Authors: Victor Gischler
Tosh didn’t know how to respond to this, so he sipped wine.
“We’ll need to wait until the time is right.” Mother closed her fist tightly over the ring. “If we handle it poorly it will make the situation worse instead of better. So there’s time. Keep training the girls. They’ll be ready by the time we do it.”
“I’m sorry, Mother,” Tosh said. “But do what?”
“Don’t you know?” she said. “We’re going to kill Lord Giffen, of course.”
And that’s when the ground opened up beneath Tosh’s feet.
The harsh winter wind rattled the shutters, and the dwindling fire in the hearth flickered. Giffen curled into a ball beneath the double layer of furs. He
almost
regretted telling the servants not to disturb him during the night. Normally they would slip in during the wee hours to stoke the fire and then silently slip out again.
But Giffen had company and didn’t want to be disturbed. He’d made it clear to the servants. Stay away. Giffen is busy with a lady.
Well, perhaps
lady
was being generous, but never mind. He felt her shift under the furs next to him, and a smile spread across his face. He pictured her, curvaceous and dark-haired, eyes as blue as ice. Full lips and high cheekbones. Fingernails and toenails painted a bright red. Giffen suspected she spent the bulk of her day grooming herself just to be ready for him, which was just fine with Giffen.
He’d spent most of his life serving others; let the peasants fall over themselves pleasing
him
for a change. It’s what he’d always wanted. No more groveling and simpering for Lord Giffen. The Klaarian rabble could damn well dance to his tune from now on. All of his scheming had finally paid off. From now on, Giffen would have exactly what he wanted and woe unto anyone who stood in his way.
Giffen turned over and spooned with the whore. What was her name again? Ah, yes. Sarin. That squalid little place over in Backgate had sent her as some sort of tribute. He inferred some sort of arrangement. The brothel would keep him happy in bed, and in return, Giffen would not find a reason to close the place down. A fine arrangement. If Sarin continued to approach her duties with the same level of enthusiasm as she had the night before, Giffen didn’t foresee a problem.
He cupped one of her ample breasts, and she sighed contentment, squirming back against him. He pinched a thick nipple between thumb and forefinger. Yes, he was plenty warm enough without the fire. He was satisfied with just about everything. Life was good. Except …
It still rankled him to be at the beck and call of the Perranese, specifically General Chen, but the invaders were a necessary evil. Giffen reminded himself that Klaar was merely a stepping stone to the conquest of Helva itself. Soon the foreigners would move on to bigger and better things, and they would reward Giffen by leaving him to his own devices as lord of Klaar. A carefully orchestrated deceit was making it appear that Giffen was Klaar’s savior. He’d always despised the accident of birth that made him a commoner. Yes, he’d been a man of some power in service of the duke. But that wasn’t good enough—an oversight that was currently being corrected.
And then Giffen would be the
new
duke with all the privileges that entailed.
Sarin ground her soft backside against Giffen’s growing erection.
He kissed her ear, and she purred. Giffen hadn’t planned a session of pre-breakfast copulation, but if Sarin were eager, then who was Giffen to refuse? He positioned himself to enter her. She gasped, twisting to kiss him, her mouth wet and inviting.
A knock at his chamber door.
You have got to be fucking kidding me
.
“Go away!” Giffen barked. He pawed at Sarin’s tits, trying to maintain his erection.
The door cracked open, and a wide-eyed, nervous servant stuck his head around it. It was the scrawny lad who had been assigned as his valet. “Beg pardon, your lordship, but General Chen wants to see you. Uh … immediately.”
Giffen mumbled a curse. The only man who could take him away from a warm bed and a soft woman was the Perranese general. He pulled the furs over his head and groaned.
The valet cleared his throat. “Sir?”
“What?”
“Shall I tell General Chen you’re on your way?”
“Tell him I’m busy plowing this comely whore up her luxurious backside.”
The valet blinked. “Really?”
“Of course not, idiot!” Giffen threw back the furs and swung his legs over the side of the bed. “Now fetch my robes before I have you skinned.”
* * *
Chen had begun taking his meals in the small dining room just off the castle kitchens. Heating the formal dining hall this far into winter consumed too much fuel. So Chen sat at a small table only big enough for a few people, sipping tea and picking from a plate of steamed cabbage and fish. The soft layer around his middle had begun to diminish after he’d started eschewing the butter and potatoes.
