Blood Of Kings: The Shadow Mage (21 page)

“They will be too many for us when they do come.”

“Yes,” Crawulf agreed.

“Perhaps we could mend the gates…”

“You would fight behind those walls, Olf?” Crawulf asked, a hint of amusement in his eyes.

“No, of course not!” The Nortman was aghast. Crawulf laughed.

“Once the treasure and thralls are loaded, give the order for the ships to pull back from the coast, out of harm’s way. In the meantime we’ll see if we can’t force Duke Elsward’s hand.” Crawulf grinned.

Duke Normand: Mountains of Eor

D
uke Normand absent-mindedly soothed his horse by cooing in its ear and patting the beast’s muscular neck. He was rewarded with a snort and the stomping of hooves on the cobbled street as a caravan of traders, compiled of ox-drawn carts filed past. It gave him enormous pleasure to see the wagons, piled high with goods from the south, pass through the gates of Eorotia. Now that the mountain passes had been made safe and cleared of brigands, just as Djangra Roe had predicted, the traffic travelling between the Duchies and the lands to the south had begun to trickle through. In time it would increase and generate substantial wealth for the small duchy of Lenstir – assuming Normand could hold onto it.

“This is the third caravan in a week,” Djangra Roe said.

“The taxes they bring in barely cover the upkeep of guarding the road,” Normand grumbled, unwilling to concede acknowledgment to Djangra’s foresight. The mage simply shrugged and made no further comment.

The past months had been busy for Normand. The taking of Eorotia had made a lot of people around him nervous. The king fretted that it would be seen as an act of aggression by the lands south of the mountain range all the way to the Sunsai Empire, although Duke Normand thought it none of their damn business. His neighbouring nobles were anxious that he was becoming too ambitious and were wary of him encroaching on their own territory. They were right. Lenstir was one of the smallest duchies in the kingdom. Normand was intent on overseeing its growth, and the potential wealth of Eorotia becoming a trade hub between north and south would aid him greatly in this desire.

First he needed to rebuild the walls he himself had knocked down with his siege engines, fend off those who would have the Thieves Citadel returned to a so-called neutral faction and become a buffer between north and south, calm the insecurities of a nervous monarch—one lacking in ambition as far as Normand was concerned—root out whatever brigands still using the mountain as a haven, and wipe out the threat from the man-like beasts who, supposedly, inhabited the higher regions of the mountains. Normand had never seen these monsters himself and doubted their existence, but there were many sightings of them wandering down from the colder regions in search of food, including a reported attack on a caravan three days previously. A wagon driver was supposedly ripped limb from limb before the beast was chased away by the convoy’s guards. Waiting with the Duke and his men were his hunting hounds, huge shaggy creatures capable of great bursts of speed and jaws seemingly made from iron.

“What news, Mage of your witch?”

Djangra’s smile wilted. “Nothing, my lord, these past months. I am thinking that is not such a bad thing though.”

“Your thoughts could cost us everything… cost
me
everything!”

“They are on her trail. Had they been thwarted and killed I would have heard. Trust me, my lord, the dream-witch is no threat to you while she is being hunted halfway to the empire.”

“I hope you are right. I do not trust your witch and her rogue knight, but at least they have three of my men with them to keep their minds focused.”

“He was never a knight, my lord.”

“Whatever he was, I hope you chose well.”

“Oh yes, they are all well suited to the job.” Djangra met Normand’s stern gaze. “Happy hunting, my lord.”

“It is not too late for you to come,” Normand said.

“No, my lord, these old bones are no longer suited to such an arduous expedition.” The mage looked up, beyond the walls of Eorotia and towards the snow-capped peaks of the jagged mountains, to where the spring thaw never touched and one misplaced step could send a man tumbling to a cold, lonely death. “Besides there is work that must be done here to rid the city of any remaining charms and curses left by the witches of Eor.”

