"Oh, lad," he said softly. "What have I gotten you into?"
Haggling with a King
"Is that it?" Garin said as he stood in his stirrups. "Is that Halenhol?"
Bran nodded. "The Last Refuge of Civilization. The city that has never been conquered since the Eternal Animus began between the Eastern Empire and the Reach Realms, not even during the worst of the Nightkin incursions. Or so the historians claim."
The youth seemed well-inclined to believe anything as he stared, wide-eyed, at the white-walled city, and Bran was content to let him. His burst of enthusiasm was a welcome change from the week before. After the quetzals had so strangely fled, Garin had been so weak he could barely walk. Three days later, he'd regained strength enough to ride the horses Aelyn finally found available for purchase. Bran had kept watch over the youth to make sure he didn't slide from the saddle, and often had to pry open his eyes with a ribald joke or a teasing remark. But finally, as they arrived at their destination, he seemed to be himself again.
Bran's eyes wandered over to their other companion, who had also been watching the youth, but now pretended to observe the city. His gaze had often been on Garin since the quetzal attack. The mage had come upon them as they lay exhausted by the ravine and demanded to know what happened. Bran had lied through his teeth, though it had hardly been his best story — bleeding from a dozen small wounds, he'd only had the wit to say he'd come just in time to ward them off from the boy. In the state he'd been in, he knew it seemed unlikely, particularly as they both knew quetzals were famed for hunting until the whole tangle was dead. But Aelyn hadn't questioned him further, and Bran had no intention of bringing it up again.
He looked toward Halenhol again, and his stomach turned in that familiar mix of emotions. Here is where it ends. The thin squall of peace of the past five years would blow away as soon as he entered the gates. The weight of who he had been and who others believed him to be still would hang from his neck, dragging his spirits down into the morass he'd risen from.
At least, he thought, there'll be feather beds and foaming baths as a consolation gift.
Aelyn drew his horse a little ahead of them, blocking the way. "Remember," he said imperiously, "speak nothing to the guards and allow me do the talking. Times are hard, and even for emissaries to the King, entering the Refuge can be a tricky business."
But the guardsmen gave less trouble than Aelyn had warned. Though they cast them hard looks, a flash of a scroll with the King's seal — a hawk with a crown clutched in its talons — was enough for them to cut the queue and clop their way into the city.
As they set down the main thoroughfare, people parting before their horses, Bran glanced over at Garin and smiled at his expression. "Nothing like Hunt's Hollow, eh?"
The youth looked back at him, eyes wide. "I didn't think there was anything like this in the World." His gaze swept around. "The buildings — you could stack three barns and still not be as tall. What do they need them so tall for?"
Bran grinned wider. "To pack the people in. The more you can get in one place, the more money the landlords earn from rent."
That made his expression falter. "It's about commerce?"
"In a city, lad, it's always about commerce."
But Garin's amazement waxed again as the city unfolded around them. The youth didn't see the mud-smeared walls, the dust and smoke clogging the air, the beggars putting all their tricks and wiles toward earning a single coin from an uncaring passerby.
No — he saw Halenhol as grandeur incarnate, as a mythical city from a fireside tale. Edifices rising so high they cast the streets in shadow. Manors as large as the whole of Hunt's Hollow, and tenement houses with the village's population living in a single building. And in the public squares, the magnificent marble archways, the fountains, and the Undying Flames, said to have been burning since the beginning of the Rexall reign, mounted above statues of the old kings and queens.
Watching the youth brought a smile to Bran's lips. Perhaps the ugliness of Halenhol didn't drown out the beauty. Perhaps it was worth looking past the grime to see the shine lying beneath it. But then again, as his commander, the first of his many mentors, had always said, Pays to know what shit smells like when you're wading through it.
Soon, the greatest that Halenhol could offer rose before them. The Coral Castle, so-named for the pink tint of the rose limestone it was built from, perched on the highest point in the city. All the better for a king to look down on his subjects, Bran thought, and for his subjects to look up to him.