His plan to move the bulk of the garrison outside the city had been successful so far. There had been grumbling at first—a sign in and of itself that the change had been necessary—but once full discipline had been reinstated, the men’s fighting edge had again been honed razor sharp. He kept them rotating. A battalion inside the city walls to keep the peace. Another battalion at Harran’s Bay to rebuild the deep water docks. A company to erect a rough palisade around the barracks. Another company to cut timber for the both the dock and palisade projects.
Chen had assigned a third company to scour the outer and lower villages for livestock, but these settlements had been picked clean weeks ago, and with snow clogging most of the passes, it had been more efficient to reduce the force to a mounted detail to patrol for enemy spies.
So far, the bulk of Helva remained blissfully unaware of the Perranese presence on its soil—a fact that seemed about to change if Chen understood the situation correctly.
He refilled his teacup from a delicate porcelain pot just as Giffen entered the room.
“You wanted to see me, General Chen?” Giffen moved to the room’s small fireplace, warmed his hands.
“Yes.” Chen gestured to the seat across from him. “Sit if you like.”
Giffen hesitated only a moment as if reluctant to leave the fire, then sat. Chen filled Giffen’s cup from the teapot.
Giffen nodded his head. “Thank you.”
“You’ll be happy to know the men are doing well in the barracks,” Chen said. “Two iron stoves in each barracks suffice. What are they called again?”
“Pot-belly stoves.”
“Yes, exactly.” Obviously named for men who’d stuffed themselves with buttered potatoes. “It is still very cold, but the men are hearty.”
Giffen sipped his tea and shrugged. “It hasn’t gotten
really
cold. Not yet. The big blizzards are still to come.”
Chen tried to cover his surprise by jamming a wad of cabbage into his mouth. He chewed, thinking. He swallowed, then said, “We will reinforce the barracks’ insulation and lay in triple the fuel for the stoves, both peat and wood.” He hated that he might be wrong about moving the men outside the city. Irrational. Giffen was from Klaar. He’d know the local weather better than Chen. It would be foolish not to listen even if he did consider himself the man’s better. “Still. We will make preparations to move the men back inside the city walls if need be.”
Chen thought he saw Giffen hide a smug smile behind his teacup and had to stifle a sudden swell of fury. Letting an inferior goad you was a sign of weakness. Chen wouldn’t allow that. He mastered himself. Pride must be eliminated from the equation. Only problems and their solutions mattered.
“A wise precaution, General,” Giffen said.
And yet Chen could not resist an opportunity to put a dent in Giffen’s smug facade. “Captain Tchi sent a rider. He arrived in the wee hours this morning with the news that he and his men lost Rina Veraiin in the forest south of Kern.” He cut a chunk of fish, brought it up to his mouth. “She could be almost anywhere by now.”
Giffen frowned. “This is bad news.”
Chen chewed the fish, swallowed. “Yes.”
“Well, what do you plan to do about it?”
Chen speared another chunk of fish with his fork, shrugged with deliberate nonchalance. Let Giffen squirm. “What is there to do?”
Giffen fidgeted in his chair. “If your presence here is known, then the king could send troops before your Emperor sends his fleet.”
Chen ate a bite of cabbage and nodded.
“The point was to hold Klaar
secretly
until the spring thaw,” Giffen said.
“Why are you telling me the plan?” Chen said calmly. “I know the plan. It’s my plan.”
“If the Veraiin brat has raised the alarm, the king’s army could be on its way
now
.”
Chen sipped tea, wiped the corner of his mouth with a napkin. “Yes.”
“Forgive me, general, but you do not seem concerned.”
“What should my concern look like to you, Giffen? Shall I wave my arms in the air and run around in circles? Calm yourself. We always knew it was a possibility word would leak. Frankly, I’m surprised we’ve kept ourselves hidden this long. Our best hope is that the heavy snows come and block the passes. Then the king could send every soldier in Helva and it wouldn’t matter. One way or another, war must wait until spring.”
Giffen pushed his teacup away, sat back in his chair, shaking his head. “Wait, this isn’t right.”
“What isn’t?”
