The Fell Sword (5 page)

In the far doorway, a tall man in mail raised a long sword. ‘Take them, brothers!’ he called. ‘Kill the princess and the day is ours!’

Even as he spoke a hidden crossbowman put a bolt into the bishop’s groin, and he went down screaming. The monk fell back a step and swung his staff two-handed. A swordsman tried to slip past him, and a grey-haired woman in silk plunged her long-bladed scissors into the assassin’s unprotected back.

Derkensun cut twice, forward and back, and men fell back before him.

‘Now the Guardsman,’ said the mailed man, at the other side of the room. He raised his sword. ‘And the women. Kill them all.’

The bridegroom threw his spear. He did so with an odd, hopping cast, not at all the way men learned to throw spears in the City Watch or the military. His spear was a short, broad-headed weapon almost like a boar-spear, and it went through the mailed man’s armour like a hot knife through warm butter, dropping him. There was a flare of hermetical energy from the lead assassin and he got to one knee as the spear suddenly fell away from his body.

Derkensun killed another man and half-turned, having reached the monk. His axe turned a complicated pair of butterflies between his hands as he wove it in the complex pattern that the Guard learned to keep their wrists strong.

The assassins paused and the Bridegroom bellowed, ‘On me, Scholae!’

Every man in the room could hear the pounding feet of the oncoming Guard.

The assassins broke and ran. Derkensun got one as he turned, and a crossbow bolt took off the lower half of his right ear as he made his cut. The monk parried two sword thrusts and made a mighty swing, but his assailant turned his staff on his side sword, pinked the monk’s hand with a dagger in his off hand, and jumped back. He was as thin as a wraith and wore black, and Derkensun never saw his face – the man got through the gateway to the main audience chamber and ran in among the columns.

Bridegroom tackled another one, took a dagger in the side for it, and broke the man’s arm in a wrestling lock. The desperate attacker stabbed him three more times.

The Scholae trooper fell atop his captive, and slammed the man’s head into the tiles, knocking him unconscious.

The older woman – the one with blood on her shears – motioned the younger woman to stand behind her.

Derkensun met her eyes. ‘The princess?’ he asked.

The younger seamstress with the shears peeked out. Her face was a perfect oval, her lips full and red, her eyes an almost impossible blue.

The woman in the princess’s garments kicked and gave a stifled scream on the floor.

‘See to her,’ snapped the younger seamstress. She nodded to her rescuers and the monk. ‘Gentlemen, my thanks.’ She backed away a step. ‘Can
anyone
tell me what is happening?’

Derkensun recognised the older woman – one of the many minor members of the Imperial family who decorated the palace. The Lady Maria. Her son was one of Derkensun’s favourite drinking companions – and wrestling opponents.

He bowed. ‘Honoured Lady, the Duke of Thrake has captured or killed your father on the Field of Ares. The Logothete and the Spatharioi too.’

The young seamstress put her hand to her breast. ‘Killed?’ she said. Then she seemed to collect herself. ‘Very well,’ she said with determined calm. ‘Do we hold the palace?’ she asked.

Derkensun looked at the bridegroom, who was dusting himself off. He shrugged. ‘Lady Irene, when I went on duty an hour ago the Scholae held all the portals.’

Derkensun turned to the princess. ‘Who ordered the Scholae out, Honoured Lady?’

She pointed to the scarlet-clad corpse. ‘The Mayor. Something the Logothete said.’

‘Christ on the cross,’ Derkensun said. ‘We should ride clear, Honoured Lady.’

‘Do not blaspheme in my presence,’ Irene snapped. ‘If we leave the palace, we will never get it back.’ She glanced at Lady Maria, who nodded.

‘Throne room,’ she said. ‘At the very least the Imperial purple will make a superior burial shroud.’

Derkensun took a moment to look at the bridegroom. He was unwounded; under his wedding clothes, he was wearing scale as fine as the scales on a big fish.

Derkensun made a face.

‘I live in a tough neighbourhood,’ the young man said, kneeling by the bishop, who had stopped screaming. The man was dead.

Together they dragged the bridegroom’s unconscious prisoner with them as they made their way along the main audience hall and into the central throne room. There should have been six Nordik Guards on duty. Instead, there were the corpses of two Scholae.

The princess went straight to the throne. She paused, gathered her skirts, and sat.

Lady Maria gave her a slight nod.

Derkensun walked to the right-hand guard platform and stood at attention. It felt quite natural. The bridegroom went to the left platform.

The monk bowed and when Irene didn’t offer him a stool, he stood.

She looked around at them. ‘Thoughts?’ she asked.

