Conquests and Crowns

by S E Meliers

  Her face was flushed, and she bit her lip, pressing up at him so his pubic bone pressed against her clitoris, seeking release. ‘Not before me,’ he scolded fondly, then focussed on his own pleasure, plunging into her with speed and force that drew his balls up to his stomach until he released his seed with a sensation that was very close to pain. He felt her muscles clamp about him as she found her own release, in silence as always. ‘It is admirable,’ he panted next to her ear, his tone coloured with irritation, ‘that, despite the reputation women hold of being garrulous, you can keep so silent. One day,’ he warned her, ‘I will succeed in making you moan, and then you will have no choice but to stay with me.’

  She stroked his back with a soothing hand, and said nothing.

  He withdrew slowly and rolled off of the bed, trembling with supressed ire. He mocked her with silence as he thrust feet into trousers and boots, and pulled a shirt over his head. Naked, all inviting curves and shadows, she held out his tunic. He snatched it from her, repented, and kissed her forehead. ‘I am not angry at you,’ he said in apology. ‘Just circumstance. I do not like having you on loan.’ He thrust his hands through his hair. ‘I am going for a walk,’ he announced needlessly and opened the door.

  In the hall, it was just him and the moon casting shadows across the marble-like floor. He stepped off of the main walkway into the recession behind the ornamental pillars. This second, shadowy walkway was a highway for nightwalkers on arcane missions, or assignations. It amused him to see the likes of Lady Patience walking the main path oblivious to those who watched from the shadows.

  And there were a lot of eyes watching the Lady Patience, he noted. The Hallows seemed to maintain a continuous guard over her; several of the lesser nobles of both Shoethalian and Rhyndelian original also seemed to be maintaining a watch – perhaps for opportunities to further their aspirations through making her acquaintance; and, recently, there was a flux of young boys tag teaming their observation. These last intrigued him and he was determined to discover their purpose. He had recently set a couple of skeletons to also maintain a guard over the Lady and her children, and these sufficed to ensure that these many watchers maintained a distance, however, so capturing one of the boys in order to interrogate him was of low priority.

  The Lady was a night wanderer, too. Often when he walked by her chambers he would see her in transit from one of her children’s chambers. He wondered why she did not simply acquire a suite of rooms, thus keeping her nightly checks within the safety of her closed and barred doors, but supposed that her role within Amori had been in transition in recent times and her rooms reflected the move from Lady, to prisoner, to concubine.

  Beyond the restless Lady’s chambers he wandered, passing a half dozen Hallows who viewed him with varying degrees of suspicion. His service to the Lady Patience, and her apparent favour within the Hallow ranks, held them to inaction however. He nodded pleasantly as he passed. ‘Just doing my nightly rounds,’ he murmured to himself, amused.

  The main hall was occupied. The heavy wooden tables lined the walls, leaving a central square bare. The rushes of winter had been removed and the stones were bare and clean swept. The room was lit by smoking torches hanging from the walls, candelabra on the tables, and the central fireplace that, although the weather was warm, burnt with mellow fire. A maid dozed in a chair, and a pot of stew hung on an iron arm, just off the flames. He peered into the pot, and decided he was not hungry enough to weather the crusted fare within. Others were not so particular, and several Hallows and Lordlings supped at the tables.

  He looped by the alcoves tucked away at one end of the hall. These narrow little booths had a seat against each wall and were originally constructed for those unable to mingle with the rest of the hall due to the constrictions of old mourning rites, but had been adapted by lovers and conspirators alike as hidey holes in which to conduct assignations. He had met the Lady Patience in the larger of the three. The closed in aspects of the alcoves led conspirators to a false sense of privacy, when in fact the curtains covering the main entrances provided no security or silence.

  The word ‘Spider’ caught his ear, and he lingered under the pretence of admiring a tapestry on the wall, with a sly glance at the hall’s other occupants to ensure that no one was watching him too closely. ‘… Gallant in secret… from Shoethal… crown him King… Truen…’ was all he made out before the two conspirators behind the curtain parted ways. Shade quickstepped back so the Hallow that departed the alcove did so before him, and after sparing him a quick assessing look, the tall dark-blonde man yanked his hood up over his hair and made his way from the hall.

