Shadow Of The Winter King (Book 1) (3 page)

He drove his fingers into a handhold and pulled himself to the next, shoulders corded with effort. Breath came hard as he worked, so he found a perching dragon, wedged his calves inside, and leaned back to rest and gulp down the cold mountain air that rushed through his hair, chapped hands hanging. Thirty years had passed since he had first made this climb, and he had grown no younger in that time.

A thousand feet below him, low-city sparkled with a night sky’s worth of candles burning in thousands of windows. From this distance, Tar Vangr looked peaceful, even though he knew the watch would be storming house to house, searching for the murderer of Paeter Ravalis. Fitting, he supposed, that he had dealt Paeter’s death on this night of all nights. Doom stalked the streets on Ruin’s Night, the last night of the year, visiting death and destruction where it wished.

He had ridden a skylift most of the way up to the palace, but ultimately he’d had to duck Ravalis guards at the gates. They were out in force, and had even rounded up ironclads to guard high-city for Ruin’s Night. Any other route—even killing the guards, regardless of armament—would have been easier than the climb, but the effort quieted the fierce joy and anger that warred in his heart. Scaling the mountain gave him a chance to be alone and think.

Regel felt it before he heard it: stone trembled and cracked under his feet. He lunged out and caught himself on the dragon’s wing, then leaped from there to the carved slit of a window. The dragon itself broke away from the mountain and tumbled down over low-city. Regel remembered the jackal figurine, falling on Paeter’s body. The stone beast shattered into rubble on a lower ridge.

The whole city was falling apart, as Ruin encroached outside the walls.

Regel flexed his arms, swung about, and alighted on a high balcony that looked out over low-city and the bay. As a nameless child climbing and skulking in the passages beneath the palace, he had delighted in his skill. The palace had been his world, and these stones his kingdom. Now, as a man, he was tired and wanted nothing more than to find a warm place to rest.

He thought of the king. “We are all of us old men,” he said to no one.

The darkness of Ruin’s Night whispered in reply, but he thought that just the wind. Either way, it chilled him.

Before that night, Regel had expected to feel righteous or at least
justified
. Finally, Orbrin had loosed his hand, and Regel had avenged the only woman he had ever loved. Finally, Princess Semana was old enough to rule on her own without Paeter, and depriving her of her wretch of a father seemed like a service. Finally, the Blood of Winter could break free of these damned Ravalis of the summerblood.

So why did he feel no warm elation, but only cold dread?

Then Regel saw something afire in the ice-choked harbor. Ships were making their way toward burning hunks of metal that lay strewn across the harbor: the wreck of a crashed skyship.

Regel’s stomach lurched. This very eve, Princess Semana had been returning to the city by skyship.

It took a moment for the horror to strike him—a moment wherein his chest heaved in increasing panic and he almost lost his grip on the window. He knew, with a frenzied, mad certainty, that something had gone terribly wrong this night, in part by his own hand.

Then he saw it: a dark shape framed against the moon, flying toward the king’s balcony above. Not a bird, he thought—a
man
.

Heedless of the deadly drop below, Regel leaped up the outside wall and caught one of the nearly invisible handholds he’d cut years ago. He climbed, racing the flying man, and swung up over the banister onto the main balcony just as he landed. Inner light through the stained glass of the palace window cast scintillating colors over the two figures.

Before Regel stood a spindly creature wrapped toe to crown in black leather. Its arms and legs—the latter trailing smoke in the wake of the flight—looked more like black-swathed bones than the limbs of a living thing. It wore mismatched gauntlets: one of fire-blasted metal with talons, one a more elegant construction of silver and iron. Its face hid behind a leather mask that covered its head entirely, leaving only small slits for eyes and mouth. Regel might have thought the creature a manikin, but for the way its eyes flicked to him beneath the mask. The moonlight made the eyes seem blood red.

Regel knew this creature and his murderous powers. Frostburn was instantly in his hands, filling him with a cold hunger. “Mask,” he said.

