Gorgoroth (Haladras Trilogy Book 2)

by Michael Karr

  “I found a tunnel,” he told them. “And there’s a faint light coming from it.”

  “I hope it leads to the kitchen,” said Endrick.

  The tunnel proved to be a pipe. A narrow pipe, but wide enough that they could crawl through. A shallow stream of water ran along the bottom of it. Nothing sufficient to hamper their going. It did serve to remind them of the ostensible source of the stench, which incessantly burned their nostrils.

  About twenty meters into the pipe and Skylar began to see clearly the source of the light. The end of the pipe. As best he could discern, the pipe looked out into the night sky, dark but touched by the light of Gorgoroth’s moon. He also saw a form which he couldn’t be sure of, but dampened his hope of escape. After another minute of crawling, he no longer doubted. The entrance—or in their case, the exit—to the pipe was blocked by a grate of bars.

  “Please tell me those are giant sausages,” said Endrick from behind.

  “Not unless you like gnawing on rusted iron,” replied Skylar.

  “At this point, I’m willing to try.”

  They had come all this way, traveled from Ahlderon, been kidnapped by smugglers, sold as slaves, suffered deprivation, wallowed in hunger, all for this? To find a sister who wanted him dead and then to die trapped in a castle sewer trying to get away for her.

  In sheer malice, Skylar beat at the bars with his fist—as if this would punish them for their offense. To his surprise, the bars let out a sharp screech. Had they budged, ever so minutely? Without hesitation, he sat back, brought his legs to his chest and kicked against the bars with as much force as he could produce. Again, the bars screeched as they budged even more. He kicked a second time, then a third. On the fourth kick, the bars broke free, falling from sight.

  The end of pipe extended a few meters over the great chasm which helped to guard the castle. Without much difficulty though, they managed to climb out and onto to the top of the pipe. From there, they crawled to the safety of a rocky ledge in the face of the chasm. They were free of the castle, but still on the wrong side of the chasm. The servant girl, for the first time, showed that she was not entirely useless. She knew of some switchbacks which led down the face of the chasm and back up the other side. These they followed slowly, fearing to move too quickly in the dark. And after several hours they reached the top of the other side.

  It was near dawn by the time they reached Wenna’s dwelling. Wenna was awake when they arrived; she responded too quickly to their rap on the door to have been asleep. She hurried them inside. No sooner had she bolted the door behind them, than the little old woman fixed her attention on the servant girl. Wenna’s eyes were as wide as the moon outside. She approached the servant girl, who looked nervously from side to side.

  “I never thought I’d see that face again,” said Wenna, taking the girl’s hands in her own. “I thought you were dead.”

  The girl looked as confused as Skylar felt.

  “I...I don’t know you,” the servant girl stammered out.

  “No,” replied Wenna warmly, “but I know you. You’re the princess.”

  Thirty-one

  The frightened girl shook her head emphatically.

  “No!” she cried, sounding as if she were pleading for help. “I am just a serving wench.”

  Floorboards creaked behind them. Grüny Sykes appeared on the threshold from the other room. He looked at the girl, face screwed up.

  “Is that her?” he said.

  Endrick laughed. “Skylar only wished it were her. This one—unless she’s hiding something—doesn’t want to serve his head to the empress.”

  “We don’t know for certain she’s my sister,” replied Skylar. Though, his voice lacked any conviction when he said it.

  “What madness are you two rambling about?” said Grüny.

  “The princess,” said Skylar with a sigh. “She claims she’s my sister.”

  “What princess?”

  “Of Gorgoroth.”

  “What!” exclaimed Grüny. “That’s the biggest nonsense I ever heard.”

  Skylar nodded his head. “I know it is. Maybe…she just wanted to fool me?”

  “Calm yourselves,” said Wenna. “Come in by the fire and warm your bones by what’s left of the fire. This poor child is shaking from cold. Then, I shall try to clear up this confusion.”

