The King, page 22
part #4 of The Jester King Series
“I have few doubts about Hugh, Your Highness.” Feolaghe bowed his head.
They were all silent for a moment, and then Feolaghe continued. “Besides, Lyonesse is worth the price of one life, wouldn’t you say? Like any great nation, it has been forged at the cost of many. I would betray them all to trade it for less.”
“If you die, I think it will be for your honor, not your nation.”
Feolaghe lifted his eyes to look into Billy’s. “I had hoped you would understand.” He sounded disappointed. “The trout cannot swim through the meadow without the brook, Your Highness. And neither can I.”
Billy glanced at Hugh. He knew that his friend’s honor was his life’s blood. He then considered Feolaghe.
Feolaghe was an enigma. How could such an undistinguished and aging knight become the king’s champion? Sure, he had participated in battles, but never well enough for honors. The only reasonable explanation was a scarcity of honor in Orgulous, which Billy could fathom, given that Ergyfel sat on the throne. And yet this hanger-on, this faded ghost of the court with a complete lack of reputation, stood before him a blaring trumpet for honor. He had even stood up to Deimog. Where did this sudden spurt of courage, at the end of a vacuous career, come from? Perhaps it was the weight of the office thrust upon him, or the gravity of the situation he found himself in, that incited his honor to such a climax, or perhaps honor was all this middling knight had left. Perhaps he wasn’t a trumpet after all, but a simple drum, sounding out a steady, resolute beat, which goes unnoticed until all the horns are still.
Billy took a deep breath and let it out. Then, with measured words, he said, “To the death.”
***
At the appointed time, Hugh and Sir Feolaghe rode out alone from their respective lines to the center of the field of battle. The dull clomping made by their mounts was the only sound on the quiet meadow. They dismounted and tramped through the tall grass towards each other with swords bared.
Hugh took his sword and stabbed it into the soil in front of him. Feolaghe stared at the pommel.
“This sword should serve Lyonesse, from the side of her king’s champion,” Hugh said. “If I am wrong in my cause—if I am slain here today—you must take up this sword.”
Hugh then drew the sword he had borrowed from the knights of Hillshire and stepped forward. The weapon was plain, but it was true and sharp, and indifferent to taking a man’s life.
Once the two warriors were within striking range, they circled. Their movements enthralled every eye in the meadow.
“I will do as you say, Hugh, but you must promise me something.”
“What?”
“If I am slain here today, you will safeguard the lives of my wife and daughter.”
“I don’t hold your actions against them.”
“Clearly, you are the better man.”
“Look, I’m not that angry boy anymore.”
“Yes, but will you protect them?”
“Of course. But why ever should I need to?”
“Give me your pledge on it!”
Billy glanced at Hereweald. Despite the prince’s habitual stone mask, Billy could sense that he was worried. Deep within him was turmoil. Billy felt it too. Trust had come too quickly between them.
While Billy still eyed the prince, Lady Aderyn of Hillshire appeared beside Hereweald and offered him a pewter mug. She had her cousin Myrredith’s fiery hair and looked very much as Billy imagined Myrredith would look if she were younger and had freckles instead of worries.
“For the pain, Your Highness,” she said with a curtsy.
The prince took the mug, never looking from the combatants. On the other hand, the lady’s eyes clung to the prince, even as she walked away.
Feolaghe thrust his shield at Hugh. “Give me your pledge, man!”
Hugh continued to circle Feolaghe. “I so pledge! But why? Why should I need to defend your family?”
“Because my daughter is Ergyfel’s queen.”
Hugh stopped and lowered his shield, inviting an attack from Feolaghe.
Hereweald stepped forward. “What’s he doing?”
Feolaghe struck, and Hugh raised his shield to block the heavy blade. The clank reverberated in the meadow.
“Sir Feolaghe had to strike the first blow,” Billy said.
“Otherwise, Hugh’s honor and Billy’s crown would be tainted.”
Hereweald glanced sideways at Myrredith, then at Billy, who stood in front of her.
