Shadow of a Dark Queen (46 page)

“Look out!” said Owen. “Gods, you're going to boil yourself.”

Erik lifted the bowl to his lips and took a long sip, then said, “Heat doesn't bother me. I think it's the years at the forge. Now, cold, that makes me hurt.”

Owen laughed. “Hungry?”

Erik tore a large piece of bread off one of the loaves on the serving table and said, “Can we talk for a minute?”

Owen motioned for Erik to sit on a log that had been felled to provide a rude bench for men eating. No one else was nearby save the two men who would clean up the cook area and ready it for the morning meal before turning in.

Owen said, “Where do you want to begin?”

Erik said, “I want to know how you got here, but first, can I ask you something?”

“Certainly.”

“When you kill a man, how does that make you feel?”

Owen was silent and then blew out his cheeks and let a long breath slowly escape. “That's a difficult one, isn't it?” He fell silent a minute, then said, “I've killed men two ways, Erik. As my lord's Swordmaster I was dispenser of the high justice and I've hung more than one man. It's different each time, and never easy. And it depends on why I'm
hanging them. Murderers, rapists, thugs, they . . . I don't feel much of anything, except relief when it's, over. When it's something dicey, like your execution was set to be, then it's a nasty business. I feel like taking a long, long hot bath afterward, though I rarely get the chance.

“When it comes to battle, things just happen too quickly and you're usually too busy staying alive to think about it. Does that answer you?”

Erik nodded as he munched on soggy vegetables. “In a way. Did you ever want to see someone suffer?”

Owen scratched his head at this. “Can't say as I have. I've wanted to see a few men dead, but suffer? Not really.”

“I wanted to see a man feel pain today.” Erik explained about Embrisa and how he had wanted to make her killer experience a long, slow, terrible death. When he finished, he added, “Then I found I could barely keep my arse closed. Flux and then throwing up. Then suddenly I'm here eating like nothing happened.”

“Rage does strange things to you,” Owen said. “You're not going to like hearing this, I think, but the only two other men I've known who felt as you say you did were your father and . . . Stefan.”

Erik shook his head and laughed ruefully. “You're right. I didn't like hearing that.”

“Your father only got that way with rage. If he was angry, he'd rather have seen his enemy injured and in pain than dead. But that was the only time.” His voice lowered. “Stefan was worse. He really enjoyed watching people suffer. He got . . . excited by it. Your father had to bribe more than one father off because his daughter was . . . damaged.”

“What about Manfred?”

Owen shrugged. “Given who his parents are, he's a decent enough person. You'd like him, given a chance to know each other, but that's neither here nor there.” Owen studied Erik, then said, “I've known you a long time, since you were a baby, Erik, and while you have some of your father in you, you don't have
only
your father's blood in you. Your mother can be a hard woman, but she was never a mean one. She's never hurt anyone for pleasure. And you can bet that Stefan was the worst mix of his father and mother.

“I think I can understand why you'd be so ferocious with the man who killed the girl. You were fond of her, I take it?”

“In a way.” Erik smiled. “She tried to cozen me into her bed so she could be the village smith's wife.” He shook his head in regret. “She was so obvious and there was no art to it, but in a way . . .”

“It made you feel good?”

“Yes.”

Owen nodded. “We all have our vanity, and a pretty girl's attentions are rarely unwelcomed by any man.”

“But it doesn't explain why I wanted to see that man hurt so much. I can still feel it, Owen. If I could raise him from the dead and cause him to scream in agony, I think I'd do it.”

“Justice, maybe. The girl died in agony, and he got a simple death in return.”

A voice from the dark said, “Sometimes revenge goes disguised as justice.”

Both Owen and Erik turned to see Nakor entering from the darkness. “I was out walking and heard you
talk. Sounds like an interesting discussion.” Without asking their leave, he sat down.

Erik said, “I was telling Owen here what happened today. Have you heard?”

Nakor nodded. “Sho Pi told me. You were in a rage. You wanted to cause this man pain. Bobby kept you from indulging in his suffering.”