The sorcerer considered him a moment, as though pondering his presence. In his left hand, he held what looked like a hempen rope soaked in blood. “Regel, King’s Shadow,” he said, his voice both sibilant and rough-shod, like a snake slithering through jagged glass. “I always knew it would be you.”

Regel found the words odd, but a surge of anger drowned out all thought. The ravings of a lunatic could not be credited. “What are you doing here?”

Mask hesitated a moment. “I slay the Blood of Winter this night—what of you?”

He thought of the destroyed skyship he’d seen in the harbor. “It was you,” he said. “You crashed the
Heiress
. You...” He raised Frostburn. “You killed Semana.”

He could not read Mask’s expression, of course, but the sorcerer hesitated. “Why would you care? Were you not here to kill the king, slayer? Do you not kill all that you swear to love, by your hand or another’s?”

Then Mask tossed the gory rope to the stone between them, and Regel knew it for what it was: a sticky mass of hair. It was Semana’s silver-white braid, smeared with half-congealed blood.

Rage welling, Regel tensed to spring, but a cry from the throne room broke his concentration. His eyes flickered to the window for an instant, and something struck him from Mask’s direction—sickly green magic that flared around the slayer’s mask and surged forth to saturate him like a flood. His body felt hard as bone under Mask’s power, every muscle afire. His insides churned and air would not come. He coughed, spattering the stones with blackish blood. He fell, nerveless beyond his inner agony, face turned so he could see into the throne room.

A score of guardsmen stood in a circle, weapons drawn, frozen. There, in the center of the ring, knelt King Orbrin, leaning against Ovelia. Regel thought at first that they were embracing, and found it strange. She was devoted to him, yes, but that embrace was too intimate—like that of a child and parent, or even that of lovers. Then she pulled away, and her sword wrenched free of Orbrin’s chest. Blood smeared across her face. For a moment, her hazel eyes wet and gleaming, she gazed out at them—at him. Then she saluted with her bloody sword.

The guardsmen roared a chorus of anger and charged her.

Regel heard a sound like a choked gasp. Mask was looking into the throne room, hand at his obscured mouth. Was that laughter?

Then the creature strode away and leaped from the balcony to take flight.

The magic wracking Regel’s body subsided, but he was too weak to move, too weak to defend his king or even himself.

The scalding rain returned, sliding across his face like burning tears as he lay helpless as a corpse.

One

Present Day—Streets of Tar Vangr—Autumn 981, Sorcerus Annis

S
team rising from their
clothes, Regel and Ovelia plunged out of the Burned Man into the night. The scything rain fell like acid on their exposed skin and their blood burned inside. Behind them, Ravalis slayers fought against the Circle of Tears, who bought them time to flee.

Three hundred feet above them, balanced gracefully on mage-glass and curling buttresses, high-city sparkled in the rain light, pouring down waterfall streams of liquid fire. The great palace of Tar Vangr rose on a mountain through the center of the city, standing like a petrified god in judgment as they plunged into the labyrinth of ancient streets, putting as much cobblestone between them and their pursuers as possible. Ovelia had left her cloak back at the embattled tavern, so Regel held his over her head as they ran past suspicious tradesmen and ducked gazes from behind the soot-stained windows of wine taverns. He kept his eyes up for Ravalis patrols, and they steered away from the echoing watch horns.

Around them, the rain sizzled on ground heated from the silver forge-fires of the Nar deep below. In their time in Tar Vangr, the Ravalis had stoked the Narfire to turn out blades and armor by the wagonload to gird an army of soldiers. The power armor they constructed was a threat, though it had its weaknesses, and their swords were all inferior pieces, of course—hardly a one of them could stand against the ancient art of Tar Vangr swordsmithing. But the Ravalis commanded enough soldiers that the dwindling noble bloods of the city stood little chance of rising against their summerblood masters.

