Darkling Fields of Arvon

by James G Anderson

  "Do you like art? Take a look," Enbarr said with a sly grin on his face as he unveiled the large painting.

  Kal's eyes widened in stark surprise. From the painting, an image stared back at him. The young Holdsman's first thought was that he must be looking at himself in a mirror. The attire, the face, the figure were his. So, too, were the facial expression and pose. Knitting his brow, he took a hesitant step forward, his hand raised as if to test and explore the painting.

  "Aye, take a good look, my slippery Master Kalaquinn Wright," said Enbarr, drawing out the syllables of Kal's name in lazy mockery. "It is you. You, sure enough, in all your regal glory. Your spitting image, anyway." Enbarr nodded, his thick lips pursed knowingly, his arms folded across his chest. "Aye, who'd have thought? Your very self! And you, like a picture sprung to life. A sight for sore eyes, too, I might add." A wry smile softened Enbarr's cold features.

  "That—it has nothing to do with me. You know it's not me. It's—"

  "Colurian, yes. A painting of the young king from the Stoneholding. Been gathering dust for years in Owlpen Castle. But it might as well be you. A remarkable likeness, wouldn't you say? I would. Like father, like son, I'd say, one a mirror of the other."

  "No . . . No!" Kal's voice rose in stern protest as, clenching his fists in frustration, he stepped back from the picture and shook his head. "You're wrong, absolutely wrong. I'm no king's son, I tell you. Frysan Wright is my father. Frysan, the wheelwright of Lammermorn. Ask anyone. Anyone!" He looked around in desperation. From everything he had learned at Aelward's Cot, he understood the long-hidden reason for the likeness, that it was not as one of father to son but a chance likeness that had arched like a stray bolt of lightning over the several generations that lay between him and his royal ancestor—scarcely more than an accidental quirk of bloodline, like a harelip or lefthandedness, or the streak of white growing at the nape of his neck that blazed his otherwise sable hair. "It is no more that a strange resemblance—"

  "Proof positive, I'd call it. Proof enough for me and for my lord Ferabek that you, my fine young Holdsman, are the long-lost Prince Starigan and none other, stolen, secreted into the Stoneholding as a babe, and nurtured as a commoner's son." Enbarr paused to adjust the gold-embroidered deep crimson cloak that was draped over his simple white tunic, brushing some dust off his sleeve. He looked up to the armed escort that surrounded them. "See that you guard him closely," he said, "with your very lives. Guard him . . . like royalty." Enbarr turned on his heel and began to walk away.

  "No!" Kal cried out. "Here, take back your trappings! Do what you want with me. I don't care!" He tore off his cap and lifted the pendant on its chain. "Take it back!"

  Enbarr stopped in his tracks. Slowly, with an air of studied indifference, he turned. His gaze sought out Kal again. His eyes narrowed into piercing little gemstones that flared with anger like cool points of blue flame in a face that had hardened like granite.

  "Put that back on. Now!"

  Kal let the pendant fall back around his neck and for a moment stared down at the feather-topped cap clutched in his hands.

  "Let me make something clear to you, young Master Wright . . . ." Enbarr wagged his forefinger in admonition and then paused, cupping his chin with the same hand as if pondering the words to say next. "Abundantly clear, in fact. You will do as you are bidden, or it will be the worse for your friends from the Isles. You have little idea how much worse. Uferian will die, and his daughter . . ." Enbarr's eyes narrowed as he watched Kal's reaction. "As I thought. She will spend years ruing the day she met you, begging us to put her out of her misery. Do I make myself understood?"

  Kal nodded in mute acknowledgment and replaced the cap on his head, his bid at resistance thwarted by a deft counterstroke—a counterstroke that went straight to the heart.

  A guard placed a hand firmly on Kal's shoulder, wheeled him around, and pushed him towards the door. Acutely aware of the conspicuous figure he cut, Kal stepped in behind the guard at the door, as one of the Black Scorpions recovered the painting and fell in behind him. They threaded their way through a maze of galleries and stairs, descending to the main hall of the Silver Palace, a grand chamber filled with paintings that dwelled in vivid detail on the theme of hunting, a relic of the reign of Colurian.

