The RuneLords (53 page)

Orden nodded thoughtfully.

"Captain Tempest, I suppose you know why my men and I have come?" It was a delicate subject, but Orden needed to know if Tempest had captured the forcibles, moved them from Bredsfor Manor. Though he'd sent a man to find them, Orden didn't want to be kept waiting, especially if he waited only for bad news.

The captain stared up at him, incurious. "You heard we were under attack?"

"Yes," Orden said, "but that is not why I came. All of Heredon is under attack, and I'd have preferred to bend my efforts to freeing Castle Sylvarresta. I came for the treasure."

"Treasure?" Captain Tempest asked. His eyes widened. Almost, Orden believed the man knew nothing about it. But he didn't quite trust that response. Tempest was working too hard to control his emotions, to show no reaction.

"You know what I'm talking about?"

"What treasure?" Tempest asked, with no hint of deception in his eyes.

Had the Duchess kept the existence of the forcibles hidden even from her own aide-de-camp? Orden had expected so, had hoped so.

"You knew the Duke was a forger, didn't you?" Orden asked. He let just a little of the power of his Voice slide into the question, in a tone that would elicit guilt.

"No!" Tempest protested, but his eyes flickered, and his pupils contracted.

The dishonest, miserable cur, Orden thought. The man lies to me now. When I asked about treasure, he thought I spoke of the gold blanks in the treasury. Truly, he had not heard of Raj Ahten's forcibles. That interested Orden.

So the Duchess had not trusted Tempest. Which meant Orden could not trust him, either.

King Orden forged ahead with a half-truth. "King Sylvarresta sent a message, saying the Duchess had overthrown Raj Ahten's forces here, and she had hidden or buried a treasure here in the castle. Have you seen signs of digging hereabout? Has anyone recovered the treasure?"

Tempest shook his head, eyes wide. Orden felt sure Tempest's men would be digging within the hour.

"Who did the Duchess trust most? Who would she have had bury the treasure?"

"The chamberlain," Tempest said quickly.

"Where is he now?"

"Gone! He left the castle shortly after the uprising. He--I haven't seen him since!" From the tone of Tempest's voice, he seemed worried that the chamberlain had made off with the treasure.

"What did he look like?"

"A thin fellow, like a willow switch, with blond hair and no beard."

The very messenger Orden had found slain. So the Duchess had sent the message to Sylvarresta using the man who'd hidden the forcibles, then told no one else about them. Captain Tempest might be a fine soldier, capable of defending the castle, but he was obviously dishonest. Knowledge of the treasure would have tempted him, and the Duchess had not wanted to let her king get betrayed again.

This news filled King Orden with sadness, a heaviness. Such a waste, that a fine king like Sylvarresta could suffer from such disloyalty. A whole nation compromised.

If a fine man like Sylvarresta was so little loved by his lords, Orden wondered, how can I trust my own vassals?

"Thank you, Captain Tempest," King Orden said, in a tone of dismissal.

"Oh, and Captain," Orden added, as Tempest hesitated in the doorway, strapping on his helm, "relief will come from Groverman and Dreis, as soon as they make arrangements. I sent a message asking for aid, and I told them of the treasure. The armies of the North will gather here!"

Tempest nodded, breathed a sigh of relief, departed. The matronly Days followed him out.

Orden sat for a long hour in the darkness, in a chair carved of dark walnut, finely wrought--too finely. The chiseled emblems of feasting men on its backboard dug into his flesh. One could not rest in these chairs.

So Orden stoked the fire in the fireplace, threw in a couple of shattered chairs for fuel, then lay on a bearskin, petting the Duke's hunting hounds, who batted the floor with their tails, reveling in his affection.

His Days had been standing in a corner, forgotten. Now the man came and sat in one of the uncomfortable chairs. Gaborn's Days remained in the corner.

Orden had not lain on the floor with a dog since he was a boy. He remembered the first time he'd come to Longmont with his father. He'd been nine years old, on his way home from his first big hunt, a hundred men in his retinue. It was in the fall, at Hostenfest, of course, where he'd met a young prince with long amber hair and narrow shoulders.

Sylvarresta. Prince Mendellas Orden's first friend. His only true friend. Orden had had soldiers who schooled him in the arts of war, and he'd made alliances with fawning sons of minor nobles who might have liked him but who always seemed too much aware how their inherited stations forever separated them from a prince.