And, of course, the Ravalis had their war machines to tip the balance and keep the people in line. Some of the monstrosities were salvaged from the fields of Echvarr, others freshly built in the caverns below Tar Vangr. Regel shuddered to think what other devices the southern princes—with their blood of metal and thoughts of gears—might be forging in those caves.

Around Hangman’s Crook, half a mile from the Burned Man, they finally halted to catch their breath at the edge of the Square of the Fallen, nestled near one of the towering, cloud-wreathed columns that held up high-city. The watch horns had receded in the distance, and they would be safe for the moment. Regel cursed the loss of his carved dove back at the tavern, as it would have let him see without seeing. Instead, he hid against the corner and glanced back. No pursuit—good.

As on most nights, the Square of the Fallen lay fallow, barren of visitors. Vangryur rarely frequented the place except on Ruin’s Night, when they paid their respects at the black obelisk that rose from its heart. Tar Vangr’s calamitous history was carved into its surface in just a few words: a list of years, and names of those Ruin had claimed on the final, fatal night of that year. The monument to Ruin’s Night made the square a sacred place, and under the rule of the godless Ravalis, Tar Vangr had little room left for the sacred.

“Still as fast as ever,” Ovelia said breathlessly. Her warm body pressed against his side felt entirely too good. “Deflecting a casterbolt with a blade? Not many could do that.”

“Luck.” He broke away from her to step toward the obelisk.

“Ha...
luck
.” Ovelia gazed at him piercingly. “Only Regel the Frostburn could do that.”

“As you say.”

Regel examined the weathered obelisk, carved with a list of deaths, losses, and blood-breakings that reached halfway up from the ground. Each entry was simply a year and one or more names, all of whom that fallen to Ruin in one way or another. Many runes rose from the time since the Ravalis had come to the city—almost as many as the rest of Tar Vangr’s centuries-long history. Though Regel had been present at many of the assassinations, only a few of the dates and names meant anything to him. “961—Luether,” when the Ravalis had come to Tar Vangr. “966—Lenalin Denerre,” murdered by her monstrous husband Paeter. “971—Darak Ravalis nô Denerre,” sent into exile for a crime Regel could not prove he did not commit. And, of course, five years past: “976—Orbrin Denerre, Paeter Ravalis, Semana Denerre nô Ravalis,” all of them gone in one bloody night of treachery.
Ovelia’s
treachery.

“What is it?” Ovelia pointedly did not look at the obelisk.

“How simple that makes it all seem,” Regel said. “As if those nights were merely history.”

“We know better.” Ovelia nodded back the way they had come. “Who were those folk back at the tavern? You had an
army
in that place.”

“Tears,” Regel said. “Courtesans, spies—little passes in this city that I don’t know.”

“You are a spymaster in your own right, then,” Ovelia said. “Did you know about me all along?”

“No.” Regel peered around the edge once more, but the street had yet to clear. “The only one who knows more than I do about the goings-on of Tar Vangr is the Shroud, whoever he is. I’ve never been able to reason it out. I believe those were his men. If the Ravalis know of you, we have to move quickly.”

“Agreed.” Ovelia nodded slightly, her face unreadable.

“I’ve a safehouse for the night,” Regel said. “But we should leave the city as soon as possible.”

“I have a ship waiting at the dock,” she said.

“I should have known you’d have a plan.”

Ovelia stiffened at Regel’s side. Before he could react, she tackled him against the obelisk.

“Ovelia,” Regel said, warning in his voice.

“Just—” She pressed herself against him and kissed him hard. Her lips were warm and soft.

He reached for her shoulders, but belatedly he saw warning shadows leaking from the sword sheathed at her belt. He relaxed and put his arms up around her. Above him, he was accutely aware of Lenalin’s name, traced in acid rain, burning at the edge of his senses.