Derkensun thought that she sounded composed, and a good deal sharper than the Emperor. In fact she sounded Imperial.

Maria looked at the two soldiers. ‘We have the city?’ asked the older lady.

Derkensun bowed his head. ‘Madame, I sounded the gate alarm myself. But any gate may have been betrayed.’

‘The army?’ asked the princess. Or was she now the Empress? Her hesitation showed, despite her deicisive air.

‘The Vardariotes are in their barracks. Many of the Nordika . . .’ Derkensun paused. ‘Are dead.’

The bridegroom bowed in turn. ‘I’ve seen the corpses of twenty Scholae,’ he admitted.

‘The Duke of Thrake has three thousand men, at least, outside the walls. Perhaps twice that.’ Derkensun spoke carefully. He had only addressed the Emperor two or three times. This was the longest conversation he had ever had with royalty.

‘And we have a few hundred,’ said the princess. ‘When it seems I need an army.’

The Lady Maria gave a curtsey. ‘My lady, I happen to know where one can be found.’ She gave a slight smile. ‘Indeed, my lady, your father had already hired one. He sent my son to fetch them, if you recall.’

The Porphyrogenetrix Irene leaned back and sighed. ‘More mercenaries? They’ve been the bane of our people for five hundred years,’ she said. ‘With what did my esteemed father intend to pay these sellswords?’ she asked Maria.

‘You,’ Lady Maria said, offering another curtsey. ‘Majesty,’ she added.

‘Ah,’ said the princess. ‘Yes, I remember.’

Part One

The Princess

Chapter Three

The Green Hills near Morea – The Red Knight

T
he Captain of the company stood almost alone in the dawn, watching the sun rise. He had one foot up on a solid stool, and his squire was buckling his leg armour on.

Toby was wise enough not to speak. So he simply went about his work; keyed the greave into the knee-cop’s demi-greave, and then held the whole leg harness open to slide it on the knight’s right leg.

The Captain was eating a sausage.

Toby fought the greave – it liked to close on the cloth of the Captain’s padded chausse, and because they were newly laundered, they were stiff. The air was cool, almost cold – the leather was stiff, too.

Toby was above such concerns. He got the greave closed, got the lower buckle done, got the upper buckle cinched, and started on the various straps that would keep it on his master’s leg all day.

The Captain finished his sausage, spat out a bit of skin, and laced the top of the harness to his arming doublet himself.

The sun appeared above the horizon – it seemed to leap up out of the east between two mountains, and the full light of the sun fell on him. Dark-haired, with a pointed beard and grey-green eyes, the morning sun made his hair almost blue and made his mail haubergeon shine and his red arming jacket scarlet.

Toby slapped the Captain’s armoured thigh.

‘Good,’ said the Red Knight.

Toby went and got the breast and back – dented in a dozen places – from the rack and held it open while the Captain slipped into it. Even as he began to do the shoulder buckles, a dozen archers and camp servants took the twenty-four ropes of the Red Knight’s pavilion in hand, loosened them, and had the whole thing down on the ground as fast as Toby could do the buckles. By the time the Captain flexed his arms, his tent was gone.

Behind them the whole camp was being struck. Rows of tents went down like pins on a bowling green. Wagons were loading at the head of every street. The pages were currying horses or leading them to the men-at-arms.

Men were pissing on fires.

The Captain watched it all, munching an apple, and he nodded at the thought.
Pissing on fires.

Nell, his new page, appeared with his ugly warhorse. He didn’t have a name for the brute – after riding one horse for four years, he was now killing a horse in every fight.

At a cost of a hundred florins a horse.

Still, he gave his apple core to the ugly brute, and the horse took it with more delicacy than his ill-bred head showed.

Nell stood nervously. Toby tried to motion her away – she was thirteen and no one knew why she’d been made the Captain’s page except for Toby, who knew that horses loved her.

The Red Knight’s gaze crossed hers. He raised an eyebrow. ‘Yes?’ he asked.

She flinched. ‘Which – I don’t know what to do.’

The Red Knight glanced at Toby and walked away, towards a small fire left for him by a servant.

‘You don’t talk to him,’ Toby hissed. ‘Christ almighty, girl! He’ll turn you into something unnatural. Talk to me. Never to him.’

Mag handed him a cup of hippocras.

‘Your usual cheerful self?’ she asked.

He looked back at where Toby was gesticulating at Nell. ‘I don’t know why I’m saddled with the child care,’ he said. Then he shrugged. ‘Never mind me, Mag. Are we ready to march?’

The seamstress shrugged. ‘Do I look like an officer? My wagon is packed, of that much I can assure you.’ She paused. ‘Except, of course, my tent and my daughter.’