  From the main hall, they passed through a set of stout oaken doors flanked by a detail of soldiers who gazed ahead soberly with seeming inattention but bore the dread Scorpion insignia, a warrant of their efficiency and discipline, and emerged into a covered arcade soaring with white marble columns and arches. The space bustled with soldiers, liveried servants, and attendants, many of whom stopped to look, some discreetly pointing in Kal's direction.

  This made him still more uncomfortable. Like a cornered animal, his eyes darting, he sought for an avenue of escape—any avenue. If only he could bolt from this place, reach the warren of alleyways surrounding the square, and lose himself, evading pursuit in some way. His mind raced. He gauged his chances, but almost immediately a dozen Dragoons fell in beside him and his two Gharssûlian keepers. They marched him to a shaded wing that adjoined the unroofed part of the portico. From the portico, a broad and gentle flight of steps fell to the Great Square below. He caught a glimpse of the growing swarm of people gathered there. A dais and high carved chair stood empty in the portico. These had become the focal point of the many eyes in the milling crowd below. Before the stage, a row of heralds in dark livery stood, staring blankly out over the square, waiting. Each held lowered to his side a long silver trumpet decorated with coloured bunting that stirred and fluttered in the breeze.

  Kal remained hedged in by his escort. Around him, other armed men moved with purpose, most of them Black Scorpions and Gharssûlian footsoldiers. There was little more than a sprinkling of the usurper Gawmage's own mastiff's-head troops, the voices of these nearly drowned in the harsh foreign sounds of Gharssûlian that filled the area around the dais and the shadowed coolness of the portico.

  He spotted Enbarr engaged in an animated conversation with a lean middle-aged man who was overseeing the preparations for the Convocation from a central spot behind the dais. Quick and birdlike in his movements, the man bore a marked air of authority as he looked aside from Enbarr and crisply issued orders to various soldiers and attendants, after which he returned his attention to his master.

  Kal glanced at the painting that had been set on an easel nearby. Then turned away from it and pushed forward in an effort to take in his surroundings from a better point of vantage. He remained flanked by guards, and when he moved too far out towards the stage to gain a better look at the square below, they quickly closed ranks and pressed him back to the shadows. Still, he was able to tell, even at a glance, that the square was filling rapidly. Indeed, he thought he had seen Uferian's silver swan standard in the array of banners fluttering before the steps that led up to the raised stagelike platform that was being prepared for the Convocation of Notables. Of course, as a vassal, the old king would have to be present here for this event; an event of this magnitude and moment occurred only once or twice in the span of a century.

  Forced to retreat into the wings, Kal noticed on a tall hooded figure clad all in black, wearing a sleeveless leather jerkin, gauntlets, and hose, standing square-shouldered beside a pillar a scant few paces away from him. There was a sinister aloofness in the man's mien and stature, the way he held himself unsmiling, as he looked out on the square, bare arms folded across his chest, his grey hair cropped short under his upraised cowl and a scar running down his cheek from the corner of his eye.

  Kal's attention wandered again. While Enbarr had left the scene, the overseer to whom he had earlier been speaking remained near the dais, still issuing orders and sometimes checking the sheet that he held in his hand. Glancing up from his parchment, he marked the arrival of an attendant gingerly carrying something wrapped in a black cloth with an air of hesitation and inquiry. Immediately, the overseer directed the attendant, ushering him towards the black-c
lad man. The sombre man took in hand the object now proferred him by the servant, who retreated like a startled rat back into the safety of the Palace, and tore away the cloth.

  Kal swallowed hard. The taste of bile rose sour in his throat. The man held a scabbard and slowly drew out the sword that it enclosed, his fist clenching the weapon's hawk-shaped hilt. He pulled the length of blade clear of the scabbard and held it up before him, flexing his gauntleted wrist, testing the sword's weight and heft. He nodded in approval of Rhodangalas, admiring the smithcraft, the temper of its steel. Then, after laying aside the scabbard, two-handed he brought the blade around in a whirring arc that sliced the air before him at a sharp angle. He straightened and held Rhodangalas in front of him. His lips curled in the faint makings of a smile, all the more fearful in a face so wanting in emotion. Again he swung the sword, and again. The blade whistled through the air, the man taking grim pleasure in his practiced strokes. Now all eyes in the vicinity of the portico were trained on the man. Kal caught his breath. It was a pointed choice of instrument, Kal thought. There had to be a reason. Now that he thought about it, it was obvious. His knees felt weak and his stomach churned as waves of fear washed over him. The headsman glanced at him unsmiling, then returned to his measured evaluation of the sword.

