Frank-KWar

by Kynyr's War [lit]

  He poured another small glass of the rum that Malthus had given him. Claw appreciated the smooth, sweet taste of the amber liquor, the sensual way that it clung like syrup to his palate and throat. He wished Kynyr would get home. The more his health worsened, the more Claw felt as if the reins of power in his own home were slipping from his grasp, and only Kynyr stood between him and disaster.

  Malthus stopped at the door and looked in at him. I'm going into the village. Is there anything you wish me to bring back?"

  Claw waved him off. Nothing at all. The liquor was the best present you could have given me."

  "I'm glad that you think so. It's a pleasure to see you enjoy it."

  Malthus walked on and Claw was left once more alone.

  Belgair came in and sat down at the table beside Claw. How are you feeling?"

  "Fine, Claw lied.

  Belgair picked up the bottle of Ildyrsetti rum and examined the label. That's a legendary year."

  Claw nodded. You want some?"

  "I'd like that. Belgair fetched himself a glass and poured a measure from the bottle. He sipped his drink a moment. I didn't come to make small talk, Claw."

  "I didn't think you had."

  "I wanted to talk about Merissa."

  "No, you didn't, Claw grumbled. You've come to talk about Sheradyn's saying I'm going to be dead soon."

  Belgair knocked down his drink and poured another. I didn't want to put it that way."

  "Don't dance around the issues, Belgair. It irritates me. Claw refilled his own glass.

  "The children will need a suitable regent to run the estate for them. Malthus can't serve."

  "Thank the gods for that."

  "You don't like him."

  "I don't."

  "Why? He's a good mon, Claw."

  "Just because I don't. Hair sprouted along Claw's arms in irritation. I wanted Merissa to marry her own kind."

  Belgair gave a small nod of acquiescence. I understand. You'll have to choose a lycan to be regent until the babes that Merissa is carrying come of age."

  "I already have."

  "Who? Belgair lifted his eyebrow.

  "Brock."

  "Psssah! He hasn't been seen in nearly ten years and he went eighty without being seen before that."

  "Brock will come."

  "I doubt that Fianait could bear to have him here. My father says she threatened to kill herself over it."

  "Brock is a good mon."

  "Brock cocked-up his own sister. Some say he raped Fianait. You really want someone like that raising your grandcubs?"

  Belgair's statement hit Claw hard, and his chest tightened painfully.

  Fianait had admitted years ago that she had used an arcane aphrodisiac to force her twin Brock into a sexual relationship, but people still blamed his brother for getting her pregnant. A side effect of the potion, which she had gotten from a shrine to Ishla, had nearly killed Brock. As a result, their father had thrown the Ishlanan priests out of the valley and torn the shrine down. Old Suleahan Redhand tried to clean up the disgrace by exiling Brock and forcing an abortion on Fianait. The result destroyed Fianait and left her emotionally and physically fragile.

  Claw's lips curled back and his eyeteeth looked wolfish. Are you suggesting yourself?"

  "I'm doing most of it already."

  "I want my own flesh and blood looking out for my grandcubs."

  "Claw, this is a bad decision."

  Claw's face flushed and he smashed his fist on the table. Don't argue with me! My mind is made up. I want Brock. Sharp pain lanced through the chieftain's chest. Claw's face went from bright red to pasty white. Help me back to bed and fetch Sheradyn."

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  BATTLE OF THE SCARLET PETTICOAT

  After getting as much information as possible from his scout reports, Kynyr decided to attack at dawn when most of the prostitutes and non-combatant employees of the brothel would be gone to bed. Fighting room to room at close quarters had enough inherent complications, that he did not wish to add somewhere between thirty and forty terrified whores into the mess. Fergus wanted to go in and kill everyone as he had done at the Green Sheaf, but Kynyr had overruled him.

  Odds were that at least some of the prostitutes had been Silkie's girls; and Kynyr felt that he owed it to Silkie's memory, since he had been unable to save her, to save as many of her girls as he could. Silkie had run her brothel like a fiefdom, protecting her own against all threats.

  They moved into position at moonset. Darcy and her bitches took out the sentries and patrolling guardsmyn. Units were set in place to catch anyone attempting to escape after the action began. All the lycans had changed to hybrid form, but Kynyr's myn were the best-armed, armored, and trained thanks to Todd.

