Springwar

by Tom Deitz

  Cold wind bit at him; he shuddered even in the ceremonial fur and armor they’d provided to mark him part of this expedition. Stars rode overhead, but no moons, which was one reason the attack had been mounted when it had. Kraxxi wondered what time it was, and when this would all be over. But more than that, he wondered about Merryn. He tried to catch her eye, but they’d bound her head in a padded vise so that she could only look toward the hold she had betrayed. Her mouth was gagged, but her eyes were open, held that way by clamps. A woman stood nearby, dripping water into them. It was Barrax’s idea, not Lynnz’s. Proof that a king could be crueler than any torturer.

  At least they hadn’t torched the place—not that it would burn anyway. Though full of fine wood, carpet, and tapestries, the bulk of the hold was thick stone. Even a major fire would be confined, though not its poisonous smoke, perhaps, or other noxious fumes. In any event, it had been four hands since the attack had begun, and resolution, if any, should be imminent.

  As if in reply, a flare rose from the central tower, exploding overhead in a burst of green and white. Proof War-Hold was, to Barrax’s satisfaction, taken.

  Kraxxi wondered why his father had bothered to put himself at risk to lead the attack. It was foolish and rash.

  But perhaps he was like Kraxxi. Perhaps he wanted a glimpse of the splendors their cold northern rival could produce during its forced confinement.

  All Kraxxi knew was that he was sick—at heart, and almost physically ill as well. He had brought this to pass. People he knew and liked were dead or dying. People who’d trusted him, who’d sparred with him, who’d given him books to read, who’d treated him like a kinsman and friend.

  All … dead.

  He closed his eyes to shut it out, but was jerked back to attention by the pounding of hoofbeats on the slope below. Dark shapes showed, moving across the muddy grass, shapes that slowly resolved into riders. Long before they arrived, however, Kraxxi had identified them, by the glitter of gold on weapons, helms, and armor, as his father’s personal guard. To his great surprise, however, they didn’t veer to the right, toward Barrax’s hastily raised tent, but galloped straight toward him, not stopping until they reached the ring of torchlight that turned trampled grass to molten gold.

  The king himself leapt down, tossing his reins to a groom with practiced nonchalance, then gestured to his companions. Kraxxi squinted into the glare. They were helping someone from a horse, it appeared. A prisoner, he supposed. But why …?

  His father had doffed his helm and was marching toward him. His face was sheened with sweat and his hair was plastered to his skull like paint. Blotches of darkness on armor and clothing hinted at more stains than smoke. All at once, Barrax was before him. He reached to his waist and drew out his sword, thrusting it beneath Kraxxi’s nose. Blood glistened on it, still wet for all it had been scabbarded. “The blood of Eron,” Barrax sneered. “Given to me by you—or by your lady, who followed you!”

  Kraxxi tried to close his eyes, to look away, but at a sign from Barrax, two of Kraxxi’s guards seized him, forcing his eyes open.

  Barrax grinned, and wiped the sword along Kraxxi’s throat—not to cut, but to mark him there.

  And then the king moved on to Merryn. Who ignored his taunts completely, as he repeated what he’d done to Kraxxi.

  “Enough!” the king barked. “Bring the prisoner.”

  Kraxxi followed the sound of movement to his left, and saw the prisoner being hauled to Barrax’s feet, a span to Kraxxi’s right. It was a woman, and not young, in rough clothing splattered with blood and permeated with the stench of smoke. Still, she must be important. Kraxxi tried to make out the shadowed face beneath the grime. No one he knew. Or maybe—She’d sat back on her haunches now, and he had a clearer view.

  Lorvinn! Warden of War-Hold. And Merryn’s kin. He saw her stiffen, heard a muffled cry of alarm he suspected she regretted, given what it might have betrayed.

  “Hold her,” the king snapped, and moved toward Kraxxi. “Release him!” he continued, to Kraxxi’s guards. “But keep him in chains. If he makes to escape, hamstring him.”

  At those words, movement seethed around him. Hands reached to unclamp his wrists and ankles from their fetters, leaving the manacles and joining-chains. But behind those who wielded the keys, he saw rank after rank of drawn swords and spears. And damn his father for it.

