War of the Misread Augury: Book One of the Black Griffin Rising Trilogy

by D. S. Halyard

  She was thankful to Felder for giving her the slippers, for they made much less noise in the forest then her riding boots would have. Making as little sound as possible, she crept toward the fire, and the welcome smell of cooked rabbit greeted her. Her dress was green, as were her slippers, and she was confident she could not be seen from farther away than a few paces. She tucked the dagger the Mortentian named Levin had given her into her sleeve.

  Through a gap in the trees she saw the yellow flickering of a ribbon of fire, and the smell of smoke grew stronger. She saw a square shouldered man standing by the fire, and he was wearing the worn livery of a Mortentian soldier. Reassured, she crept closer, and she saw another young man, a brown haired boy, really, sitting on a fallen log and picking the meat off of a bone. It appeared that the two of them had only the one rabbit between them, but she thought of the buck, knowing that most of the meat would still be there when Sentinel was done eating.

  “Here, what’s this?” Came a loud voice nearly at her ear, and she turned to find another young man standing beside her. He was dressed in ragged clothing but had a soldier’s broadsword in a military issue scabbard at his hip. The two men at the fire immediately ceased what they were doing and turned sharp eyes in her direction. The one in soldier’s livery drew his sword. “I found a girl! Ilos, Kelbin! Take a look here!”

  In seconds they had surrounded her. “Are you alone?” Demanded the one in the soldier’s clothes. She lifted her chin.

  “Yes.” She replied. “I am Lanae Brookhouse, and I am a king’s eye. I am on the king’s business.”

  One of the men, boys really, although they were all at least two or three years older than she was, gave a loud guffaw. “King’s eye she is! All dressed up like a farmer’s daughter.” He laughed. “Pleased to meet you, Madam King’s Eye. I’m Torri, the Baron of Poover.”

  “And I’m the Duke of Flana, so I outrank him.” Laughed the one in soldier’s clothes. Lanae saw that he had three broken teeth and at least a week’s worth of stubble on his chin. All three of them were dirty and unkempt. “Duke Ilos of Flana at your service. You may address me as Your Grace.” He gave a mocking bow.

  “I’m his right and holy majesty the Bishop of Dunwater.” Said the third, again with the mocking bow. “I bet you got a sweet little cunny.”

  If the one called Ilos cringed at the remark, the one called Torri grinned wolfishly. “Let’s have a look.” He nodded to the third man. “Get that dress off her, Kelbin. I found her first, so I get the first go.” He reached out and grabbed her arm, and Lanae stabbed him in the guts. Hot blood poured from that wound, but it didn’t stop Lanae. Four more times she stabbed him, just as fast and as hard as she could, and then he screamed and fell.

  The stabbing, as much as the high-pitched keening wail that proceeded from Torri froze the other two in their tracks, and Lanae turned and ran, stumbling over fallen trees and caroming against sycamore trunks, leaving bloody smears where her hands touched.

  Ilos looked at his fallen friend and ran to his side, cursing. Torri’s entire right side was drenched in blood, and a pool of it was fast gathering where he lay. “I’ll screw the shit out of her!” Kelbin declared, and he drew his sword to give chase. Ilos held onto Torri until he quit screaming, then wept, and then died.

  “Lio preserve us.” Ilos whispered. Then, in a louder voice. “That fornicating little cunt.”

  He got to his feet and joined the pursuit.

  Lanae knew nothing but to run uphill. Behind her, she could hear the one called Kelbin cursing and promising her that he would “fuck her ‘til she was dead.” She heard his sword slashing and clanging against tree trunks while he ran. She was desperate, and she was fast, but he was much faster. She could almost feel his breath on her neck as she ran.

  The light grew as she climbed, and the tree trunks grew farther apart. Her dress caught at every bramble and stone as she ran, and she fell, clutching the knife desperately. She spun around and Kelbin was there, sword in hand. “You fornicating little tease.” He said. “Get out of that dress and drop that knife, or I’m going to cut you down like the little whore you are!”

  Like all of the king’s eyes, Lanae had been extensively trained in combat. Bansher had schooled all of them in the use of fists, feet and daggers, as well as short bows and swords. She had spent many hours in the practice yard, but until today she had never actually hurt a person with a weapon. The thought of it stung her heart.

