by Garth Nix
‘If it is not too late,’ observed Hundred. ‘We have perhaps tarried here too long already.’
‘You can’t leave us with Sceam, that …’ Eleanor fought for a fittingly cutting phrase. ‘… that slimy cumberwold!’
‘We will not,’ Egda promised her, reaching out to pat her shoulder. ‘He will be dealt with tonight, once the moon has set.’
‘Do you have a plan, sire?’ asked Runnel, standing point-down at Eleanor’s side, her ruby gleaming a soft blood-red. ‘More detailed than my brother’s, I mean.’
‘I do. We need six able-bodied volunteers. Master Symon, can you enlist them to our cause?’
Eleanor’s father nodded. ‘I could find a dozen without taking as many steps.’
‘Very good. Light footfalls would be valuable, also.’
‘Understood, sire.’
‘Hundred? Settle on a rendezvous point while I address our knights and their swords.’
Egda turned to Odo and Eleanor as Symon and Hundred conversed in hushed voices.
‘Sir Odo, Sir Eleanor: Tonight, we fight for Lenburh, as you have fought bravely once already. I have no compunction concerning your courage when called upon to act in the teeth of the moment, but with forethought … and in consideration of your tender age … I wonder if you might prefer to watch this battle from the gallery.’
‘Not fight with you?’ Eleanor couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘Don’t be mad – I mean … sorry, sire … but we’re knights, not shirkers!’
‘Our place is by your side,’ Odo agreed with a vigorous nod.
‘I t is kind of you to worry, sire,’ said Runnel. ‘Although they may be young, Odo and Eleanor have drawn blood against beasts with two legs as well as four.’
‘The dragon Quenwulf herself decreed them knights in truth,’ agreed Biter, sweeping back into Odo’s hand and lifting his arm in a salute. ‘We are your eager servants!’
Egda nodded, the corners of his lips turning up in a smile. ‘It seems I have little choice in the matter. Against noble hearts, one rarely does. You will follow Hundred’s lead as we advance together on the manor house. Together, we will do what must be done – and quickly, ere Instrument Sceam and his lackeys recover from their long journey. Those who break the rules of chivalry do not deserve chivalry in return.’
He paused, then added, ‘We must refrain from killing anyone, if we can. They are in some sense servants of the Crown, and though greedy varlets, they do not deserve to die.’
At sun’s fall, Eleanor’s father and the others gathered behind a hedge near the Dry Well. Hundred kept watch as Symon made introductions. He had brought along the six largest men and women in Lenburh, Odo’s mother and the baker among them, all with their staves. Odo wondered at Elmer being there, but decided that against a common enemy, all were united. Besides, the baker was as strong as Odo from carrying sacks of flour.
‘Sir Odo, Sir Eleanor, Hundred and myself will lead the assault,’ Egda explained. ‘We will enter from the rear, subduing and restraining any guards we find. You have your lengths of rope, Eleanor, Odo? Good. Symon, you and your stout allies will take positions in the grounds to ensure all exits are sealed from within and without. Reinforcements must be stalled, and none must escape to spread the word of what happens here. Remember, knock them down, but refrain from killing if you can.’
‘Understood, sire,’ said Symon.
‘Four against seven?’ said Elmer. He had the good grace not to add, ‘one of them blind and two of them children?’, for which Eleanor gave him credit. ‘What if you run into trouble?’
‘Then your aid will be invaluable. Listen for Hundred’s horn. If you hear it, come running.’
‘Aye, sire.’
Symon daubed his face black with charcoal to hide better in the darkness, and in a few moments he had attended to the others.
Hundred returned.
‘All clear,’ she whispered, her breath little more than a breeze in the night.
‘Very well,’ said Egda. ‘We begin.’
Biter and Runnel slipped silently from their sheaths and joined their knights in readiness. As Symon and his six strong-arms slid off into the darkness, Hundred took the lead, moving in a rapid crouch towards the estate. Odo followed, watching his tread carefully to avoid dry twigs. Eleanor came after him, nearly as quiet as Hundred, and behind her, last of all, Egda, moving with confident stealth, his hood tugged low over his face, well used to the darkness that impeded the others.
