Regret's Shadow (Sins of Earth Trilogy) (19 page)

Ethelrynne inclined her head toward him, “Thank you, Your
Highness.  Your hospitality is most welcome.”

“I hope you will forgive my troops, it’s not often that a flying ship clears the walls.”

She took an offered glass of mead and took a sip.  She offered a tiny smile to Remiel,

“It’s understandable, Your
Highness.  Your men did their jobs.  I’m happy that it has turned out well.”

He nodded, returning the smile, “Excellent.  You know, I spoke to your father once, just after my coronation.  He is of singular character.”

Hade dropped a hand on her shoulder, feeling her tense at the intended compliment.  She let out a quick breath.

“Yes, well,” she said, “I’ll be sure and deliver your regards.”

The others looked back and forth at the odd response, before Hade cleared his throat.

“Yes, Hade, of course,” Remiel said, “Fill us in on this news that’s brought you so far so fantastically.”

“My King,” he began somberly, “Kelleran’s Folly has been overtaken.”

There
was a gasp from Reynolt as the king’s expression darkened.

“Goblins,” the soldier went on, plunging ahead before his courage failed him, “Thousands upon thousands of blackbloods stormed the Holdwalls at the Hammerfist.  I…was the sole survivor of my patrol.” 

He seemed about to say more, but held his tongue.  Ethelrynne reached up and placed her hand reassuringly over his.

“I still can’t believe I’m hearing correctly
.” This was from an incredulous Reynolt. 

Tavister held his tongue, though he was obviously curious.
  The king held up his hand, silencing the wizard.

“What else, Corporal?  How did you come to be in the company of elves?”

Taking a deep breath, Hade soldiered on, “We were chased down the mountain trails, and I was the last.  I hid in the ruins of an old watchtower, and the horde passed me in the night.  By the time I’d made the ravine, the fort was being breached while the town bled.”

He made sure and hold the k
ing’s eyes, “I’ve been patrolling the Holdwalls for almost twenty years, Your Highness, and I’ve never seen anything like this.  There were trolls and giants among them, and the discipline they showed was beyond even our tall tales.

“There’s something else,” said, remembering.  He produced a rag from his pocket and spread it out on the desk.  Emblazoned upon the gray fabric was the stylized skull icon that all the goblins had worn.  Everyone leaned in to have a look.
              “They all bore this glyph on their clothing.”

Tavister let out a low whistle.  He reached over and slid the scrap closer to the
king as he looked over the man’s shoulder.

“That’s new to
me, My King,” he said.

“I’ve never heard of blackbloods wearing uniforms.”

The Remiel rubbed his chin.  Something about the symbol stirred a vague disquiet in him.  It was familiar, but hovered at the edge of his memory.

“Your
Highness,” Ethelrynne said, causing the two men to look up.

“I’m sad to sa
y that our scouts had reported increased goblinoid activity leading up to this invasion, but my father,” she emphasized the word with mild annoyance, “thought it would be more trouble than it could be worth to send a delegation to meet with you.”

The silence t
hat followed was telling.  The princess had the grace to look chagrined.

“The p
rincess took it upon herself to come to the fort,” Hade interjected.  “She and her rangers came upon me as I…as I fled from the sacking of the fort.” He reddened at the admission of his desertion.

Tavister waved away the
self-recrimination, “You couldn’t have saved the fort by yourself, Corporal.  You did the right thing.”

The k
ing nodded, “Indeed.  Your meeting with the princess may prove to be a great boon as we look at how best to address this crisis.”

“Her team aided in defending the town of Ormery from a raiding party.  She lost one of her men there.” Hade said.

“I’m sorry to hear of your loss, Princess,” the king said, not unkindly.  She nodded her thanks.

“We met the wizard, Osric Glenshadow there.  He actually saved us
from some trolls,” Hade went on.

“He volunteered to stay behind and help the people evacuate, and told us how to contact his apprentices in Vizerburg.

“We met with the baron, and then Osric’s students who showed us the flying ship.  That was two days ago.”

Reynolt looked impressed, “Old Osric was a bit eccentric, but I can see I was wrong about his designs!”

A chime sounded from the massive grandfather clock near the eastern hearth, and the king stood.

