Shadow's Master

by Jon Sprunk

  “How can the stars be wrong?” Malig asked. “By the Dark, Caim. Where in the seven hells did you bring us?”

  Caim shook his head. I wish I knew.

  “How much longer do you want to keep going tonight?” Egil asked, coming back to meet them.

  Caim looked to the horses. “I suppose this is far enough. I don't figure we'll find much shelter out here.”

  “Not much,” Egil said. “There's a few places where hunters hole up when the weather gets bad, but most of them are off the road.”

  “What cities lay north of here?”

  Egil shook his head. “Aren't any cities on the wastes. A few villages, but you can go days out here without seeing another person.”

  That didn't make sense. Caim remembered his last moments with Sybelle in her sanctum. As her life bled out on the floor, his aunt had mentioned a name. Erebus. He hadn't learned anything more in the months since to explain what she'd meant. Where was this Erebus? He wanted to come right out and ask, but held back.

  It started to snow as they bedded down. While their mounts huddled under tarps, the men slept on the ground huddled around a fire that did little to ward off the bitter cold. Caim listened to the soft fall of flakes on the snow. When the others had closed their eyes and drifted off, he held out his arm. The shoulder was stiff where he'd been wounded. Caim went to the place in his mind where his power resided and called for a shadow to aid in his healing. Moments passed without an appearance, but he could sense them beyond the firelight, watching him with invisible eyes. Sweat formed on his upper lip. What's wrong? You lost your taste for my blood?

  Finally, he dropped his arm and gave up. Maybe the shadows were acting strange because of this place. He hadn't felt like himself since crossing the mountains. Sighing, Caim closed his eyes. He had just drifted into the first, light throes of sleep when a gentle touch caressed his temple.

  “You awake, darling?” Kit asked.

  He opened his eyes to find her lying on his chest, her chin propped in one hand as her other hand teased his upper lip. In the dim firelight, he could almost believe she was real. It made his blood quicken. She was more than beautiful. He knew every inch of her face. He could close his eyes and see the exact shade of her violet eyes.

  “Let's sneak away,” she said.

  “You're crazy,” he whispered. “It's freezing.”

  “I'll keep you warm.”

  “You're not—”

  She levitated up a few inches and frowned. “Not what?”

  Caim stifled a groan. This was the last thing he wanted right now, an argument with a spirit in the middle of the night after a long day, and with a longer day ahead of him tomorrow. “I'm just tired, Kit. Let me sleep and we'll talk tomorrow.”

  She sunk back to press against him, but the frown didn't move. “There's a place up ahead if you stay on this path.”

  “What kind of place?” He lowered his voice as Aemon rolled over in his sleep. “A town?”

  “Not quite. But there's people.”

  “Is it safe?”

  She shrugged. “I was thinking we could stay the night.” Her fingers walked up his chest, making goose bumps on his flesh. “Get a room to ourselves.”

  Caim closed his eyes. “All right. If you let me sleep, we'll do that.”

  “Really?” Her lips made buzzing tingles on his cheek. “Sleep tight, love. I'll keep watch.”

  He drifted back into the pull of slumber with the snow falling around him, into a series of interesting dreams.

  Josey leaned back in the wobbly camp chair as she shoved the papers away. Another dispatch had arrived from the capital this morning. Hubert must be keeping the court scribes working day and night to keep up, not to mention the messenger service.

  It was gratifying to know she'd left the empire in such diligent hands, but the lord regent evidently failed to realize she didn't need to know every aspect of the court's activities while she was away. She'd left him in charge for a reason, but from reading his letters it was apparent that he felt the need to justify every decision.

  The door flap moved aside, and Iola entered carrying a basket of laundry. Josey smiled, glad for a distraction, however brief. When she got up to help, Iola shook her head. “Please, milady. You're busy. Let me do this.”

  Josey went over and picked up a kirtle, stiff from drying in the cold air. “Nonsense. I need a break. My eyes are about to fall out of my head.”