  In the distance, a horn blast rose above the din of the crowd. At once, in reply, there erupted a deafening blare of trumpets from the heralds ranged high above the people in full view. The overseer summoned Kal and his escort closer to the dais. He had the picture of King Colurian brought forward, then hurried to make last-minute adjustments and dispositions in a quick series of orders accompanied by sharp gestures. Kal was now afforded a clearer view of the enormous crowd that had gathered before the steps. All heads were craned towards the back of the Great Square. Kal looked to the standards arrayed below and spotted Uferian and several of his men. The king faced him, his head lifted, gazing up towards the raised platform. From this distance, though, it was impossible to make out his facial expression.

  At a discreet remove from the contingent that had come from the Oakapple Isles were the obvious figures of Gwyn, Galli, and Devved. Kal felt a warmth that dispelled some of the gnawing fear. His friends had risked everything to be present.

  An expectant hush fell over the crowd. Out of a wide boulevard that formed the main entrance to the square, a small handful of riders appeared—cavalrymen mounted on great warhorses, the grim silhouette of a scorpion emblazoned on each of their tabards. This was how the Black Scorpion Dragoons had started out—as an elite group of armed horsemen, taking for their own the heraldic sign of Ferabek himself. These would be the elite of the elite.

  The riders pressed forward into the square. Scrambling out of the way, the crowd parted before them, making way for a carriage drawn by six horses that followed, its large curtained windows and gilded trim gracing a black chassis so highly polished that it gleamed in the strong afternoon sun. When they reached the steps of the portico, the mounted men drew aside to the edge of the crowded concourse, leaving the carriage to pull to a stop amid the banners that represented the foremost vassals of Arvon's high king, not just the leaders of clanholdings, counties, and keverangs, but guildmasters, too, from Dinas Antrum, many of them members of the Mindal, gathered with the members of their fraternity under pennants that showed the emblems of their craft.

  A footman, dressed in a mastiff's-head tunic, stepped forward to open the door of the carriage. The first of its occupants stooped his head and set foot on the ground of the square. A man of imposing build and height, with a strong jaw and guarded eyes, he wore an ermine cape over a purple doublet. The devious usurper Gawmage, Kal surmised. He bore a gleaming silver mace, and a simple gold coronet wreathed his full white head of hair. He took three strides to the bottom of the stairs and turned to face the carriage and the crowd beyond it.

  A second figure descended from the carriage, this one younger, but more stooped and decidedly nervous, his hair thinning, draped in a long brown bard's cloak tied about the waist with a white sash and bearing in his arms a harp—a golden harp. Kal's eyes widened as he beheld the Talamadh, clutched by somebody who could only be Messaan, the onetime merchant trader falsely installed by Gawmage and the powermongers of the Mindal as Hordanu, in defiance of all custom and usage, in an attempt to undermine Wilum. Messaan moved to stand beside Gawmage at the base of the stairs.

  Another wave of numbing fear washed over him as the next figure emerged from the carriage in all his exotic garb, complete with black leather cap and ungainly chin flaps, set off by a white beltless robe embroidered with strange devices: Cromus. Kal fought to stifle the chill that prickled his spine as he remembered with alarming vividness the role that the Thrygian magician had played as Ferabek's soothsayer and conjurer of spirits on that fateful day when Kal and Galli had stumbled on the enemy camp in an upland meadow and had barely escaped with their lives.

  Behind Cromus, the door to the carriage gaped empty and black. A stillness had fallen over the entire square. Some time passed before there was a movement in the shadows of the carriage's compartment. Kal was beyond shock or surprise, when, tossing back his long mane of jet-black hair, a short but imposing figure disembarked, a figure whose thick, bearded features and manner would be forever associated in Kal's memory with the terrible destruction of the Stoneholding. The dread Boar of Gharssûl turned from the carriage to the sea of onlookers and raised an arm in greeting, his personality a raw force of nature that seemed to draw all irresistibly into its sway.

