Wolf's Blood (6 page)

Grandfather’s enemies said that Grandfather had violated those confidences, and used them to undermine the sovereign he should have supported. Grandfather’s supporters had said that Grandfather had wisely revealed that the sovereign he served was less than fit for his post. In return for this courage and forthrightness, he had been elevated by a grateful people to rulership over them.

With which version of the truth was closer to reality, Bryessidan did not trouble himself. The lesson he took from his grandfather’s elevation to king was to never show insecurity—not even to one’s nearest and dearest.

The lesson Bryessidan took from his father’s long reign was more complicated. Bryessidan’s father had not been content merely to maintain the holdings he had inherited. King Veztressidan had been determined to strengthen and, if at all possible, expand his kingdom. He faced one difficulty in this goal—the geographical positioning of the land which he ruled.

The Kingdom of the Mires was aptly, if somewhat deceptively, named. Bordered on one edge by the sea, and on two others by expansive marsh and swampland, the kingdom was a great deal more than merely mires. Within those bordering wetlands were a large amount of good, well-watered farmland and some mineral resources, the whole inhabited by a hardy, strong-willed people.

Regular tidal action meant that the wetlands did not breed disease as Bryessidan had been told was typical in many other areas where swamps dominated. What diseases there were, his people had long ago grown strong against. Moreover, the wetlands were home to a wide variety of plants that were rarely found elsewhere, plants valuable for their use as spices, medicinals, and dyes.

But for all these fine aspects, the Kingdom of the Mires possessed only one land route that might be used for transporting armies. Although the ocean-side border possessed some good harbors, the dominant winds and currents made sailing in other than a few predictable directions quite difficult.

So King Veztressidan. Bryessidan’s father, had ventured out with his armies along the land route, and even met with a few initial victories in the borderlands of Hearthome. But those victories had not been easy to keep, much less to extend.

Neighbors of Hearthome came to her assistance. They Could see that if Veztressidan were permitted to hold on to his new conquests, he would soon be looking beyond those borders to their own kingdoms. Within a few bloody years, the armies of Veztressidan were beaten back into the Mires and sealed there like a bug in a bottle.

That the bug was bottled, rather than being completely squashed, was again due to the marshes and mires that bordered the kingdom. Veztressidan’s people might be inured to the local illnesses, but the armies of the would-be invaders were not. Moreover, although Veztressidan had been able to send out scouting and spying forces through the marshes themselves, the would-be invaders could not do the same. Therefore, they left the bug in the bottle, called themselves merciful, called Veztressidan defeated and broken.

But Veztressidan was not so easily convinced to relinquish his ambitions. He looked about him, and sought another way out of his bottle. He believed he had discovered it in a resource his opponents not only ignored, but openly avoided—even destroyed. In short, he found it in the small but definite reappearance of magical ability over the last couple of generations.

Perhaps because the resources of the wetlands could be harvested only by those who had both skill and willingness, the residents of the Kingdom of the Mires had never been abused by sorcerers who had ruled before the coming of the Sorcerers’ Bane. The coming of the Bane had been seen as an opportunity for restructuring the local government, rather than the liberation it was celebrated as in so many other lands.

Indeed, there were those who mourned the days when sorcery had ruled the world, for then the Kingdom of the Mires had not been so isolated by her geography. Then, even the poorest of her people benefitted, if secondhand, from the wealth and luxury that their own labors, transported by sorcery, had brought to the mire dwellers.

So King Veztressidan did not find much resistance among his counselors when he decreed that those of his subjects who survived the Bane as Once Dead were to come to him at his court. When the first of those survivors to arrive found themselves welcomed and given employment in the castle itself, the word spread and others came.

Not long after, King Veztressidan had decreed that the word of his generous hospitality was to be spread discreetly and carefully outside his own borders. So it was that those who found themselves unwelcome elsewhere sought sanctuary within the Kingdom of the Mires.