  The girl's hands were quick and deft as she folded each article with precision and tucked it away in the large trunks. “Has there been any word about when we'll be moving again?”

  Josey shook her head. She'd gone to see the fallen bridge the previous day. What had once been an impressive wooden span over twenty ells long was now reduced to a few broken pilings sticking up from the river's icy waters. There was no sign of how it had happened, but whatever the cause, the bridge's collapse had put her journey on hold.

  “You know,” Iola said. “I've heard there is a village not far from here. We could go if you like. Maybe we'll find something more edible than gruel.”

  “I like that idea. I'll call for Captain Drathan.”

  “I can do it, milady.”

  Josey regarded the girl. “Oh?”

  She had never seen Iola blush before, but bright spots of red appeared on the girl's cheeks. It was quite fetching.

  “Or you could,” Iola said. “I didn't mean I had to. I mean, you're perfectly capable of—”

  “Iola.” Josey couldn't resist smiling. “Is there something I should know?”

  “I'm sure I don't know what you're referring to, milady,” Iola replied, and left the tent before Josey could comment.

  Captain Drathan was summoned and preparations made, and a short time later Josey was riding over flat, brown plains. Islands of snow decorated the ground in some places, but mostly what she saw in every direction was mud. Heavens, I've seen enough mud to last the rest of my life.

  The sun was almost at its zenith, burning away the cloud cover that had lent such a wintry pall to the past couple weeks. Lightning picked his way along, his hooves sinking deep into the saturated earth and coming out with sucking pops.

  Iola rode beside her on a beautiful sorrel mare with a flaxen mane. The girl was lively, looking all around, everywhere except the front of her escorting company of bodyguards where Captain Drathan rode. Josey spotted several peaked shapes to the west. Rooftops.

  “Is that it, do you think?” she asked.

  Iola stood up in her stirrups. “I think so, Majesty. My father said it wasn't far from camp.”

  Her bodyguard had seen it, too. At Captain Drathan's direction, a dozen soldiers cantered ahead. The rest formed up around her. But rather than safe, Josey felt cloistered. The whole point of this jaunt was to get away from the stuffy routines of the camp.

  It wasn't long before they reached the village. Josey was dismayed at its ramshackle appearance. She was used to seeing the small homes that the commons of her country lived in, but these buildings were nothing more than shacks. Hovels, really. There were more at the middle of the village, huddled close together, but they were in even worse repair, their walls streaked with ash and soot. A shanty of tents and dilapidated shelters extended out into the surrounding fields.

  As they entered the village center, people emerged from the buildings and tents. Josey expected a few dozen, but apprehension stirred in her belly as more and more arrived. Soon the square was surrounded. There must more than three hundred people here. Where did they all come from?

  Josey stopped inside her cordon of bodyguards, feeling all the eyes suddenly fixed upon her. When Captain Drathan shouted her name and title, a few of the people bowed or curtsied. Others looked away, which made Josey feel even worse. But a number of the villagers simply stared.

  Three men exited the largest of the standing structures. They were older, all white-haired and thin. Everyone here was painfully thin, Josey noticed. As the men approached, she dismounted. Capta
in Drathan likewise got down from his warhorse and came over to stand with her, one hand on the pommel of his sword.

  The shortest of the three old men walked before the others. His face was lined and craggy with a large nose, but he smiled as he stopped before her and bowed his head. “I'm Elser,” he said. “What brings you out to us, Your Grace?”

  Josey found herself smiling back at the old man. There was something comforting about him. Her throat became dry as she remembered this was how her foster father had made her feel. “We were traveling north, but the bridge is down. While we wait for another route to be found, I thought we would see…”

  The old man seemed to understand. “Not what you expected to find, Your Grace?”

  “No.” Josey fought the knot forming in her throat. Looking at these people, some of them with hardly anything warm to wear, women holding their rag-swaddled children, was heartbreaking. “What happened here?”

  “War, Your Grace. The oldest story there is.”