“This is indeed grave news,” he said, “and we shall discuss it furt
her.

“
Unfortunately, I have another matter to attend to.  Please, enjoy the meal.  I shall return as soon as I am able.”

With that he took his leave of them, Calvert in tow.

The others fell into animated discussion.  Tavister had plenty of thoughts on how to organize the defense of the east.  He was concerned about the logistics, as the bulk of the army was fighting off mutant incursions to the south.

“We’re going to need more men,” he said, thoughtfully, “We’re also going to need officers with experience dealing with blackbloods.” He looked sharply at Hade.

“I’d like you to help with the planning, Corporal.  You’ll need to join us in the war room when the king returns.”

Hade straightened reflexively at the man’s military tone, “Absolutely, sir.  I’ll do what I can.”

Tavister nodded, “Good.  First, take your dinner and have some time to relax.  Things are going to start moving fast around here, and you’ll be glad you did.”

With that, the big man excused himself and quit the solar.  Ethelrynne looked at Hade with a smile.

“I smell a promotion, Corporal,” she teased.  Reynolt and the princess rose to walk with him toward the food.

“Just what I need,”
he replied in mock indignation.

“I finally get away from the blackbloods and now they’ll send me back at ‘em…
this time at the front of the line!”

The roar of the crowd was an uncomfortable backdrop for those who wished to be heard in the Pit and Pickerel.  The inn, which was little more than a fighting pit and gambling den on the nasty end of the docks, was a favorite of smugglers, pirates, thieves, and racketeers. 

It was a place that Wielder Duln knew well.

He’d gotten a note with the first shipment of supplies to their warehouse hideout, and had cooked up an excuse to get away for the evening; something about scouting the watch routines.  Calistra had bought it, she had no reason not to, and here he was.

Back in the days of his youth, he had frequented places like this all over Galloway, working his way through the ranks of a gang known as the Night Thorns.  They were a ragtag group, low on the totem pole of organized crime, and always spoiling for a fight.  Duln had been an exemplar of the
mindset, big for his age, rough-and-tumble, and sharper than your average street knife.

It hadn’t taken him long to attract the attention of the Old Badger.  A near-mythical figure in the city’s underworld, the man ran the Pinnacle, a mob that specialized in working the noble quarter near the palace.  Some said they even had men placed among the
baron’s household, but it was all hearsay.

The Badger, though, he was real enough.  He had a reputation for cruelty and some said
he possessed a tendency to be casually homicidal.  He was a stocky man of indeterminable age, with salt and pepper hair, and a bushy gray beard shot through with streaks of black.  It was the beard, along with the man’s reputation, that had earned him the moniker.

Wielder had made an impression on the man, especially after an operation went bad and rather than blame it on the crew he was with, Duln had taken responsibility himself. 

When asked why he didn’t make an excuse, the young rake had simply said, “You want the glory, you gotta take the lumps.”

And he had.  More than a few scars made their appearance that night, as the Badger had worked him over.  When it was done, the crime boss had sent him on his way with instructions to return after he’d mended. 

Surprised that he hadn’t been chopped into fish bait, Wielder had come back two days later and gone to work.

Years passed, and the Badger came to trust Duln.  He saw in the younger man a sense of honor that so many of his minions lacked.  It was during one particular drinking binge that the Old Badger had confided his deepest secret to Wielder; he was a plant.

The Pinnacle didn’t have men placed among the baron’s staff, the baron had men placed among the gang.  The most important of these men, of course, was the Badger himself.

Duln had reeled.  He never suspected even a hint of the old man being on the straight and narrow, and it rocked his world. 

He’d spent a night wandering the street, tangling with anyone who dared get in his way, wondering whether he should be thinking of ways to assassinate the Badger, or if he was actually relieved that he might have a chance at a legitimate life.

In the end, he’d returned, and a sober Badger had sat down with him to hash things
out.  They talked about what it all meant, and how the Badger believed that he was doing more good as the head of one of the toughest crime organizations in the city, than he could as a watchman.

It caused a sea change in the younger man’s thinking.  He’d always believed that society was beyond saving, and that feasting on the festering corpse of civilization was the only way to get through life without losing his mind.  He’d been orphaned at a young age by a robbery gone bad
and it colored his outlook. 