  The second occupant parted the curtain, but Shade smoothly drew his dagger and stepped into the alcove, pushing him back against the stone wall with the dagger point in the soft spot below his chin. ‘Good evening, my friend,’ he smiled charmingly at the slight man in messenger colours. ‘Lets you and I have a little chat.’

  ‘I do not know you,’ the messenger stammered.

  ‘Quietly now,’ Shade warned. ‘We would not want to be overheard, would we? Who I am is not important. What is important, to you, right now, is the keen point of my blade sinking ever so slowly into the jowls of your neck.’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I want you to tell me what you told the blonde Hallow,’ Shade decided.

  The messenger swallowed and considered. ‘They will kill me,’ he protested finally.

  Shade shrugged. ‘I will kill you now if you do not tell me, they will kill you later if they catch you,’ he said. ‘Tell me and you get at least a chance of life. It is the better option, I assure you. A man can do a lot with a chance.’

  ‘They will kill me slowly,’ the man murmured. ‘And in terrible ways.’

  Shade leaned into him and met his eye. ‘I am really very inventive.’

  The messenger licked his lips. ‘The Priest Gallant lives and is with the Prince Cinder heading towards Guarn from Lyendar. He has sent me to travel to Shoethal to collect the King’s Crown that is held in trust by the High Priests there so Prince Cinder can be crowned King in Truen.’

  ‘Very interesting,’ Shade stored that information away for future use. ‘Can you write, by the way?’ The man shook his head. ‘Oh. Unfortunate. One last question, if I may. I heard the word Spider during your conversation with the Hallow. Tell me about Spider.’

  ‘Spider is the designation of a Hallow,’ the messenger supplied hesitantly in a whisper. ‘She leads the Hallows and has Cinder’s ear. She is… savage.’

  ‘Intriguing,’ Shade noted; the man was terrified of this Spider. The Prophet’s warning about spiders and webs might relate, or may not, he thought interest tweaked. He would have to make the acquaintance of the Hallow designated Spider.

  ‘Can I go, now?’ the messenger pleaded.

  ‘One moment,’ Shade considered him, and eased off with his knife. ‘In just one moment,’ he seized the man in a headlock with a sudden motion and a swift kick to the groin. The messenger cried out in pain and protest, struggling against Shade’s hold, but Shade was stronger and prevailed. He pushed the blade of his dagger through the man’s lips slicing them open due to the man’s flailing limbs jerking his arm, the hilt breaking his front teeth. ‘Stay still,’ Shade hissed in irritation at the mess. The messenger did not obey. A downward pressure on the blade sliced through the flesh of the man’s tongue and Shade stepped back as the man spat blood, his wailing incoherent. ‘It is really much easier, and does less damage, if you do not struggle,’ he reprimanded the man. ‘You will live, as promised, but I cannot risk you passing on the details of our little discussion to anyone else. Now, your silence on the matter is assured. Go, find a healer to stop the bleeding,’ he gave the man a push out the curtains with his foot.

  The brief cry had attracted attention from the hall’s sparse occupants, but they had insufficient curiosity to investigate it, such upsets being common of nocturnal activity around the castle; however the bleeding man sp
rawled on the stones was another matter. Shade strolled out of alcove as several of the Hallows dining rose to their feet. ‘The man insulted my wife,’ he explained to them glibly. ‘He is lucky I only took his tongue.’

  Chapter Eight

  Cedar

  Amori. Its graceful yellow-white spires reflecting the sun, its feet kissed by the azure ocean below. The fine smooth stretch of sand curving up to the cliffs on which Amori perched, the bustling city, the distant sails. Cedar, although no fan of the pretentions of Amori, had to admire its beauty.

  They were a small party camped in the dune brush, waiting for Cedar’s boy-spies to report their findings. Charity had insisted in being a member of the party, although it was Cedar’s preference for him to stay far from Amori rather than risk detection by the Shoethalians as Charity in the vicinity of Amori was a clear indication of the intention to attack. In the party was also Zeal, the scout who had disbelieved Charity’s identity initially. Charity had never reduced Zeal to a latrine digger, as he had threatened, having discovered that the man was a talented scout. With them were two soldiers of Truen origin, Bleak and Gall, who both had professed more skill at camping than they had demonstrated. Bleak and Gall had been at Guarn on leave visiting Gall’s married sister, when the invasion had occurred. By the time they had reached Truen, it had been under siege and they had wisely returned to Guarn.

