The Invisible Chains - Part 1: Bonds of Hate (24 page)

“That's very good of you, that you want to do this, and don't think that I am ungrateful... but it's simply not enough.” Anaxantis looked thoroughly unhappy at him. “You can see that, can't you? You would still be a prince of Ximerion. At any moment a group of officers could challenge my position and demand to reinstate you. They could even use you as a weapon against me. So, it would solve a private problem, sort of anyway, and immediately create a much more dangerous one on another level. Sorry, but thank you nevertheless for proposing it.”

“Come, the next step is self evident,”
he thought.

“No, as much as I hate to do it, by the end of the week I move out,” Anaxantis added sadly.

Ehandar saw the deep furrows on his brow and felt Anaxantis's hand pressing his, as if to hold on to him against all hope. He himself felt as if the world had again begun to spin around him. He had been prepared to fade into the background and now it appeared that even that would not suffice. But what else was there?

“What do you want from me?”
he thought becoming more and more desperate.
“Don't you see I am prepared to do anything to keep you with me? I love you. I am yours and there is nothing I can do about that. And I owe you, by the Gods, I owe you.”

As if he felt Ehandar's despair, Anaxantis laid his arm around his neck and drew closer to him. Ehandar shivered at the sudden intimacy and the all too real possibility of losing it forever. When Anaxantis kissed him softly on the cheek, it came to him. Feverishly he thought it over, tried to estimate all consequences, but gave up and decided, on the spur of the moment and under pressure of the unbearable prospect of being abandoned by what was undoubtedly the love of his life, to take the plunge.

“Listen, my love,” he whispered, “I can't bear to be separated from you and I'll do anything to prevent that from happening. As it happens I read grandfather's Traitor's Law. I suppose you want to use it against the duchess-regent of Landemere. Very clever of you. But we can also use it. I will not only resign my commission as lord governor, but I will also renounce my lineage—”

“Ehandar, no. I can't let you do that. You'll lose everything.”

“Oh, brother, how easy it turned out to be,”
Anaxantis thought sadly.
“It took almost nothing to goad you to this point, and now you will talk yourself deeper and deeper into your own downfall. And to think that I don't even know whether I could have gone through with it.”

Ehandar kissed him on the lips.

“Shush, I know you love me, and I myself have often enough said that I love you too. But words are cheap, so let me prove it to you. The law allows me to commend myself to your protection, and that is exactly what I'll do.”

He smiled encouragingly at his brother who looked doubtfully at him.

“You see, you can move to wherever you want. You'll have to take me with you. So, why not stay here?”

“No, definitely no. I don't want the responsibility.”

“Anaxantis, you already own my heart, so you might as well have all the rest too. How could I be safer and more secure than in the hands of the one who loves me? It will be all right, I know.”

“And in a few months it won't make any difference anyway,”
Ehandar thought.
“Once we're in Soranza neither our titles nor our lineage won't matter one bit.”

“Just promise me you'll stay here. With me,” he added softly.

“Ehandar, I don't know what to say. But if you're sure, I'm certain we can make it work.”

“That's settled then.”

“Think again, Ehandar. Think carefully, what you're getting into. It is a monumental decision.”

Ehandar shrugged.

“I don't have to think. I love you and I have an outstanding debt to you. If this is what you want, this is what you get.”

The gray-blue eyes looked inquisitively at him.

Later, when they were in bed, Ehandar was more than ever sure that he had made the right decision. Anaxantis's love making was so hungry, so needy that he knew that his little brother had dreaded the separation at least as much as he had, probably even more. It felt like handling an over enthusiastic puppy. To Ehandar it was intense and unconditional love, unabashed, shameless. It was almost being in Soranza.

Afterwards, Ehandar, his mind at ease and his body satisfied, fell almost immediately asleep. Anaxantis, on the other hand, lay awake for hours, staring in the near dark, once in a while looking at the vague shape of the body sleeping so peacefully beside him.

“Once this is done, I own you.”

Chapter 12:

Fall of the Eagle

Birnac Maelar had become a doctor, not out of false sentiments like an urge to help people or to alleviate their suffering, but because his father was also a physician. One with rich patients. That didn't mean he didn't take good care of the people who entrusted their health to him. On the contrary, as dead people tended not to pay, he tried to keep them alive and happy as long as possible. He was good at what he did because he had a genuine interest in the workings of the human body.

A few years ago a powerful organization had made him a very attractive offer. The money was nice, but in the mean time he had inherited both his father's fortune and his rich patients, so he felt himself to be in a position to negotiate some extra benefits. Soon after they had come to a mutually satisfying agreement, he began to see a dramatic increase in his noble patients. They all seemed to be urged on by their spouses to consult him. In fact, nowadays he had so many titled patients with who he was on familiar terms that he had begun to think of himself as a noble. He had the money, the upbringing, the culture, the lifestyle and even the lands. He just lacked the title itself.