  “Give him a sword,” Barrax rasped. Then, when he saw a ghost of hesitation, he strode forward and thrust his own into Kraxxi’s hands. Confined by the chains, and half-numbed by the clamps, Kraxxi nearly dropped it. Certainly there was no way to strike at his father. Which he doubted was the intent in any case. But what—?

  “Bring him here,” Barrax spat, motioning Kraxxi and his captors toward the kneeling Warden.

  A flurry of confusion followed, and then Barrax himself eased beside Kraxxi and maneuvered him before the woman he once had known. Dimly he recalled how Lorvinn had looked down on him in judgment the day after he’d been brought captive to War-Hold. She’d tempered justice with mercy then. He owed her much. Or did he? If she’d had him slain outright fewer people would be suffering now. If only he could turn the sword on himself. But he knew he would be forestalled.

  “Kill her,” Barrax rasped.

  Kraxxi blinked at him. He’d heard the words, and they made sense, yet they carried no real meaning.

  “Kill her!” Barrax repeated coldly. “Or watch Merryn die a joint at a time as we march north.”

  Kraxxi closed his eyes, wishing this were all a dream—a nightmare, even. A delusion born of scorpion sting. Anything but what he would see when he opened his eyes again. But open them he did, when he heard the scrape of steel to his right.

  He saw Lorvinn looking up at him. Her face was smudged and streaked with smoky sweat, yet her eyes were calm. No accusation showed there, only calm resignation.

  “I can’t,” he choked.

  Barrax slapped him hard. His cheek stung. Blood filled his mouth from a cut cheek. “Kill her, boy, or Merryn dies!”

  Lorvinn said nothing.

  Kraxxi took a deep breath—and dropped the sword.

  Barrax grabbed it before it hit the ground, and forced it once more into Kraxxi’s grasp. But this time he didn’t let go. Rather, he stepped behind his son and with inexorable force secured his grip on the weapon—Kraxxi’s hand on the hilt, but Barrax’s hand on Kraxxi’s—and with slow deliberation, pressed the blade into Lorvinn’s breast. She recoiled reflexively—whereupon four men grabbed her and pinned her spread-eagled on the earth. Barrax wrestled Kraxxi forward until he stood above her, then, again, lowered the sword to her chest. Kraxxi tried to struggle, but to no avail. All he could do was try not to watch, try not to feel, try not to sense anything at all, as Eronese steel pierced Eronese mail and Eronese wool, and finally entered High Clan Eronese flesh.

  At least he was able to exert a tiny twist of control at the last, so that it was quickly over.

  Abruptly, the pressure was gone—as was the sword. He sagged back and would’ve fallen had hands not grabbed him and dragged him back to his chair.

  Barrax hadn’t moved. He was staring down at the first of what Kraxxi supposed would be many vanquished foes.

  And he was still standing there ten breaths later, when a low rumble jarred the land, quaking up through their boots, and making tent poles and standards tremble. Kraxxi glanced up at once, fearing—or hoping—that the fire mountain on whose knees the hold was raised was voicing its protest. Or that, perhaps, he might be about to witness a physical manifestation of the so-far mythical Eight.

  The rumbling increased alarmingly. An explosion lit the night. Fire was only part of it, however. Mostly it was pressurized steam released abruptly, as the untended heat plant beneath the hold did what Barrax himself had forbidden—and blew War-Hold-Winter, the guardian-gate to Eron’s southern flank, to flinders.

  Kraxxi watched numbly. They all did. Yet only when the sun rose did they grasp the true scope of the
devastation. The central keep was gone, and with it a length of wall across which it had fallen. Fire sparked here and there. Maybe some survived—on either side; Kraxxi doubted Barrax cared. The power of War-Hold was broken. Spring was in the air, and the north of Eron waited.

  Among those who rode out the following morning were a soldier named Zrill, who remembered someone saying in the bowels of the hold that they were fools, and a woman named Merryn, to whom breath itself was now a burden.

  With them, and two thousand others, went a packtrain filled with Eronese war gear and Warcraft cloaks and armor.

  Half a night ahead of them, a bleeding young man named Krynneth had also seen the explosion, but had not gone back to investigate. Rather, he set heel to the horse he’d found running wild outside the secret gate, and raced daylight and the armies of Ixti toward the High King of all Eron.

