by Tim Stead
“She’s quite something,” he said to the big man. “Talented.”
Bargil shook his head. “Yes,” he said. “Talented, but be careful there Captain. They’re strange folk, the Duranders.”
“I know,” he said, keeping his voice expressionless. “You can’t trust these foreigners.”
Bargil laughed.
22. Retribution
The Marquis of Bel Arac rode just within the line of trees, walking his horse carefully out of sight of any watchful eyes out on the plain. He felt wretched. All his life he had been accustomed to the best, the best food, the best clothes, the best conversation, the best of everything that money could buy. Now he had nothing but a tired horse, albeit a quality one, a suit of stained and stinking clothes, a sword, and the hope of a warm welcome. He felt degraded.
He had recovered quickly from the shock. Wolf Narak had been much more effective than he’d expected. He gave no credence to the old stories. They were still nonsense, he was sure of that, but the man was a superb swordsman. The twelve Seth Yarra cleansers he’d been given as a bodyguard were all very good men. They had been quick, subtle, skilled and experienced, and they’d been armed with blood silver blades. They should not have lost.
But they had.
By the end it had become a show, and he had found it difficult to tear himself away. Narak had been dismantling the cleansers one at a time in a display of martial exuberance the like of which he had never before witnessed, and in spite of himself he had been impressed.
It had come as even more of a shock when he discovered the Seth Yarra force along the border had been destroyed, all five hundred men killed, he had heard. He’d learned that just in time to avoid stumbling into some crude Berashi trap. That would have been humiliating. He had turned and headed for the Seth Yarra army, massing on the coast north of Afael.
Now that he was drawing close he had other problems. There were Afaeli scouts all over the place. Just the day before he had seen twenty men, Afaeli light cavalry, riding north through the woods. He’d been lucky to avoid them and been forced to hide in a thicket while they passed.
It meant that the Afaeli, and probably the Avilians had discovered their presence, and that war was drawing close. That, of course, was the problem. There would come a time when he would have to leave the cover of the forest and ride across the plain to join his new allies, and that plain was now full of Afaeli patrols.
He had made a plan, though. He had a good horse, and he was, perforce, travelling light. He would settle himself about fifty miles from the coast and wait for two or three days, and allow the horse to recover its strength. Then he would ride hard for the Seth Yarra lines, not stopping until he reached them. It might kill the horse, but as long as he got there in one piece the job would be done. He would be safe.
He stopped for lunch in a quiet glade close to a stream. He did not rest by the stream itself. There was a chance of a patrol coming through, and they would probably stick by water because the going was easier and there was little chance of getting lost, all the rivers in this part running north to south. He had very little food, and he wondered at the sensation of hunger he felt. It was extraordinary. It made him feel dangerous and adventurous: things he had never been. There was some dried bread, horrible stuff, but he made himself eat a small portion at every meal, and some hard cheese that he would never have touched at home. It was the sort of thing that peasants ate. At home he would have had a soft cheese, and he would have eaten it with fruit and a suitable wine.
He remembered just such a meal not more than a month ago. He had been dining alone, as was his custom. Since his wife had died in childbirth some twenty years ago he had not been able to eat with anyone else in the room. Even the Seth Yarra knights were not invited. They would not have accepted, at any rate, he thought. They had a strange, almost superstitious attachment to their own rations and would not eat the castle’s food or wine. He had told them that they might order what they wished from the kitchens, but they had declined. It had not been a particularly courtly refusal, he recalled. One might even call it rude.
Anyway, he remembered eating a particularly fine cheese. It had been soft and blue-veined with a rich flavour, well complemented by a rich, red, Telan wine, sweetened by grapes and thinly sliced apple. That was not the whole meal, of course. There was duck, roasted with a stuffing of nuts and apricots, a joint of beef, pink and tender beneath its flame seared exterior. And a confection of ice and fruit and sugar, with beaten egg whites, sliced strawberries, and yet another wine, this one a sweet Avilian white from the coast where such things were skilfully made.
He licked his lips and looked with distaste at the dry bread and hard cheese.
There would be a time when he could eat like a king again. Indeed, he expected to be a king. Who else would the Seth Yarra put to rule Avilian? They would need someone to keep things under control once their conquest was complete, and he had assured that conquest with blood silver. Now even the Benetheon could not stand against them.
He put the food away and drunk deeply from his water bottle. The water helped to stave off the hunger more than the food.
He climbed back on his horse and rode carefully out of his glade, crossed the stream, pausing to refill his water, and headed east. The plain was visible occasionally through gaps in the trees, a bright, exposed expanse, but he saw no sign of movement there. Beyond the stream he came across a path running east, beckoning him to follow, but it was too clear. A path like this must be used often, and he was not for the company of other men. He pulled the horse to the right, deeper into the woods, and after a short while headed east again.
