronin; they are not listening. And do not berate yourself, for you had no part in it. Most of that sad affair was the fault of the druids.’
Lifting his head Ronin said, ‘Be that as it may, it is with Slievmordhu that the responsibility lies. Without the weather-masters, humankind is all but powerless before the wickedness of unseelie hordes.’
‘There are no hordes. It is a false report that has been blown wildly out of proportion. I myself germinated the original hearsay in a clever tactical manoeuvre, when I concocted tales of unseelie wights gathering on the South-Eastern Moors.’
‘They say these monsters are issuing from the north. Many folk claim to have seen them.’
‘It is a trick.’
‘What if it is no trick?’
‘Then the first obstacles on their southbound route will be the armies of Narngalis. I consider that no inconvenience.’
‘And after they have slaughtered the Narngalish, what then? A man’s loyalty is of no concern to wicked wights. Being human, alone, is enough cause for them to put us to death. They hate humankind, and would destroy us all.’
‘What would you have me do?’ Uabhar asked with exaggerated politeness.
‘Put aside all quarrels and join with Warwick in alliance against the unseelie threat.’
‘That is treasonous talk! How dare you suggest it?’ the king roared. ‘Unworthy son! Have I taught you nothing? Would you bring dishonour upon your own father?’
Quietly Kieran subjoined, ‘You show yourself a traitor, Ronin,’ but his tone was a warning to his brother to shield himself, rather than an accusation with which to persecute him. Ronin was dear to him, and in the most secret recesses of his heart he agreed with much that he was saying, though this caused him untold anguish and confusion, for it threatened to undermine the very foundations on which his life had been built. They were not weak-minded, these young men—not in the slightest. It was an insidious, invisible influence they had to contend with; one that has ensnared and ultimately ruined many a mighty man.
The king addressed Ronin. ‘Observe your brother, who stands closer to the throne than you do, praise the Fates. Of all my sons Kieran is the best, the most dutiful and steadfast. Of all my sons you are the worst. Take heed of your elder brother. Model yourself on him. He obeys his father without question, and by this he proves himself worthy as my heir.’
‘If I am a traitor and disloyal son, if I am the worst of all offenders, then let it be proclaimed,’ declared Ronin. ‘Let me be reviled for all time, but I cannot in good conscience commit treason against the whole of humanity.’
Uabhar thrust his face close to that of his second son. ‘Were you not my flesh and blood I would see you hanged,’ he hissed corrosively.
The young prince flinched, but stood his ground, avoiding his father’s eye. ‘I apologise for speaking out against you, Father,’ he said tightly. ‘If you knew what it has cost me . . . ’
‘You should have held your tongue, sirrah! I deny all you have said, and ’twould be better for you if you had never said it. Now I will reconsider my ban after all, and you will find out how generously I can reach a compromise. Put on your armour. Go forth to fight for king and country. See if you can find it in your faithless heart to wage war against the very realms with whom you so ardently desire to form alliance, and if you cannot do it in good conscience then do it while stung by guilt. Should you perish on the battlefield, at least you will have given your last strength while proving yourself no disloyal son. In that, maybe you will salvage some honour for the name of Ó Maoldúin.’
The king stretched out his hand.
Ronin stood as wan and still as an image painted on the silk draperies. He was lost, utterly lost. A moment later the training of a lifetime reasserted itself and he saw, again, the only path he knew, the familiar, deep-rutted track along which he had been driven so often that it had become the only way he could find. He stooped, pressing his lips to his father’s hand in the gesture of fealty and acknowledgement.
Dismissively his father turned away and began speaking to Kieran, diverting his attention to matters of war.
‘The wicked hordes are coming,’ Ronin said under his breath, intentionally unheard and unheeded. To his hands that he had lifted, upturned and empty as shells, he whispered, ‘and the weathermasters are betrayed.’
Then he went to put on his battle gear.
3
IRONSTONE KEEP
True friendship is worth more than can be measured,
A quality forever to be treasured.
True friends will staunchly stand beside each other,
As loyally as brother shieldeth brother,
Remaining firm in spite of war and strife,
In poverty or sickness, throughout life.
True friendship doth endure while comrades age
From boy to youth, from warrior to sage.
‘TRUE FRIENDS’
(A SONG FAVOURED BY MAUDLIN DRUNKARDS THROUGHOUT TIR)
A pair of eagles had flown over the crimson pavilions of Uabhar just as the despatch rider was making his exit. Swift though the rider was as he headed for the lodgings of Lord Genan, he could not outrace birds on the wing. The eagles soared and glided on their way north-west against the morning breeze, across hill and dale, over reedy brook and rushing river, until they reache
d a region where no war was being waged amongst humankind.