  "Hail, Ferabek!" Close-packed in the square, its instincts spontaneous and violent, the crowd erupted into a loud cheer that was marked by an eerily hypnotic rhythm, repeated again and again, carried on its own swell like a chant—"Hail, Ferabek! Hail, Ferabek!"

  Ferabek quelled the noise of the crowd with a broad gesture of his hands and then turned to mount the staircase, drawing in his wake the other three dignitaries. Now the young Holdsman had a full-frontal view of him and recognized, suddenly, the way in which he was attired. He swallowed hard against the bile rising in his gorge as he took in the crimson velvet robe and heavy golden chain and pendant. It was a deeply disquieting sight. Ferabek was dressed from head to toe exactly like Kal, even to the soft leather shoes and the feathered cap with jewelled turn-up, which was handed to him now by Cromus.

  With a rough energy, Ferabek tramped up the steps, ascending towards the portico that overlooked the concourse and its throng, its open forecourt surmounted by the raised structure of the dais. Cromus remained just a step behind him, while Gawmage and Messaan followed even farther behind, their bearing more irresolute and uncertain than that of the Thrygian. Messaan seemed particularly discomfited, holding the golden harp as if it were a useless appendage, like a person ignorant of music, unschooled in the use of the instrument. For his part, Gawmage, who had been a guildsman, a silversmith, appeared to be somewhat more comfortable with the mace, which looked decidedly more than ceremonial, a wickedly lethal club with an orblike head, prickling with long metal spikes.

  When they reached the top of the staircase, Ferabek, still accompanied by Cromus, continued his progress across the stone forecourt towards the farther set of steps, which led to the heavily carpeted stage. At the top, flanked by the magician, he turned his back to the ornate high-backed chair that dominated the raised platform and, arms folded across his chest, bowed to the crowd below, which erupted once more into a thunderous chant of "Hail, Ferabek!" Meanwhile, Gawmage and Messaan remained standing at the foot of the raised structure, facing the Boar, raising their arms in acclaim, adding their voices to the din.

  Again, with a confident motion of his hands, Ferabek quieted the throng in the square. "Greetings, distinguished citizens of Arvon—kings, thanes, vassals, subjects," Ferabek said. "Loyal subjects, all."

  Kal's memories of his first encounter with the Boar stirred to life again at the sound of the man's voice—deep and mellifluous, unique in its power, its lulling resonance belied by the
thick lips and the dour cast of his face. It rang out clear over the hush, reaching even the farthest corners of the square, perfect in its pitch and range. Except that today he spoke in good, clear, near-perfect Arvonian, tinged with just enough of an accent to make him seem evocatively foreign and intriguing.

  Ferabek cast his gaze over the assembly. Calmly he moved his head around, first away from Kal and then towards him, so that his cold green eyes locked with Kal's, lingering on him with a menace that was almost palpable. Kal flinched at the malevolent air of power exuding from the man, but held his gaze, nervously whispering supplication to Wuldor under his breath, refusing to avert his eyes and be cowed. It was Ferabek who broke the fetters of what seemed like an endless moment, shifting his eyes, turning them to the headsman, beside whom a good half-dozen armed Scorpions had quietly taken station. Almost imperceptibly, Ferabek nodded in acknowledgment of their presence, even as his lips twisted in the slightest of smiles.

  "You have been summoned to the Great Square for the Convocation of Notables," he said, returning his attention to the crowd. "I hardly need tell you, an event so rare signifies that momentous events are afoot, that decisions of the highest import are required, that strong action must be taken. The old order is dying, but, even in its death throes, it obstructs the march of peace and order within the kingdoms and principalities of Ahn Norvys that destiny has laid within my charge. The old harmony has been faltering for many years, over a span of time that is measured now in generations and centuries, withering to a shrivelled husk, weak and outworn, with only a small cankerous body of adherents, most of them here in Arvon, its birthplace and cradle, resisting what in the end must come to Arvon and to all of Ahn Norvys without fail, as surely as the sun will rise tomorrow." Ferabek paused as his words echoed over the square and faded away. The assembled people waited, the silence crackling over the square, until the Boar spoke again.