An owl called ‘Who!’ as the four humans passed beneath her branch. Swivelling her head from side to side in case their footfalls disturbed any cowering mice, she suddenly froze, then launched with deadly speed into the air. An instant later, there came a tiny, short-lived squeak, and she flew to her favourite perch to eat her first snack of the evening.
There was a guard posted to the rear of the manor house, a long-limbed woman who had nodded off with her chin propped up on the cross-bar of her boar spear. Eleanor looked around for Hundred, but she had disappeared. Seconds later she darted out of the trees and brought the guard down with one hand across her mouth and a forearm tight against her throat.
The guard struggled for a minute, then fell unconscious. Odo and Eleanor bound her limbs while Egda tied a gag across her mouth. Hundred took the boar spear and the guard’s dagger away and hid them in the bushes.
‘Gag, bind, remove weapons,’ she whispered.
Odo and Eleanor nodded. Hundred made it look easy, but both knew it wouldn’t be. Odo felt Biter shift in his hand, and held the sword tighter. Biter might well need to be restrained from delivering killing blows.
As soundless as a shadow, Hundred opened the door and eased inside.
Eleanor went next, wishing her mail didn’t make so much noise. Odo could hear nothing over the sound of snoring that issued from the interior of the manor. The main hall, it quickly became clear, had been taken over by Sceam’s entourage. Six sleeping figures sprawled on their bedrolls, lit by flickering candles and the remains of a fire. Sceam was the closest to the warmth, curled into a ball.
Odo tallied up the numbers and concluded that there must be another guard at the front door.
Hundred held a finger to her lips and tiptoed among the sleeping figures, removing weapons from their owners with the dexterity of a pickpocket. The collection of daggers and swords she quickly accumulated went behind a tapestry that lapped down to the flagstones behind the front door.
Then she pointed Odo at one guard, Eleanor at another, and made a clicking noise with her tongue next to a third, which Egda followed to position himself close to that sleeper. They all sheathed their weapons and readied lengths of rope.
With everyone in position, Hundred held up three fingers, closed one, then another, and then, with the last, suddenly seized the sleeper in front of her as the others did the same to theirs, swiftly trussing them up like livestock, wrists tied to ankles.
This was done so quickly that by the time their confused shouts had woken the last two guards, Odo and Hundred had already finished their first lot and were onto them. One guard sprang up with a dagger, but Hundred gripped his wrist and twisted his arm until he shrieked and fell to his knees, dropping the weapon. Odo simply clapped the one who came at him on the shoulder blade, sending him straight back down again. Both were tied up in a moment, as Eleanor and Egda closed in on Sceam, who had gotten wrapped up in his cloak and was struggling to free himself.
Eleanor bent down and pulled the cloak away. Sceam’s head popped out, his expression outraged.
‘How dare you! Guards! Guards!’
The front door burst in, admitting the single remaining guard. But Odo and Hundred were ready. Hundred tripped the guard and Odo fell on him, one knee pinning him to the ground as Hundred removed his sword and they both tied him up.
‘You can’t do this!’ screeched Sceam. ‘I am an Instrument of the Crown!’
Hundred drew a shining leaf-shaped blade and held it up in front of the Instrument,
moving the knife slowly back and forth.
‘Who … who are you?’ asked Sceam nervously, his eyes following the glint of the blade. ‘What do you want?’
‘Remind him who you are, Sir Odo, Sir Eleanor,’ Egda said.
‘We’re the knights of Lenburh,’ said Eleanor, drawing herself up to her full height. Possibly this was less impressive than she intended, as she was shorter than Sceam.
‘And we don’t take kindly to being told we’re no longer needed,’ added Odo.
‘D-did I say that?’ Sceam said, nearly babbling. ‘I’m s-sorry I gave you that impression—’
‘Ceremonial, you said.’ Biter leaped out of his scabbard, evading Odo’s attempt to grab him. The sword swung in a lethal arc until his tip pointed directly at the Instrument’s fast-beating heart. ‘The word leaves little room for ambiguity.’