  Charity was restless. His home and family were within his sights, and yet he could not reach them. He was continuously pushing for a mission to enter the city, even going so far as to darkening his hair with tea for disguise. It was, Cedar argued, just too dangerous. The Lord was petulant with the restrictions imposed and so had spent the last few hours down on the beach casting stones out into the blue and muttering about officious wanderer.

  The Shoethalians were busy. The land around the city, the city and the castle, were all very obviously patrolled. The Shoethalian soldiers were orderly and efficient, a constant presence, and a constant pressure on Cedar’s party to remain hidden from sight. ‘They are not so many as they seem,’ Zeal surprised him by stating.

  ‘What do you mean?’ he asked.

  The ornery man shrugged. ‘There’s shifts, I’ve seen. Four shifts, twenty men in each party, five parties per shift. Makes about four hundred men guarding Amori that we can see. I’d guess another hundred, maybe twice that number, that we cannot see. So they’re not as big in number as they make out to be with all this patrolling. It is a ruse.’

  ‘A clever one,’ Cedar was admiring. Was this his brother’s mind at work, or another’s? He wondered. There had been a Hallow, a little wisp of a thing, but she had been quick and cunning – had to be, he admitted to himself, to survive the training as a Hallow.

  ‘Yes. If this Prince is a clever man, and he strikes me as a clever man, he’d have the same sort of thing going at Truen – though probably less men, Amori being the vital point of passage between Shoethal and Rhyndel that it is, it would make sense to double security here. That enables the body of his men to be mobilized in the army whilst leaving the conquests secure. With fortifications, a few hundred men can hold a city against thousands for long enough. Especially with Amori receiving supplies from Shoethal on one side, it could hardly be considered a siege at all if it were to happen.’

  ‘No sieges,’ Cedar agreed. ‘When we retake Amori, it will have to be quick.’

  ‘When we retake Amori,’ Zeal raised a sceptical eyebrow.

  ‘You have little confidence in our ability?’ Cedar did not have much confidence himself.

  ‘I am a realist,’ Zeal chewed on his bottom lip. ‘They have a country supporting them, resupplying them; we have one crotchety city, a quarter of an army, and a King who will not part from his gold to fund us. They have what seems to be a clever and charismatic Prince and a religion spurring them on; we have him,’ he nodded to the beach where Lord Charity sulked, ‘hardly inspiring, the Lords of Guarn who it is kind to call cantankerous, and a half a dozen second and third sons who are used to ornamenting courts not leading men and who are only out here with the inglorious goal of winning themselves some land. They have seasoned, trained, and, frankly, viciously hardened soldiers and those scary-as Hallows, whilst we have a bunch of boys who cannot even lift a broadsword let along swing it effectively. So, yes, I have a little reservation regarding our chances of success.’ He snorted.

  Cedar laughed, wryly. ‘When you say it like that,’ he admitted. ‘But, I have learnt that sometimes Fate is on your side, and that, and a little clever manoeuvring, can bridge these sorts of gaps.’

  ‘Well,’ Zeal conceded. ‘We do have spies in their stronghold that they do not know of. That is a big something.’

  ‘We shall see how big shortly,’ Cedar stood as a boy strolled through the scraggly dune scrub. ‘Hoi, Mire, how goes it?’

  Mire was one of the older boys in his group, lanky and awkward with newly lengthened limbs. His trousers were mid-shin and his wrists showed knobbly points where the sleeves of his shirt no longer covered. He was filthy, dirt giving his skin a greyish pallor, and making his eyes look overly white. ‘Commander,’ he bowed to Cedar.

  ‘Here,’ Cedar assessed him accurately and passed over a waterskin and a hunk of bread. ‘Eat that first, you look half starved.’ Zeal reached into his bag and produced a wrapped cheese which he handed over with surprising empathy for the gaunt youth.