He truly believed that, even though he yearned for a life of integrity, that such a life was an illusion.  Now he was being shown how ironic that outlook had been.

The Old Badger had been relieved that Duln chose to stay and work with him to make a difference for people on the street.  Wielder had become his right hand man, his ‘chain man’, so called because together they projected the image that the Badger kept him on a tight chain, and when he let Duln loose, somebody died.

Years had passed this way, and Wielder had found some meaning in his
existence.  They were making life a little better for the poor folk of the city, while keeping the truly heinous elements off of the street.  Things had been going so well, they hadn’t seen the betrayal coming.

One of the other men under the Baron’s command in the Pinnacle had chosen to turn his back on his patron.  The money finally got to him, and he decided to out the Badger as a plant.  The only saving grace for the old man had been the warning of a hooker that had paid attention when the man talked in his sleep.

Wielder and the old man had hashed out plans to deal with the coup, and had settled on a solution that would ensure the survival of the Old Badger’s position, but which left a bitter taste in his mouth just the same.

Duln murdered the man, and set it up to look as though he had been confronted about his loyalty to the group.  He left enough clues to incriminate himself, before fleeing the gang’s hideout.

The Old Badger had been all fire and brimstone, calling for Duln’s head on a platter.  The rouse had worked; everyone was incensed at the infiltrator who’d worked his way so high only to betray them all, and any idea  that the Badger was in the baron’s pocket was erased from the collective consciousness.

That had been a little over ten years ago.  Duln had fled the city, ranging far to the north, making a living by his sword, until settling down in Corwood.  He thought he’d put this chapter of his life permanently behind him.

“Old habits die hard, eh?”

He snapped his head from his drink.  He’d gotten lost in memory, and lowered his guard.  A pudgy man was sitting next to him, smoking a cigar.  As Duln faced him, the fellow blew a puff of smoke in his face.

Wielder glared and coughed slightly.  Even in his heyday, he’d never gotten fully accustomed to smoking.  The cigar smoker only laughed.

He was wearing heavily padded clothing, a ridiculous coonskin cap, and appeared to be slathered in makeup, but Duln knew him immediately.  The Old Badger nodded toward his tankard.

“Still pretending that’s beer?” he chuckled.

Wielder looked at his tankard of lemon water and smirked.  He looked at his old frien
d with something like affection.

“Still pretending to be a criminal?”

Replacing the cigar in his mouth, the Badger nodded, smiling.  He leaned in close to Duln.

“Same as always.  Never thought I’d see you back here.  What gives, Duln?”

Wielder paused, unsure of the answer himself.  He looked around the clamorous bar and said, “Is there someplace more private we can go?”

The Badger got serious and nodded.  He tipped his cap slightly to the barkeep, and then motioned for Duln to get up with him.  The two made their way to the back of the room, and through a door used by the kitchen staff.

They walked through dimly lit hallways and a few storage rooms to emerge in a back alley.  The sun had gone down, and a fat moon was making its shy entrance behind the palace.  There was the stink of rotten food, booze, and worse about, and the two of them hurried along, the Badger in the lead.

Before long they came to a townhouse, nondescript in design, and apparently on the list of the Badger’s safe houses.  The older man fit a key into the lock, and pulled Wielder along with him into the darkened interior.

There were a few moments that passed in the darkness, while the Badger rummaged through an end table that was positioned near the entrance.  Wielder listened patiently.  Finally, light bloomed in the small hallway, cast by the lamp that the Badger held aloft.

The two continued through the house in silence, before entering the kitchen at the back.  The Badger set the lantern upon a table, found a cleverly concealed latch on the floor and pulled open a trap door.  He smiled up at Duln, who returned his look with a shake of his head.  The Badger had always loved his
clandestine meeting places; the more reminiscent of spy thriller novels the better.

They descended into the cellar, where Duln was happy to find chairs and a couch that were comfortable, if a bit mildewed.  The walls were of rough stone, the floor dirt, covered in an old braided rug.  Upon a rectangular table in the center of the room, the Badger placed the lantern, before beginning the process of removing his disguise.