Bryessidan did not remember his father’s first efforts as warlord, for these had happened before he was born. He did remember the coming of the Once Dead and the Twice Dead, for during his boyhood what had been a trickle became something of a flood. He remembered the strangely colored, strangely clad figures who frequented certain areas of the castle. He remembered the efforts to open the magical gate in what had been a walled-up, nearly forgotten building. He remembered when the gate had been opened, and the Nexus Islands discovered. He remembered when his father had once again ventured into war—a more successful war this time—war that made the Kingdom of the Mires a land with borders that extended beyond the mires …

And Bryessidan remembered when some ten years ago all that glory collapsed. This had happened when the neighboring lands became suspicious of the source of Veztressidan’s success, when the sorcerers Veztressidan had trusted turned against him rather than face annihilation. In the end, after all the treaties were signed, the sorcerers claimed the Nexus Islands for their own and began to charge tariff for the use of their gates.

Once again, the bug was back in its bottle.

Veztressidan accepted this resolution, as he had accepted so much else, with the point of his enemies’ swords against his throat. These enemies, however, did not destroy Veztressidan. They were wise enough to see that there was no going back, that magic was once again a power in the world. Moreover, the Spell Wielders would only agree not to turn their power to war if their old patron—for whom Bryessidan reluctantly had to admit they must have felt some gratitude—was spared and his kingdom with him.

And so the situation had stood within the kingdom Bryessidan had inherited upon his father’s death eighteen moonspans before.

Bryessidan had no such ambitions as his father or grandfather, only a desire to hold the lands he had inherited and to keep them prosperous. Now, however, the chief among the Once Dead who worked the gates from the Mires side stood before the king, confessing that the gates had been blocked to prevent free use, and the first spring shipments of plants sensitive to decay and rot could not be sent as planned.

“Something has happened on the Nexus Islands,” the Once Dead said. In appearance he was as average a mire dweller as Bryessidan himself, but as the king’s throne set him apart, so did the Once Dead’s elaborately embroidered robes and close-fitting bejeweled cap. “Something has rearranged everything since last we contacted them.”

“And when was this?”

“Last autumn. We sent a final shipment, and a final payment, including an installment to reserve service for this spring. Most of our shipping needs come in the warm months, when the goods will not bear the heat. The Nexus Islands charge high fees for their services, and we only use them when the cost balances the need.”

Bryessidan knew this, but he did not chide the man for repetition. He was grateful, as the man’s nervous babble gave him opportunity to think.

“Rearranged,” Bryessidan repeated. “Explain yourself, but first be seated.”

After all, I have made my point. No need to keep the man standing, especially when I need his goodwill.

The Once Dead took his place in the chair to the king’s right, adjusting his robes fussily as he did so, taking care that the heavily embroidered fabric fell in graceful folds. He claimed that his family had practiced sorcery in these lands before the Bane. As he took care not to even hint that his family had ruled here, and as his given name, Amelo Soapwort, was as common as mud, Bryessidan felt no threat from him.

A swamp healer elevated to king’s counselor,
Bryessidan thought
. My father and I have done Amelo Soapwort honor enough for him to serve us well.

A minor attendant quietly filled goblets with thrice-boiled water and thimble-sized cups with honey mead, then withdrew to waiting silence. A sip of mead seemed to settle Amelo, and he began his report with more composure than he had shown since requesting a private audience with the king.

“As Your Majesty may recall,” Amelo began, “any contact with the Nexus Islands begins with the sending of an emissary through the gates to make arrangements for the transport. Earlier today I performed the appropriate rituals and made my passage.

“From the moment I passed through the fiery spaces that separate the gates and set foot in the terminus on the Nexus Island side, I realized something was amiss. For one, the exit point was surrounded by a cage of sorts, the bars of which were crafted from iron.”

“A cage?” Bryessidan asked. “How so?”

“With three sides and a roof,” Amelo sketched the proportions in the air, “crafted so that one might take a few steps from the portal, but go no further. It was anchored with bolts into the stone wall that surrounds the gate.”

“So you were imprisoned?”

