Mordraud, Book One (78 page)

“
Do you recall that resonance they taught at the academy... the one to overcome fatigue and to sleep less?” Griserio asked, chuckling scornfully. “Well... don’t use it. The chant’s dire, and it takes an enormous strain to keep it afloat. In the end your legs are rested but your head’s drooping.”

“
Yes, I presume it’s somewhat useless...” replied Dunwich “I never bothered with that resonance. I prefer a couple of glasses of wine.”

“
I definitely agree! I have two missives to deliver to you: one from the provisions department, and the other from Asaeld. Here...” Griserio opened the bag he carried slung around his shoulder and pulled out a wad tied with string. Dunwich broke the seal and examined the first message.

“
Listen to this!” he cried, astounded. “
We are, at present, unable to send you the horses requested. They are all currently in use in the fields.
Unbelievable! Fine steeds dispatched into the quagmire and cauliflowers!” commented Dunwich, grinding his teeth. “How do they expect me to assault the Rampart without the means?! Don’t they realise we’re losing men down here by the day?”

“
And you haven’t heard the half of it...” replied the other Lance. “North of the front and around Hann Creek to the south, we’re under assault.”

“
WHAT?!” yelled Dunwich in dismay. “They’re attacking us?!”

“
That’s exactly how it is! The Rinn family’s armies have taken control of the lands directly by their borders. They say the plague is raging down there. Loralon has already sent fresh battalions to the area, but it’ll be tricky to regain control.”

“
You don’t seem particularly concerned...”

Griserio
spread his arms and smiled.

“
Why should I be? Four sick beggars raiding a couple of arid fields... So what? What does it change for the Empire? What does it change for
us?
”

“
You’re underestimating them...” Dunwich answered. “You, like all the others. You don’t know what they’re capable of.”

“
What I know is that Eldain’s in a pretty sorry state. Very sorry. Launching an assault is the worst choice he could make. Loralon’s ordered two battalions to be dispatched from the Rampart for the south, to quell this irksome snag as swiftly as possible. Organise a contingent, put in it all those men who are giving you trouble here at the camp, and you’ll see that before spring comes we’ll have sorted all this nicely!”

Dunwich burst out laughing.
Griserio gazed at him in bewilderment, unable to work out the reason for such hilarity. Dunwich knew that look to a T.

It was called
ignorance
.

“
The Emperor’s orders are not open to discussion. Within three days, Loralon will have the men he requests.”

“
Perfect,” Griserio replied dubiously. “But what do you find so funny?!”

“
Nothing, or rather nothing you could understand. Don’t you worry, I’ll follow my orders. But I find it amusing that I’ve been asked to win this war, only to find myself alone and then pilfered of my men to boot.”

“
I merely bring the orders, Dunwich.”

“
I know... By the way, I need to go through the rest of my correspondence. Would you excuse me? Perhaps you’d like to dine with me later.”

Griserio
got up with a half-bow and placed his empty glass on the table.

“
I understand. You’d like some time alone... Certainly. See you later.”

The
Lance left the tent without further ado. Dunwich filled his glass again, got comfortable on his armchair and cracked the wax seal on the second letter. It was Asaeld’s mark: a letter A crossed by two swords.

Official correspondence. A
rare event.

Stay at the central front, at any cost. Strike the Rampart should the opportunity presents itself. The Lances I name below have orders to return urgently to Cambria. Consider no other orders as valid, and carry out only those that I, in person, send you.

“Stay at any cost... What an odd message,” Dunwich murmured, sipping from his wine goblet as his eyes ran down the list of names. “There was no need for you to repeat it – I’d already received precise instructions from the Emperor...”

Freeing himself of those Lances was a nasty blow, and he pondered on the reason for so much haste on Asaeld
’s part. Had something that he was unaware of happened? Perhaps the commander had dug up other elusive assault plans by the Empire’s traitors. There’d undoubtedly be repercussions to that business with Chancellor Parro and his scheming. Whatever the reason might be, he could do little other than obey.