  But when she looked at Kelbin, all of her lessons came home with a sudden awareness that was like plunging into cold but familiar water. She came to her feet in a crouch, holding Levin’s dagger in her right hand and holding her left extended before her. Kelbin stood stanceless, holding his iron broadsword before him like you would hold a hammer, and she knew in an instant that he had no idea how to use it.

  “I am a king’s eye.” She warned him again. “I am on the king’s business. Run if you value your life.”

  Kelbin laughed at her, the silly little cunny. He was twice her size or more and he had a broadsword. He was less pissed about her killing stupid Torri than aroused by her perky little nipples beneath her damp dress. He stuck out his tongue and rubbed his crotch with his left hand. “I’m going to fuck you silly, little king’s eye.” He promised. “What are you, thirteen? I’m nineteen and my cock is hard as a rock. I’m going to split you open with it.”

  She sighed and let her shoulders slump downward in despair and surrender. He grinned and lowered his blade, and she pounced, slashing right to left across his forehead like Bansher had trained her. Then she spun out of his reach while a freshet of blood cascaded over his eyes, blinding him, just like Bansher said it would.

  “You twice damned bitch!” He screamed, and his hand went up to wipe the blood from his face. A moment she hesitated, torn between her desperate desire to flee and Bansher’s training, then she struck again, hard, opening up the side of his neck and beginning the inexorable process of draining his blood. ‘If once you start it, you’d better finish it.’ Bansher said, and she did him proud.

  Kelbin screamed loudly, for she had not hit his windpipe or voicebox, but in seconds, he was weakening. He fell to his knees.

  “Damn you!” Came a voice from just below. “You’ve killed them both!” Ilos held his sword before him in a basic fighting stance, his posture telling Lanae that he at least had some training. He came on carefully, ignoring Kelbin’s dying and inarticulate pleas for help. Any fool could see that Kelbin was beyond help, his entire front covered in blood, and vigorous, hot spurts of it shooting from his neck.

  One look told Lanae that although he may not have had her training, Ilos had enough. His size, combined with the much longer reach of the broadsword and the armor under his soldier’s tabard, boiled leather though it was, made him an impossible opponent for a skinny fifteen year old girl armed with only a dagger. She turned and ran, trying vainly to hike up her skirt so she didn’t trip or fall.

  Ilos stalked her carefully, like he would have stalked a deer, but swiftly too. He didn’t want her getting away. He wasn’t a fool like Torri or cockblind like Kelbin, but he knew enough to know that he couldn’t let her escape to tell others about a deserter hiding in the Whitewood. She was smart, he thought, for instead of trying to continue up the hill she cut across it at a slight angle, making it a relatively equal contest of speed between them. But Ilos could run, and he knew he would catch her up. He wasn’t going to fool around with trying to get her out of her dress, neither. He meant to have her head off.

  A shadow fell across him and he felt a strange impact from behind and a sharp, stabbing pain in both of his shoulders. Suddenly he was moving, very, very fast, down the hill, so fast that his feet came off the ground. A great dark shape like a gigantic bird loomed above his head and he tried desperately to bring his sword up, but his shoulders would not work right, and all he accomplished was a terrible pain and an ineffective flailing with the weapon. He saw the tops of trees rushing toward him and he
forgot his sword, letting it spin to the ground as he raised his hands to protect his face. Suddenly he was above the trees, and they were falling away beneath him. His mind and body became instantly aware of how high he was above the ground and his bowels let go while he clawed desperately for purchase at the talons stabbing into his shoulders.

  King’s eye, she’d said, and they had mocked her. He felt a fool.

  Then Sentinel let go. Ilos screamed louder than Torri had until he hit the rocky place, ninety paces below, where the great eagle had decided he would drop him. Although Lanae never knew it, only his legs and spine were broken, and it took him a day and a half to die. For much of that Ilos was awake and in agony.

  When Lanae reached the top of the hill, she found the body of the buck. She whistled hopefully and Sentinel appeared, landing gracefully beside her. She checked his plumage and made sure he was ready for flight, then wiped her hands on her dress and climbed onto his back, regretting the mess she had made of Felder’s daughter’s clothes.