The Red Knight smiled and drank her hippocras – the best in camp.

Bad Tom – six feet and some inches of unruly muscle and long black hair – appeared from the third to last tent still standing in the camp. In the doorway, Mag’s daughter Sukey could be seen, as well as one attractive bare shoulder. Bad Tom was fully armed, cap-à-pied, and he gleamed in the new sun.

‘I’m going to miss all yon,’ he said. ‘If I go to be a drover.’

Mag scowled at her daughter. ‘If you are not quicker, my girl, the Captain will leave you behind!’

The Red Knight raised an eyebrow at his first lance. ‘Are we ready to march?’ he asked.

Bad Tom didn’t even look around. ‘Finish your wine, Captain. You said “matins” and it ain’t rung yet.’

Seeing the two of them together seemed to act as a magnet. Ser Michael came first, fully armed. Ser Gavin was next, from the opposite direction, his great tawny warhorse held in his fist by the reins, and Ser Alison – Sauce – cantered up, already mounted.

‘I don’t even have to sound officer’s call. Where’s Gelfred?’ the Captain asked.

The forester was sent for. Nell could be seen running from wagon to wagon as if her life depended on it. She was very fast.

The Morean, Ser Alcaeus, came up with a hawk on his wrist and two small birds dangling from his belt, and he and Gavin began a quiet conversation about the bird.

The last three tents came down. The occupants of the final one, who had slept through every morning call and several volleys of orders, had cold water poured on them and were kicked. The Captain’s new trumpeter, who fancied himself a gentleman, was one of them.

Cully, an archer, punched the young gentleman in the head.

There was cheering.

Gelfred came up on a pretty mare.

Sauce reached out and patted the horse on the head and then blew into its mouth. ‘Sweet thing,’ she said. ‘What a pretty horse!’

Gelfred beamed at her.

The Red Knight drained his cup and tossed it to Sukey, who caught it.

‘Everyone ready?’ he asked.

‘What’s the plan?’ asked Sauce.

The new trumpeter – soaked to the skin and with a swelling on the side of his head – came stumbling along the line of fires.

The Captain scratched under his beard. ‘Gelfred is to ride for Liviapolis and find us a nice, defensible camp about a day’s ride away. Two days’ ride at most.’

They all nodded. Two days before, they had received word that the Emperor – their prospective employer – was missing. Liviapolis was his centre of power, one of the three largest cities in the world as well as being the home of the Patriarchate, one of the centres of the faith, and of the Academy, the very epicentre of the study of hermeticism.

Ser Alcaeus nodded. ‘And then we attempt to learn what, exactly, has happened.’

Tom grunted. ‘Sounds dull. Why the fucking Morea, anyway?’

The Red Knight looked over the hills to the east. ‘Riches. Fame. Worldly power.’

‘How are we going to deal with Middleburg?’ Tom asked. The fortress city of Middleburg – the third largest in the Morea, after Liviapolis, widely known as ‘The City’, and Lonika, the capital of the north – was viewed as impregnable and sat astride their line of march east from the Inn of Dorling.

The Captain snorted. ‘Kilkis, the locals call it. Only Alban merchants call it Middleburg.’ He ate the last bite of his sausage. ‘Friends have arranged our passage.’ His eyes met Tom’s. ‘If we don’t make trouble, the garrison there will let us pass.’

Gelfred winced. ‘And fodder?’ he asked.

‘We’re to meet with a party. It’s dealt with, I tell you.’ The Captain was impatient.’

Ser Gavin sighed. ‘Easier getting in than getting out, if something goes wrong.’

The Captain glared at his brother. ‘Your hesitation is noted.’

Gavin rolled his eyes. ‘I only mean—’

Ser Alison – Sauce – put her hand on Gavin’s shoulder and made him flinch. It was the shoulder that was now covered in fine green scales. Such things didn’t trouble Sauce. ‘When he’s like this, there’s no dissuading him,’ she said.

‘What about Wyverns?’ asked Wilful Murder.

Gelfred laughed. ‘Not a single one,’ he said. ‘If we fight, we’ll face nothing but the hand of man.’

The archers all looked at each other. There was silence.

‘Any other comments?’ the Captain asked in a voice that should have stifled any such.

‘I hear there’s a princess,’ said Sauce.

The Captain smiled crookedly. ‘That’s what I hear, too,’ he drawled. ‘Let’s ride.’

Harndon – The Royal Court

The King sat comfortably in a great black oak chair, with a pair of wolf-hounds at his dangling fingertips. Most of his attention was on two apprentices who were laying pieces of armour out on a heavy table in the corner of the great receiving room, under the Wyvern head he’d mounted there with his own name under it.

