Mordraud, Book One (8 page)

Varno
took his weapon and showed it to Mordraud, with him sitting on his lap opposite the door. It was a chilly but pleasant evening. The moon bathed the yard in pale blue shadows.

“
This is the hilt. It’s the part where you grip the sword. Instead, this is the guard. It helps shield from the enemy’s blows.”

“
And is this the blade?” Mordraud inquired, stretching out a hand, but Varno blocked it at once.

“
Be careful! It’s sharp! You know, I’ve had this sword with me since I met your mother. It’s a good sword.”

“
And why’s it good? Isn’t it made for killing? How can it be good?”

“
It’s good because it kills
well.
And it’s never let me down.”

Mordraud
wasn’t sure he’d grasped the meaning of those words, but he said nothing, attracted only by the hypnotic gleam of the moonlight on the steel edge of the blade. “How do you use it?”

Varno
glanced around to find something suitable. He took a long-handled axe he usually used for chopping the wood. Eglade watched the scene from the kitchen window, worried but glad to see father and son together at last.

Varno
put the sword in Mordraud’s hands, and placed himself opposite, showing him how he had to support it. The child tried to hold it up with one hand, but couldn’t. Huffing and whining in annoyance, he squeezed the hilt in two hands and lifted the tip, exactly as his father was instructing him to.

“
It’s too heavy for you... You still need to build up some arm muscles!”

Mordraud
looked barely four. It was already a miracle he could hold a piece of metal of that weight without crumpling to the ground.

Varno entirely
failed to react when he saw Mordraud lift it above his head and charge.

“
MORDRAUD!” Eglade yelled through the window. Varno felt the steel brush his shirt. The tip tore the fabric and reached his skin. He touched his chest in amazement, his face taut with a dumb smile.

Blood
between his fingers.

It was just a scratch, one of many.

The fear came later, when he saw Mordraud hadn’t even realised what he’d done.

“
It’s so long!” he blurted, with unexpected satisfaction in his voice. He was staring at the weapon lying on the ground. It had fallen from his hands, due to the thrust.

Varno had fought many
battles in his lifetime. He tried to keep himself away from the front ranks, and avoided the bloodiest clashes by beating a retreat. He’d witnessed various shocking scenes. But he had never felt so disturbed by something as he did that night observing his son.

A monstrous might.

Like Dunwich’s intelligence. Like Eglade, who’d learnt how to speak his language before he understood a single word of hers.

And
like Aris’s punches. That still rang in his head when he recalled those blows that had almost slaughtered him.

“
Never touch it again!” he yelled viciously, unleashing two violent smacks to the boy’s face.

“
But... I...”

“
NEVER AGAIN!” Varno repeated, in terror. Another slap was dealt.

Eglade
ran outside, seized her son and embraced him to automatically protect him. Mordraud was crying. He’d done something wrong, he knew he had. But he didn’t know what.

He merely wanted to learn how to use a
sword. And to spend some time with Varno.

“
Mummy... Why’s daddy so cross with me?”

“
It’s not your fault...” she murmured. “It’s not your fault.”

Varno didn
’t return home that night. Before Eglade could say a word, he’d fled along the path leading to the village. His pockets were empty, but that didn’t worry him. He’d cope one way or another.

He reached the inn and drank until he felt ill. On credit.

“It can’t be true... They’re miniature monsters...” he burbled the whole time, as he glugged down one glass of nasty wine after another. Endlessly fingering that farcical scratch on his chest.

***

From that day on, Varno chose the jobs furthest from home, and above all the longest. Any front was fine for him. All he was interested in was being weeks from home. He pushed to fight as far away as the Hann Marshland, the southern-most front of the war, and requested to skip countless leave periods. Eglade had to cope with everything on her own. Mordraud did what he could to mitigate her loneliness and lighten the heavy work. He chopped the wood and looked after the chickens they kept in the yard. He tidied the house. They’d fall asleep together in the evening, and she would tell him one of her many Aelian stories, which he liked to live out in his mind in silence.

“
Which one do you fancy tonight?”

“
Cambirian, the last king!” Mordraud urged. That was definitely one of his favourites.

“
Again?! Okay then...” Eglade replied, with pretend resignation.

“
Cambirian lived in his great tower in the skies. Around him stood the city that he’d proudly taken his name from.
The heart of all things
, that’s what we call the capital of the world. Even the other realms – Ankhar in the North, where the Khartians like your father came from, and Dankhar in the South, where the sea bubbles among the ice – had to bow down before Cambirian’s might... Not even the Endless Night has managed to blot out his shining memory.”