  ‘Thanks. Is not easy to keep a belly full in Amori when yous have nobody, no family, working to feed yous. Scuz lost a hand, caught stealing,’ he grimaced. ‘He died. We been careful what we steal since, nobody wants to go the same way.’

  Cedar looked away. It was no worse than they would have seen on the battlefield, but this was a loss under his command, therefore it was his loss. So young, he mourned, ill with it, before putting the emotion away in a box for a later time. ‘I am sorry to hear that,’ he said softly. ‘Aside from Scuz, your number remains intact?’

  ‘We not lost anybody else, is what you mean?’ Mire chewed ravenously. ‘No.’

  ‘That is good, at least. We will give you some food to take back with you,’ Cedar offered. They could at least provide that, although their own supply was thin – they had been waiting several days and they had packed lightly. He would have to set some snares for their dinner; collect mussels from the shoreline; or maybe try his hand at spear fishing again. ‘You should try digging along the beach where you see holes in the sand – there are shellfish there you can cook over a fire and eat.’

  ‘I never been to the sea before,’ Mire looked at him blankly. ‘I dunno what a shellfish is.’

  ‘I will show you, before you go,’ Zeal offered.

  ‘It would be good,’ Mire smiled briefly before looking baffled. ‘How come there’s hungry people in the city if there’s food just in the sand and there’s sand just a short walk away?’

  ‘Maybe they do not know what to look for, either,’ Zeal shrugged. ‘Maybe they are just too lazy.’

  ‘Many think they are dangerous to eat,’ Cedar supplied. ‘The rich will not eat them – they prefer the shellfish that can only be gotten from deep in the water at great peril to the fisherman. As the rich do not eat them, the poor do not prepare them, and somewhere along the lines, they forgot that they were edible at all, I guess.’

  ‘Hmph,’ Mire was not impressed. ‘Well, we will eat them. Better to have a belly full of weird food then missing a hand and dying in the gutter-trash.’

  ‘Yes, quite,’ Cedar agreed sourly wishing he had possessed the foresight to mention this food source prior to Scuz’s demise. ‘So, you have been successful in getting into the castle, at least?’

  ‘Easy as,’ Mire shrugged a shoulder with the carelessness of youth. ‘Ain’t no one notices a dirty kid ducking through the servants gates – there’s dirty kids in and out all day, and one kid looks as much as another to the guards, if they sees us at all.’

  ‘And in the castle?’

  ‘Weird castle,’ Mire wrinkled
his nose. ‘Places we can go, places we can’t. But some of the places where we would stand out like dog’s balls, they have this… like… I dunno; it is like there’s two walkways. One where the grand folks go and one where anyone who doesn’t want to be seen by the grand folk goes.’

  ‘A subterranean passage?’

  ‘It is an act of deliberate oblivion,’ Charity had re-joined them. ‘Not so much hidden from sight as not looked upon. The arterial passages through the castle are double the width of every other passage, and they have a recession of the floor and a division of pillars. At night, the lamps are lit on the pillars so the light only falls on the raised section of walkway and the windows are only on that side, so the recess behind the pillars is perpetually in darkness. The original purpose was the same as various alcoves throughout the castle: old mourning rites meant that you were not meant to be seen in public places. These recesses allowed passage through what was considered public domains. It also served to allow servants to be unseen by the nobles when it was popular to be served with such discretion your servants were all but invisible.

  ‘Naturally,’ his lips turned up in a smile that wasn’t. ‘The passage has always been used for assignations.’

  ‘And fvccanting, and murder, and plotting, and spying,’ Mire added gleefully.

  ‘Hmmm,’ the Lord of the Amori pressed his lips together disapprovingly.

  Cedar hid a grin. ‘So you are using these passages for spying?’ he asked the boy.

  ‘Yes, but we have to be careful, ‘cause of the fvccanting, the murder and the other spies.’

  ‘What is happening in my castle?’ Charity was astounded. ‘That there’s murder in the subterranean walks?’

  The boy looked daunted at the Lord’s anger. Cedar shook his head at Charity in warning. ‘What other spies are there?’ he asked.