Kings and Daemons

by Marcus Lee

  ‘My king,’ Alano said. ‘I was simply watching over you when at your most vulnerable, and I wondered if you had news from Brandon on the execution of the fugitives, or whether by any chance he’d seen any signs of my brother, Kalas?’

  Daleth sat down and reached for a flask of wine, deciding he needed something stronger, and told Alano of what he’d seen, and that he believed Brandon and his men were now feeding the worms.

  ‘What action do you think we should take?’ he asked Alano.

  Alano’s smile was sickening. ‘We should hunt them down and drink their blood immediately,’ he said, his tongue lolling out to lick his lips.

  Daleth shook his head. ‘That’s a daemon’s advice. I want the advice of my old general Alano, sage advice, not one driven by the need to drink the lifeblood of everyone you come across!’ He looked at Alano some more, but then shook his head as the daemon just stared back. At times like these, he wished he could have the man, and not the daemon.

  Daleth slammed his fist into a table. ‘Damn them, but I need to focus on the campaign, not get continually distracted by these renegades, not yet at least. If they try and cross the valley, they’ll be pulled limb from limb by the giants. If they stay with Laksa as is likely, then once the Freestates lies bleeding at my feet, I can personally put an end to all of their lives. Imagine their despair when they allow their hopes to rise, thinking that I have turned my back on them, only to find us camped on their doorstep one morning a few moons from now.

  ‘Leave me,’ said Daleth, ‘I need to rest,’ and he rolled into his camp bed, the image of red hungry eyes in his mind, as he tried to fall asleep.

  -----

  Tristan and Astren rode in through the eastern gate of the citadel looking up at the massive stone blocks as they passed under its arch.

  The men that marched at their backs, feet stomping in unison, cheered loudly now that their long journey was over.

  Tristan called their commanders forward to him.

  One, a savage-looking man with skin burned dark by the desert sun, and a thick forked beard, was called Sancen. The other, the Eyre commander Dritz, was a small man as were all his kind, with a skin tinged green from generations of his forebears living in the swampland.

  ‘It seems no one is here to greet us, my lords,’ said Tristan, offering them a genteel title.

  Sancen looked around with disdain on his futures. ‘You westerners with your high walls. Where is the honour in hiding behind such? There is no hiding in the desert, you face your enemy in the shield wall, and the only thing between them and you are your spear and shield! You fight and die with honour.’

  Dritz nodded slowly. ‘I don’t much like this place either, too much stone, no trees. But I for one am happy there are walls between the enemy and us. I would be happier to live and spend my pay than die honourably on the battlefield.’

  Sancen laughed. ‘But if half my men die, then the rest all take home twice as much. My way is better!’

  ‘Please order your men to make themselves comfortable outside of the walls until we meet the commander,’ interrupted Tristan. ‘It might not do his nerves any good to have nearly a thousand armed men march in through his gates without being forewarned.‘

  Drizt and Sancen jogged off to pass on the instructions.

  Tristan waited for the return of the two men.

  ‘This truly is awe-inspiring,’ commented Astren, looking all around. ‘I’ve flown over it, and it looked impressive from above, but from down here it truly is a feat of tremendous engineering.’

  Tristan nodded as he swung himself down from his saddle, and Astren followed suit, thinking he would never be able to walk properly again as the insides of his thighs ached so terribly.

  Drizt and Sancen came back, and Astren wondered if maybe marching with them might have been a better idea than riding with Tristan.

  They headed past the keep which had been constructed against the northern side of the pass, having tethered their horses against a picket line that looked like it wouldn’t hold if their mounts decided to test it.

  ‘It’s a good thing we aren’t the enemy,’ muttered Astren, as they wandered around unchallenged. ‘But I guess if we were and inside the citadel, we’d have lost the war already.’

  Here and there men sat laughing and talking, while a few others seemed to be repairing weapons at a smithy that belched out smoke, and yet there was no sense of urgency.

  ‘Remind me, how many men are supposed to be stationed here now?’ asked Tristan, noting how quiet it seemed.

  Astren looked around, then shook his head. ‘Around seven to eight thousand and growing daily.’