“
What’s the Endless Night, mummy?”

“
A bad dream, my darling... It was a long, so very long, bad dream.”

“
And Cambirian? Was he handsome?” Mordraud asked, enraptured by his mother’s deep flowing voice.

“
Extremely handsome... He had hair as white as snow, and green eyes, just like yours.”

“
Just like mine?”

“
Just like yours. He had a sword made of sharpened light, and when he spoke, even the animals could understand his commands. Nobody else was like Cambirian, nobody had ever been like him, and nobody ever will be. He had a single weakness, one small vice that he kept for the evenings, when he contemplated, from up above in his tower, the golden gates glimmering in the moonlight...”

“
Aniria!” Mordraud murmured in excitement.

“
That’s right: Aniria, the wine of the Aelians. As green as a meadow, as green as Cambirian’s eyes.”

Eglade
lowered her voice. Mordraud had dropped off to sleep. Slumber came to claim her too, lulled by the sweet rhythm of her child’s breathing.

Eglade
had a dream that night.

It had come to her before, but she
’d forgotten it. Almost ten years had gone by. A grey landscape whipped by the wind. All was grey. Entirely colourless, as if the countryside was simply waiting for someone to paint it, to complete it. And just like the time before, she heard a voice talking in the wind. Near her, yet also worlds away from the real. A single name. A breathless whisper.

‘
Gwern...’

Eglade
’s eyes snapped open. Mordraud was still cuddling up to her. He’d placed his hand on her belly. It was him speaking. He had a strange expression on his face, a blend of awe and fear. He still seemed asleep. But his eyes were open and he was studying her carefully.

“
He’s moving.”

Eglade
took her son’s hand. She couldn’t feel anything in particular. But when he imperceptibly nodded, she picked up on it. She caught her breath for an instant.

However little they
’d been trying, and however little they wanted it.

“
You’re going to have a baby brother, my darling...” Eglade murmured. She didn’t know whether to be happy, or whether to cry in despair.

She decided to be glad.

“And we’ll call him Gwern,” she announced, stroking Mordraud’s hair as he rested on her.

“A squirrel hunt?”

“
Yeah!”

Mordraud took a long stick from the woodshed and ran into the forest with Gwern. His brother scurried behind while he crept into the dense vegetation. Low stumpy trees, patches of thorny bushes and clumps of ivy concealed logs smothered in broad fungus
dishes. Mordraud was explaining everything Eglade had passed on to him on their walks, when Gwern was not yet born. When he noticed his brother was getting bored, he stopped talking about plants and told him a light-hearted Aelian story. Eglade had taught him many, during their long evenings alone at home.

They h
ad no friends. Mordraud was at times driven as far as the village, but when his mother fell ill he would no longer risk venturing far from home. And he never went when he was with Gwern. They didn’t like the way people looked at them. He often realised he was being watched. It was usually the women around the well, pointing as they whispered to each other. On certain occasions, Mordraud had noticed a man with a nondescript face sitting outside a tumbledown house. He stayed there staring until Mordraud went away. He hadn’t seen him around for a while, he thought. He’d probably left the village. It was the man’s eyes that had struck him. An indefinable colour. As if they reflected the light in a mildly unnatural way.

But the man wasn
’t the reason he wasn’t fond of the village. It was the children who lived there. He couldn’t fit in. He hadn’t even tried, since that rabble of dust-covered sprogs had started picking on him straight away.

They called him
witch’s child
.

“
Look, here comes the witch’s child! He sneaks out of the forest like a wild boar and steals away! He wipes his bum with his hands and you’ll catch the black fever off him! The witch’s child!”

They were all older and bigger than him, and always went around in a group. They insulted him in bits of rhyming verse mixed with offensive names, in awful senseless scenes. Mordraud had found out he wasn
’t a particularly patient boy. One day, when he was tired of being made fun of every time he set foot in the village, he went for the one who seemed to be the ringleader. He charged at him, head down. Luckily, Gwern had stayed home that day. Mordraud fled in pretty bad shape. With a prize of bruises and scratches in his pocket. But the boy who’d uttered the words
witch’s child
could only hope for the comfort of a good set of made-to-measure false teeth.

Mordraud had
broken the front ones, with a couple of hard, well-placed punches.