Asaeld
’s words were law for the entire army. As they were for him.

“
Why all this hurry, Asaeld? What’s going on at home?”

***

Drenched in ice-cold sweat, Deanna widened her eyes in the darkness of the bedroom. Adraman was lying at her side. She felt for his breath with the palm of her hand. He was alive, luckily. The blankets on Mordraud’s cot moved imperceptibly – a sign he was fine.

It was on
ly a dream. Always the same ghastly nightmare that came to torment her every night since she’d given birth.

Deanna tossed and turned in the bed. She plumped up the pillow, took it away and shuffled the covers,
sluiced by unwelcome and sudden waves of hot and cold. Hopeless. She couldn’t doze off again. She hadn’t had a decent sleep for days, and when she was on the brink of managing to drop off, the baby started wailing. She had to change his nappy, wash him and feed him. Her breasts were swollen to bursting, and her nipples were absurdly painful every time Mordraud suckled.

Mordraud.
The name was like a knife driven into her spinal cord. She’d been trapped by her own deception. She couldn’t even utter protest when Adraman chose that name. He’d have worked everything out.

If
Adraman knew the truth, he would undoubtedly turn his back on her. Cast her off. Throw her out of the house. Perhaps even haul her up in front of Eldain’s justice. And he, a good family friend, would certainly condemn her to the harshest punishment possible. Exile within her own disgrace. And if one thing terrified her to the point of losing sleep over it, it was the fear of ending up alone.

The serenity
she’d struggled so hard to instil during the long months of pregnancy, that sense of peace she’d reached by finally accepting Adraman as husband and the man of her life, had evaporated mere seconds after the birth. She’d returned to the worst moments, where she rejected everything and everyone, herself included.

She was in a trap. Her breath was stifled, as if gradually drowning
day by day in a lake of treacle. Each time she contemplated her son’s green eyes, she saw his real father. When Adraman took him in his arms, cuddled him and showered him with affection, she would picture Mordraud in his place. And he, without a shadow of doubt, would make a far worse father than Adraman. But at least he’d be the real one.

Mordraud
was too young, aggressive and full of rage over things she knew nothing of, and didn’t want to know about. He was like her, in many respects. A terrible wife. A terrible mother.

‘
So why is it I wish he were here, by my side?’ she interrogated herself, bitterly. Adraman was still asleep, undisturbed by her torment. He’d wake up only at his son’s whimpering, even the slightest. He was naturally ready to be a father, despite his sterility. The Gods had been over-cruel to him.

Deanna
got up, took a dressing gown from the trunk and sat before the mirror. Watery blue moonlight filtered in through the window’s half-open wooden shutters. Eld was swaddled in silence.

“
Deanna, you look awful... absolutely ghastly,” she murmured faintly at her face reflected in the pane of silver. Abetted by the night’s cold light, she was as pale as a spectre, her skin seemed like wax, and her eyes were sunken in wells of puffed sockets. Even her raven hair – her pride and joy – looked like straw dipped in ink. She’d put on weight and felt flabby. Annoyed, she grabbed a dark clay pencil and began putting on make-up. First a fine veil, but all she saw was greater ugliness. Her hands twitched nervously, in jolts and starts. She laid colour upon colour, nuances beneath her eyes and on her cheeks. She rubbed on a couple of different creams, yet only seemed to grow more slatternly and distorted.

She seized her brush and, with violent yanks, attempted to tame her mass of tangled hair. E
ach new tug sparked a jab of pain to her scalp. A pleasant sensation. She stared at her effigy, trapped in the mirror, enjoying the infliction of hurt on herself. Her face was a frightening mask worn by acrobat performers during village pageants. The witch. The virgin ghoul. She felt her belly gurgle menacingly, as if something were growing inside her. Or perhaps it was purely the void her child had left in her bowels. A hole in her body. A gaping chasm that would never fill with new flesh.