  She was a king’s eye on the king’s business, and suddenly she was no longer afraid.

  Strangely sated and docile, Sentinel obeyed her commands exactly, and as the bottom of the bright red sun shone beams of crimson across the belly of the overhanging clouds, she saw the city of Nevermind glowing in the distance, and made her way to the eagles’ landing there. She would be there well before full dark, and she knew the masterfarmer would be waiting.

  Chapter 45: The Celebration and Tales

  “Listen, Levin Ghoulslayer, I must talk to you.” Jarlben approached Levin while the Thimenians were finishing their looting of the Brizaki ship, some of them refusing to stop even as their prize was heeling over and filling with water, daring the Father of Kraken to drown them as they swam inside of it. Levin was sitting on the deck of the longship with his tired head between his hands, and the sky had grown overcast. A light mist was falling.

  “Yes, Jarlben?” Levin looked up.

  “Good, you are awake.” The Thimenian replied. “So, Levin, who has the heart of a Thimenian and the balls of a gnat, Levin who let the naked girl go and did not fuck her or take her for thrall, I must tell you, you have made things bad for us. You see, when that eagle flies to Mortentia, he will go to the town of Nevermind, and that naked girl will tell them there is a longboat here. They will all climb into their ships and come hunting us, so we must go.” Jarlben did not look particularly upset as he spoke, despite the hard words.

  “We would usually go ashore and divide the plunder, but now we must sail to the Island of the Long Look and make our evening camp there. We do not have the time to put you onto the shore of Mortentia, so you must come with us or we must drop you into the sea and let you swim to shore.”

  Levin saw that it was a good half mile against the wind to the rocky beach, for while the fighting had been going on the prevailing wind had pushed the two ships away from it on a falling tide. “If you decide to swim to the shore, we cannot give you a share of the plunder, and most likely you will drown in the current, so I think to come with us will be better.”

  Levin sighed and nodded his agreement.

  “Good!” Said Jarlben. “I will call back the men and we will go.”

  The wind was behind them and the red sail was full. The Thimenians had found several casks of wine in the Brizaki ship, and many were drinking as they rowed. Jarlben did nothing to prevent this, and as drunk as they got, the longship continued to move across the sea on a line that did not drift to starboard or port.

  The wound on his hip still itched and troubled him a bit, but it was not serious, and Levin dozed fitfully, still riding as a guest in the front bench of the longboat. Jarlben stood at the front of the vessel, only occasionally having to lift a hand one way or the other to direct the rowers. When they were five miles or so away from shore the Thimenians shipped the oars and let the sail do the work. Many of them either slept or passed out on the benches, the spaces between which were full of plunder, the bulk of which was Brizaki weapons and armor.

  When Levin awoke again the sun was well past the nooning and he looked to the front of the vessel to see the profile of the Lost Ladies Islands rising from the sea. He yawned and saw that Jarlben was dozing where he stood. “I thought we were camping at Long Look Island.” He said to no one, but Jarlben turned and looked at him, his eyes bleary from drink and lack of sleep.

  “Aye.” Jarlben said. “And there they are.” He nodded toward the islands.

  “Those are the Lost Ladies.” Levin observed and Jarlben gave a mighty laugh.

  “The Lost Ladies.” He chuckled again. “Yes, that is what the Mortentians call them. Listen, Levin, and hear me well. I will tell you the true tale of those islands. I heard this from my grandfather, for he was there, and he is Thimenian and does not lie.”

  “Jaager One-Eye had a longship that was one hundred paces long and he had one hundred men. This is coincidence, not some storyteller’s trick. Anyway, like any good and honest Thimenian, Jaager came reaving the Mortentians in the late part of summer for he wanted to make his fortune. He was standing at the mast looking about as they came upon these islands, and he saw two perfect teats on the beach.”

  “There was Maritsa, and she was a Mortentian countess or duchess or princess or some such thing. She was in the habit of walking half naked on the beach. When I say half naked, I mean the top half, and so that was the half with her teats showing, you understand?”

  Levin smiled and acknowledged that he did.