Billy shrugged. “Well, that’s what Sir Hugh told me.”
“And he was right.” Myrredith patted him on the shoulders.
Again, Feolaghe swung his sword. Hugh blocked and stepped back.
Hereweald focused on the combatants. “So, Billy, … did Hugh share his strategy with you?”
“What do you mean?”
Feolaghe beat on Hugh’s shield and continued his advance, increasing his stride and the tempo of his blows. His sword sang out in spirited song of battles won and bravery stirred, and compelled the shield’s bass voice to acknowledge it.
The soldiers of Lyonesse cheered.
“Does he intend to let the old man wear himself out before he attacks?”
“No. … That is, I don’t think so.”
Hugh spun away from his opponent’s next blow and moved past him. He stumbled and revealed that the bottom of his tunic was red with blood.
Myrredith gasped.
“It must be the old wound,” Billy said.
“I thought it was healed.”
“So did I.”
Hereweald frowned. “Good thing we’re not fighting to first blood.”
Myrredith studied Hereweald out the corner of her eye but never lost sight of Hugh.
Sir Feolaghe took advantage of Hugh’s misstep and fell upon him with relentless fervor, chopping again and again like a woodsman. Hugh fell back to one knee. Feolaghe, now frenzied, drew back to smite his opponent with all his might, to end the fight with one deadly blow.
The men of the meadow held their breath as one, each man anticipating the next blow with personal dread or satisfaction. Myrredith’s grip tightened on Billy’s shoulders.
Without warning, Hugh thrust his sword up through Feolaghe’s chest, and all anticipation came crashing to the ground. The meadow was still.
Sir Feolaghe dropped his sword and grabbed Hugh’s shoulders as he crumpled to his knees. Hugh caught him under the arms and held him up.
Feolaghe smiled weakly. “Remember your pledge to my family.”
“I will guard them as my own.”
“Cheer up.” Feolaghe gasped for breath. “The better man won. Apologies to your prince.”
Ergyfel’s champion went limp and fell to Hugh’s chest. Hugh lowered him to the matted grass with a prayer and removed the sword from his body. “God help us if Death devised this victory.”
The soldiers under Hereweald’s command cheered and drummed their shields with their swords.
At that moment, Drif appeared next to Billy and touched his elbow. “Come quickly,” she shouted over the ruckus. “It’s Shaldra.”
Billy turned to face her. “Is he awake?”
“Yes.”
Billy and Drif raced past the rows of cheering Gwythian soldiers and entered the tent where Hereweald’s physician and Sylvys tended some of the sick and dying of Hereweald’s army. Shaldra lay to one side, with Sylvys holding his hand.
“Here’s our prince now.” Sylvys put Shaldra’s hand in Billy’s.
Billy searched Sylvys’ gloomy eyes as he took the elf’s hand. The satyr shook his head. Billy squeezed Shaldra’s hand, and the trusty bodyguard’s eyes fluttered open.
“Sorry, I got you into this.”
Shaldra smiled. “Not me. What an adventure!”
“Adventures are supposed to end happily.”
“To whatever end, my prince.”
“Your oath to me. I remember. Our days in the forest seem so long ago.”
“But never far from my heart.”
“I should have left you behind with the others.”
“I wouldn’t have let you.”
“Then, I should have left you to guard Myrredith while we met with Feolaghe.”
“And cheat me out of the happiest moment of my life?”
“What?”
“You could not have known, for I have never spoken of the fate I learned so many years ago: to die at the hand of the Ghoul King. I could not outrun my fate, and neither can you, my king.”
“Fate.” Billy stared at his mother’s ring. “Fate is responsible for all the unhappy moments of my life.”
“I spent much of my life hoping for a way to put off my fate. Had I known that my death would mean life for my king—my friend—I would have wished it to come on swift wings. I die a happy spirit.”
“But you can’t die. I still need you.”
A tear ran from Billy’s eye, as he remembered similar words to John, and his feeble attempt to thwart his death. The tear fell from his cheek and landed in Shaldra’s hand. The elf closed his hand around it with a smile.