  Kynyr, at the head of his personal guard, hit the front door. Three guards in the foyer looked up as the door crashed inward. Kynyr gutted the first one before his sword could clear leather, glanced, and saw that Finn and Erskine had already eliminated the other two. Two doors opened to his right and a third to his left. Acting on his gut instinct, Kynyr went right and his myn followed him while the Sharani units took the left and the second right.

  * * * *

  Fergus, his axes bloody, checked rooms as he went.

  Kynyr could bloody well complain later, but Fergus MacFie had no intention of taking chances and leaving anyone alive in his path. They were all guilty by association.

  The bedroom he entered contained a prostitute. She screamed and tried to wedge herself between the back of the bed and the floor. Fergus popped her between the eyes with his axe and jerked it free oozing with bits of gray matter and blood. He wiped it on the bedspread and went on.

  The bedrooms thinned out and he began finding empty offices.

  Guards started appearing and Darcy bolted past Fergus to engage the nearest one.

  * * * *

  Jondries burst into Heironim's quarters with a dozen soldiers at his back. He had his blades buckled on and a loaded crossbow in his hand. They've found us."

  "Tell me something I don't know. Heironim went to the weapons rack, loaded two crossbows and hung them from his harness with a quiver of bolts, settled an array of knives on his waist, his harness, and his arms. We're getting out of here, Alex."

  "I don't know how they found us, said Jondries.

  "Doesn't matter. Heironim made one last adjustment to his harness and started walking with a crossbow in hand.

  He gathered his myn and headed down the corridor to the back door.

  "What do we do?"

  "We get out of here, Alex. That's what we do. The game is lost."

  A lycan appeared in the corridor.

  Heironim shot him, and paused to reload. One of his soldiers shoved a blade into the wounded lycan's throat and finished him off. Then they went on.

  "Where do we go? Sidera's?"

  "Northeast. Try to link up with Egidius."

  * * * *

  "Bloody hell, Darcy! Don't get so far ahead."

  Fergus trotted down the corridor with his soldiers trying to overtake her, but the scent of blood and death had brought out the wolf in her and she was in hot pursuit of a fleeing enemy.

  Darcy overtook the Waejontori in an intersection of hallways, and slammed her sword into his back. She kicked him off the blade and turned as Fergus caught up with her.

  Fergus glanced down the hallway just as a group of armed myn appeared led by a tall, broad-shouldered sa'necari and a lean spindleshanks of a mon. The crossbows in their hands registered.

  "Bloody hell, get back, Darcy. Fergus stepped between her and the approaching soldiers. He grunted as a bolt hit him in the stomach, staggered and started to fall. A second bolt caught him in the shoulder. He struck the wall and slid to the floor, settling in a seated position with his back to it. Fergus fingers dug vainly at the chain mail around the bolt in his belly, as a howl of anguish ripped from his throat, which the lycans called the death scream.

  Fergus vision grayed, his
head settled sideways onto his left shoulder. Then his shoulders sagged, and his hands slid to either side of him.

  Darcy stared for an instant at her fallen cousin. Fergus."

  His name caught in her throat, waves of emotion rushing through in her rapid succession. Grief and guilt melted into rage. Bloody sa'necari."

  The MacLachlan soldiers faltered at seeing him fall.

  Darcy rallied them with dire imprecations and they engaged the enemy.

  The two leaders broke free of the melee and started past Fergus. Desperate to take one of them with him, his fingers closed upon his axe and his blurring vision focused upon Jondries thin legs. Fergus chopped into Jondries back with all his failing strength.

  Jondries shrieked, spun, and plunged his sword into Fergus chest with a twist.

  Fergus face screwed up into a grimace, his lips parted, and he stilled.

  * * * *

  Covered in golden fur, Kynyr fought his way down the corridor in hybrid form, as were the rest of his myn. Only in hybrid form could they hope to match the stronger of the sa'necari. They had finally stumbled upon the most heavily guarded sections, which could only mean that Lord Heironim Traxton and Alexander Jondries were nearby.