The King was tall, broad and blond, with a pointed beard and a thick moustache. He carried the weight of muscle required to fight in heavy harness, and his skin-tight scarlet jupon strained every time he leaned down to scratch Emma, his favourite wolfhound.

‘If you’d taken the wolf, you little bastard, there’d be more meat for you, too,’ he said to Loyal, his youngest male hound. He gave the dog a mock-cuff, and the young male looked at him with the kind of worship that dogs reserve for their masters.

The Master of the Staple cleared his throat politely.

The King looked up, and his eyes slid right off his Master of the Staple and went to the armour.

The Queen put her hand on the King’s arm and breathed in. To say the Queen was beautiful would be to do her an injustice. She was beyond mere beauty. Her skin had a texture that made men want to touch it to see if it was real; the tops of her breasts, which showed over her tight-laced kirtle, shone as if they had been oiled, and drew the attention of every man in the room each time she moved despite the careful arrangement of her gown and her decorous carriage. Her red-brown hair was glorious in sunlight, and perhaps she had taken the time to site her chair in the best of the late afternoon sun – her salmon-pink overgown so perfectly complemented her hair that even men might have noticed it, if only they hadn’t had so much else to admire.

The King’s interest was instantly transferred from the armour to her. He smiled at her – beamed, even, and she flushed. ‘These worthy men,’ she said, ‘are trying to tell you about the coinage, my dear.’

The King’s ruddy face suggested he was suddenly interested in something much closer than the coinage. But he sighed and sat back, and stopped playing with his hounds. ‘Say it again, Master,’ he said.

The Master of the Staple was Ailwin Darkwood, and he was accounted to be the wealthiest man in Alba. He had purchased the wool staple from the King for three years – he owned the tax on wool. He also owned the most warehouses in the city, and the most ships at the docks. Despite the convention that merchants should be fat men with greedy eyes, he was tall and handsome with jet-black hair just beginning to grey and skin that had spent too many days at sea for perfection. He wore black wool hose and a black wool gown over a black wool doublet, and all his fittings – the rows of tiny buttons, the hilt of his dagger, the buckles on his belt – were of solid gold worked with red enamel. He had a pearl earring in his ear, with a ruby pendant like a drop of blood. It might have looked womanish on another man. On Ailwin Darkwood, it looked piratical. Which was apt enough, as the rumour was that his fortune had begun off the coast of Galle in a desperate sea fight.

With him were the Lord Mayor of Harndon, Ser Richard Smythe, and Master Random, whose coup with the grain wagons and boats in the late spring had catapulted him to the front rank of merchants in the city. He was missing a foot, despite which he seemed to smile all the time.

Master Ailwin smiled too, and nodded to the Queen. ‘Your Grace, my wife often tells me I talk too much and too little to the point, so let me try to be brief.’ He laid out on the table a dozen coins.

Behind him, the two apprentices finished laying out the armour and retired. Their master entered, bowed low to the throne, and stood decorously against the wall.

The King looked at the coins. ‘Silver leopards and gold. Perhaps not our finest strikes – look how many times this one has been clipped!’ He laughed. ‘Sixty-four twenty-nine?’ he said. ‘My grandfather minted that before Chevin.’

‘Just so,’ muttered Master Random.

‘And this one seems as fat as a ewe with a lamb in her belly,’ the King went on, picking up a heavy silver coin. His eyebrow shot up. ‘Sixty-four sixty-three?’ he asked. ‘I haven’t minted any new coins.’

Ailwin looked at his companions. ‘It is not from Your Grace’s mints,’ he said.

‘It’s from Galle, or Hoek,’ added the Lord Mayor.

The King frowned. ‘King of Kings,’ he said. ‘Who dares counterfeit my coins?’ Then he sat back. ‘But it is solid enough. A fine coin. My father’s likeness.’ He spun it in the air.

‘The King of Galle and the Count of Hoek are counterfeiting our coins,’ Master Random said. ‘Pardon me that I do not stand, Your Grace. I took a wound at Lissen Carrak.’

‘Well I know it, Master Random, and you may always sit in my presence. Holding that door against all those wights – many a belted knight would have failed – aye, and more would give their left hands to have done it! Eh?’ The King’s eyes sparkled. He began to rise. ‘That puts me in mind – I meant to—’

His wife’s hand dragged him back into his seat.

‘The King of Galle and the Count of Hoek are counterfeiting Your Grace’s coins,’ Master Random said again.

The King shrugged. ‘So? They are fine coins.’ He looked at the merchants. ‘They are princes, not highwaymen. If they choose to make coins like ours—’