  ‘If there are eight thousand troops here, then they’re either all out fighting, or very good at hiding,’ suggested Drizt. ‘That or maybe they’re sleeping off hangovers.’

  Tristan had worn a long robe to cover his gaudy armour on the journey. Astren wondered why he didn’t remove it, then came to the conclusion that Tristan wanted to see what was going on before they were challenged - if they were ever challenged.

  Astren felt the best place to start would have been the keep, which was no doubt where the citadel commander was in office, and of course where the soldiers would be housed, yet Tristan headed along the pass toward the fourth and highest curtain wall to their west.

  It was so tall and imposing that for a moment, Astren felt reassured. Its towers stood higher than the wall itself, yet as they came closer, he saw that many of the enormous blocks of stone were crumbling, or even askew. Astren walked up to the wall and probed with his fingers between the blocks, pushing them into the mortar, to find it crumbling and dusty. ‘My king,’ he said, to catch Tristan’s attention.

  Tristan drew a small dagger and stepped forward, then scraped it between two blocks. A torrent of mortar dust blew away in the gentle afternoon breeze. ‘We better hope the core of the wall is stronger,’ he commented, and everyone could only nod in agreement.

  Soldiers from the garrison strolled past in their dusty uniforms, and while some cast a curious glance in their direction, not one challenged them.

  How could the king of the land, with nearly a thousand troops turn up, and no one raises even an eyebrow at his arrival? Astren thought it was ridiculous.

  They entered the base of one of the towers then climbed the circular steps, stopping on occasion to look through arrow slits, noting the same state of disrepair everywhere. Higher, and higher, they climbed, and as they reached the top, Astren held tightly to one of the battlements to steady himself as a wave of dizziness washed over him.

  He saw Sancen doing the same and felt a little better that a fearsome warrior could also suffer from a fear of something. Drizt, on the other hand, leapt nimbly on to the very battlements themselves, then hopped from one merlon to the next, sure-footed despite the breeze.

  ‘Amazing,’ he cried, sheer joy upon his face, ‘I could fire an arrow to the very moon itself from up here,’ and he leapt around laughing at the looks on everyone’s faces.

  From this vantage point, they gazed westward, and there in the distance at the other end of the pass was a wall; all that remained of the citadel that once stood denoting the border with Daleth’s lands.

  ‘Ours is bigger than his,’ said Drizt, laughing.

  Astren couldn’t help but smile at his constant levity. ‘If it were just about how big one’s citadel is, then yes, we’d win hands down. However, I fear what will pass through its gates is more what we should be concerned about,’ he replied.

  ‘Come,’ motioned Tristan, and they turned, heading back down the stairs, cautious of the loose rocking steps as they walked upon them.

  They stopped their descent partway and stepped out on to the wall. As they walked along studying its condition, Drizt constantly fooled around until Sancen threatened to push him over the edge if he jumped up one last time.

  ‘To push me over the edge means you’re going to have to get close to it, and at the moment, from the look on your face,
I think I’m pretty safe,’ challenged Drizt. ‘You sand eaters have no idea of fun.’ Yet he didn’t jump up again either, noting perhaps the serious look in Sancen’s eye.

  After inspecting the crumbling wall, they descended another set of steps by the wall’s gatehouse into the courtyard, and Sancen knelt briefly to place his forehead against the rocky ground.

  Astren hoped they would now go to find the commander and wash the dust from their throats with a good wine. Tristan, however, seemed on a mission to inspect the whole citadel, even though the sun was past halfway across the sky.

  They continued their inspection, passing through a large open gate, and were hit by a wave of sounds and smells. The area between the walls was full of small pens, with chickens, goats, and pigs kept as fresh meat for the garrison. While up against the wall, wooden lean-to’s had been built, so the animals could be slaughtered and butchered.

  Drizt laughed. ‘Look there!’ he said pointing, and they followed his arm toward a catapult at the base of the wall. What had made him laugh however, was that the goats were using it as a climbing frame. ‘I wonder if they’re the ammunition?’ he quipped, before turning to Sancen. ‘Would it be honourable to be killed by a flying goat on the field of battle, as long as you were in a shield wall?’ he asked.