Metal crunched on stone as something huge ground its way toward them. Over his shoulder, Regel glimpsed the massive silhouette of a Lancer striding into the Square of the Fallen, a mechanized suit of armor the size of a dire bear. It bore the standard armament the Ravalis bestowed on their war machines: a heavy caster installed in its right arm, while its left boasted a crackling butcher’s sword that could cut through solid stone walls at a single blow. That single war machine could kill a dozen men in less time than it took a trained swordsman to draw steel.

Trailing behind the ironclad, two Ravalis foot soldiers appeared at the mouth of the alley, searing rain dripping off their wide-brimmed hats to sizzle off their powered armor. In the night, their eyes gleamed, making them resemble wolves more than men. They saw the two lovers, leered a few seconds, then walked on, grumbling about crazy Vangryur and the rain as they followed the ironclad south down the Path of Dustweavers out of the square.

“You could have simply warned me.” Regel broke their embrace. “You didn’t have to
kiss
me.”

Ovelia refused to meet his eye. “As you say.”

They paused in the alley to collect their breath. Regel watched the soldiers disappear in the haze, then considered the rivulets of searing rain on the ground. He would do anything to avoid looking at Ovelia, or Lenalin’s name on the obelisk. “What if I had refused?”

“Refused the kiss?” Ovelia asked. “We could have killed them, I suppose. Perhaps not the ironclad, but we could have fled.”

“I meant your desperate scheme,” Regel said. “If I had said no, what would you have done then?”

“Ah.” Ovelia’s expression cooled. “Then we would have dueled. And even if you hadn’t called in what is apparently a small army of agents, I would likely be dead now.”

“Why take such a risk?”

“I—” Ovelia looked at her feet. “I have made mistakes, Regel—unforgivable mistakes.”

“Yes,” he said.

He saw tension ripple through Ovelia as the last vestiges of her once-fearsome pride made war against her will. Finally, she sank to one knee, there in the Square of the Fallen. “Please,” she said.

Regel regarded her silently, unable to muster a reply.

“Please aid me.” She laid her hands on his calves—the old gesture of supplication. “I know I have no right to ask it of you, but I do as I must. ‘Eternal, Unyielding’—those are the words of my house, but I will yield unto you. Promise me.”

He looked up at Lenalin’s name, and at that of her daughter Semana. The injustice burned him.

“Ovelia, I am a man of honor.”

“Yes, but you doubt me. I can see it in your eyes.” She clutched him hard. “Please help me. Take my gold, my body, my life—only do this.
Please
.”

Regel wanted to touch her face. He wanted to reassure her. He did neither.

“I will not play you false,” Regel repeated. “Get up.”

Ovelia shook her head. “Say it again—give me your word.”

“I give it. I will aid you.” Regel looked away from her, up at the obelisk. When he gave his word, it was less to Ovelia than to Lenalin’s name, graven in the stone. “We will kill Mask.” He looked back to Ovelia, with her blonde hair like Lenalin’s. “Get up—you shame me.”

She did so, standing with her familiar, easy grace. She touched her lips with two fingers.

“What is it?” Regel asked. “We need to move.”

She drew her fingers away and closed her hand into a fist. “Nothing,” she said. “Let’s away.”

* * *

As they rounded a corner along the Path of Spidercatchers, Regel and Ovelia passed by the worn feet of the outer wall that marked Tar Vangr’s northern edge. The monstrous presence dominated the maze of alleys below, offering shelter but also a dire promise: Ruin lay beyond this wall. Outside those stones, Regel thought, the world went mad.

Since the Ravalis had come to power five years ago, the northern kingdom had eroded to little beyond the city wall. Thus had Tar Vangr—the last city-state remaining of the old Empire of Calatan, born a thousand years ago and fallen before its eight hundredth year—entered its final dotage. Beyond the old stones lay fallow plains where once had stood farms and homesteads that became endless snowfields in the winter. Since ascending the throne, the Ravalis had made no effort to expand Tar Vangr’s power or lands. It was only a matter of time, some said, before the Ravalis let Tar Vangr itself fall to Ruin just as they had lost their ancestral homeland of Luether. Some even believed the ancient Prophecy of Return was being fulfilled, and the passing of King Orbrin—the last unifying force in Tar Vangr—heralded the final triumph of Ruin a thousand years after the birth of Calatan. Nineteen years had yet to pass before the roll of Sorcerius Annis came to a thousand, but with each year, the world seemed a little darker—and a little madder.

