‘Rumour has it that Zaravaz was not buried with his knights in the golden caves,’ the feminine newsmongers tattled. ‘Some say he roamed free, but with his powers bound by some mighty enchantment.’
‘We’ve heard he rules a stupendous palace made of ice, somewhere in the heights of the north,’ they prated. ‘A charmed fastness guarded by deadly wights, where no man dares venture.’
Always the chatterers spoke in tones of disapproval, tut-tut-ting and shaking their heads, but they could not leave their theme alone, and an uninformed observer might have surmised that they could not wait to set eyes on the infamous goblin king, though they avowed, vehemently and repeatedly, that they hated him and wished him wiped out of existence.
Asrăthiel could not brook such gossip, nor did she have time for it. Most of her waking hours were spent overseeing sky-balloon transport, piloted by inexperienced crew members, ferrying passengers who had never in their lives flown through the sky. When she had a spare moment to herself her thoughts would stray to grievous or disorienting matters; she felt the approach of doom; she longed for her sleeping mother to revive before the end so that at least she might embrace her and say farewell; she fretted for her father and ached with sorrow for the betrayed Councillors of Ellenhall.
She bled, too, for little wanton Crowthistle and the terrible deed he had obliged her to do. Why had he wearied of the world, when it was filled with endless wonder? How could she have missed any clues to his despair, she who had believed she knew him as well as any human being could hope to know an eldritch wight? Had she understood the depths of his despondency she would have tried everything possible to cheer him. Was it possible she had been at fault in some way, perhaps unwittingly contributing to his sadness? Now, none of these questions could ever be answered.
At whiles her musings did alight, too, on the subject of the women’s gossip, but she never allowed them to remain there for long. I dismiss ruffian losels from my scope. They are unworthy of attention. Notwithstanding, she once asked Avalloc, in passing, if he knew aught about the reports of the goblin king’s enchantment.
‘It is true he was not entombed in the golden caves,’ he replied. ‘His sentence was a different form of imprisonment. The weathermasters bound him with unimaginably potent chains of gramarye, rendering him harmless, unable to use his powers. That much I have learned, but if there is more it will have to wait. No doubt there will be ample record of it in the archives, somewhere, but I have not yet had sufficient leisure to delve amongst the tomes, and the scribes have been inundated with urgent matters.’
Happier than Asrăthiel was one of the lesser druids in the sanctorum of Cathair Rua, he whose baffling task it was to engineer fresh—and increasingly bizarre—prophecies to be proclaimed by his seniors. On receiving the latest news from the battlefield he leaped about in glee, claiming to have accurately predicted the entire sequence of events; though when pressed he was forced to admit that if one put a finer point on the matter, there was only one truly apt phrase in the augury to which he referred: ‘Thrice upon the moors will they gather.’ Taken out of context it might have referred to the confrontation between unseeliekind and the race of men, but the phrases precedent and antecedent made that conclusion a moot point:
‘When the flaccid vole drops off the old oak sundial,
Thrice upon the moors will they gather,
And the half-baked loaf will be downtrodden . . . ’
It took enormous effort to meet the demands of the goblin knights, and on occasion Asrăthiel dreaded that they would not fulfil the conditions before the arrival of the deadline. Albeit, by the specified night the task was completed. For the third occasion—and, everyone understood, the final one no matter which way the dice fell—Asrăthiel waited with her companions at the southern edge of the Wuthering Moors while twilight gathered.
It was a warm evening. Solemnly, with fast-beating hearts, the luminaries of Tir assembled, in the knowledge they faced possible sacrifice. No common soldiers escorted them; instead they were attended by a vast concourse of military officers, and courtiers, both men and women; the attendants of royalty. The dead had long since been carried from the field, and wonderfully, even in those few short weeks, the brutalised heather, the trampled gorse and bracken had begun to spring afresh, sprinkling the heath lands with a haze of palest green. Purple tufts of crowthistle daubed the leafy carpet. Pale pink and white moths fluttered like petals of apple blossom through the Summer dusk, and the firmament glimmered a luminous shade of sapphire, darkening to foundered amethyst.