Sceam’s eyes widened at the sword’s short speech, but he seemed less afraid of the sword than he was of Hundred. His sharp eyes had spotted that his guards were tied up, rather than lying dead. Clearly his enemies were afraid of doing any real damage to persons of his importance.
‘You don’t know what you’re dealing with,’ he spat. ‘The times are changing, and you can’t fight it – not with steel or spells or other old-fashioned notions. This is the age of opportunity, where anyone can rise regardless of birth or wealth. Stand in our way and you will be trampled.’
‘Is that what Regent Odelyn tells you?’ Egda asked. ‘Her age of opportunity applies only to herself. And she does not have the right to do what she has done.’
‘Bah!’ Sceam tried to sit up straighter, but quailed back as Biter shivered in front of him. ‘The regent has done only what must be done! Prince Kendryk is weak. He is not fit to rule. His hours are spent in the palace, idly doodling. The boy has lost his mind! The regent does not want power for herself, but to take it away from a madman for the good of the people—’
‘Take it away?’ Egda interrupted. ‘Do you mean Odelyn intends to crown herself? To be king and not just regent?’
‘The prince is unfit to rule,’ said Sceam sullenly. ‘The king – Regent Odelyn – is doing only what is necessary. Now, you yokels have had your fun. Regulator Ardrahei has twenty … no, fifty guards with him, and if he doesn’t receive a pigeon from me after dawn, he’ll come looking, and then you’ll all be locked up in irons! If you disperse now, I will be merciful. Go!’
No one moved.
‘You think you’ve won,’ snarled Sceam. ‘You are wrong. Regulator Ardrahei and the regent will hear of what has happened here—’
‘That I doubt very much,’ said Egda. ‘And even if they do, they will simply know what happens to people who ignore the ancient customs.’
‘Regulator Ardrahei will come, with his eighty guards—’
‘And we will fight them. The four of us, who dealt so easily with the eight of you.’ Egda gestured with one hand, encompassing the roped-up fighters. ‘Have no fear on our account. Hundred? It is time.’
The woman nodded and drew out a small, gold-banded horn and sounded it, its harsh call echoing through the hall and beyond.
A minute later, Symon and the other six burst into the manor through the front and back.
‘What is this?’ Elmer asked, looking about him in confusion at the disarmed men and women tied up on the floor. ‘Where’s the fight?’
‘Temporarily delayed,’ Hundred told him.
‘Take this man to the lockup,’ Egda instructed the baker. ‘He’s to be treated well but denied access to writing materials and pigeons, be they speckled or otherwise. Lock the others in with him. Keep them there until you receive word from Winterset. Hundred, give them a gold noble for the prisoner’s upkeep.’
‘No need on that score,’ Elmer said, taking a protesting Sceam about the collar and lifting him with strong arms. ‘I think I have some mouldy loaves left from last week, perhaps a pot of rancid butter or two …’
‘Does this mean you’re our new steward, sire?’ asked Odo’s mother, with a surprisingly humble tug at her forelock.
Egda inclined his head in regret. ‘You do me a great honour … but I think Master Symon would fit the role better than I.’
‘Me, sire?’ Symon looked momentarily startled, then bowed deeply. ‘Until the prince is crowned king and appoints a proper replacement for Sir Halfdan, I will serve … if the others will have me.’
‘Aye,’ said Elmer. ‘You’ll do. You’re fair, even if you do think too much.’
That was as close to a compliment as the baker ever came, and Eleanor was amazed to hear it. Symon bowed again, and Elmer dragged Sceam out of the manor and down the hill, shaking him all the way. Odo’s mother and the rest retied the Instrument’s guards into a hobbled line and quickly followed, encouraging the crestfallen Instrument’s companions with taps from their staves.
When they were gone, Symon turned to Egda with a wry smile.
‘You never had any intention of us fighting, did you, sire?’
The former king swept back his hood and straightened it. ‘No. I merely wished to see if people would follow you. And they did. Therefore, you would make a good steward. I would appoint you permanently were it my place to.’
Eleanor beamed in pride. Her father, acting steward of Lenburh!
‘What next?’ asked Odo. ‘First the bilewolves, and then this lot—’
‘They are not necessarily connected,’ said Hundred.