  Josey pursed her lips. She'd heard the reports of nobles fighting in the heartlands. She never thought it was so devastating. These people are suffering, and I have failed them.

  “It's been going on for as long as any of us can remember, Your Grace,” the old man said. “But these past few years it's gotten worse. Spring raids turned into summer campaigns that lasted through the autumn. And now the fighting goes on all winter, too. We haven't been able to bring in a good harvest in years. All the young men were taken away. They've only left those of us too old to fight. Our women have no husbands, our children no fathers. We've been holding on as best we can, waiting for things to get better. Now people from other villages have come here, but we can hardly provide for ourselves. In another season or two, we'll be gone.”

  Josey wanted to turn away as pricks of moisture gathered in her eyes, but she forced herself to face the old man. “How can I help?”

  The smile he gave her was like a warm ray of sunshine. “Our stores are gone. We could use something to eat, Your Grace.”

  Josey looked to Drathan. “Captain, send someone back to the camp. I want wagons here with food, warm clothing, and blankets. Anything these people need. And send for Doctor Krav, too.”

  With a salute, Captain Drathan went about following her orders. Some of her bodyguards gave up their cloaks to the people in the crowd and broke out packages of rations from their saddlebags. Like water over a dam, the villagers surged forward, accepting these gifts and thanking the soldiers. Children laughed as they bit into rolls of hard tack and drank from waterskins. Watching Iola hold a small girl of three or four, Josey trembled at the rush of emotions running through her.

  She turned back to Elser. “Who is your liege lord, Elser?”

  Josey watched with a child balanced on her hip as the frame of a new barn went up. Ropes creaked and men grunted as the wooden lattice rose to meet the three sides already in place. Villagers with hammers climbed across the framework, pounding in nails to secure it in place.

  “What do you think?” Josey asked the child. “Isn't it big?”

  Marian, who was only three, smiled shyly around the candy stick in her mouth and buried her face in Josey's shoulder.

  “Marian!” her mother cried as peppermint goo smeared across Josey's gown. “I'm sorry, Your Majesty.”

  Josey laughed. “It's all right, Tara. Nothing that won't wash out.” She kissed the child's head. “And who could be cross with such a little angel?”

  Her mother shook her head. “Angel, is she? Tell me that when she's up before the sun.”

  They watched as the men, her soldiers and the villagers together, worked on the barn. In two days, they had rebuilt most of the homes in the village. Without any thatch for the roofs, a squad of her army was carving tiles from excess timber. When they were done, this would be the best-looking village in the empire. A line of people waited in a queue outside the tent Doctor Krav had set up in the square. Josey had been appalled to learn they had no medicine except what they could find for themselves in the wild.

  “We can't thank you enough, Majesty,” Tara said as she teased the candy from between Marian's teeth. “If you hadn't come by…” A shadow passed over her face, which was far too worn and tired for a woman barely past twenty. “You've saved us.”

  Josey buried her nose in Marian's hair and swallowed the lump in her throat. How many more villages like this one were out there, just weeks or days from starvation? How could she save them all?

  A rider maneuvered around the piles of fresh-hewn lumber, coming in her direction. Josey handed the child back to Tara. She'd been expecting word from Lord General Argentus, but she wasn't sure what she wanted to hear anymore. Two days ago she'd been hell-bent for racing north. Now, things looked different. No. I need to find Caim. He needs to know about his child. And… What? Couldn't she admit her selfish motives for this trip? She missed him. Was that a sin?

  The rider was one of her officer corps. As he got closer, she recognized his distinctive sleek, blond mustache that flowed down into his goatee.

  “Lieutenant Butus. Good afternoon. What news?”

  The lieutenant slid down and took off his helmet. Making a quick bow, he said, “Majesty, I've just come from the outer patrols. The fourth squad has spotted a party of armed men to the south, riding hard.”

  Armed men on horseback. That sounded exactly like the kind of trouble that had caused the people of this village so much misery. Not again, if she had anything to say about it. “Were they flying a banner?”