  CHAPTER XVII:

  MARKERS CALLED

  ERON: TIR-ERON: THE CITADEL- NEAR SPRING: DAY XXVII-EVENING)

  Avall was making lackluster sketches for a new royal helm—and doing even that without conviction—when he heard footsteps approaching the suite in the Citadel to which he’d been spirited after the incident in Eddyn’s cell. Officially, it was to protect him from Tyrill’s inquiries, but of course she’d found out anyway—or found out enough. Eellon had told her about the gem sometime back, but not having seen it, she hadn’t believed him until the Craft-Chief had reminded her that Avall’s arrival there in the middle of Deep Winter constituted more than sufficient proof that something untoward had occurred. The matter of Eddyn was more difficult, because no one but a handful of guards and the King had seen him. But Avall had been beaten. And Rrath was back at Priest-Hold, which couldn’t be denied, either. So Tyrill had been forced to accept that something had occurred, to which her Chief and her King were both witness. She’d also had sense enough to agree that the gem’s purported qualities were more important than intraclan rivalry, and was as alarmed as the rest at Eddyn’s sudden—and patently impossible—disappearance, though not necessarily for the same reason.

  Not that it mattered now, when someone was approaching—under escort, Avall assumed, which usually wasn’t good. At times like this, he needed Strynn and Rann, separately or together. Even Lykkon, to whom he’d grown much closer since his return, would do.

  But this was almost certainly either the King himself, or—

  “Chief,” he heard someone mutter without, and surmised by the rapid steps that it wasn’t Tyrill, who could barely walk since a certain escapade outdoors. Eellon, then, or Tryffon of Ferr.

  He rose automatically, dismissing the sketches with a disgusted shrug that was typical of his attitude these days. The first knock sounded as he found his feet. He snugged the ties of his house-robe and made for the door. “Open, boy,” came a voice from without. “It’s me, Eellon.”

  Avall breathed a sigh of relief. He shot the bolt and heaved the portal open, to admit his mentor. Alone, save for the inevitable Lykkon, who somehow managed to continue his studies at Lore and play squire all at once. A pair of guards remained outside: Myx and his former commander, Veen—who likewise looked to have attached herself to Eellon permanently.

  Eellon took a seat without asking. After giving Lykkon a perfunctory hug, Avall also sat. Lykkon opened a hot jar of cider, filled three mugs, then joined them, note-scroll in hand. He watched everything, Avall knew. Saw everything. Probably knew more than anyone in the hold except Eellon himself.

  Eellon looked tired—which was typical of him these days. Still, his eyes roved across the sketches as a cook might sniff odors upon entering a strange kitchen. “Not your best work,” he muttered.

  Avall shrugged. “Hard to care about something you’ve already done.”

  “Do something else.”

  “It was the best work I’ve ever done. But I need the gem—”

  “So you think. That only made it faster, so you said.”

  “It also gave me finer control. I—”

  “That’s for later,” Eellon sighed, accepting a mug from Lykkon. “I’m here now as your Clan-Chief, though without my robe and hood.”

  Avall raised a brow.

  “I need you to sit in Council tomorrow.”

  Avall shook his head. “I can’t. I—”

  Eellon slammed his mug down with a thump. “It isn’t a choice, boy. I need you there to support your King and your clan. I need you there to support me! I need you there as proof—as a distraction, if you must know.”

  “From what?”

  “Tyrill’s making her move, fool that she is. She claims she’s got proof of Gynn’s injury and intends to demand he step down.”

  “Even with the gem loose in the world?”

  “She’s decided to blame Eddyn’s disappearance on Gynn’s commission.”

  “That’s insane!”

  “So is she, I sometimes think.”

  “That will upset—everything.”

  “I see you’ve grasped the implications.”

  “But he’s not up for Proving until autumn. Even Tyrill knows that.”

  “He shouldn’t be, but Tyrill’s going to try to force the issue. If nothing else, she’ll have groundwork laid for Sundeath.”

  “Meanwhile Eddyn—”

  “Eddyn is the King’s problem right now. Nor does he need this distraction. Which is why we need another one.”

  Avall shook his head. “I … don’t know, sir. I’m—Dammit, Two-father, I’m just so—” He broke off and stared at his mug. “You have no idea how I feel, sir. Without the gem—Well, I had no idea how dependent on it I’d become. But it’s like … like losing one of my senses. Like I’m only half-alive.”