Upon the steps of a decayed and roofless oratorium Prince Ronin kneeled, surrounded by his closest companions and courtiers, whispering pleas to the Fates to be kind to his father. A handful of senior druids stood upon the raised floor of the ruin, enclosed by an open palisade of jagged pillars in varying heights. Led by Primoris Virosus, they were intoning a chant. As the sun’s last radiance struck the sides of the columns, striping their rounded grooves with apricot and saffron, another noble company approached. It was the entourage of Princess Solveig Torkilsalven; she who had been betrothed to Ronin’s brother Kieran. Side by side, prince and princess knelt on the corrupt stones in the posture of submission to higher powers, pleading with the Fates to be lenient with the people of Tir. Clouds of tiny wings, like flickering scraps of confetti, wove in and out of the stone palisade.
Watching that fair assembly illuminated by topaz light, amongst the mossy ruins and the pastel drifts of moths, Prince William said softly to Asrăthiel, ‘Solveig and Ronin plead for help from an invention fabricated by the druids. But what else is there to do?’
‘Aye,’ said the damsel, tenderness in her glance as she gazed upon the scene. ‘Ronin is aware of the Sanctorum’s power plays, yet he has crossed the brink of desolation. The ritual gives them some comfort.’ Meeting the eyes of the comely prince she murmured, ‘My grandfather maintains, “Even false hope is better than none.”’
Dragging a cloak of darkness behind it, the sun sank out of sight. The flying insects vanished like candle flames. Little watch fires sprang up amongst the tents, and the first hours of darkness began to stretch agonisingly on the rack of apprehension. From horizon to horizon the heavens arched above the open acreage of the moors, a bowl of black crystal encrusted with startling glints and meteor flashes.
Before midnight there was no sign of the goblin knights, and then quite suddenly between one blink of the eye and the next, they appeared in the distance. As before, nobody had actually witnessed or heard them approaching. As before, their trollhästen and kobolds attended them, and their inky owls soared above like leaf shadows; as before the numinous knights were arrayed in sable and silver, and glistening diamantes of pure frost. Their hair was almost silk-straight, though with the hint of a sweeping wave. Impossibly, they seemed more beautiful than ever, and those who had never set eyes on them gaped, thunderstruck, while those who had seen them earlier were awed afresh by their excellence.
He rode once more at the forefront of his cavalry, Zaravaz the goblin king. Women sighed when they beheld him. So far beyond handsome was he, that they knew not what to do, and were rendered speechless. He was tall, perhaps six feet two inches in height, and strikingly well made. With utter poise and composure he sat his steed. Vitality and effortless grace imbued his every movement, and when once he turned to look back across the echelons of the knights who followed him, something glinted behind his head—a plain silver clip shaped like a pair of upswept wings clasping the profuse storm cloud of his hair.
As for the immense crowd who had gathered at the command of Zaravaz, they mounted their horses or boarded their chariots, from which all golden embellishment had been stripped, and went forth to meet him with a great clatter and jingle but rarely a word. There were few other human folk who dared to stay and watch, if they had not been summoned. The goblins’ reputation for pitiless savagery had fired their hearts with terror. Soldiers, peasants, ordinary folk; most had broken camp or abandoned thei
r abodes to take flight far away from the moors, looking for a place to hide, in a desperate attempt to escape a tragic fate.
Tied with silken cords, Uabhar, worn out and sunken, sat astride a chestnut mare; to his left rode Conall Gearnach; to his right, Prince Ronin. With them went the two remaining kings in Tir, Warwick and Thorgild, with their sons and daughters and high-ranking office-bearers, and Queen Saibh, and Queen Halfrida of Grïmnørsland, and even Chohrab’s widowed queen, Parvaneh; Duke Rahim and Shahzadeh, Princess Royal of Ashqalêth; Lord Avalloc and—on foot—Lady Asrăthiel Maelstronnar. Primoris Asper Virosus and all the most venerable druids of Tir were amongst that assembly, along with Cuiva Featherfern Stillwater, the White Lady of the Marsh; the carlin Lidoine Galenrithar and a company of her sisterhood; the Duke of Bucks Horn Oak; Lord Genan of Áth Midbine; the principal aristocrats and knights of all the realms, and numerous other influential persons besides.