“
Look, you see that hole in the tree trunk? Up there, above the second branch…”

“
Where? I can’t see it!”

Mordraud moved closer, signalling to him to be quiet. Gwern stifled an amused giggle.
The older brother slapped the trunk. A squirrel jumped out of the crack in the bark. The younger boy hopped around waving the stick, laughing and tunelessly singing the chorus to a tavern ditty his father would whistle from time to time. They ran along together, following the path of the puff of brown fur through the tree branches.

“
Again, go on!”

Mordraud stared at the sky nestled be
tween the forest foliage. He noticed the sun was low and was ready to slip down below the horizon. It was late, and he still had the supper to prepare.

“
No, let’s head home now. Mum needs to eat something hot.”

“
Just one more, come on, come on...”

“
No!”

Gwern
stiffened as the smile slid immediately from his face. Mordraud realised too late that he’d been too blunt. Before the child could start whimpering, he took him by the hips and, snorting like a bull, lifted him to sit him on his shoulders. They returned to the house like that. Gwern giggling and tapping his brother’s head with small white hands. Slender, and very different to Mordraud’s. The boy’s complexion was slightly fairer, pale and vaguely sickly. His hair was a brown similar to old hessian. The highlights were like his mother’s. Vivacious grey eyes streaked with sky blue. Of the three brothers, he was the one who echoed Eglade in his feminine features, even if they were still blossoming.

Waiting patiently in the beaten earth clearing before the house was a carriage
pulled by two dark horses. A footman in grey livery was busy grooming them. When he saw the two children emerge from the forest, he placed his arm in front of his stomach and bent down in a formal bow. Mordraud already knew who the handsome carriage belonged to. Gwern fidgeted on his shoulders, excited by such an unexpected surprise.

“
Dunwich!” cried the boy, kicking out in joy. He was already three but, as was normal in their family, looked much younger. He’d only learnt to walk well recently, while he definitely seemed born with a gift for words. Eglade had had no difficulty at all in teaching him to speak the languages of his two peoples – even easier in fact than with the eldest brother.

“
Great. That might be him.”

“
Aren’t you happy? He’s come home, and maybe he’ll stay a while!”

Mordraud
didn’t reply. He headed straight for the door, which was ajar. He unloaded Gwern, asking him, in a tone that would accept no contradiction, to go to the vegetable plot behind the building to pull up a few carrots and a couple of potatoes. Only once he saw the child set off did he enter the house.

Dunwich
was grappling with a small pan of hot water over the burning fire. Eglade was sitting up in a little wicker armchair, her favourite blanket covering her legs. She was gazing at her eldest son, lost in admiration. They were speaking about him, Gwern and their father. Mordraud lingered just outside the room, listening in silence, concealed behind the open door.

“
How long have you been sick? We must do something!”

“
Oh, there’s no need to make a fuss! I’m not ill, my energy’s just a bit low... I’ve felt so drained since little Gwern was born...”

“
But that was three years ago!”

Dunwich
’s voice was laced with pained apprehension. Mordraud felt that familiar rage swell in his chest – the one he experienced when he thought about his brother and Varno.

“
But you know we Aelians are so very... slow...” retorted Eglade, chuckling between coughs.

“
Gwern’s not very well either, is he? That’s what you wrote in your last letter.”

“
No, sadly he’s a bit delicate, like me. But he’s still young. Perhaps with time he’ll grow strong like his brothers...” she answered. Mordraud looked from her face to Dunwich’s. They were similar in so many details. Fine graceful features, a sprightly bearing, and a wiry build. His brother was tall and slender but compact and balanced. His shoulders already shaped by careful physical exercise. Dunwich’s eyes were slightly paler than his mother’s, but just as bright.

“
And Mordraud, how’s he?” he inquired, with the same anxious tone. He had good reason to be worried: it couldn’t be said that the evening had gone well the last time they’d met. Mordraud had still been young, but it was immediately evident that the affection he’d once felt for his elder brother had entirely faded. They hadn’t even said goodbye to each other. And he hadn’t seen him since. Three years had gone by.

Dunwich
had come to visit Eglade when he’d heard about Gwern’s birth. He turned up in a fine carriage, presenting a large hamper of gifts: salami, cold meats, wine, cheeses. And a bagful of gold pieces.

Varno
wasn’t home that day, of course.

F
rustrated by his father’s desire for absence and concerned about his mother, who never seemed able to recover from giving birth, Mordraud had started to blame Dunwich for everything. He’d always been Varno’s favourite. He was the one who’d gone to Cambria to study. And he never returned, unless to show off to them what success he’d achieved.