The forest became thicker as he travelled, and he was forced to lean low over the horse’s neck, ducking under branches as the animal pushed too and fro, picking a path between the scrubby bushes that grew rank and thick about the base of the trees.
Suddenly he was in a clearing, broad and open, the trees towering above him and nothing but leaf litter beneath the horse’s hooves. He stretched his body, looked across the empty space, and stopped.
He almost stopped breathing, his hands limp on the reins. The horse stopped too. Idling to a standstill, and bending its head to see if there was anything edible to be found among the brown carpet of leaves.
Wolf Narak sat on the far side of the clearing, leaning his back against a tree, and he was looking directly at the Marquis.
This was a catastrophic surprise. Narak was not mounted, so for a moment it occurred to him that he might flee, but he quickly became aware that the woods around him were seething with wolves. He saw their slender grey bodies flickering between the trees, their hungry eyes looking at him, their pink tongues lolling. There was no running, then. He would be brought down and torn to pieces within five minutes. Inwardly he cursed. He had been so close. Just another few days and he would have been safe. Well, he would have to make the best of the situation.
He dismounted and drew his sword. He saw Narak stand and draw his own twin blades, but the Marquis had no intention of fighting the Wolf. That was certain death. He was no match for Narak.
They stood facing each other for a moment. Narak was quite still, his blades hovering at his sides, his face expressionless. The distance between them was too great for a blow, but a couple of steps would remedy that. The Marquis threw his sword to the ground.
“I surrender myself to you,” he said.
It was a gamble, but the Wolf was often described as sentimental, a man who took the Karimic virtues seriously, and a man who would not kill a prisoner. This way the Marquis might survive until the point of Seth Yarra victory.
“You surrender?”
“I place myself in your charge, and I am prepared to answer any allegation against me in any court.”
Narak shook his head. “You are guilty of so many crimes that I could not begin to guess which court should judge you,” he said. “You have conspired with the enemies of your king, which is high treason, and you have supplied weap
ons with the full knowledge that they will be used against the citizens of Berash, for which you should face the Dragon Court, and you have broken the blood silver pact, for which you should face the judgement of the Benetheon.”
“I will face them all,” the Marquis said.
“Will you? I think you may not, for there is a higher, more immediate court that calls you to judgement, and it is here, and it is now.”
“There is no higher court. You must obey the law.” The Marquis was insistent. He would bend the Wolf to his will. The so-called god had a weakness for doing the right thing, and it was the Marquis’ best weapon.
Narak stepped forwards and placed his left hand blade against the nobleman’s chest.
“You caused a friend of mine to die,” he said. “Her blood is on your hands. Of all your crimes this is the greatest, and I have judged you.”
The blade pressed home, and the Marquis was shocked to feel it cut through cloth and skin, plunging into his chest as easily as a sharp knife though soft cheese. He tried to speak, to tell Narak that he couldn’t kill him, that he needed time, but all he managed was a cough, and he tasted blood in his mouth.
This wasn’t right at all. He clawed at the blade, but only managed to cut his fingers, and the pain became worse, blossoming out from the wound, filling his body. His legs began to feel weak. He was standing on stilts that were impossibly high, and he wobbled, looked again at the shining face of Wolf Narak. The whole world was brighter, shining
He saw the other blade come up wide, and watched, everything slowing to his eyes, light struggling down the pathways to his mind, as the blade swept across. He felt it bite his neck. There was a tumbling of light and pain.
Then nothing.
23. Bas Erinor
Lord Quinnial sat at his father’s table and read the letter three times. It was as unambiguous a document as he was ever likely to read, but he read it again anyway. He wanted the words to be clear in his mind.
It was hardly a surprise. He had been expecting a letter from the King, and its contents were exactly what his father had predicted, almost word for word, but he still found it unsettling. This piece of paper was an instrument of power. Change a couple of names in it and it could destroy any man in the land – even his father the Duke.
Times were difficult, there was no denying it. His father had gone, left with the army and with Aidon to answer the Wolf’s call, and he knew that they were going to danger, to war, and possibly a violent death. Almost everyone else had gone, too. All the officers, men, knights and noble scions that filled the castle had packed their weapons and armour and mounted their horses and gone in search of glory.
He was left behind.
There were compensations. His father had given him power over the Duchy, so that until the duke and Aidon returned from war, if they returned, he was effectively the Duke of Bas Erinor. It was a position of great trust. He also felt that it was a position considerably beyond his competence. If not for Maryal he might have despaired.
It was the one good thing. They were betrothed with her father’s blessing. They were in love, and the one person who actually believed that he could achieve the tasks set before him was constantly at his side, encouraging, praising, commiserating, supporting. It made his new life bearable.