  The old widow ushered them into the next room, where she saw that they huddled around the fire. Then she served them each a hot cup of an herbal infusion which reminded him of a drink his mother had often made when Lasseter had visited their home in the Gorge. The infusion helped soothe his troubled thoughts. It also made him think of his father. What would he think of all this? Part of Skylar felt glad his father wasn’t alive to know what had truly become of his stolen daughter.

  Wenna wrapped a thin blanket around the servant girl’s shoulders and gave her extra attention to ensure she was comfortable. Perhaps never before had this girl been shown any such tenderness. The girl looked anxious, as though she expected a hand to strike her at any moment.

  Skylar looked back toward the far side of the room, where the door to Wenna’s bedchamber stood. The door was closed. Kendyl must be asleep. He felt a twinge of pain that she hadn’t stayed awake to see them—to see him—return safely. Did she not care? Good. He tried to convince himself that this is what he wanted.

  When Wenna finished fretting over her guests, she eased into her own chair, took a sip from her cup and began to speak.

  “I do not believe Princess Shahra was trying to fool you,” she said. “Oh, no. I’ve known for many years that girl which the people hail as The Fair One, The Future Empress Supreme, the Princess Shahra Hira Minka, Gift from the Gods, is no daughter of the empress. For here sits next to me the only one who can claim that birthright.”

  “But I am just a serving wench,” protested the girl.

  “Be that as it may, that is not what you were born as.”

  “How can that be?” said Skylar.

  “A secret. One which I have guarded for these eighteen years.”

  The old widow then recounted all she knew.

  “Many years ago, I was midwife to the empress when the true princess of Gorgoroth was born.”

  Skylar looked at the old woman in disbelief. But Wenn only nodded and kept on talking.

  “The baby girl’s father was the Prince Consort of Gorgoroth, Volkrev Darkes. He and the empress were married seven years before she conceived her first and only child. By that time, Volkrev’s fidelity had begun to waver. He had grown an obvious interest in the daughter of a powerful land baron. She was young and fair, and exceedingly wealthy. So, just a month before the princess was to be born, he left the empress and wed the baron’s daughter. He likely broke several laws doing it, but none dared to accuse him, least of all the Empress. For she still loved him.

  Months later, Volkrev was killed in a skirmish, after a dispute over land broke between his new father-in-law and a neighboring ward lord.

  “During this time, the baby princess was born. The heartbroken empress named her Shahra Hira Minka. A name which means blossom of pain. I was there to deliver the infant girl. But the Empress, still grieving and smarting from her husband’s betrayal, despised the baby, for she represented the offspring of a spurned love. The empress did not so much as hold the baby, but commanded I to hold the baby up so she could see its face. There was a touch of sadness and longing that flashed in the empress’ eyes when she beheld the babe. It lasted but a moment. With evident pain in her voice, she declared that the baby looked too much like Volkrev, and command that the baby be taken away. She never wished to see it again.

  “For fear of what the empress might do to me because I delivered the child, I fled from the castle and from the capital city. For ten years I stayed away, never knowing what became of the baby. I believed that the empress had had the child killed. Three years later, talk of the princess began to spread to every corner of Gorg
oroth. This gave me hope that the empress had accepted the child after all.

  “After those ten years passed, I returned to the capital. Though eager to behold the little princess with my own eyes, I dared not return to the castle. Several more years passed, and I heard little else of the princess. Then one day the empress and her daughter rode through the city streets in a procession honoring the fifteenth birthday of the princess. From a distance, I caught my first glance of the child since that dreadful night long ago. In a moment, though, I knew that it was not the same child I had delivered. The baby’s hair had been jet black, like her mother’s. This girl before me had auburn tresses. Nor did her face resemble Volkrev’s.

  “And that,” said Wenna, with a deep breath, “is all that I know.”

  “Could the empress not have given birth to another in the time you were away?” asked Skylar.

  “If she did, it was never spoken of. But I do not believe it is so. The empress never remarried.”

  “You can’t be sure that this is the same girl, though,” said Grüny. “She was just baby last time you saw her.”