Erik nodded.

Nakor said, “Some men take to the pain in others the way other men take to strong drink or potent drugs. If you recognize that appetite in yourself early and learn to master it within yourself, you'll be the better man for knowing, Erik.”

“I don't know what I wanted,” Erik admitted. “I don't know if it was that he didn't suffer enough or if I really wanted to see something in his eyes as he died.”

Owen said, “Most soldiers are struck by others' death after the fact. That you got sick—”

Nakor said, “You got sick?”

“Like I had eaten green apples,” admitted Erik.

Nakor grinned. “Then you're not a man to eat poison and like it. If you hadn't gotten sick, it would be because that poison of hate found a home in your gut.” He reached over and poked a finger into Erik's side. “You ate the hatred, but your body threw it up as if it were those green apples.” He smiled, apparently satisfied with the explanation. “Do your reiki each night and let your mind seek calmness and you will survive the terrors you've just met.”

Owen and Erik exchanged looks that said neither man knew what Nakor was talking about. Erik said, “Now tell me how you came here?”

Owen said, “That was due to you.”

“Me?”

Owen said, “When you were caught, my lady Mathilda and your half brother raced to Krondor, to ensure the Prince knew you were to be hung without question.

“When we got there, I asked a friend in the Prince's court to grant me an audience with Nicholas, and I tried to give him some idea of how you'd been dealt with as a child.” He shrugged. “It obviously didn't do any good, as you were to be hung, and the Dowager Baroness discovered I had tried to intercede upon your behalf.” He looked at Erik and smiled. “I was asked to retire from my office. Manfred said he regretted to ask, but she is his mother, after all.”

“I've never met her, but she seems a most persuasive woman, by all reports,” offered Nakor.

“That's one way of putting it,” said Owen. “Well, there isn't a great demand for discharged Swordmasters, so I applied to the Prince's Guard for a billet. I was prepared to stand down to man-at-arms if needs be, or to attempt to gain a commission on the frontier. Failing that, I was going to try my hand at the mercenary trade, providing escort for merchant trains down into the Vale of Dreams and Great Kesh.

“But that black heart Bobby de Loungville found me at a tavern and got me very drunk, and I woke up the next day and discovered I was going to be running like a madman from Questor's View to Land's End on one errand or another for Prince Nicholas and Calis.”

Owen continued, “That's a strange customer, our Captain. Did you know he ranks in the court as a Duke?”

Erik said, “I only know him as—”

“The Eagle of Krondor,” finished Owen. “I know. He's important, that's all I know. But when the dust settled, I was on the
Freeport Ranger
, with a list of missions to last three months, and one month to finish them when we made port in Maharta.”

Erik finished his food and said, “Sorry to have put you to this, Owen.”

Owen laughed. “It was in the cards, as the gamblers say. And truth to tell, I was growing bored at Darkmoor. The wine's the best in the world, and the women as fair as anywhere, but there's little else to stir a man there. I've grown tired of hanging bandits and running escort from one safe city to another. I think it's time for something grand.”

Nakor shook his head. “There's little grand ahead of us.” He stood up, yawning. “I'm going to sleep. We have three long days ahead.”

“Why?” asked Erik.

“While you were killing those men, we got word of a rendezvous.”

“What is that?” asked Erik. “I've heard that term before.”

“Meeting,” said Owen.

“A great camp,” offered Nakor. With a grin he said, “It is where the two sides in this war will come to make offers for the service of companies like ours. It's where we will find the army of this Emerald Queen, and then friend Greylock's adventure will begin.” He wandered off into the gloom.

Owen said, “He may be the strangest man I've met. I've only talked to him a couple of times since yesterday, but he has some of the oddest notions I've ever encountered. But he's right about one thing: it's a long day tomorrow and we both need to sleep.”

Erik nodded and took Owen's bowl. “I'll wash that up. I'm doing mine anyway.”

“Thank you.”

“And thank you,” replied Erik.

“For what?”