“I loved your mother, Highness, but she never shed a tear for me. I shall cherish it always. Now ... I’m going ahead to scout ... ”
Shaldra closed his eyes and seemed to shrink.
Billy wept. When, at last, he opened his eyes and released Shaldra’s hand, the elf appeared smaller than he remembered him, as if he were farther away. Sylvys and Deordrif appeared next to Billy and stated they would prepare his body.
Billy stared at the weave of the tent’s fabric. “Thank you. We shall bury him next to my mother, in Orgulous.”
“Not Tirn Aill?”
“I ... Maybe, Drif. I cannot speak to that now.”
Deordrif looked down and gasped. “Diagor,” she whispered. She then rose and left the tent with haste.
Billy’s eyes followed her. “What’s that all about? What’s diagor?”
“Something she fears.”
“And that is?”
“More proof of your nobility.”
Sylvys respectfully opened Shaldra’s hand to reveal a small, smooth, iridescent stone where Billy’s tear had landed. It gave off a faint, fading glow.
“This is a diagor. The ring you wear bears one very similar to this.”
Billy examined his mother’s ring. Its haunting stone stared back at him, its scintillating colors drawing him in.
“It’s a frozen tear, Highness.”
“A tear?”
“Of our first queen; shed in grief.”
Billy exited the tent to a sea of bent knees and bowing heads. Hugh and Myrredith stood next to the tent entrance, smiling at him. Behind them, Billy could see Prince Hereweald sitting outside his tent, with Lady Aderyn tending to his broken arm. The prince nodded and smiled at him.
Myrredith squeezed Billy’s shoulder. “These men wish to swear allegiance to you.”
Billy stared at the crowd of bowed heads filling the meadow. “How many are they?”
Lord Colomdyn knelt in the front row of men. “Near four-thousand loyal servants of Lyonesse, eager to serve Your Highness. That is, if Your Highness will have us.”
Billy leaned towards Hugh. “And the others?”
“Gone or going home.”
“Without food?”
“Not all. Most are trading in what weapons they have for food.”
“Good.” Billy jumped up on a nearby rock and stood straight, looking over the kneeling men. “Men of Lyonesse, if you would join with me to rid our land of the usurper Ergyfel, rise now and feast with me! Tomorrow, we begin our march to Orgulous!”
The men jumped to their feet with a cheer. “Long live Lyonesse! Long live Prince William!”
***
Sir Feolaghe’s body arrived at Nyraval on a rainy day, escorted by an honor guard of volunteers. In a just land, he would receive a hero’s welcome, with citizens lining the streets in somber colors to pay their respects, and young maidens tossing flowers on the cart that conveyed him. He would be showered with praise in public and toasted in every public house. But the land he had faithfully served was no longer just. The tyrant of Orgulous forbade the people to gather on the street or in the public houses. Moreover, by his royal decree, the honor guard was denied entry to the city. Instead, their charge was slipped away from them and carted off through a narrow gate by laborers from the castle.
And so, the lonely cart that carried his bones was met with no fanfare, no announcement; none of the respect its occupant was due. At first glance, it might have been the butcher’s cart delivering its weekly order. However, it did not stop at the kitchen, but clattered its way across the faded, wet cobblestones to the broad steps at the base of the donjon.
Despite its surreptitious entry to the castle, Lady Barane soon heard of the cart parked in the inner ward of Orgulous, and its content. Upon her belief, she rose from her sickbed and walked barefoot to the balcony overlooking the inner ward. Before her daughter could arrive, the Lady of Feolaghe Tor stepped off the edge and ended her life, scant paces from her husband’s body.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The Calm before the Storm
The air of the king’s great hall was thick with a complex mélange of incense smoke, lavender, mint, and decay—the last being the provocation for all the rest. Grey, smoke-laden shafts of light drained into pools on the floor, illuminating the central space between the great oak columns but leaving the outer reaches in stifling darkness.