At the gates, Aelyn scarcely needed the King's seal to be granted entry. In a matter of minutes, their horses had been taken away to the stables and the elf was leading them through the tall double doors, under the carved edifice of the Whispering Gods, and into the grand atrium. Bran hid a smile at Garin's unrelenting gape as he stared at the ceiling a hundred feet above and hurried the youth after the mage.
His smile was short-lived. With every step, the weight of what he walked toward pressed down on him. His heart thumped like a servant pounding the dust out of a rug. His breathing grew shallow as an apprentice pumping at a forge's bellows. His cast-off name, repressed for so many years, burned in his mind like a curse.
Garin leaned close to him and whispered, "Are we really seeing the King now?"
"Yes."
The youth's eyes were as wide as if he were eight summers old rather than nearly twice that age. "Aldric Rexall the Fourth, King of Avendor… I can't believe I'm about to meet him."
"I wouldn't grow too eager. Aldric, like most kings and queens, is a man best avoided whenever possible and handled like a crag boar when you cannot."
Garin's brow furrowed. "What do you mean?"
Bran glanced to either side at the guards flanking them and spoke loudly enough for them to hear. "When Aldric came into power eleven years ago, he faced opposition from within and without. His father's power had been slowly crumbling away during his reign, and the nobility were claiming more for themselves. They even began demanding a Peers' House in the fashion of the Gladelysh so they might weigh in on the making of the law and the ruling of the kingdom. Twenty-two years old at the time of his coronation, Aldric seemed an impressionable boy to the nobility, a puppet by which they could take yet more power from the throne."
The guards wore frowns, but neither interrupted as Bran continued.
"But Aldric was far from a puppet. Knowing he needed to consolidate power, he manufactured an affront from Jakad and invaded their small kingdom. Typically, an act of war would be protested by the nobility, but Aldric was clever, promising to reward key houses with significant lands from the kingdom once it was won, and keep little of it for the crown. It played on both the nobility's petty politics, allowing some to lord their promised winnings over their rivals, and their greed, for Jakadi vineyards and the wine they produce are favored across the Westreach.
"But Sendesh, as Avendor's balancing power, couldn't ignore such an aggressive act. Believing Avendor overcommitted to the Jakadi front, the Sendeshi Protector declared war in defense of their ally and began to march south. But Aldric had known Sendesh would come and had set a plan in motion. While his armies swept through Jakad, he sent ships to Nemenport, a Sendeshi town important for trade along the northern coast. Yet Aldric didn't sail his warships, nor fly the flags of Avendor, but instead commandeered fishing vessels and trade boats and raised the black sails of the northern marauders, the Yraldi. Oddly enough, it became the foreshadowing of the summer that would follow, where the Yraldi came down in greater force than they ever had before."
The guards were nodding now, eyes gleaming as they basked in the reflected glory of their King's butchery. Though I'm the last man who can condemn another's massacre, Bran mused.
"Burning and pillaging Nemenport, Aldric's self-fashioned marauders swept east along the coast, razing three other Sendeshi towns as they went. It was enough to force Sendesh to split its forces into two, with half the army continuing to march south
and the other returning to deal with the incursions. But by the time Sendesh had reached Avendor's border, Jakad had been conquered, and King Aldric extended them a claim they couldn't refuse, granting them the best of the Jakadi vineyards and castles. The Sendeshi Protector, seeming to have lost his appetite for blood and gained one for wine, accepted the offer after only minor skirmishes. Ever since, it has established an uneasy peace between our nations, but one long enough that the Annexation of Jakad has been touted as a victory."
For a youth walking through a castle for the first time, Garin looked strangely somber. "My father must have died in one of those wars," he murmured. "In Jakad, or Sendesh. I thought he went to the Fringes. But it was eleven years ago that he went to serve the King and never came back."
How well I know it. Bran found he couldn't look at the youth. "Must have," he muttered.