“You always were one for the theatrics,” Wielder couldn’t help but grin at the man as he wrestled with the stuffed clothing.

The Badger grunted as he struggled, “Works…I got next to you without you…nng…noticing, didn’t I?”  The last was triumphant, as he worked his head free of the belly shirt.  Wielder just shook his head and stared.

Wiping his face clear of makeup, the man presented a drastically different figure than that of Duln’s memory.  He was a stripling of a man in his late sixties, wire thin and steel hard.  He had a five o’clock shadow that trailed up to his stubbly head.  His bushy eyebrows remained, however, white as virgin snow. 

Wielder figured a lot must have happened in the ten years he’d been gone, bu
t somehow he thought the rake would have remained exactly the same.

“So,” the older man sighed as he plopped down in a chair, “What brings the infamous Wielder Duln back to his old stomping grounds?”

The soldier sat forward, rubbing his eye patch as he thought.  He decided to start with the truth.

“I work for the Baroness Emberlock now,” he started.  The Badger merely nodded, as if he already knew this. 

And why not
, Duln wondered.  The man certainly made a living by possessing and selling information as much as any other illicit good.

“She’s come to Galloway on a quest, a bid for power,” he said, not sure if he should have.

The Badger’s eyebrows perked up just a tick, “Bid for power, eh? Does she mean to go after our baron?  I’d hate to lose my job.” His eyes twinkled.

“I’m not sure, exactly,” Duln replied, and for the first time since the whole thing had begun, he realized it was true.

“To be honest, I’m not sure that Calistra knows exactly what’s going to happen.”

Neither man spoke for a moment.  The Badger held Duln’s gaze, as if trying to extract information from him through osmosis.  Duln halfway believed the old man could do it.

“I should tell you that I’ve informed the baron that she’s arrived,” the old man said quietly, testing the waters.

Duln nodded.  He would have expected no less.  Still, he had concerns.

“You know that she might be on to something here,” he started, feeling the words.  “It’s possible that these Van Uthers are not the best we can do for leaders.”

The Badger’s eyes were like chips of ice.

“You really believe that?”

Duln stood suddenly, “I don’t know.”  He started to pace the small room, something he hadn’t done in a long time.  Th
e Badger could read his anxiety and let him work through it.

“It’s possible what I believe doesn’t matter,” the warrior snapped, frustrated with his inabili
ty to sort through his feelings.

“She’s come in force, Badger.  I’m not the only one in her guard.  Tolwyn has made the
journey, and I mislike the power that old buzzard wields.”

Again the bushy eyebrow
s shot up, “Tolwyn…the one the lord mages tried to assassinate?  I thought he’d disappeared beyond the Holdwalls or some such. 

“
She’s done well to keep his service a secret.”

“She’s done more than that,” Duln replied, turning to offer a grim look to his old mentor, “She’s dabbling in Drejth affairs.”

The room seemed to get colder. 

The Badger sat forward, “Drejth,” he breathed. 

“You’re sure?”

Duln nodded, “Its worse.  She’s been contacted by the shade of Malavarius himself, Badge.”

The Badger balked.

“I tell you, it’s true.  The only reason I didn’t leave her service the moment I found out
was that I’d hoped to stop her before she fell too far.  I’m not sure how I can do that, now.”

The old man frowned, “That’s not like you, Duln.  You have a plan for everything.”

Wielder stopped pacing and spread his hands upon the table, leaning forward.  He shook his head in exasperation.

“I’m out of my depth here, Badge.  She’s got sorcerers
, and some kind of ancient artifact that supposedly is being delivered from the Temple of the Sacred Scroll. 

“
All she needs is some stripling of a monk who has a gift that can make the thing work, and she’s got everything in place to deliver a knock-out punch to the royals.” 

He formed a fist and thumped it on the table.

“Guards I can kill.  Hell, I might be able to catch Tolwyn in his sleep,
if
he sleeps, but the baroness is no slouch. 

“
She’s got that infernal blade the Emberlocks have always carried, and Drejth’s given it more magic.  She’s sharp as a scorpion’s tail and sees enemies where there aren’t any.  At the first hint of detection, she’ll be gone.