Even the other princes had treated Orden with too much deference--always aware that his realm was richer and larger than any other.

It was only Sylvarresta whom Mendellas could trust. Sylvarresta would tell him if some hat made him look stupid instead of stylish, or would laugh at him when he missed a quintain with his lance. Only Sylvarresta ever dared tell him when he was wrong.

King Orden found himself breathing hard. I am wrong now, he realized. Wrong to have sent Borenson to kill Raj Ahten's Dedicates.

What if Borenson kills Sylvarresta? Could I ever forgive myself? Or will I have to bear the scar of it for the rest of my life, as a badge of this war?

Other kings had borne such scars, Orden told himself. Others had been forced to slaughter friends. As a child, Orden had begrudged the men who killed his own grandfather. Now he knew that too often, guilt became the price of leadership.

"Days?" King Orden whispered to the man who sat at his back.

"Yes, Your Lordship," his Days answered.

"What news have you of my son?" He had known the man all his life, had never considered the Days a friend or confidant. Yet he also admired the man as a scholar.

"To speak of it would violate my most sacred oaths, milord. We do not meddle in the affairs of state," the Days whispered.

Of course he knew the answer. The Days were never to hinder or help. If the King were drowning two feet from shore, the Days could not grasp his hand. "Yet you could tell me," King Orden asked. "You know the answer."

"Yes," the Days whispered.

"Do you not care for me? Are my feelings unimportant?" Orden asked. "Is my fate unimportant, or the fates of my people? You could help me beat Raj Ahten."

The Days did not speak for a long moment, and Orden knew he was considering. Other Days had broken their vows, spoken to kings of great secrets. Of that, Orden felt sure. So why not this man? Why not now?

From the corner, Gaborn's Days said, "If he answers your questions, he would violate a most sacred vow. His twin would know." A threat sounded in those words. Watchers watching the watchers. "Surely you understand, milord."

Orden didn't really understand, could hardly comprehend such callousness. Often he'd thought the Days and their religion quaint and strange. Now he thought them hard of heart.

Yet he sought to understand them. Gaborn's Days remained here, instead of going to Gaborn. Why? Had his son died, so the Days could not follow? Or did the Days merely wait for Gaborn to come back here? Or...had his son disappeared even from the sight of the Days?

Orden pondered. His Days had called him "milord," a title he'd never used before. The man wanted to speak, found it hard to remain a bystander. He restrained himself, but wanted to ameliorate any hard feelings in the nasty affair.

Might a Days not counsel him, even if his own life became forfeit in the process? Orden had studied history, knew that in some wars a Days had revealed secrets. But Orden had never learned the fate of such Days.

The chronicles told the deeds of kings and nations. If a Days had ever gone rogue, had become a counselor, the fate of such a Days was never mentioned.

Instead, the chronicles flowed as if a single dispassionate watcher had observed the king, studying his affairs. For a long hour, Orden wondered at this.

When Captain Stroecker returned from Bredsfor Manor, he found Orden lying before a dying fire, petting the hounds.

"Excuse me, milord," Captain Stroecker said from the doorway.

King Orden turned over, sat up. "What did you find?"

Stroecker smiled grimly. He held a bunch of fresh turnips in his right hand; his eyes shone with what might have been anger. "These, milord. Enough turnips to feed an army."

Intense terror struck King Orden as he realized the forcibles were gone, had been taken.

Stroecker smiled wickedly. "And these," he said, reaching behind his back. He pulled a small bundle of forcibles from his belt.

King Orden's heart leapt in relief, so much so that he forgave the captain's jest immediately.

He jumped up, grabbed the forcibles, inspected them. The runes in each looked perfect, without dents or abrasions in the blood metal, all in the Kartish style. Orden had no facilitator here to perform the rites, but he needed none. With the wits of twenty men, and gifts of voice from fifteen, Orden could chant the spells as well as the best of them.

A weapon. He had his weapon.

"Captain Stroecker," Orden said softly. "You and I and Borenson are the only three men who know where this treasure lies. We must keep it that way. I can't risk that the enemy find these. I can't risk that you get captured."