  Eellon slapped him. Not hard, but it stung. Lykkon looked up with a start. “I’m tired of this self-pity, boy. You made an important discovery and did a brave and very foolish thing that was still, probably, the right thing. And you’ve suffered a loss because of it, but that doesn’t mean you can play hermit for the rest of your life. Eight, lad, I see maybe a third as well as I did in my prime. I can’t half hear, and everything tastes the same. You’ve seen the braces I use to maintain the illusion that I’m still vigorous, and you know how much they hurt. All you have to deal with is the lack of something you didn’t have three eighths ago.”

  “It’s like being blind, then seeing,” Avall snapped back. “And then losing it again. Wouldn’t you be bitter about that?”

  “I’d be grateful it had happened at all,” Eellon retorted coldly. And rose. “I will see you in Council tomorrow, sitting by my side, in full clan regalia. Even if I have to drag you there myself. I’m sorry it’s come to this, but sometimes there’s no time for nicety.”

  “And what shall I say if I’m questioned?” “The truth,” Eellon sighed. “The time for lies is over.” And with that, he swept from the room. Lykkon lingered long enough to give Avall’s shoulders a comradely squeeze, then he, too, fled, leaving Avall to stare at indifferent drawings and wonder if he had once again attracted the eye—or ire—of Fate.

  (THE HALL OF CLANS—NEAR SPRING:

  DAY XIV—MORNING)

  “Slide your hood back a bit,” Eellon growled, as he and Avall prepared to enter the Hall of Clans for the latest convocation of the Council of Chiefs, which met every sixteen days throughout the year. “We need you to be recognized. People pondering rumors won’t pay as much attention to other things, if we’re lucky.”

  Avall tried not to glare at him. Eellon was right, in his way: Avall had played hermit too long. Meanwhile the world was as full of mysteries as ever, and none would wait on him.

  Eellon had timed his arrival carefully—with royal connivance, Avall suspected—so that most of the other Clan-and Craft-Chiefs were already seated when he made his way into the hall. It would be Avall’s first time on the floor; the last time he’d been here was as a first-time observer at the High King’s Proving, the previous Sundeath. He’d occupied one of the galleries then. But Chiefs were allowed aides
, and a certain number of adults rotated in and out of the floor seats regardless.

  The main difference Avall observed, as he followed Eellon down the carpeted marble of the particular spoke assigned to their clan and let the vast surge of stonework rise over him, was that the Stone on the dais was caged by a simple wooden throne.

  The King himself wasn’t present, nor would be until every Chief had deposited a ball in the counting chute beside his or her seat. Only when a quorum was tallied would he grace them with his presence.

  In the meantime, Avall tried to match Eellon’s dignity as he paced in measured steps toward Argen’s wedge. A hush followed him, vanguard of a murmur of surprise that indicated Eellon still had his flare for spectacle. Avall hoped it also meant that some of those present didn’t know he’d returned to Tir-Eron impossibly early. Unfortunately, too many people were accidentally privy to the odd events surrounding him, and even the King had no illusions as to the force of rumor. Or its accuracy.

  Tyrill was already seated in her accustomed place on the craft side of the clan’s section, nor did she stand when Eellon steered his way past half a dozen other mostly unoccupied seats to claim his own beside her. Avall took the one to Eellon’s right—officially, as clan scribe—and followed his two-father’s example in pulling his hood as far forward as it would go. “Regrettable,” Eellon muttered. “It’s supposed to symbolize the darkness of the ignorance that exists without debate—until the King comes in.”

  Barely had he uttered those words than the King arrived, clad in his cloak of state, and with the Iron Crown of Contention upon his hair, token, Avall supposed, of his mood. Two priests followed: Law and World, who would act as heralds and organizers. The King sat without fanfare. The Council followed his lead. After the usual welcomes, ritual blessings, and avowals of loyalty, truth, and service, he got down to business. Normally, those with matters to be brought before the Throne entered their requests with the heralds and were summoned forward in the King’s good time. Today, however, Gynn simply cleared his throat and announced, “Lady Tyrill, I understand you have a matter you would like addressed?”