Ovelia had made herself harbinger of that self-same Ruin by slaying Orbrin. For this alone, Regel might have killed her, but he needed her for now. For Mask.

Regel paused at the Aleisaar, the wide main road that ran north to south. They would have to cross to reach the safehouse. Here, he hesitated. Across the road stood an empty commune that had held perhaps fifty families in ages past. Now it was condemned and wholly unoccupied, its every window dark. By all accounts it looked safe, but Regel was cautious. He drew one of his falcata and focused on the plain steel pommel, letting his senses drift. Sure enough, Regel saw without seeing—knew without knowing—that foes waited.

“The way is watched,” he said. “Ravalis soldiers.”

“I feel it too.” Ovelia had one hand on her sword hilt. “Draca does not lie.”

Sure enough, her bloodsword glimmered with crimson fire and cast devious shadows all around them. Regel had used the warning sword to some effect in the Burning Man, but it awoke to its true power in the hands of an heir of Dracaris. Few in the World of Ruin bore true magic in these latter days, with the noble lines all but exhausted, but some wielded ensorcelled heirlooms that spoke to their blood. For Ovelia, the sword conjured portentious images of swordsmen that came at them in a rush. The flame-wrought semblances burst away into the air as they struck, leaving only a warning.

Regel and Ovelia shared a nod, eyes deadly. They were prepared. Regel drew his second sword and took a single step into the street to announce their presence.

The attack came suddenly. Regel raised his falcata as a slayer rushed from hiding. No casters—whoever had come to kill them wanted to keep it quiet. Ovelia’s sword had warned him of the direction of the man’s attack, so he could block easily. He caught the slash high, locked blades, and twisted to slash his other blade across the man’s belly. Steel screeched against power armor, shedding sparks as its fine edge gouged the imbued iron. The man staggered back, surprised at Regel’s perfect block and counterstroke, and his gray cloak swirled in the night air.

“Dusters,” Regel said. Neither of them had known the identity of their foe, and it gave him pause.

Three more power armored men—elite Dust Knights of the Ravalis—appeared then, their gray cloaks parting as they moved. Hooked swords glittered and armor hummed, imbued with destructive magic. Thaumaturgy or “dust magic” was not real magic—not like the Frostfire of Denerre, the metal sculpting of Ravalis, the warding of Dracaris, or the power certain heirs of another noble blood might wield. A thamaturgical charge could be used up unlike a true relic, but it could slay just the same.

“ ‘Ware sorcery!” Regel cried even as one of the swords blasted into his defense with a roar. The cacophony blew him through the air three paces, and he fell to one knee, magic ensnaring and binding him like a man trapped in a net. Eyes swimming, he looked back to the duel.

Ovelia was holding all four at bay, cutting red lines through the air with Draca. One of the ensorcelled blades slashed toward her but she caught it and—with a whine of fizzling magic—the Duster’s sword rebounded, its power drained away. That was Draca’s other power: it devoured magic, the better to defend its chosen ward. The wavy shape of the steel gave Ovelia a further advantage, because it made swords she parried vibrate painfully in their wielders’ hands. Regel felt a surge of hope.

Blades sang in the gloomy alley and artificial magic withered away to nothing. Ovelia hissed aloud as she fought, sacrificing accuracy for speed, and the ferocity of her defense surprised and impressed Regel. At length, the four Dusters fought defensively to reassess the situation. They showed no fear, only an evolving strategy. They gave up hope of overwhelming her and instead sought to tire her.