"Agreed," Stroecker said in such a tone that Orden realized the man thought Orden wanted him to make the ultimate sacrifice. In a moment, Stroecker would disembowel himself.

"Therefore, Captain," Orden said, "I want you to tell the men that we need guards to take a great treasure back to Mystarria. Choose three men--young family men with children--to accompany you as guards. Choose them carefully, for you may be saving their lives. Then take the men and four fast horses, and fill your saddlebags with stones, and leave here, taking every effort not to get caught."

"Milord?" Stroecker asked.

"You heard me right. A war will be fought here near dawn. I expect Raj Ahten to throw his full force against us. He anticipates the help of an army of a hundred thousand, and I--do not know what allies I might have. If this castle falls, if we all die, it will be your duty to return here and retrieve the treasure, then deliver it to Mystarria."

"Milord, have you considered retreat?" Stroecker asked. One of the dogs stood, pushed its muzzle against the King's thigh. The dog seemed hungry, but would settle for affection.

"I think about it every moment," Orden said, "but my son is missing in the wilderness, and, so far, I have no word of him. Until I hear word, I must consider that Raj Ahten holds him prisoner and has taken an endowment--or that he is dead." Orden took a deep breath. For all his life, he'd sought to protect and nurture his son. His wife had borne him four children. Only Gaborn had survived. Yet his worry for Gaborn was but one of a multitude of pains. His voice faltered as he admitted, "And I have sent my most fearsome warrior to kill my best friend. If my fears prove true, Captain Stroecker--if the worst comes to pass--I won't want to live through this battle. I'm going to raise my sword against Raj Ahten. I'm going to attack him, personally. Either he will die or I will die. At dawn we will be forming a serpent ring."

King Orden held up the forcibles.

Captain Stroecker's face paled. Creating a serpent ring was a dangerous gambit. With these forcibles, Orden could take an endowment of metabolism from a man, who would then take an endowment from another, who would take an endowment from another, so that each man became one in a long line of vectors. In the parlance of facilitators, this line of men was called a "serpent," for the man at the head of the chain became very powerful, deadly as a poisoned serpent, and should he be destroyed, should the serpent be beheaded, the next man in line would arise, hardly diminished in power from the first.

But if a man took too many endowments of metabolism, it was sure death. He might become a great warrior for a few hours or days, but he would burn himself out like a shooting star. Desperate men had done it in the past, at times. But it would be hard to find twenty able fighters willing to form a serpent, to throw away their lives.

So Orden offered them some hope. In this case, last of all, the King would give his own endowment of metabolism to the last man in the serpent, so that every man in the serpent became vectored to another. Thus, with twenty forcibles, twenty men could all share their metabolism, forming a pool from which any one warrior could draw. Since Orden had the most endowments and the greatest skill in battle, the task of fighting Raj Ahten would fall to him. He would volunteer to act as "the serpent's head," and so long as the other men in the ring remained inert, Orden would be able to draw upon their surplus metabolism. Many of Orden's soldiers had metabolism from one or two men. So, as the serpent's head, Orden would be able to move with the speed of thirty or forty men.

And the hope that Orden offered his men was this: that if he himself managed to survive the battle, the serpent ring would remain unbroken, and each man in the ring would thus be able to continue his life with some degree of normalcy.

But still it was a dangerous gambit. If any other man in the ring were forced into battle, that man might well draw away metabolism that Orden needed at a critical moment, sabotaging Orden's chances in the fight. Even worse, if a member of the serpent ring were slain, Orden might find himself a mere vector to another man, might suddenly fall in battle, unable to move.

No, if anyone died in this battle, it would best be the serpent's head--Orden himself. For if Orden died, if the ring broke, then the burden of. metabolism would fall to the person who had granted Orden his endowment.

This next man in line would become the new serpent's head. And he could continue to fight Raj Ahten's forces, spreading destruction.

Yet even if Orden won his battle with Raj Ahten, even if the serpent ring remained intact today, Orden was still calling upon all his men to make a terrible sacrifice. For at some time, hopefully on some distant morning, the circle would break. A man from the circle would die in some battle, or would fall prey to illness. When that happened, all other vectors would fall into the deep slumber of those who'd given metabolism, with the exception of one man, the new serpent's head, doomed to age and die in a matter of months.