At each column, facing the center, stood a warrior of bone and steel, armed with shield and spear, and shrouded by a black veil. The dais was dressed in rich black curtains all around and bore a second, smaller throne for Ergyfel’s queen. The thrones themselves were draped in black, and the supreme symbol of Lyonesse – a silvered lion crest that hung high on the back wall – was now sable. Beyond these bleak trappings, the chamber appeared much the same as it had when King William unveiled it to his queen; yet those who knew it in its happy glory might think it a different world. The spirit was gone, usurped by a heavy mantle.
To the side of the cavernous hall, near the great doors, a growing constellation of candle flames gradually deposed the darkness from under that corner of the grand gallery. The queen lit the last of five score candles and turned around with tear-streaked cheeks to face the two catafalques, where her mother and father laid in state. The next day, if Hereweald didn’t snuff out the light of Orgulous, the citizens would line up to pay their respects. However, now it was Maeven’s time.
The queen ambled towards her parents’ remains, stopping at the head of their beds to steady herself. She had not slept, nor eaten anything since the day before when she learned of her parents’ demise. She couldn’t stop crying, no more than she could stop a crushing avalanche.
Maeven looked to either side, still reeling from the sudden turn the world had taken. Her mother and father appeared to be sleeping. For a moment, she was a child looking for Mother and Father to chase away the nightmare that had woken her. She reached out to touch her father’s shoulder and found herself pushing up from the floor. Her body was stiff and cold. She sat up with her back to the head of her father’s catafalque and noticed that her candles had burned down significantly. What little daylight there had been was fading.
“I’m altogether alone.”
A short groan broke her contemplation, and a splinter of light darted across the room as a dark figure entered through a side door and closed it behind him. Maeven grinned, thinking someone had finally remembered where to find her, but there came no voice from the darkness, no calling of her name. Instead, the figure skulked about the doorway.
After scanning the great chamber, the man bolted the door behind him and produced from his cloak a small covered lamp. Its dim light illuminated his plump face.
“Snegaddrick,” Maeven whispered.
The portly statesman fixed his eyes on the corner across from him as Maeven ducked behind her father’s catafalque. She held her breath, hoping he hadn’t seen her.
“Is someone there?”
Maeven held still, only moving to draw in her feet. She heard Snegaddrick take a few steps, then stop.
“Do you need help?” the ambassador called out.
Again, Maeven held her breath, feeling strangely panicked by the presence of this ne’er-do-well creeping around her court. He had always been the enemy in her mind, and now that he was a known traitor, he was twice as dangerous.
Snegaddrick advanced on Maeven’s position. Each step he took brought him closer to discovering her. She felt her heart pounding against her chest and heard her blood coursing through her ears. He came closer. Her mind raced to what path she might take if she had to make a dash for the door. Still he came closer. She placed her hand over her mouth to stifle a scream.
Snegaddrick stopped. From the sound of his last steps, Maeven thought he must be standing near her father’s feet. The light from his lamp cast sharp, waving shadows on the wall before her.
“You stink as much as your swordplay, old fool!”
Maeven tensed from head to toe to keep from jumping.
Snegaddrick continued. “What were you thinking? Last minute dream of being a hero? Ha! Bit late for that, don’t ya think? Did you actually think you could beat him? You were supposed to battle Hereweald’s army! You were supposed to delay them for a few days, and while they were licking their wounds, we would all get away. Well, I would. It was so simple!” Snegaddrick kicked the catafalque. “Now ... now I have to move up my every plan, collect my just rewards, and escape this place before Hereweald comes for my head; all because of an ill-timed prick from your timid conscience!”
Snegaddrick turned and started up the center of the great hall to the dais, muttering. “I only hope the battle is distraction enough to cover my escape.”
Maeven got to her knees and peered over her father’s body at the rogue as he mounted the dais and went to the corner nearest the queen’s throne. He reached up and twisted a fluted torch sconce behind the throne while pushing on a panel in the wall. The panel opened, and he stepped through it.