  “None that the squad could see.”

  Josey started to turn. “Cap—!”

  Captain Drathan was right behind her. Sweat matted his hair, which actually made him look more attractive. No wonder Iola seemed smitten with him.

  “Yes, Majesty.”

  “Lieutenant Butus has a report of a band of men riding in the area. How far did you say, Lieutenant?”

  “About half a league, Majesty.”

  “We're going to find them before they cause any more damage. Please have Lightning brought over from the pasture.”

  Captain Drathan saluted and jogged away, shouting orders. The villagers watched as the soldiers assembled in their little square. Elser walked over from the barn raising.

  “Trouble, Majesty?” he asked.

  “I don't know yet. We're going to find out.”

  Josey looked down at her clothes. Though she wasn't dressed for riding, she couldn't take the time to change. They needed to catch these riders before they slipped away. The village headman backed away as a soldier led Josey's horse over. She put her foot in the stirrup and climbed up, relieved to see her bodyguard was likewise mounting.

  Captain Drathan rode over. “We have thirty-seven men here, Majesty. I could send for more.”

  “No. We'll ride with what we have. Elser, can you send someone to the camp and tell them where we've gone?”

  As Elser went to find a runner, they rode out at a swift canter, Lieutenant Butus leading the way. They followed a dirt path to the end of the adjacent fields, but then it was a bumpy ride across—of course—more mud. Riding more east than south, they came upon a line of trees running perpendicular to their course and found a raised road running along the arbor. Beyond were more mud flats that extended to the foot of some low hills in the distance.

  Lieutenant Butus pointed to a stand of trees bordering the flats. “That's where they were seen, Majesty. They would have had to cross this ground. So if we—”

  “There!” Captain Drathan flung up his hand.

  Josey saw them, too, a party of ten horsemen making their way across the eastern edge of the flats. Like Butus had reported, they flew no colors, but she could pick out the gleam of armor even from this distance. “I want them stopped!” she shouted, and urged Lightning into a gallop.

  The clamor of hoofbeats and jangling chainmail filled Josey's ears as she crouched over Lightning's neck. For a moment, she considered the wisdom of her actions. She had little idea what they
were riding into, whether the men ahead had friends in the area. Months ago she had fended off multiple attempts on her life, but after the long, slow journey from Othir she longed for some excitement. Just a little.

  They approached the end of the arbor, and suddenly the path vanished in a wide patch of frozen mud. Josey tried to pull up, but Lightning had too much momentum to stop. As her steed's hooves struck the slick ice, Josey was hit by the sickening feeling of weightlessness. Lightning floundered, and they would have fallen over except that the horse slid into a patch of knee-deep snow. Josey gulped as the world righted itself, hardly believing she had kept her seat. The others, seeing her folly, rode around the icy patch.

  Captain Drathan's face went white as the snow as he reined in close to her. “Majesty! Are you—?”

  Josey took a breath. “I'm fine. Really.” She bent over to see if Lightning was all right. The stallion's legs quivered, but otherwise he appeared hale and healthy. That's what I get for not thinking.

  Josey climbed down from her horse, not wanting to risk an injury to him. One of her soldiers dismounted and gave up his steed. While Josey climbed up, her bodyguard continued forward. She rode at the rear across the ground, which was a mash of mud and ice. The stirrups were too long for her, forcing her to cling to the horse's belly with her thighs. She couldn't see the armed riders anywhere. Just as she started cursing in her head, Captain Drathan shouted.

  “In the name of Josephine, Empress of Nimea, halt where you stand!”

  Josey couldn't see anything through the crowd of tall soldiers, but as they slowed she was able to wend through their ranks. The armed riders had gathered across a small meadow. She could see right away by their gleaming mail and the quality of their steeds that they were men of means and not brigands. All wore great helms that hid their features. Josey imagined what they must look like to the defenseless villagers, riding in with swords swinging. Like monsters. She kneed her mount forward as her bodyguard spread out to surround the men.