And when they had all gathered before the goblin king upon his pyrogenic steed, Prince Ronin dismounted, fell to his knees upon the wiry foliage blanketing the ground and bowed his head, saying, ‘Lord, behold your humble petitioner,’ at which the prince’s loyal Slievmordhuan retinue seethed with repressed outrage to see their liege thus humiliate himself at the feet of anathema, their frustration exacerbated by being curbed from so much as stirring a finger to right the wrong. Most of them averted their eyes, unable to countenance the scene.
‘I am the uncrowned king of Slievmordhu,’ said Ronin, ‘and therefore of political value to you. I beg of you, permit me to take my father’s place as ransom.’
The maleficent leader said not a word in response to this entreaty, but Zauberin, insolent first lieutenant, replied, ‘You try our tolerance. It was stipulated that ransoms must be surrendered to us without argument or haggling. One more word in this vein will put an end to our patience and the covenant will be forfeit.’
At some negligent signal from the goblin king one of Zauberin’s unseelie brothers-in-arms came forward, saying, ‘Know me as Zerstör, second in rank of the king’s lieutenants. The terms have been set, Ronin Ó Maoldúin. Seek to argue again, and we shall communicate no more with words, but only with swords, and a far greater delight it shall be to me and my brethren, I assure you.’
Ronin’s followers glowered and clenched their fists impotently, burning with wrath at this ill treatment, but the prince merely rose to his feet mutely and stood beside his horse.
Then Uabhar lifted his dishevelled head as if it were as heavy as a millstone and spoke, saying disparagingly to his son, ‘You would try to make a hero of yourself at my expense. I would rather have perished in the dungeons than pander to your self-glorification.’
‘Father—’ the prince’s agony was piteous to witness. He struggled to convey his thoughts; clearly it was a tremendous effort. ‘Father, you are too harsh on me,’ he continued, ‘for I have never been aught but a dutiful son. My intentions are honourable, though I acknowledge I have my faults. Perhaps you could value that in me and do likewise.’
It was the first time in his life he had come close to criticising his father.
Uabhar stared condescendingly at Ronin and made as if to speak, whereupon Fergus, who had been standing nearby, his chest heaving with fury, broke in, ‘You old canker! You are so raddled with corruption you can no longer even recognise purity. My brother would give his flesh for king and country, yet all you can do is mouth insults.’
‘Get away,’ Uabhar spat, ‘you are no son of mine.’
‘Enough of these family squabbles,’ Zauberin snapped, making a threatening gesture, but Uabhar managed to throw in one final barb for his ungrateful progeny.
‘Much good may it do you to wear the crown of Slievmordhu,’ he said bitterly to Ronin. ‘You might as well fall on your sword. Virosus has cursed the royal lineage, father and son, for all time. You will never thrive, for all your swaggering and posing.’
After that, Prince Ronin withdrew into silence, but the look on his face was the look of a man pierced by a blade.
As for Asrăthiel, to her own dismay she found herself barely able to respond to the troubles of Ronin. Her attention was drawn inexorably to the goblin king. Now that she was closer to him than ever before, she let her gaze linger upon him as long as she dared, capturing every detail.
His presence was mesmerising. He looked to be aged somewhere between twenty and thirty-five Winters, yet he was immortal, of course, and must be thousands of years old. His hair, pouring down his back, was intensely black, shot through, here and there, with a sheen of blue iridescence, like the colour on a butterfly’s wing or a peacock’s feathers; not a pigment but an effect caused by the way light was reflected from each hair shaft.
And such eyes.
Their colour was, of all colours, deep violet, like a rage of storms. Dark were the lashes, and smudged with a fine black line along the roots; no cosmetic but a natural colouration, a contrast that only enhanced his arresting looks. He seemed fashioned of midnight and moonrise, flame and ice. So achingly beautiful was he that to look upon him for too long was to abandon hope.