“I was imprisoned,” Amelo agreed, “and hardly had I appreciated this when a voice spoke to me from beyond the cage. I recognized it as that of one Skea, a Twice Dead. You may recall him. Before the Nexus Islands became independent, Skea served for a time as one of your father’s bodyguards.”

“I remember Skea,” Bryessidan said, “a big man, with skin the blue-black of a moonless night. A trustworthy man, until our enemies forced a choice. Even then I think Skea would have stood with my father to the last, but Skea had fallen in love with one of those who chose the Nexus Islands.”

“You remember well,” Amelo said. His tone was not in the least fawning and so Bryessidan felt the compliment all the more. “Skea spoke to me, calling me by name. He said to me, ‘Do you remember how ten years ago choices were forced upon those of us who served King Veztressidan?’ I allowed that those were not days any one of us who had lived through them would ever forget.

“Skea then said, ‘This past autumn brought changes here to the Nexus Islands, changes at least as marked. I must apologize, but for the time being, the gates may not be used for transit of goods or people.’”

“He said that?” Bryessidan said in astonishment. “That implies that the Nexus Islands have been invaded, and that someone more powerful than the Spell Wielders now rules.”

Amelo nodded. “So I thought as well, my king. I did not question Skea to prove his claim, for in the shadows beyond him I could see someone moving. Although this person took care to remain out of my clear line of sight, I do not think he—or she, I could not tell—was any I knew.”

“Interesting,” Bryessidan said. “I believe you were fairly well acquainted with most who dwelled on the Nexus Islands.”

“I was,” Amelo Soapwort agreed, and took another tiny sip of mead.

“Finish your tale,” Bryessidan said. “I will hold my questions.”

Amelo nodded. “What remains is brief enough. I challenged Skea, reminding him of the advance we had paid on services, pleading with him to remember that the goods we sought to transport are sensitive to the passage of time, reminding him that medicinals are not mere luxury goods but save lives and heal illnesses. But Skea remained firm. He apologized and promised that when the Nexus Islands again resumed business, our payment would be remembered. Then he offered me refreshment, and politely asked if I would need help working the spells needed to take me home again.”

Bryessidan kept his promise not to interrupt again, but his question must have been written on his features, for Amelo answered it.

“Food and drink were brought to me, and even a cushion so I might sit in cramped comfort, but never was I permitted to leave the cage. Skea stayed with me all the time, and conversed in a very general fashion. I asked after his wife, Ynamynet, and their little girl. He allowed that they were well, but when I asked about anyone else it was as if he did not hear my words. I might have remained longer, hoping that someone else who was more talkative might come, but I remembered Skea of old and knew he could outlast me. Therefore, I returned and begged audience of you.”

“You did well,” Bryessidan said, and for the first time he sipped his own mead. “So your sense is that the Nexus Islands have been conquered. I thought that was impossible. Certainly, they were easily held against invasion in my father’s day.”

The king managed to say this last without letting his bitterness show, for although Amelo had remained in service with the Kingdom of the Mires, in another sense he and all his associates in sorcery had betrayed that kingdom.

“Invasion would explain Skea’s words,” Amelo said, “but so would some sort of reorganization from within. I find significant that Skea came and spoke with me. He is Twice Dead, remember. Might the Twice Dead have taken rulership over the Once Dead? Many of the Spell Wielders treated those without power very harshly.”

“And if the Spell Wielders have somehow been overthrown by the Twice Dead,” Bryessidan said, thinking aloud, “perhaps with the assistance of the Never Lived, then the Once Dead who still breathed might refuse to work the gates. Or, perhaps, do you think they killed them all?”

“Skea spoke of his wife, Ynamynet, as if she still lived,” Amelo reminded him. “I suppose he could have lied. However, I also remember the figure I glimpsed. I said I knew most of those on the Nexus Islands, but that is not completely true. Those I knew were the Once Dead and some of the Twice Dead, especially those who came from this kingdom. I knew very few of the Never Lived, only those who assisted us with our sorcery and research. Over the ten years since the Nexus Islands separated from the Kingdom of the Mires, new people have come to live there.”