  Sancen’s arm swung out to cuff Drizt, but the small man was too agile, and Astren sighed with relief when Sancen’s deep laughter matched Drizt’s.

  ‘Beware we don’t fire you over the wall at the enemy, little man!’ he boomed, smiling. ‘They’d all run away rather than listen to your chatter all day long.’

  This exchange lightened the mood, and Astren felt his spirits lifted further.

  Occasionally they made way for garrison soldiers as they walked around, but not once did they come across any of the substantial numbers of troops that were supposed to be based here.

  Between the third and second wall were a few piles of rubbish, but it was mostly empty. The barren ground was split with a wide trench that bisected the pass, over which three wooden bridges spanned the gap. Finally, they passed through the gateway of the second wall into the shadow of the main curtain wall, the first line of defence against the Witch-King and his army.

  Here, at last, were the signs of activity that Astren had perceived in his spirit travels. Wooden scaffold towers were up against some parts of the wall, and several dozen men seemed to be slowly working along its length.

  Tristan led the way, across a wooden bridge, toward the middle of the wall and the main gatehouse which housed the pulleys that helped open and close the gates.

  As they got closer, Drizt whistled, his keen archer’s eyes seeing into the gloomy tunnel ahead. ‘Let me riddle you this,’ he said to everyone. ‘When is a gatehouse just a house?’

  Sancen, rising to the bait, shook his head. ‘I don’t know,’ he replied.

  ‘When there are no gates!’ announced Drizt, and everyone except Sancen laughed until they realised it wasn’t a joke at all.

  For sure enough as they walked closer, the main gates to the fortress were nowhere to be seen.

  -----

  ‘We should kill him,’ advised Laska, ‘for he is too dangerous and he carries a name of ill omen.’ He’d decided to put Kalas’ fate to a vote, at his granddaughter’s insistence, assuming it would be easily won, and now he leaned back in his chair, eyes challenging anyone to disagree with him.

  Laska wanted Kalas dead for the harm he’d initially brought upon Yana. Rakan nodded as he also wanted him dead for the unstoppable danger he represented, whereas Maya shook her head in disagreement, reiterating her earlier stance.

  Yana added her voice. ‘No, grandfather,’ she said, causing Laska’s eyes to open wide in surprise. ‘Maya has asked that he be spared, and in this, I would have you grant her wish. There is also something familiar about him even though I’ve never met him before.’

  Rakan shook his head, both at her decision and because he was unable to believe the turn of events. He looked across at Taran, who was also somewhat bemused at the bridges Yana was trying to build with Maya. She now seemed to be doing everything possible to make amends for her earlier behaviour, even if it meant opposing her grandfather’s wishes.

  Several days ago, upon awakening from Maya’s healing, Yana had seen her sleeping in Taran’s arm’s, recovering from the drain it put upon her body. She’d walked across and knelt next to Taran, eyes lowered, looking down at Maya, at the new lock of white hair that shone in the dying light, and the fine lines around her mouth.

  ‘I am sorry,’ she’d said, looking at Taran with moist eyes. ‘Truly I am,’ and her guards had brought water and food for when Maya awoke.

  Over the following days, as Maya had finished her healing of the surrounding lands, Yana had frequently spent time at Maya and Taran’s side. While Maya had been reticent at first to accept Yana’s change of attitude as genuine, she couldn’t help but recognise her continued efforts. Taran and Rakan had welcomed the shift as well.

  Kalas was currently bound in chains in one of the cellars beneath the great hall, and he was watched over by crossbowmen with orders to kill if he showed any signs of trying to break his bonds. It was unlikely the possessed warrior could escape, but Laska wouldn’t take any chances, and no one disagreed with him in this regard.

  Laska, Rakan, Maya, and Yana turned to Taran. ‘It’s down to you, boy,’ Laska muttered, ‘to determine this man daemon’s fate. However, If he lives by your choice, know this, he cannot stay with us when you leave and will be cast out into the wilderness. So, consider your choice carefully.’