Mordraud s
tirred in his crib, and whined at the rough noise of her brushing. Deanna stood up and went over to him with feline paces. She didn’t want Adraman to wake. He shouldn’t see her in that state. She tucked the babe’s covers in, but he carried on whimpering. She stroked him, rocked him in her arms, walked to and fro, but Mordraud carried on crying weakly. So she placed him back down, anxiety crushing her skull. The whimper was a bellow drilling her ears.

“
Shh... be good now... shh,” she muttered tautly. “Be quiet...”

“
Is Mordraud hungry?”

Deanna
span round. Adraman was getting out of bed, yawning. Then she looked at the baby. He’d given up crying, at last.

She had
stoppered his mouth with a finger. Mordraud was no longer moving. His tiny hands were stiff, clenched on her palm in his last frantic effort.

“
Is everything alright? Are you okay, my love?”

Deanna
pulled her hand away and took a step backwards. Sweat was causing the make-up to run into her eyes. She gazed first at the crib, then at her husband. Adraman hadn’t noticed, or at least so it seemed.

“
Come back to bed, you look exhausted...” he told her as he took Mordraud in his arms. Deanna heard his whimper and saw him move, as if nothing had occurred.

But
had something actually happened? Or was she only dreaming? Deanna traipsed to the bed in silence, lay down and buried her head beneath the pillow. She wanted to sob, but couldn’t. She wanted to feel guilty, but failed to manage even that. Adraman was playing with Mordraud, she could hear them laughing together, even from under the blankets where she was hidden. She was quivering with shame, like a plague-carrier.

When
she’d seen her son with his little shut eyes, motionless and silent, she hadn’t been afraid. Quite the contrary.

She hadn
’t minded, not at all.

***

“WHERE’S HE HOLED UP?!”

Asaeld
was a river flooding at full speed along the corridors of the great Imperial palace. A legion of Lances endeavoured to keep up with his quick angry strides. The echo of his voice resounded on walls hung with paintings and tapestries, it rang off the white marble statues commemorating the Loren family heroes, and it meandered through the labyrinth of polychrome stuccowork adorning the barrel-vault ceilings of the empty rooms.

“
DO SOMETHING, INSTEAD OF MAKING ME TRIP OVER MY OWN FEET!” he barked furiously at the men trailing him. Yet nobody knew what to do. Dunwich had left Cambria several months earlier, on a mission to the central front, upon Loralon’s orders. Asaeld had tried to object, but in vain. The truth was he’d have easily been able to dissuade the ruler, but he didn’t want to strain things. The business involving Parro, the chancellor, had been a hefty coup. He’d preferred to let things run their course, and behave normally. However, the missives he’d sent to the front had remained unanswered. It was the first time something of the kind had happened.

An unprecedented affront to his authority.

“Sir, we’ve asked all the soldiers returning from the Rampart... Dunwich is still there and hasn’t mentioned coming back...”

“
I know that, YOU FOOL! I want you to find the flea-brain I entrusted my messages to, to find out if he lost them or was unable to deliver them. Bring him to me! It won’t be hard to lace him with some nice little charge, to keep him in a cell for a few decades!”

The time to act had finally come. It wasn
’t exactly that perfect set-up Asaeld had been dreaming of for years, but he could make do. The Rinn family’s personal troops had moved north and south of the front, claiming lands under Cambria’s control. The war had switched face, from colonial expansion to relentless defence of the rights of the Empire’s people. The winter of that rain-clogged year was now at its last chilly gusts. The spring was on its way, already laden with defeats at the front. The population’s indignation was at its highest levels ever, if Asaeld was to believe reports from the myriad of informers he had wormed in all about. Tiny costly voices nibbling away at his money pouch every month, for years now. But the era of the silent waiting was over. The rebels’ Alliance had served him a precious pretext on a silver platter.