“For talking.”

Owen put his hand upon Erik's shoulder. “Anytime, Erik. Good night.” He walked after Nakor.

Erik went to the bucket used to clean the wooden bowls and rinsed them with water, scoured them with cleaning sand, then rinsed with fresh water again. He put the bowls where the men who would make the morning mess would expect to find them, and returned to his own tent.

The others were sleeping, except Roo, who said, “Are you all right?”

Erik sighed and said, “I don't know. But I am better.”

Roo seemed about to make a remark, then thought better of it and turned over to go to sleep. Erik lay in the darkness, and while he intended to practice the self-healing Nakor had taught him, sleep was on him less than a minute after Roo.

* * *

The camp was immense. At least ten thousand armed men were scattered across a low valley that ran from the hills on the east to the river on the west. Cutting through the middle was a smaller tributary to the Vedra, and along this smaller river camps had been made.

The brokers who were conducting the contracts were arrayed under a large canopy, ocher in color, at the heart of the valley. Erik rode with his companions in their usual position near the head of the column,
near enough to Calis to overhear his conversations with the men around him.

Praji pointed. “Some of those banners are damn strange; I thought I knew every company worth talking about in this gods-forsaken continent.” He glanced around. “Some of these others are a long way from home.”

“How is it shaping up?” asked de Loungville.

“It's early yet. Khaipur fell less than a month ago. If the Emerald Queen's representatives get here in the next week I'll be surprised. But I'll bet you a whore's hoard that the Priest-King of Lanada is spending money like a sailor in port.” Looking around, he said, “We'd better head up the valley and see if there's anywhere good near the river.” He sniffed the air. “With the number of these fools pissing in the water after they get drunk, downstream's the last place I want to be.”

De Loungville laughed. “Looks like the best places are taken.”

“Only if you like the taste of another man's piss in your water,” said Praji. “This is just the start. The word's been about for five years now. There's a big war to end all wars coming, and any man with a sword who doesn't get in now will be out of the looting.” He shook his head. “Doesn't make much sense, does it? You'd think any man with eyes in his head could see—”

Calis cut him off with an upraised hand. “Not here. Too many ears.”

Praji nodded. “Look for a red eagle banner, twin to your own. That'll be Vaja if he's found his way here.”

Calis nodded.

They rode into the camp area, and Erik felt his pulse race. Never had so many pairs of eyes regarded him with suspicion. The rendezvous was neutral ground, where both sides in the coming conflict could recruit mercenary companies to their cause, openly bidding against one another, and tradition bound every man who entered sight of the tent to keep his sword sheathed. But tradition and enforceable law were two different things, and more than once a battle had erupted at such a meeting. Men in this camp knew only that those in their own company were allies. Anyone else might be someone they would see across the field of battle mere days or weeks after leaving the rendezvous.

They passed by the large yellowish tent, though on the other side of the water, as they picked their way upriver, and away from the main body of men camping. Calis found a small rise with a flat top that gave a commanding view of the valley below and motioned to de Loungville that they would camp there. “No fortifications; it's against the compact, but I want double guard. When the whores come by, let the men indulge, but no strong drink and no drugs—chase the peddlers away. I'll not have some fool start a war because he sees the ghost of some enemy in the smoke and pulls his sword.”

De Loungville nodded and gave the order. Without the need to dig a trench and rampart, making camp took little time. When Erik's squad had finished erecting their tent, Foster came by and gave the rotation for guard duty. Erik groaned when he was told the second watch, which was from midnight to two hours before dawn. Sleep interrupted was as good as not sleeping from his point of view.

Still, after three days in the saddle, a little time to lie around would be welcome. And if he had the midnight watch tonight, that meant the dawn watch tomorrow, and the day after, no watch at all. He found that a little gratifying, and was glad to have found any reason to feel good whatsoever.

Trumpets blew and Erik came awake with a start. They had been in camp for five days now and he was back to a split night of guard duty. He rolled out of his tent and saw that everyone was looking down into the valley below.