“Very well, Mage, happy hunting to you also.” Normand led a line of a dozen mounted, fighting-men, riding two abreast, their red cloaks fluttering in the breeze, followed by half a score of the great shaggy hunting hounds, barely contained by their handlers, and in turn by a small group of lightly armoured archers. Among them were men who had lived and hunted, much of their lives, in the mountains. They would lead Normand towards the high peaks, where travellers rarely ventured, and any with half an ounce of sense steered well clear of, as any man who lived in the shadow of the great mountain range knew well, there were things best left undisturbed where man rarely travelled.

Normand glanced back at the city he was now master of, with its walls gleaming in autumnal light, and the mountains rising up behind it, a ragged line shading a clear blue sky, his thoughts racing from one idea to the next on how best to build and fortify his new possession, and indeed, how to add to it. The small column was soon swallowed up by trees cloaked in orange and plum coloured leaves. Twice as many again lay in clumps on the worn track, used as a road through the forest, or swirled about their feet, blown in a chill wind.

There were few travellers passing through the forest, but there were some, which pleased Normand to see. They scurried off the road to make way for mounted warriors, but the duke could read little resentment on their faces, and some even smiled at the sight of armed men appearing to patrol the woods. It would mean a safer journey for them, making them more than happy to give way if it meant a visible deterrent to the bandits who once claimed the forest for their own.

“We should make camp up at Widow’s Keep, my lord,” one of the foresters accompanying the duke and his men suggested. “If you don’t mind havin’ her ghost for company that is.” He grinned.

Normand turned away from the sight of blackened teeth leering in a dirt-covered face. The wind sent a chill through him at that moment, making him pull his cloak tighter about him. He noticed the air had become colder the higher they got, and the deeper into the forest the steeper the winding road became. He had even seen flakes of snow drift down between the trees only to dissolve on impact. “This Widow’s Keep is an old ruin, is it not?”

“Aye, my lord, a castle belongin’ to those who disappeared long ago,” the scout answered.

“Very well, it will give us shelter for the night.” He motioned with a wave of his hand for the forester to lead on.

Light was already fading from the sky when they approached the ruin. Widow’s Keep was in fact a tower castle with only three remaining walls. The fourth had collapsed long before, with the stone harvested by local folk to build walls and small cottages. A stone staircase spiralled up the side of one wall, the steps uneven and different sizes, an old trick to make life difficult for any would-be invaders. All interior walls and any wooden features, such as floors or rafters were long gone. Normand looked up at the ragged line on top of the three remaining walls, a dark scar in the twilit sky.

They made campfires in the shadow of the ruin, using the walls to shield them from the cold winds blowing down from the ice-capped mountains. They sat around the fires according to class and hierarchy, the dog-handlers huddled together with the big shaggy hounds close by. The archers made sure their strings were dry and protected as they settled in for the night, humming a tune known only to themselves. The warriors sat together checking their weapons and gear, sharpening swords and axes. Normand stared into the flames of a fire he shared with the two most senior men he had brought on the expedition, their words drifting over his consciousness as he felt the glow of the flames warming his face, and the inner fire garnered from the fortified wine he swigged from a flask. Only the woodsmen seemed at ease as they laughed and shared stories, passing skins of wine between them to chase away the night chill. The duke wrapped his fur-trimmed cloak tightly around his shoulders, listening to their tales.

“She were a maid, wed and widowed all in one day,” one such story began. “It were a time long before the Duchies were called the Duchies, a time when folk were different… wilder. It is said a great king ruled these mountains and beyond, and his castle were Widow’s Keep, only it weren’t called Widow’s Keep then.

“Her beauty was beyond compare. Thick curls, dark as a raven’s wing fell down to her waist, and skin so fair it was almost translucent. Her eyes were the colour of a mountain spring in morning sunlight, her lips like ruby red wine. Some said she had ensnared the king with dark magic, others, that her beauty alone was enough to trap any man. The morning of her wedding, when she was presented to the king, dressed in an ivory gown and with her hair tied up in a crown of flowers, every man present at the feast felt a pang of envy, their thoughts turning to the luck of the king and the night he would look forward to, for what man would not wish to spend a night with such a beauty?