  “I never forget a face,” Wenna replied earnestly. “In all my years of midwifing, I’ve never failed to recognize one of my babies when I see them grown.”

  “But,” she added, “if you truly want proof, I recall that baby princess bore a pronounced birthmark on her back, just above the shoulder blade—I can’t remember which shoulder.”

  All eyes turned to the servant girl. Despite the blanket, she still shivered.

  “But, I don’t have a birthmark,” she stammered.

  “How do you know, child?” said Wenna kindly. “When did you last look at your shoulder in a mirror?”

  The girl bowed her head.

  “May I?”

  Wenna stood and brushed the girl’s dark hair aside so that it cascaded down one side of her face. The girl flinched at the touch.

  “It’s alright,” said Wenna. “I’m just having a look.”

  Hesitantly, the girl loosened the lace of her blouse near her throat. Then she pulled the neckline over, baring her right shoulder. Wenna held the blanket up, so as to provide some privacy for the girl. Then she inspected the girls back.

  “Yes, there it is,” she said. “Just as I remember it.”

  Skylar stood and moved to see for himself, but halted short.

  “I’d like to see,” he said. “If it’s alright with you.”

  The servant girl nodded.

  Skylar went to Wenna’s side. He didn’t exactly know why, but he hoped that there would be no birthmark. There it was, though. A palm-sized discoloration in her skin, shaped like a malformed heart.

  Then, it was true? Did this evidence prove inconclusively that this girl was not a serving wench, but the true daughter of the empress? If so, then claims of the false princess could be true.

  “If she is the real princess…” began Skylar, but stopped, unable to articulate his thoughts as confusion rattled his brain.

  “Why is she forced to be a serving wench, and knows nothing of her true parentage?” said Wenna, attempting to give voice to his thoughts for him.

  “Yes. And why did the empress—if it’s true—replace her own daughter with the princess of Ahlderon, my sister?”

  Wenna bobbed her head sympathetically, as she adjusted the girl’s blouse to cover her shoulder again. She returned to her seat and lowered herself into it.

  “I suspect,” she said, after taking a sip of her infusion, “that the empress rescinded her order to have the baby taken away. After the fatigue from childbirth subsided, she felt a mother’s pang of longing for her child. She called for the baby. Still too proud to truly accept the baby as her daughter—yet desiring to keep the child near—she put the baby in charge of one of the nurses, to be raised as a servant in the castle. Thus she could keep her daughter, yet not hurt her pride by accepting her as her own.”

  “That’s fascinating story,” said Grüny. “Still, it doesn’t explain this lunatic idea that this imposter princess is actually Skylar’s sister. Lunacy!”

  “It’s not lunacy,” replied Skylar quietly after a few moments. “It makes perfect sense. I don’t like to admit it—to realize it. Who’s the heir to the Ahlderion throne?”

  “You are, of course.”

  “No. It’s my sister, if she’s indeed alive. What better way to crush your enemy than to kidnap the heir to their throne as a child, raise her to despise her own people, then use her to take control of their kingdom.”

  “You think the empress intends to use your sister to steal the throne from you? No one would let her. She’s a Tor.”

  “She has birthright claim to the throne. None can deny that.”

  “Great!” cried Endrick. “With your sister as queen, I’m sure things can only get better for Ahlderon. Can I put in my letter of resignation now?”

  “She can’t just waltz right into the Ahlderon and take the throne,” said Grüny. “We won’t even allow a Tor ship to enter Ahlderon.”

  Skylar shook his head, staring vacantly at the fireplace.

  “I don’t think they have any intention of waltzing in. They’re planning an invasion.”

  Skylar proceeded to tell of his discoveries from the empress’ study about the Trackers and the letter from General Karíknof about the troops and fleet of shuttles.

  “Trackers!” exclaimed Endrick, when Skylar had recounted all he knew. “Just what we need. Do us all a favor, next time you have that snake Morvath in your grasp don’t let him slither away. Chop of his head.”