  “Anyway, she was lying on the beach with her teats getting sun on them, and she was lying on her back, so all Jaager saw was these two perfect teats like tiny pink hills. He lifts his hand and tells the rowers to stop, for he thinks the Sky Father is giving him a vision. Well, this makes some noise or something, and this Maritsa, she wakes to see a Thimenian longship fifty paces off shore, and there is Jaager One-Eye the ugly with his eye patch and his red beard, and she looks at him a long time. I mean, it is a long, long look she gives him, you understand?”

  Levin nodded when Jarlben turned to grin at him.

  “Good. So Maritsa jumps up and screams, like she is supposed to do, being a good Mortentian woman, but this is after the long look. Jaager’s blood, it boils in his veins. Here is a gift from the Sky Father, a woman with perfect teats and a beautiful face who gives ugly Jaager the long look, and he knows he must have her.”

  “Jaager says to his men, ‘we must take this island. Sheo, the great Sky Father, has given me a vision.’

  “The men, they are wise in the way of war, and they speak to Jaager. ‘There is a fortress there and we do not have enough men to take it.’ But Jaager, he is the thane, and he has the command. With thoughts that they will all soon see the Sky Father, the Thimenians put their longship on the beach and make ready for war.

  “Well, what do they find? The stupid Mortentians, they have builded a great big house right up against the walls of the fortress! Jaager sees this thing, and he says to his men, ‘You see? Sheo has given us the means of victory. The stupid Mortentians have builded a house by their outwall.’ The men with Jaager, my grandfather with them, must then agree with Jaager that this is a gift from the Sky Father.

  “So they put their war shields over their heads and they enter this house, which is empty because all of the Mortentians have fled into the fortress like they do when they see us coming. Not a single man is killed by the Mortentian arrows, and Jaager says this is more sign that the Sky Father means to give him the perfect teats.

  “Inside of the house my grandfather is sniffing the wind, for he knows that all the Mortentians must do is to burn the house, and they will kill all one hundred Thimenians, but by the grace of the Sky Father the Mortentians are too stupid to think of it. They mine under the wall and Holy Mother of Kraken, they are in the fortress!

  “So, what comes next is what you would expect, they kill all of the Mortentian soldiers and take the women and the girls for thrall, but that is not the end of the story.
Not one Thimenian has lost his life, and Jaager knows this is still another sign from Sheo. He comes to this Maritsa, and he says, ‘you are the one who gave me the long look. You I will have for thrall.’

  “Maritsa says to him, ‘you may take me thrall, and I will serve, but if you make me wife, I will give you seven strong sons and you will be master of a steading of your own.’ Jaager knows that this is what the Sky Father’s gift is to him, and he agrees, but she has a condition. She says to Jaager, ‘not only must you take me for wife, but also every girl here must have a husband, and none of them shall be made thrall.’”

  “This makes the Thimenians object, for such a thing has never been heard of. Most of the women there are very beautiful, you see, for they are all princesses or duchesses or countesses or whatever, but there are serving maids who are as ugly as a broken femur also.

  “But Maritsa, she has demanded this condition, Jaager has accepted, and so they must find Thimenian husbands for twenty seven Mortentian women, all because of the long look she gives to Jaager. And that is why we call these islands the Islands of the Long Look.”

  “Did she give him seven sons?”

  “Nine. And his steading is a very strong one. He made a Tolrissan thrall carve a statue of her perfect teats, and her grandsons caress them for luck before they go reaving.”

  The sun was setting when the Thimenians made landfall on the wide white beach. They built fires and settled into groups around them, singing in their strange and guttural language, and Levin drank wine until he could no longer stay awake. The sound of the surf gently caressing the sand was the last thing he heard that night, and he slept, dreaming of Elithea Britic and a pair of perfect teats.

  On the morning after the raid the reavers, no longer drunk but certainly not yet sober, unloaded the longship of plunder and divided it among themselves. Levin’s was half a share, which amounted to a full suit of Brizaki armor and half a talent of silver, in the form of a jewel-encrusted goblet, some coins and two pretty daggers made of Brizaki steel. It was actually quite a bit of wealth. He bundled it all into a large canvas sailor’s bag. Then they returned to their fires and settled into loose groups of twenty or so. In these early hours tight muscles sagged and relaxed as the keyed up warriors began to savor the victory of yesterday, among the broken trophies and piles and bags of plunder.