He was in his late thirties and had always taken good care of himself, but was still unmarried. Of late it had become an obsession of his to acquire a title and marry a noble woman. He didn't very much care how she would look. Essentially he wanted her for breeding purposes, to start his own noble house. He knew enough impoverished nobles with more daughters than common sense. But even they would refuse him their daughters without those all important letters patent that would ennoble him and give him a coat of arms.

Recently one of his noble patients, in whom he had confided, had agreed to help him in return for some much needed financial assistance. No wonder that it was with pleasant thoughts that this particular evening he stood upon the balcony of the master bedroom of his country estate. As a matter of fact, in his mind he was designing his crest when a blow on the head knocked him out and a figure, completely clad in black, caught him in his arms.

His arms and legs were bound tightly, and then he was wrapped in a piece of dark cloth. The men lowered him on a rope over the balcony. Two other men, equally clad in black, seized the package and disappeared with it in the night. Except for the dull whack on the head, none of them had made a sound. None of them had spoken a word.

The moment Marak Theroghall had arrived at the family estate, some twenty miles from Dermolhea, he went to his private apartments. When he entered the hall he unclasped his mantle and let it fall. Before it reached the ground a servant had hastily scrambled by and intercepted it. Without looking at what happened behind him, he ordered the servant to call the barber. It was late in the afternoon, and although he had shaved that morning, already black stubbles began showing on his cheeks and chin. He hated it with a passion, just like he hated his dry, wiry, black hair. The girls didn't seem to mind though, especially once they realized he was a Theroghall, an heir of one of the Forty.

Cleanly shaven, he felt refreshed when he went to the study of his father, Marak senior. While opening the door he absentmindedly knocked on it.

“The purpose of knocking is announcing yourself. It is quite useless when you are already entering,” Marak senior said matter-of-factly, without looking up from the parchment upon which he had been writing.

He sat at a vast wooden desk. Behind him hung an enormous painting that depicted the claim on fame of the Theroghalls. On the left the city of Dermolhea could be seen, with sturdy, high stone walls, surrounded by a moat. The center of the painting was dominated by a swarthy man, who stood on the bridge over the trench, sword drawn, calmly waiting for the army that could be seen on the right side. Legend had it that the first Marak Theroghall who came to fame had single handedly defended the bridge against the army of a coalition of barons who wanted to erase Dermolhea from the face of the earth. Wounded in more than twenty five places he had held on until reinforcements came.

“Except for the dark complexion of our forebear it is all fake,”
Marak junior thought.

He hated the painting as much as his father seemed to love it. In the second century after the End of the Darkening Dermolhea had been nothing more than a few villages, hamlets really, surrounded by an earthen wall. The stone bridge of the painting would in reality have amounted to a few planks thrown over a narrow rivulet. The mighty army nothing more than a band of thugs. The conflict could easily have been about a cattle raid. Certainly not the lofty cause of Dermolhea defending the free citizens against the oppressive nobility, as official lore had it.

Marak senior lay his quill down and smiled.

“So, you decided to take a few days off from the defense of the realm and visit your old father?”

“I doubt that my absence will make any difference to the realm, on way or the other, but, yes, I wanted to see you. And by the way, you're hardly old at thirty four.”

Marak senior grinned.

“Yes, you're right, I suppose. You have a young father. Had you're grandfather lived he would be barely fifty, you know. Which reminds me. I was sixteen when you were born and you are eighteen, almost nineteen and not even betrothed.”

“Yes, yes, my children will have an old dotard for a father. Time enough. Who knows, I might be infertile and that will be the end of the proud line of Theroghalls.”

He looked defiantly at his father.

“Eh... no. You're not and it won't.” Marak senior chuckled.

“What do you mean?” Marak junior asked, suddenly suspicious, even slightly alarmed.

“You remember that young maid, Tynia? The one with the white teeth, the big smile and the rosy cheeks?”

Marak junior blushed.

“You knew?” he asked, fazed.

“Knew? My dear boy, your mother and I chose her. I couldn't very well take you to a whorehouse now, could I?”

“I was twelve.”

Marak senior shrugged.

“We had to know. After you came your three sisters. All the more reason to make sure that—”

“—your only son and heir could continue the line?”

“Well, you didn't seem to mind. She told us you were quite enthusiastic, once she had shown—”

“You asked her?” Marak junior shouted exasperated.

“Like I said, we had to make sure that your inclinations, eh, were conducive to the propagation of, eh—”

“Oh, shut up. And then you let her disappear?”