A shimmering orb hovered in the sky.
Matching the wind’s speed, Asrăthiel’s sky-balloon floated amid airborne motes of thistledown and flocks of ravens whose cries tore open the throat of the wind. The basket was filled to capacity, though the weathermage had dispensed with the services of her maid, Linnet, bidding her return to King’s Winterbourne out of harm’s way. Beside her stood two tall men garbed in gleaming chain mail and tabards of darkest aquamarine. King Thorgild Torkilsalven scanned the horizon through eyes creased by the salt winds of the western sea, while Prince Halvdan leaned over the side of the gondola. The prince surveyed the marvellous spectacle below: burnished battalions were filing as sinuously as dragons through the countryside. The heavy drumming of marching feet was punctuated by the ravens’ calls, the creaking of the basketwork and the haphazard flapping of the envelope when buffeted by a sudden gust. Now and then Asrăthiel murmured a brí-command to the local currents, or to the sun-crystal in its cradle, ‘,’ and executed a quick, practised gesture, elusive to her companions. Sensing air pressure without effort, she was aware of her exact height above the ground.
Presently the weathermage worked a vent-line to release puffs of air from the balloon’s crown, decreasing buoyancy. The aerostat descended at a steep angle. She guided it with precision until its woven floor scraped the ground beside the next hilltop semaphore station. The assistant signalman was waiting with the station’s manservant to help anchor the balloon to hooks hammered into the rocky ground. She waved them away and saw to it herself, with the help of her royal companions, instructing Halvdan how to throw out the ropes, before vaulting over the side as gracefully as a leaping deer, despite her encumbering skirts. The wind was strong; not only did it batter at her garments, it also buffeted the envelope as if it were a punching bag. To decrease the strain on seams and fabric Asrăthiel allowed some air to escape before tying everything down securely.
Having watched the approach of the Lady in the Moon, the station chief had hastened to finish deciphering the latest messages, writing in careful script on thick sheets of paper. When the crew alighted he was astounded to behold not only a weathermage but also a prince and the King of Grïmnørsland, his locks shining like iron-streaked copper as they swept his shoulders.
It took him some while to recover his usual placidity and he spoke to them breathlessly. ‘Your Majesty, Your Royal Highness and my lady, two communications have come in this very hour,’ he said, saluting and offering them the pages as soon as they entered the signal tower. The first message was from Avalloc, at High Darioneth; Asrăthiel had been keeping him informed of her whereabouts. The damsel scanned the message quickly, eager for her grandfather’s counsel, and proceeded to read it aloud. ‘Avalloc Storm Lord and Declan of the Wildwoods greet Lady Asrăthiel.’
‘Who is Declan of the Wildwoods?’ Thorgild interrupted.
‘He is a friend of my grandfather’s, a scholar,’ Asrăthiel replied without taking her eyes from the pages. ‘Sometimes he sojourns at High Darioneth.’
The king nodded. ‘Go on.’
First, the Storm Lord informed his granddaughter that the rescue mission despatched to Cathair Rua had not yet sent back any word of the weathermasters’ whereabouts or welfare. Next, the Storm Lord revealed that he had discovered an astonishing fact about the unseelie strangers from the northern mountains.
Asrăthiel read out, ‘Maelstronnar house brownie claims unseelie attackers are—what?’ she broke off, staring in perplexity at the billet in her hand. ‘But that is impossible!’
‘What does he say of the attackers? And how can a brownie have anything to do with the matter?’ the king demanded.
Slowly, shaking her head bemusedly, Asrăthiel continued. ‘Maelstronnar house brownie claims unseelie attackers are goblinkind, escaped from caves.’ She looked up and stared at her audience. ‘Goblins? I thought they were all wiped out years ago. Surely the brownie is deluded. How could that sequestered wight be privy to such information, in any case, when better informed folk are in ignorance?’
‘Read on!’ Thorgild urged.
Eyes wide with astonishment, Asrăthiel continued, ‘Brownie terrified. Lethal force. Beware.’ Avalloc’s message, all the more alarming in its conciseness, came to an end.
Dumbfounded the three companions gazed at one another. The hilltop wind whistled through a crack beneath the closed door, whirled up the spiral staircase and rattled the windows in the tiny observation chamber overhead.
‘Goblins!’ Thorgild cried suddenly. ‘That was it, goblins! They were the only wights that ever associated with the fierymaned trollhästen.’ He laughed disbelievingly. ‘Odds fish! As you say, Asrăthiel, by all accounts those ridiculous imps were wiped out decades ago.’