  He arrived at the intersection of corridors in time to witness Jondries driving his blade into Fergus before following Heironim through the back door.

  "Bastards! Kynyr bolted for the door with Finn at his heels.

  Finn scooped up Fergus axe.

  Hair the color of cream and honey coated all the exposed surfaces of Finn MacIver's skin. They emerged into the frost killed gardens that offered little concealment. Finn, take the skinny one. Be careful. The way he shrugged off Fergus blow. They're both steeped-in-death."

  Jondries had left a trail of blood on the flagstones that veered left. Finn took off after him.

  Kynyr scanned the paths and noticed footprints leading ahead and right, breaking the brittle patches of frost on the ground. He overtook Heironim near the rear walls of the garden. Twelve feet of gray and black mottled stone blocked Heironim's flight. A gilding of frost left the gold and orange cobblestones slippery, melting along the edges of the autumn killed grass. Leafless oaks and maples raised stark brown fingers into the air, sprinkled through with white pines. Wooden benches stood scattered, some beneath the trees and others fronting the path. Boulders, placed for artistic effect, pressed close to rose bushes gone dormant for the winter.

  "Turn, bastard. Kynyr stepped off the path, taking in all the potential obstacles and every thing that might offer him a tactical advantage. I'm Kynyr Maguire."

  "Maguire. Heironim smirked. Finally."

  "Lord Traxton, I presume?"

  "The name of your death, prince."

  Heironim unsheathed his broadsword and lunged at Kynyr, his amaranthine eyes glittering as he swung. The differences in their styles showed immediately. Heironim relying on sheer brutal strength and hammering ferocity; Kynyr defending and attacking with an elegant economy of motion, unfazed by the novelty of a sword-wielding sa'necari.

  The shock of impact as their swords met revealed that Heironim's strength matched Kynyr's hybrid own. Heironim's blows might not pierce his kendaryl corselet, but a solid strike would break Kynyr's bones beneath it.

  "I killed your friend. Heironim sidestepped a blow aimed for his head and thrust at Kynyr.

  Kynyr parried, rage heated his veins, but intellect cooled it to ice. Which one?"

  "Cullen. Heironim retreated before a furious attack and launched his own.

  "Bastard."

  They danced across the garden amid the hedges and rocks, pushing each other to their limits.

  "I nailed him to a chair ... after breaking his arms and legs."

  A cold shiver ran up Kynyr's spine and words came into his mind out of nowhere, found their way to his tongue, and he spit them at Heironim as if at the promptings of a ghostly whisper. I killed Ellie."

  Heironim lost control with a shriek mingled equally of grief and rage; throwing everything he had at Kynyr without thinking, desperate to damage the wolf.

  Kynyr changed tactics, jumped onto a bench and struck hard at Heironim's head. Their swords met. Kynyr locked Ladyfaith against Heironim's blade and forced it up, and then kicked Heironim in the chest and sent him stumbling.

  Springing from the bench, Kynyr struck swiftly, coming at Heironim from all directions in quick succession before Heironim could recover his balance. Every time Heironim's blade became entangled with Kynyr's own, the wolf kicked him.

  Gradually, Kynyr's assault forced Heironim to back up. Heironim's foot struck a decorative boulder and he went sprawling onto his back on the wet ground.

  Before he could rise, Kynyr grasped his sword in both hands and drove it into Heironim's belly. The sa'necari's chain mail parted like warm butter beneath the force of Kynyr's inhuman blow.

  Heironim shrieked. His sword slipped from his hand as his fingers gouged the soft earth. He bucked and writhed.

  Ladyfaith began to hum and glow.

  Heironim convulsed, screaming. A white mist flowed from his lips as Ladyfaith forced his body to expel all the pieces of stolen souls that had given him his power and strength.

  Kynyr released the hilt, leaving it standing in Heironim's belly, and stared, unable to believe what he was seeing.

  Out of the mist a feminine shape formed. She reached out to Kynyr.

  "You are the true and only prince. You are the King of the Wolves."

  "The curse..."

  "Is not a curse ... it is a prophecy. Ask the boy with the book."

  She faded away to nothingness and vanished.