‘Perhaps,’ said Egda. ‘Although I suspect both actions do arise from the same source.’
Hundred nodded thoughtfully, then turned back to the others. ‘My liege and I passed through Lenburh only because it’s on the river road, so we might have missed Sceam entirely if the master of the bilewolves had chosen a different moment to make their move. A mixture of fortunes for both of us.’
‘I hope that rescuing you from one problem makes up for bringing another to your door,’ said Egda.
‘Think nothing of it,’ said Symon. ‘If we can be of assistance, you have but to ask.’
‘I beg only for provisions,’ said the former king. ‘My intention remains to leave at dawn.’
Dawn! Eleanor sensed an opportunity slipping through her fingers. She couldn’t bear the thought of just wishing for adventure, as she had been only yesterday, instead of having one.
‘You must let us come with you!’ exclaimed Eleanor. ‘Especially now you know it’s probably the regent who sent the bilewolves. You need us to protect you!’
‘Eleanor is right,’ said Odo heavily. He really didn’t want to leave Lenburh again, not so soon. He could tell from Eleanor’s shining eyes she was looking forward to adventure, where he only felt the weight of responsibility. But like stacking sacks of flour at the mill, this was an essential task that wouldn’t just happen, and more hands made lighter and safer work. ‘We can’t let you go on your own.’
‘With two knights,’ said Symon, ‘and two enchanted swords, you would better your odds against the prince’s adversaries.’
‘What about your daughter’s safety?’ Egda asked him.
‘By helping you restore peace to the kingdom, she will ensure that she has a home to return to. The same goes for Odo and his parents too.’
‘You are wise, Steward Symon,’ said Egda, with a gracious nod at the two young knights. ‘Now that I know you two follow orders as bravely as you rush into battle, I would be grateful to you both if you will join me on this quest as cadets in the royal – no, I suppose I must call it the former king’s guard.’
Eleanor gaped in surprise, momentarily lost for words. She had expected an argument, but it turned out the old man had been one step ahead of everyone again …
‘Sire, it will be an honour,’ said Odo with a quick bow to cover his feelings of apprehension. He wasn’t frightened of any adversaries he might meet along the way, but being thrust into the world of Winterset and the court was daunting. Sir Halfdan’s original promise to take them there had dragged on until it seemed likely
never to happen. Now it was about to become a reality, and he didn’t feel ready to leave his home.
‘On foot, it will take a month or more to reach the capital,’ said Symon. ‘You should take the horses – two each, plus two for baggage. Sceam won’t be needing them.’
‘And you will send the speckled pigeons to Winterset,’ said Hundred, ‘with false reports that Sceam is securely installed?’
‘Of course. That will gain you some time.’ Symon took Eleanor in a quick embrace and nodded at Odo over her shoulder. ‘Travel safely and fight well. Remember what Quenwulf told you.’
‘Knights be true,’ she said, nodding.
‘And swords?’
Biter flew out of Odo’s hand. ‘Do not grow rusty!’
‘In mind or steel!’ Runnel finished in more measured tones.
Dragon, dragon, heed our call …
From within the uppermost spire of Winterset Castle came the sound of a young man humming.
Come to aid us, one and all …
‘I know that tune,’ said the young man’s grandmother. ‘Don’t think I don’t know what you’re singing in here.’
The young man paused at his work, concentration broken. A long shadow reached across the wall in front of him, a silhouette anyone in Tofte would recognise, thanks to its nose. Proud and angular, it had graced kings of Tofte for three hundred years. She had it, her brother had had it, and the young man had it too.
He looked down at his crimson-spattered hands and attempted to gather his thoughts. If he could just complete the next section of his mural by nightfall, his mind would feel so much more at ease.
Dragon, dragon, heed our call …
His beaky-nosed grandmother had other ideas.
‘I’ve just come from the Privy Council,’ she said, her voice smug. ‘They’ve voted unanimously to put off the coronation indefinitely.’
She paused, her mouth curving back into a smile, before continuing.
‘Your coronation, I mean. However, the next coronation has been brought forward and will take place in three days. Mine, that is. Can’t leave the kingdom without a proper ruler any longer. I will be king. How does that make you feel?’