“You said they lost her south of Kern? Did she go into Kern itself?”
“Yes,” Chen said. “Tchi and his men were forced to wait outside of town to avoid being discovered. They’ve killed more than a dozen of the locals who spotted them and hid the bodies. But they picked up her trail again to the south of the town.”
“Have any of your patrols apprehended scouts on the border?” Giffen asked.
“No.”
Giffen snapped his fingers. “The brat hasn’t told anyone. They don’t know.”
“How do you arrive at this conclusion?”
“Arlus was reasonably close with the Baron of Kern,” Giffen said. “Rina could have sought asylum there easily. Kern would have sent scouts to verify her story.”
“You’re guessing,” Chen said.
“But they’re
good
guesses, General. Kern would have found the situation irresistible. He’s been angling to marry off one of his idiot sons to Rina, and if he can wrangle to make her his ward with Arlus dead then he can add Klaar’s lands to his own.” He shook his head again but with confidence this time. “No, no, no. We are missing a piece of the puzzle. Rina Veraiin had ample opportunity to raise the alarm but didn’t. The passes to Klaar are quiet when they should be alive with scouts in Kern livery.”
Chen considered. As with the weather, Giffen would have a better grip of regional politics than Chen would. “Educated guesses. But still guesses.”
Giffen gestured acquiescence. “Naturally I can’t know for certain, sitting here sipping tea. What we really need are spies.”
“Ah.” Chen smiled. “Funny you should mention spies.”
The wind lashed Harran’s Bay, and the commander in charge of rebuilding the docks pulled his men back to the shelters again. This was madness. Two men had drowned already and a third had perished from exposure. Progress on the new docks was costly. Soon even General Chen would have to admit the weather was too bitter to work.
The commander watched the longboats row toward shore. The ship—the last ship to come from Perran until spring—had been spotted on the horizon by rooftop watchmen earlier that morning. They’d expected the ship for a week, and when it had finally arrived, the commander had dispatched a rider to alert Chen.
The commander feared briefly the foamy waves would swamp the longboats. The sea was rough, deadly, but they both beached themselves at last on the small patch of shore between the rocks. Sailors began to unload the first batch of cargo, although it was not the cargo that was important.
Three men—two from the first boat and one from the second—tromped toward him. These men were why the commander waited out in the cold instead of going into one of the shelters to warm himself. He’d been ordered to offer them every respect and service.
The first two hunched against the cold, leaning into the wind as they walked. They wore thick layers of heavy furs with the hems of bright silk robes hanging below. It wouldn’t matter how they dressed or how many more furs they piled on, the commander knew. All of the Perranese had the same reaction at first. This desolate place seemed impossibly frozen. They’d been told time and time again to ready themselves for the hostile climate, but nothing really could have prepared them. The commander’s bones had not stopped aching since he’d arrived.
The third man was something else. He was a head taller than the others, a wide-shouldered, powerfully built hulk under a heavy cloak whose hood was pulled forward, hiding his face within deep shadow. He walked with his back straight as if the wind couldn’t touch him. He was the only man at Harran’s Bay not cowering from the harsh weather.
The other two stopped in front of them, the hulk halting a few steps behind. One was older, with long, braided white moustaches. Boney and thin. The other was younger by two decades, with a round face and a closely trimmed black beard.
“I’m Prullap,” said the round faced one. “Are y-you the m-man in ch-charge?” He was trying not to shiver and was failing.
“Yes, sir.” The commander bowed. “I’ve been holding horses for you and your comrades. General Chen has asked you to proceed on to Klaar immediately.”
“N-Now?” Prullap glanced at one of the nearby shelters then back at the commander. “
Right
now?”
The commander shrugged an apology. “I’m afraid so, sir.”
* * *
A detail of Perranese warriors escorted the three newcomers to Klaar. They crossed the Long Bridge well after dark, the gates clunking closed behind them as they were waved through to the keep.
Grooms appeared to take their horses to the stable, and they were ushered inside the castle and immediately taken to an ornate reception room. A fire roared in the hearth, and Prullap and his bony compatriot immediately rushed to warm themselves. Prullap had to make a physical effort to keep from weeping as the feeling seeped back into his feet and hands, hot needles as the circulation returned.