“It were the king’s ill luck to cross a powerful witch he had lain with and uttered false promises to after he’d met his lady. He were no noble lord this king, and took his pleasures where he willed; the witch cursed him, for it were her desire to be his bride, and not some foreign beauty from beyond the mountain. She put a hex on him that his line would end with him. And that it did, for as he lay on top of his new bride in their wedding bed he suddenly began to choke. The more he struggled for air the more his face bulged. He died while still inside his queen with a swollen head and a swollen cock, and not a drop of seed spilt.

“The new queen was dragged naked from her wedding bed and hanged from a tree – the king’s folk believing she were responsible for his death. Before she breathed her last breath they cut her down and burned her in a huge pyre in front of the castle. It’s said her screams can still be heard at night when her ghost drifts on the wind searching for her killers. With the death of the king, invaders were soon at their gates seeking easy plunder. Whatever curses the queen spat at her killers worked, as the memory of those folk was wiped from the mountains.”

“I heard tell it were dragons what laid waste to the keep,” a young archer interjected.

“Ain’t no such thing as dragons, boy,” the woodsman shot back, his words barbed with scorn. There were low chuckles from more than just the scouts silencing the boy archer.

“Enough,” Normand growled. “Get some rest, all of you.”

He inched closer to the fire, willing the warmth towards him as the weariness of the road bore down on his eyelids and aching muscles. He cursed himself silently for growing soft as he yearned for a feather-filled mattress and the security of intact castle walls around him. When his head finally drooped and he fell into a restless slumber his dreams were troubled.

She screeched a blood-freezing wail as she swirled about the camp and the sleeping warriors at an impossible rate. She approached each one in turn, reaching out with a long bony finger searching for their heart. Her icy touch was death, her breath poison, her eyes gates to everlasting torment. She was the Soul-Stealer, a harbinger of doom. Her thirst for vengeance on the men who slew her was unquenchable. Her search for the husband, who had betrayed her with another woman and brought a witch’s curse into their marriage bed, would never cease.

And yet, her beauty would fill any man with a yearning that would bring tears to his eyes. It would fill him with desire while at the same time empty his heart and soul, leaving him a shell of frustration and lust. To gaze upon her face was to know both joy and pain beyond any ever before imagined.

She was no longer a blur, screeching from the high walls of the keep, but a maiden of immense beauty and innocence, dressed in an ivory wedding gown, her deep red lips parted slightly as she seemed to float through the camp. Normand wanted to reach out to her, longed to touch. Longing became lust then torment as he struggled with the bonds of sleep. All he wanted was to be with her, forever. Her mouth opened wider as soft, snow-white skin began dripping from her face. Her eyes burned; smoke drifted from her hair and clothes, her features contorted into a hideous mask, and she screamed. A harsh, bestial noise, so filled with pain and fear it made him want to cover his ears, but he could not. Her skin began to blister and melt away making his own eyes burn as he watched, feeling the heat touch his own skin. And then she reached for him, a long skeletal finger pushed through his chest, followed by another and another until her whole hand was reaching for his heart. He screamed then.

“My lord?”

His eyes flashed open. He took in the grime-covered face of the man standing over him. “The sun will be up shortly, my lord. It’s almost morning.”

Wind wailed through the ruined castle, making Normand flinch. He swallowed hard and nodded at the warrior who had woken him. He glanced over at the campfire occupied by the scouts, it was snowing and flakes whirled about them, gusting in the wind. The storyteller was staring right at him as wind whistled through the tower.

“The widow’s searchin’ tonight,” he said. “She’ll not rest ‘til she’s tasted blood.”

The duke turned away from his leering glare as a man-at-arms handed him a skin of water and a chunk of hard, black bread. He’d not admit it to any man present, but he had to suppress a wish that his steward was with them. A tisane flavoured with honey and lemon would be most welcome to chase away the cold and screeching wind.

“How is it possible to be so damn cold up here?” he grumbled.

“The higher you go the colder it gets, my lord,” the man-at-arms offered helpfully. Normand glared at him.

“I am not an idiot.”