Asrăthiel wrenched away her gaze.
‘I will take three of you,’ said the goblin king, ‘as tithes.’ He had spoken for the first time, and the sound was thrilling. His voice was clear and penetrating, like the vital song of fast-flowing rivers; not as harsh as the tones of his brethren, but rich and velvety in timbre. By contrast, the words he pronounced were keys winding up the springs of human dread to their uttermost torsion, despite that he had just alleviated their fears that hundreds might be claimed as captives. Goblins had proved highly unpredictable. Each mortal listener wondered: Will it be me? Will it be someone I love?
‘Three ransoms for four kingdoms,’ said Zaravaz. ‘You get one free. I can be generous.’
‘The King of Slievmordhu is one of the three you asked for,’ Avalloc said formally, indicating the scowling prisoner. ‘The Sylvan Comb can be found within the purse at his belt.’
All attention turned again upon Uabhar, who glowered from his saddle.
‘If ’twere I who was taking hostages I would as lief have second thoughts,’ scoffed Zauberin. ‘That one is as long-faced as a horse at a wake.’
As if prompted by its rider’s intention alone, the daemon horse of the goblin king walked lightsomely over to the chestnut mare on which the abdicator was seated.
‘Uabhar Ó Maoldúin, have you any gold about you?’ Zaravaz asked.
The object of unseelie scrutiny had lost the cool demeanour that had possessed him when he humiliated his son. The Lord of Wickedness addressed him now, and Uabhar quaked in his boots. He seemed too frightened to frame a reply, but Avalloc said, ‘We divested him of all his gold, as requested; his rings, his buckles, his cloth-of-gold linings.’
‘While I doubt not your word, Lord of Storms,’ said Zaravaz, ‘I wonder if you are mistaken. Uabhar, have your teeth ever rotted?’
‘I have no gold in my mouth!’ Ó Maoldúin blurted impetuously. ‘Leave me alone, you profane thing, you creature of darkness!’
‘Certes, man, I would like to verify your report.’ Zaravas gave a sign to a nearby kobold, who sprang onto the back of Uabhar’s mare like some enormous cat pouncing on its prey and pulled the rider to the ground. The imp was wielding a huge set of metal pincers. Uabhar howled with rage and fright as the grotesque creature forced his jaws apart and rummaged in his mouth, but the goblin knights burst into merry laughter.
‘Since your tongue has proved so discourteous to me just now, Uabhar,’ said the goblin king, ‘I should by rights ask gentle Nidhogg to tear it out and teach it a lesson.’
Pausing in its exertions the kobold looked inquiringly at its master while its victim writhed and moaned in its grip.
‘But then we would be deprived of the sweet music of your pleadings, so perhaps later. Shut his head,’ said Zaravaz to the kobold, who obeyed and jumped off Uabhar’s chest. ‘Any nasty surprises in there, Nidhogg? No? Then it is w
ell for you, Uabhar, that your ivory champers are in fine fettle, else my little vassal would have been bound to loosen them.’
The humiliated wretch, once the perpetrator of deeds such as this and worse, shrank into himself. Towering over the fallen man on his trollhäst, Zaravaz looked him up and down, as if amused by some secret joke, and then said, with a slight smile, ‘Let there be a test for those who would be permitted to enjoy goblin company. Answer me this question, Uabhar Ó Maoldúin. If you were running in a footrace, and you overtook the person running second, in what place would you find yourself?’
Targeted by such an unexpected inquiry, Uabhar flinched. For a while he said nothing; it was evident he was striving to overcome his terrified disconcertment and concentrate on solving the quiz.
‘There is a time limit,’ Zaravaz said mellifluously.
‘I believe it to be a trick question,’ Uabhar managed to gasp.
‘Yet you must answer, now.’
‘First!’ the man shouted shrilly. ‘I would be first!’
‘Wrong,’ said the goblin king. Aiming one long, beringed finger at Uabhar he added, ‘Therefore you must come with us, after all!’
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