“You make it sound so sinister. It wouldn't do to let you fall in love with her for real now, would it? Besides, you got her pregnant. So we shipped her back to her village. We take good care of her. She hasn't a care in the world. And not to forget, a thriving six year old son with black, black hair. They're very happy, or so I'm told.”

Marak junior had listened with growing astonishment and thought back at all the nights he had agonized after Tynia had so mysteriously disappeared.

“So, you see, all our worries were allayed. Not to mention that, if the worst came to the worst, you could legitimize the little bastard. As a last resort, mind you. It has been done before, in the best Houses, to save the family name from extinction. No, we were quite satisfied with the result. Oh, and with you, of course.”

“I'm glad my... performance pleased you.”

“I'm going to pretend that I didn't hear that sarcastic tone,” Marak senior smiled indulgently. “To be honest, we can't afford to be sentimental or prudish in these questions. We have an obligation to our name and to history.”

“Setting aside my personal plight, don't you see how hypocritical that makes us?”

“I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Oh father... We live in this pretend world of days long gone by, where we are the valiant fighters for the rights of the free citizens against the barbaric aristocrats who want to enslave us. But we surround ourselves with servants who we expect to anticipate our every whim. We make sure to respect the democratic forms, but our seats in the City Council are as good as hereditary and the so called elections only a formality. In private meetings and the closed banquets of the Forty we call ourselves the Merchant-Princes of Dermolhea and the people the Many, or worse, the Breeders. Actually, we take more pride in our lineage than kings. Even Anaxantis has a more sober view on his fami—”

“Anaxantis? As in Prince Anaxantis? As in one of the lord governors? Since when are you on a first name basis with a noble?” Marak senior asked sharply.

“Since he asked me to be his friend. Since I noticed that he cares more about the defense of Dermolhea than that bunch of drunkards we sent to Lorseth. Or, for that matter, than you and the rest of the council, that fat mayor Uppam Fraleck included. Since he asked me why the Forty, who used to be more than a match for any force sent against them, left the city to the Mukthars and fled with their tails between—”

“That's quite enough”, Marak senior barked. “You don't know what you're talking about.”

“Then enlighten me. What happened? Anaxantis wants to know and what Anaxantis wants, Anaxantis usually gets. And he'll tell me, but I'd rather hear it from you.”

Marak senior went over to a table and opened a flask from which he filled two dark green glasses with a thick, sweet wine. He pointed to two arm chairs by the fireplace and gave one glass to his son.

“Very well, I'll tell you all I know, though it is not very much,” he said when they were both seated. “Of course the Forty knew the Mukthars were coming. The most important families have, let's say, an understanding with a gang of robbers that operates on the Renuvian Plains. As you know our caravans use the Plains for their trade with Zyntrea, rather than having to pay the dues every city state levies for crossing their territory. We don't look too closely at their activities and they leave our caravans, our nevertheless heavily protected caravans, alone. It is a delicate balance. If we were to take action against them, we could make life very difficult for them. They know that. To sweeten the deal a bit more we pay them. Nominally, we pay them for information.”

“But that's despicable. The Forty pay a gang of robbers to be left alone.”

“No, not the Forty, not all of them. Only the major Houses do. The others take their chances. And there is nothing despicable about it. It is just business, that's all. Anyway, it's why we knew the Mukthars were coming. We learned they were approaching on the first of the month. I personally sent word to the then lord governor, the count of Whingomar, of the imminent threat. Of course we had, then as now, our sources in Lorseth. So I know for a fact that my message was received the next day, and although it was by then late in the afternoon, Whingomar gave orders for the general mobilization of the army. He also ordered a fast cavalry unit to be formed to act as a vanguard. It was supposed to leave for Dermolhea that same evening. A few hours later the order was canceled. Whingomar retired in the tower of Lorseth Castle and didn't emerge until late the following day. Preparations to march continued, but there was no sense of urgency anymore. On the fourth Uppam received a letter from Whingomar, which as mayor he shared with the council, which he had convened for an emergency meeting. It was a very strange letter. Formally the lord governor stated that everything was being done to assure that the army would be in full strength to intercept the advancing barbarians. But, and this is the strange part, he urged Uppam to take precautions for the event that all his efforts wouldn't suffice and advised him to bring himself and his family in safety on his estates, as they lay behind the line the army looked upon as the second line of defense.”

“That amounts to saying “Get out while the going is still good.”

“Precisely. And that is exactly what happened. The meeting of the council ended in chaos. Everybody understood that the army wouldn't come in time. To give the man his due, Uppam tried to rally them, to rouse them even, to start organizing the defense. While he wasn't done addressing them, already several council members were leaving, their minds made up that flight was the only option. By the sixth most of the Forty and several of the lesser merchant families had left the city.”