  * * * *

  Finn tracked Jondries by the trail of blood, the Sharani longsword with its hand and a half hilt held ready, glinting in the frosty morning sunlight. The blue-violet kendaryl blade bore a maker's as distinguished as that of Kynyr's Ladyfaith: the minor god worshipped by the dwarves, Gimligloikynen. So far as anyone had been able to determine, it had no name, although it was common knowledge that Gimligloikynen had always named his master blades.

  As the splashes of blood grew farther and farther apart, smaller and smaller, Finn knew that the sa'necari's healing gifts had kicked in and started closing the wound. Steeped-in-death is right.

  A scream followed by a whimper drew Finn around a stand of evergreens and he saw Jondries crouched over a scantily clad female, his fangs deep sunk in her neck. She must have been one of the whores who had fled the fighting only to end up as Jondries dinner and healing elixir.

  Blood would heal the wound that Fergus had given him. Finn darted across the distance separating them, determined that Jondries would not heal himself.

  "Get off her, bastard."

  Jondries eyes slitted sideways as he dropped her. He limped toward an arbor, the curved and interlocked trellises bent above a low bench. The marked limp betrayed the fact that Jondries had not had time to drink deeply enough to heal himself.

  He climbed through the arbor as Finn knelt to check on the female. She was dead.

  "Damn."

  Finn snarled and climbed through the arbor after Jondries. Beyond it lay a postern gate, rusted solid by years of disuse. Jondries pounded on it, trying to force it open.

  As the sa'necari turned at the sound of Finn's arrival, the lycan chopped into Jondries side with the axe, re-opening the half-healed wound, and jerked it free.

  Alexander Jondries shrieked, twisted to face Finn, and his gaze fell upon the kendaryl blade.

  "It won't help you, wolf. Jondries sneered, lunging to the side as he brought his sword to guard. I'm steeped-in-death."

  For a moment, they faced each other.

  "Alexander Jondries?"

  "Yes."

  "Finn MacIver. Finn's lips curled back from his teeth in a wolfish grin. Amos says you rited little Sainy."

  All of Claw's guardsmyn who frequented the Three Candles Inn had been fond of Sainy. Finn had known Sainy since she was eight years old, a laughing, happy c
ub always eager to help; and watched her blossom into lovely young bitch.

  "I did. Filthy little beast ... like fucking a dog."

  If Jondries was hoping to provoke Finn with that remark, he was doomed to disappointment. Todd had trained Finn well. Finn assessed the terrain of the garden as he circled Jondries, taking in the decorative boulders and benches, the leafless rose bushes with their thorns. Sa'necari wielding swords instead of their baneblades and spells would take some getting used to. Finn watched Jondries free hand for signs and gestures that would tell him a spell was being readied.

  Jondries favored his right side as he launched a darting attack upon Finn. The wolf retreated, dodging to the right and forcing Jondries to put his weight on his injured side. Finn came about with a forward lunge. Jondries parried, his weight came down too hard on the right and he stumbled.

  Recovering his balance, Jondries fled and Finn pursued. Their course paralleled the high stonewall encompassing the garden. Jondries had to be looking for another exit. A long hedge forced Jondries to veer from the wall and head back into the garden.

  Finn closed with him, striking again and again at the right. Jondries snapped into garde stance, executed a lunge, and followed with a circular cut.

  Finn took a gliding step to the side and dropped to the ground avoiding Jondries slashing riposte. One hand on the ground, he thrust hard and his blade hit Jondries in the belly, knocking the wind out of the sa'necari and breaking the links on his chain mail.

  Jondries staggered back, gripping his stomach as blood leaked through the broken links. Rage and shock mingled in Jondries eyes. The kendaryl blade had not gone deep, but it hurt. He plunged through an evergreen bower.

  Screams came from the other side. Finn followed, his sword extended and Fergus axe readied. Two children crouched behind a bench, their backs to a hedge. Jondries reached for them, his fangs down, and his eyes glittering with blood hunger, determined to heal himself.

  Finn smacked Jondries in the right with his sword. Jondries pivoted on his left leg, his limp had worsened. The children bolted from behind the bench. Finn moved to block Jondries pursuit of the youngsters.

  "You're not getting them."

  Jondries backed away, snarling wordlessly.