It was almost a relief when they reached the throne room. A pair of doors nearly as impressive as the ones at the castle's entrance were cracked open in the middle so that Bran could see glances of the glimmering gold room beyond. The youth's mood had sobered since his story, his thoughts no doubt on his long-lost father, and the King he believed had sacrificed him for his own gain, but he perked up at this fresh glimpse of grandeur.
The guards at the doors took their weapons while their escort motioned them toward the entrance. As they stepped through, the room opened up into a dazzling, airy atmosphere. Sunlight from high windows filled the room with an ethereal glow, and everywhere gold and silver gleamed in complement to the apple red and sunset orange of the Rexall crest. On either side of the room, guards lined the walls, and between them, brown-robed monks stood similarly at attention.
Though their simple, coarse clothing looked out of place among the opulence of the room, Bran wasn't surprised to find them present. Monks of the Order of Ataraxis — or Mutes, as most called them — were often used by the monarchs of the Westreach to utilize to their peculiar power of Quietude. Assumedly attained through their oath of silence to the Whispering Gods, Quietude allowed Mutes to produce a barrier of silence around them when they chanted, ensuring that undesired ears would not overhear the proceedings. That the monks themselves might hear was of little concern; between their chanting and their magic, their eavesdropping was unlikely, and their silence assured. At the moment, the monks were quiet, and they watched the newcomers with demure stares.
Turning his gaze from the monks, Bran looked to the far end of the long, red carpet on which they stood to the golden throne and the man sitting atop it. His face was a mixture of annoyance and boredom as he stared at the half-circle of other richly dressed folk around him. As every king should look, Bran reflected.
Before they had taken more than a few steps toward the King, however, a herald approached them with an expectant look. Aelyn turned to Bran, one eyebrow arched, a cold smile twisting his lips. Garin watched Bran as well, seeming to realize something was about to happen, curiosity alight in his eyes.
Bran met Aelyn's gaze and knew then that Bran the Chicken Farmer would soon be just another chapter in his past.
He sighed. "I'll tell him myself — if he doesn't remember."
The mage, still smirking, waved the herald back and began leading Bran and Garin down the pristine carpet, ignoring the monks and guards to either side of them. Garin seemed nervous even to walk on the rich fabric, but followed a step behind Bran.
As they approached, the King glanced up from the men and women surrounding his throne to stare at them. "Emissary Aelyn," he said in a thin, nasally voice. "I expected you to return last week."
The King's gaze fell on Bran, and he tried not to flinch. King Aldric Rexall the Fourth was not an intimidating man in looks. He had pudgy cheeks, a weak chin, and large, watery eyes that made him seem a large babe sitting the throne, never mind having nearly three and a half decades to his age. But looks were a mask, as Bran had long ago learned during his time in an acting troupe, and though he wasn't a gambling man — at least, not anymore — he would have wagered gold that Avendor had never seen a more ruthless king.
"Your Majesty," Aelyn said as he swept off his hat and gave a low bow. His voice had gathered a sycophantic air that had been distinctly absent from any words he'd uttered to his companions. "My deepest and sincerest apologies. I would have come sooner, but a tragic lack of horses delayed my errand."
At this, the mage flashed a nasty look at Bran.
"Never mind, never mind." King Aldric wrinkled his nose and waved a hand as if trying to banish a particularly persistent flatulence. "Councilors, I bid you leave us. You guards as well. But stay close — this won't take long."
The guards bowed, then led the arc of councilors from the throne room. As the most powerful men and women of Avendor passed, eyeing them curiously, Bran kept his gaze solidly forward, forcing an insolent smile onto his lips. Let them think of that, he thought. A man who would dare smile before a private audience with the King. No doubt they'd consider him a fool, and that was all the better — a fool was permitted to do what a wise man never could.
As the door to the throne room closed behind the councilors with an echoing rumble, the Ataraxis monks began chanting. King Aldric screwed up his eyes at Bran, and over the monks' indecipherable words, he said, loud and clear in his nasal voice, "I never again thought to see you standing before me alive, Tal Harrenfel."
Garin turned his wide-eyed stare from the King to the man standing next to him.