  Taran thought back to the moment he’d glimpsed Kalas’ mind when Kalas first attacked them, and even now it brought bile to his throat. In an instant, he’d seen such shocking images that had plagued his sleep ever since. He’d also sensed the unquenchable thirst for torture, killing, and the draining of life that the daemon directed toward everyone, but specifically Maya.

  So while this was sufficient cause to support both Rakan and Laska’s decision to have Kalas killed immediately, he still paused to deliberate before voicing his thoughts.

  ‘When I looked into Kalas’ mind for the second time as he lay subdued and unconscious, I got to see many things, and it’s the man’s mind I will judge him on, not the actions of the daemon who possesses him. It is hard to believe, but I saw his thoughts and the truth of them. He is,’ and Taran shook his head in disbelief, ‘a former guard to King Anders, who ruled this land many, many years ago.’

  Rakan snorted, but Laska leaned forward, eyes wide. ‘I haven’t heard that name in over on forty years!’ he said incredulously, and his eyes softened imperceptibly.

  Taran continued. ‘I believe Kalas to be a good man, and a warrior of unsurpassable skill. He’s under oath to kill Daleth, and his possession was a means to accomplish that over fifty years ago. It seems he failed then, but now seeks to complete this mission or die in the trying. However, the daemon is powerful and constantly struggles for control. It desires not just to kill, but to drink from its victims’ life force to feed an insatiable hunger.

  ‘Maya has now healed his body, but that is not what matters if he is to live. It’s his mind. If he can’t control the daemon fully, irrespective of his worth as a man, he has to die.’

  Maya looked up in dismay, and Rakan nodded vehemently. Laska strangely didn’t voice his support anymore; instead, Taran thought he might have seen him brush away a quick tear.

  ‘So, if Maya can only heal his body, then we have no other course of action but to kill him.’ interjected Rakan, starting to rise.

  Taran shook his head and squeezed Maya’s hand reassuringly under the table. ‘No, we don’t kill him yet, for where Maya failed, I believe I can succeed. If I don’t, then, and only then, should the executioner's blade fall.’

  Laska’s face was red, and his voice shook with suppressed emotion when he spoke. ‘One more day and you leave my lands, and I truly hope Kalas the man travels with you, for if not, we
bury Kalas the daemon behind you. You have one day.’ With that, he stood up, knocking his chair over and stormed off, his eyes red and puffy.

  Yana followed, looking somewhat perplexed as she hurried to soothe him.

  Maya spoke softly to Taran in the silence that remained. ‘I don’t like this idea at all. You’ve cried out in your sleep ever since you read his mind. If trying to heal him hurts you even more, I would rather …’ and she stopped for a moment before continuing, ‘I would rather he die.’

  Taran looked into Maya’s eyes, seeing the love and concern there and felt his heart swell within his chest. ‘My princess, this world needs your compassion, your tenderness, your healing. You show the way of forgiveness and redemption, whereas the rest of us only add to the darkness by turning to anger and killing as a way to solve our problems. I want to choose your way whenever and wherever possible. So tonight I will try, for to take a life is so easy, but to give one, therein lies a true power that few in this world possess.’

  Rakan cleared his throat, and they both looked across. ‘If this fails, it will be my way instead,’ and he spun his dagger on the table while looking at them meaningfully.

  Taran grimaced as he said. ‘If I can’t solve our problem, you can end it,’ and Maya slowly nodded in agreement.

  -----

  Shortly after realising that the gates within the first wall were missing, along with over seven thousand men, Tristan, Astren, Dritz, and Sancen had turned back toward the keep to find the garrison commander.

  Tristan was incredulous as they marched briskly back through the citadel, muttering under his breath. ‘Where the hells are my gates, my men and my money?’

  Sancen was muttering too. ‘When is a gatehouse not a gatehouse,’ when suddenly he stopped and roared with laughter. ‘I get it,’ he said, holding his sides. ‘When there are no gates. It’s a joke!’ and laughed uncontrollably, whereafter Drizt told him some more.

  Astren wondered to himself how many days it would take the slow-witted Sancen to work them out.