Quinnial was no longer a child. He knew that he would make mistakes, and he knew that his father had made mistakes. All men do. What he feared was looking foolish, making some great mistake. It was true that he had men to advise him, and they were, with a couple of exceptions, the men that had advised his father for many years, but he remembered well the last piece of advice that his father had given him before leaving with the army.
It had been a cold day, and his father was uncomfortable with indigestion. It worried Quinnial, because it seemed to be troubling his father more and more often. He was surprised that the physics of Bas Erinor had been unable to engineer a change in diet or a medicine that would effectively answer the problem. They had sat together in this same room, the table covered with papers, his father running through the business of the Duchy once again.
“You do not need to remember it all, Quin,” the duke had said. “There are fifty men beneath you whose concern it is to remember everything. What you must learn is the skeleton beneath that flesh, so that when they tell you that a man has three arms you will know that they are deceiving you.”
“So it is not really I who will rule?”
“Yes, absolutely. No decision that you make can be anything other than your own. Your advisers will advise, they may even try to persuade you to a particular course of action, but the decision is yours. You will be held responsible for every single edict that you issue. A Duke cannot point the finger at an adviser and say it is another man’s fault. Always trust your own instincts. Those are what will make you a good ruler or a bad one. There is no help for it.”
No help for it indeed.
He put the letter down and rang a bell to summon a guard. A man stepped through the door of the chamber almost at once.
“My Lord?”
“Ah, Piras, has the shift changed? I did not see you out there this morning.”
“Indeed it has, my lord.”
“And your son, he is well again?”
“Yes, my lord. Recovered fully a week now. He is back at his training.”
“Well, that is good. Can you bring me the prisoner Skal Hebberd?”
“At once, my lord.” The man vanished again, and he heard words spoken beyond the door, then footsteps going away. It was more difficult to keep up with the comings and goings of the guards now that he was so occupied, but he still made the effort. These men had been his friends for years. They had treated him well in spite of all his difficulties, and he was determined that he would not be so far above them that he would cease to know them.
He picked up the document again and read it yet again.
“My lord?”
He looked up and saw that Piras was back, accompanied by two less prettily attired guards, and between then the forlorn and yet still defiant figure of Skal Hebberd.
“Thank you, Piras,” he said. “Skal, please sit.”
“I prefer to stand,” the young man replied. So full of pride, so doomed by it.
“As you wish.” He set his eyes to the letter again. “I will read this to you.”
He took a deep breath. It was an unpleasant duty, but a duty none the less.
“‘Read and believe’,” he began. “’This letter, duly sealed and signed, witnessed and confirmed is given under the hand of Beras, King of Avilian and all its peoples, lord of all its oceans and those that sail upon them, here in Golt, his capital, on the fifth day of… etc’ I will not trouble you with more of the heading.” He scanned down to the meat of the letter. “’Let all who read this letter understand that the blood of the house of Hebberd, formerly our servants bearing the title of Marquis, of our lands of Bel Arac, is from this time on degraded to the common stock. All lands and property pertaining to this title will pass into the keeping of my loyal servant, the Duke of Bas Erinor until such time as I shall otherwise dispose. The last holder of the title of Marquis, being found guilty of treason against my person and my kingdom is declared outlaw, and subject to any seizure or punishment as any of my subjects should see fit to mete upon him. All other members of his family are at the disposal of the Duke of Bas Erinor, their guilt in this matter and their punishment to be determined by him.’”
He put the letter down and looked into Skal’s resentful eyes.
“You understand this, Skal Hebberd?” he asked.
“This must give you great pleasure,” Skal said.
“You understand this? You must confirm that you understand.”
“I understand.” Skal almost spat the words.
“You misjudge me, Skal. You have not been kind to me, but I would not wish this degradation on you. You have done cruel things, but I do not hold you to be a traitor to our king, to our country.” He ro
lled the letter carefully and tied a ribbon about it.
“Yet having hurt you so much, I regret that I must hurt you again. I have news that you father is dead. He was slain by Wolf Narak to the north of Afael. He was alone.”
Skal looked inwards for a moment, as though seeking a memory of his father.
“Then he died as he lived,” Skal said. “He was ever alone since my mother died at the hour of my birth. He was not a father to me, or a friend.”
Quinnial sat back in his chair. The unpleasant business was concluded, but this was not how he wanted to leave it.
“I hesitate to show you any kindness, Skal, for I fear you will resent it, but I would not cast you out into the low city until you have had time to prepare yourself. You will remain here, in the castle, under house arrest as you have been, for the duration of a month. You will be accorded the dignity of your former title during that time, though not the title itself. At the end of the month I will ask you if there is a position that you desire, and if it is within my power and prudence, I will grant it to you.”