‘It appears not,’ said the weathermage. ‘At least, my grandfather believes so, and I have never known him to blunder.’
‘They had their own eldritch slaves, as I recall,’ said Thorgild, pacing back and forth agitatedly as he sifted through his memories. ‘It is all coming back to me now.’
‘It makes no sense, if these riders are goblins,’ said Halvdan. ‘Such feeble and foolish manikins ought to be defeated with ease, yet they have proved beyond doubt to be dangerous.’
‘The Storm Lord takes the brownie at its word. He asserts they are both goblinkind and a lethal force, and I doubt him not,’ said Thorgild. ‘I am confounded, to think that all these years they must have been lying in wait in some hidden place, some cave, by Avalloc’s report. Yet this does arouse an indistinct memory . . . ’
Said Halvdan, ‘Why should the tales assert that they were all destroyed?’
‘Not all the tales gave the same account,’ said his father. ‘As I dwell more and more on this conundrum, it seems to me that I recall fragments, stories of another kind of doom.’
‘What doom?’ Asrăthiel asked.
‘Imprisonment. That fits with the Storm Lord’s account. Yet, it is all so hard to credit . . . ’
‘A lethal force, he declares!’ repeated the prince. ‘If these Tom Thumbs have escaped from solitary confinement, then it is possible they have grown stronger during their decades of isolation. Should that be the case, the weathermasters may be Tir’s only hope.’
‘Indeed,’ the damsel replied quickly. ‘Yet there is no news from those who are trying to rescue them. My kindred remain in the clutches of our enemy. May they return safely and swiftly!’ Her blue eyes appeared darker than usual.
‘How came the goblins to be locked into caves?’ Halvdan asked his father. ‘Can you recall?’
‘If reminiscence serves me well, it was the greatest weathermaster of yore who drove the wights under the mountains.’
‘Ah! So they can be defeated by lightning and hurricanes!’
‘It was not with storms he foiled them. It was with Fallowblade,’ said the king.
Asrăthiel glanced up sharply.
‘It is now clear why the trow population of Tir has been moving north,’ Thorgild went on. ‘They wish to serve the goblins, whom they traditionally viewed as their masters. Since Avalloc has discovered the truth with relative ease, others will soon find it out also, by questioning brownies, or urisks, or other seelie wights. Scholars will deduce as we have done, from the clues of the fire-maned steeds. Word will spread. Panic may spread also.’
Halvdan said, ‘Conversely, if word gets about that this influx of wights is of goblinkind, the fears of many folk may be lulled. After all, popular stories and puppet plays ridicule goblins for being puny and stupid and easily defeated.’
‘Let us hope those stories are true,’ his father said grimly. ‘Let us hope the Storm Lord’s brownie is mistaken.’ It was plain that the king nurtured few shreds of such hope. ‘Goblins are unseelie,’ he said, ‘They have always hated humankind—all the more so, no doubt, after the weathermasters jailed them. It is now evident that contrary to their reputation they are a formidable host. Somehow the
se goblins and their daemon horses—and probably their dreadful slaves to boot—have broken free from their centuries-old incarceration, and they have caught us unprepared. Who knows, but their plan might be to sweep across the kingdoms of Tir and slaughter every member of the human race! Your brownie, at any rate, Asrăthiel, implies they are bent on further atrocities. As soon as we return to camp I will order a forced march. Let us make short work of this other report and hasten away without delay.’
The weathermage shuffled the pages of Avalloc’s message while Halvdan perused the second bulletin, a brief note that had been sent from the battlefield by Prince William. As the prince commenced to read the contents aloud, one of the signalmen, ever vigilant at the view-windows in the room at the top of the stairs, applied a spyglass to his eye. He directed the instrument towards a neighbouring station, situated high on a remote peak across the valley. The distant semaphore’s arms were rotating. While the watcher described the code sequence his assistant transcribed it to paper, ready for deciphering.
Paying no attention to the activities of the signalmen above, Halvdan read: ‘Unseelie hordes unstoppable. Nor can we hold off southerners much longer. Look forward to your swift arrival.’ The prince folded the paper and slipped it into his satchel.
To the station chief, who was hovering near at hand in a state of agitation, Asrăthiel said, ‘Send Prince William a message informing him that the weathermasters cannot be found and that the Storm Lord names the hordes as goblinkind, broken loose from age-old confinement.’
The man bowed smartly.
‘Let’s go,’ said Thorgild. ‘There is no time to lose. Signalmen, remain at your post. We need no help relaunching the balloon.’
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