But
more than anything else, he was never there when Varno behaved strangely.

“
Well, he’s fine...” Eglade replied, unconvincingly. “Hmm... He’s a bit closed in himself, he doesn’t speak much and never complains, but he’s so sensitive and aware of others... He’s been helping me with the house, since dad accepted the posting in the north.”

“
On the northern front,” Dunwich repeated, resting a hand on her leg. “There’s not a great deal of fighting in those parts, but the climate’s harsh and food is sometimes scarce. It’s a secondary front – perfect for his age. You needn’t worry about him, mother. Varno’s an experienced soldier.”

“
You’re so formal when you speak...” mumbled Eglade. “It seems only yesterday that you were here at home, with me, and were asking me a load of questions... I didn’t know how to satisfy you.”

“
Much time has gone by... Now I work in Cambria, I attend dinners, meetings...”

Dunwich
spoke like an authoritative scholar, but looked much younger than his twenty-three years. A boy trying to act like a man, Mordraud mulled furiously.

“
Come here. Let me give you a hug...”

Dunwich
bent over her and embraced her gently, while stroking her faded copper hair.

“
You’re becoming a very handsome young man, my dear...”

“
Thanks, mum. Have you thought over my proposal? Please, say you’ll accept it!”

Mordraud
flattened himself to the door and positioned his ear to hear better. A proposal? What did Dunwich want of them, he wondered. Since his brother had left, he and his mother had had nothing but problems.

“
We can’t move to the city, my darling. If they were to find out I’m an Aelian, I could become a burden for you. Nearly nobody here even knows we exist, and those few who do notice us look on us with suspicion. Did you know they call me
witch
, in the village? We’re happy here, or would be if your father came home a little more often...”

“
It’s just superstition...” Dunwich minimised, with an assertive nod.

“
It’s not that alone. They’ve seen I haven’t aged a day in the last twenty years.”

“
Do you have enough money? Do they bring you the groceries you need from the village?” he inquired, to change the subject. He knew his mother was right, but for his part he couldn’t stay away from Cambria too long or too often. If he had them all closer to home, then he might be able to give them more help than he was already providing. He had money, friends and a career in town.

Things were going excellently for him, Dunwich told himself.

“I take care of the expenses, brother.”

Mordraud
came into the kitchen clenching his fists and tramping his feet. His frowning face and stony voice clashed with his still very childlike appearance. Eglade stretched out a hand and gently took his arm. The two brothers stared at each other, with very different expressions. Dunwich in puzzlement and Mordraud with barely concealed hatred.

The boy
was different to the child he’d held in his arms so many years earlier, Dunwich reflected bitterly. The little pink toy that blubbered and clapped his hands, or tugged at Dunwich’s hair as he strolled with him, carrying him. The child who would fall asleep anywhere.

“
Why are you here?”

“
I want to know how our mother is, Mordraud. And hopefully say hello to little Gwern – he was still in swaddling the last time I saw him...”

“
We’re all fine,” he interrupted. “I’m taking care of everything.”

“
I didn’t come to cause trouble, I was just worried,” Dunwich tried to explain, but Mordraud barked at him aggressively.

“
Yeah, you were so very
worried
! Nice grey tunic, it suits you... Looks like it’s made of the finest wool. And what a lovely carriage, dear brother. How much do you pay the stable-hand? His weight in gold? Not the weight of your airs and graces, I hope... Could drive the Empire to ruin!”

All the problems
Varno was inflicting on their family. Eglade’s pain, and her feebleness. Even Gwern’s fits, which seized him in the middle of the night and had come close to killing him so many times. Mordraud had taken it upon himself to shoulder all this. Perhaps to show Dunwich how very little he actually did for them. But he hadn’t done it only out of spite. He was forced to by the times. To survive that collapse, striving to salvage what he could.

“
That’s got nothing to do with it! If you can’t bear the idea that I live in Cambria, just come out and say it. Go on!” Dunwich burst out, irritated by his brother’s sardonic tone.

“
Go back to your career, Dunwich. After all... like father, like son.”

Dunwich
took the insult like a blow to the stomach. He turned ashen and looked away. His bottom lip quivered in anger. Mordraud got ready for the retaliation. He wanted to fight it out with him. He wanted his brother to attack and to thump him savagely, so he could have another reason to detest him.