A chicken farmer, he'd thought him. Brannen Cairn had a few mysteries about him, but he'd been a chicken farmer when it came down to it. But now, with his true name revealed, Garin realized he'd been traveling with, training with, saved by none other than Tal Harrenfel himself.
All the names the man had earned streamed through his head. Red Reaver. Ringthief. Defender of the Westreach. The man who had stolen a magic ring from the Hoarseer Queen and lost it to the Warlock of Canturith. The man who had led the charge that drove back the marauders from the Northern Isles. The man declared by King Aldric Rexall, the very king they stood before, to be a living legend, the hero of Avendor, and the foremost champion of civilization against the evils of the East. Songs were sung about him in the taverns, tales told of his deeds around fires on wintery nights. Garin had dreamed of being him during more than one discontented night.
And here he'd been, standing next to him the whole time. Tal Harrenfel, the same man who had lived as his neighbor for five years, and was terrible at herding chickens.
The man he'd known as Bran looked over at him. Even knowing who he was, Garin found it hard not to see his neighbor in those eyes. How could he be both Bran Cairn and Tal Harrenfel? he asked himself, and could find no answer.
"Well?" King Aldric barked, and Garin startled, remembering with a jolt that they stood before the King himself. Frantically, he wondered if he should have already bowed, or if he was supposed to wait for some signal. But the King's eyes were on Bran — or Tal, he supposed he should call him now.
Tal turned his gaze to meet the King's. "You called. I came."
"That much I gathered myself," the King snapped. "If I needed a parrot, I would have called a menagerie. If I needed a fool, I would have called on your friend Falcon. I need neither, Tal Harrenfel." King Aldric leaned forward in his throne, almost as if it pained him to remain seated on it. "I need you."
"And what do you need me for?"
King Aldric whipped his head toward Aelyn. "You didn't tell him?"
If Garin hadn't known better, he would have thought the mage cringed.
"I tried to tell him," the mage said, a hint of a whine to his voice. "He wouldn't listen."
The King snorted and looked back to Tal. "Sounds like him. Yuldor's prick, man — time is short, and the Mutes' Quietude won't go unnoticed. Do the corner callers venture out to that bilgewater town where you've been living?"
"Few enough would listen if they did."
"Then allow your King to tell you the copper news. War is coming, Harren
fel. A great war. The East sends its monsters down from the mountains in such numbers that the Fringe Guard cannot hold them. It's gotten so bad the smallfolk are claiming to see dragons roaming the sky. Dragons!" King Aldric snorted, his derision plain.
"But that's just the beginning. Gladelyl is heading toward civil war. Sendesh is marshaling its forces, looking to take advantage of any weakness. And we of Avendor are expected to hold both lines, as usual."
"Little of that is different from before."
"You think so?" The King leaned forward. "Then here's a bit of news you won't have heard: not all of the Westreach remain filial to the Bloodlines. Some want to join the so-called Empire of the Rising Sun."
For the first time, Tal seemed to flinch. "Who?"
The King of Avendor irritably waved a hand. "Most everyone else, it seems! The Dwarven Clans have delved too deep for too long in their mines and seemed to have found a darkness they cannot shake. The Goblin Knolls, as all know, have long been sympathetic to the Eastern cause. The Elves of Gladelyl are split in their allegiances and squabble among themselves for the honor to bow and scrape at the feet of the 'Peacebringer.'"
At this, King Aldric spared Aelyn a sneer. The Gladelysh emissary's mouth twitched.
"And among us humans," the King continued, "Sendesh always plots to best us, using whatever means Protector Unne deems appropriate."
The man who had been Bran seemed utterly different now. A slight sneer perched on his lips, and his eyes looked sharp and incisive. Garin knew little of the ways of the court, but he knew that a man who didn't bow to royalty, who smiled in the face of an angry king, was a force to be reckoned with.
But then, Garin realized, neither had he bowed. Should he now? Or, if he did, would it draw attention and risk punishment? And if he didn't, would he face the King's wrath?
A King's Bargain Page 8