  “The only sensible course of action,” said Grüny, “is to get back to Ahlderon as soon as possible. Our commuter frigate departs tomorrow morning. I’m sure we have sufficient funds to convince any captain to let a few extra passengers on board.”

  Skylar bowed his head. “Yes, I was must leave. Ahlderon must be warned. I’ve kept my promise to my father—as best as I can.”

  * * *

  The streets were calm as the companions navigated their way to the docks. Skylar’s heart felt strangely heavy at the prospect of leaving now. Perhaps it was sadness over leaving Wenna. Or from the harsh reality they’d discovered about his sister. Or that the Tors planned to attack Ahlderon in a matter of days.

  The servant girl, whose name they finally learned was Icca, had wished to stay with Wenna. The old widow would care for the girl as her own daughter. She planned to keep Icca hidden away in her humble dwelling until she deemed it in safe to leave the city. Together, they would form a new life far away from the castle. Though Skylar offered to take them back to Ahlderon, Wenna had no desire to leave her homeland, however bleak it may be. Instead, Skylar left some money for them. He felt it the least he could do for this woman, who out of complete selflessness, gave them safe harbor when their lives were in peril.

  At the port, their way was blocked by a horde of people outside the entrance gates. The crowd appeared on the verge of becoming a mob, many shouting angrily as they shook their fists in the air. Through occasional breaks in the crowd, Skylar caught glimpses of armed guards holding back the throng. Some of the crowd simply turned and walked away. Grüny grabbed one of them and demanded an explanation.

  “The empress,” said the man, “she’s closed the port. All commercial and private vessels are grounded. No one knows when they’ll open again.”

  Thirty-two

  Rolander checked the door latch to his bedchamber. Locked. He was not surprised. It had been locked the last five times he’d tried it. Why was it locked, though? Just like Krom’s claim, it didn’t make sense.

  He returned to his workbench where he absently fondled his mechanical hand. The marvel of human engineering was nearly complete. All five fingers were assembled now, their tiny motors and actuators ready for calibration. That’s all which remained for the device to be operational: fine-tune the finger motions to ensure proper mimicry of the human hand. Once that step was performed, the hand wou
ld be fitted onto Rolander’s nub, and the electrode arrays inserted into his muscles. This last part always made him cringe to think of. Electrodes, implanted beneath his skin. A requisite process for the hand to replicate the behavior of a natural hand. He understood that. He trusted Jonobar. Anyone else, and talk of electrode implantation was out of the question.

  He trusted Jonobar.

  Should he trust Jonobar? Krom had called him Morvath. A defamation which Jonobar did not refute. Then there were the Tors. What dealings did Jonobar have with them? Rolander knew of the illegal tea. That was a simple thing. Consorting with the enemy was viewed as high treason on Ahlderon. That Jonobar would do such a thing…simple, disheveled, academic Jonobar…the idea was preposterous. Jonobar and Morvath could not be the same person. Then again, Jonobar understood that Tracker quite well for one who is not an expert in automata. Of course, he didn’t build the Tracker himself. None knew how to do that save Morvath alone. Unless Jonobar truly was Morvath…

  A sudden rap at the door made Rolander jump. The rap was followed by the rattling of the lock. Then a clink and a squeak as the door swung open. A man dressed in a dark robe stepped into the threshold. The man’s brown hair, cropped short, was highlighted with streaks of gray. His face was clean-shaven. Rolander had never seen the man before in his life.

  “I don’t expect you to recognize me without my beard and hat,” said the man.

  Rolander knew that voice. But it didn’t belong to this stranger who stood before him.

  The man stepped into the bedchamber and closed the door behind him.

  “I know how you must be suffering,” said the man with Jonobar’s voice. “We men of science and learning like to be in control of the facts, the data. We want to be able to explain our world through theorem, formulae, laws of matter. No physical law, however, can explain away my true identity.”

  “Then you admit that you’re Morvath?” replied Rolander, quietly.

  Jonobar bowed at the waist, flourishing his hand in the air as he did so, just as he’d done when Rolander first met him.