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In the Company of the Dead: The Sundered Oath, #1
In the Company of the Dead: The Sundered Oath, #1
In the Company of the Dead: The Sundered Oath, #1
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In the Company of the Dead: The Sundered Oath, #1

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Only a fool crosses a god.

  • WINNER: Pinnacle Book Achievement Award – Best Fantasy

Chosen as a five-year-old orphan to be the Left Hand of Death, Ellaeva has nothing to call her own—nothing except a desire to avenge her slaughtered parents.

Lyram, third in line for the throne, is serving out his exile after the murder of his wife. When the castle is unexpectedly besieged, he fears his prince means to remove him from contention for the crown permanently.

Ellaeva's arrival at the castle brings Lyram hope, until she reveals she has not come for the siege, but instead to hunt for a hidden necromancer dedicated to the dark god of decay.

Within their stone prison, Ellaeva and Lyram must fight to save themselves from political machinations and clashing gods. But as the siege lengthens, the greatest threat comes from an unexpected quarter.

EVOLVED PUBLISHING PRESENTS the award-winning first book in "The Sundered Oath" series of dark, epic fantasies. [DRM-Free]

LanguageEnglish
Release dateApr 11, 2016
ISBN9781622530304
In the Company of the Dead: The Sundered Oath, #1
Author

C.J. Ballintyne

C.J. Ballintyne grew up on a steady diet of adult epic fantasy from the age of nine, resulting in a rather confused outlook on life – believing the good guys should always win, but knowing they often don’t. C.J. is an oxymoron; an idealistic cynic. C.J.’s attempts at the craft of writing began in 1992, culminating in the publication of Confronting the Demon, the first book in “The Seven Circles of Hell” series, in 2013. In the Company of the Dead is C.J’s first book published by Evolved Publishing, and the first book in “The Sundered Oath” series. For fun, C.J. speculates about taking over the world – how hard can it really be? If C.J. could be anything, it would be a dragon, but to be honest, C.J. shares more in common with Dr. Gregory House of House M.D. – both the good and the bad. C.J. is a browncoat, a saltgunner, a Whedonite, a Sherlockian, a Ringer and a Whovian... OK, most major geek fandoms. C.J. holds degrees in law and accounting and is a practising financial services lawyer. C.J. lives in Sydney, Australia, with two daughters and a growing menagerie of animals that includes two horses but unfortunately no dragons.

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    Loved this book! Great story. Can't wait to read book 2!

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In the Company of the Dead - C.J. Ballintyne

Only a fool would split hairs with a god, least of all the goddess of death, but Ellaeva would count herself such a fool and consider it worth it—if she could get away with it.

She leaned across the knife-scarred timber of the tavern table.

Are you sure? she asked, her tone even and barely loud enough to be audible over the noise of the flute and the zither. Her work on behalf of the goddess Ahura, adjudicating the small war here in Dayhl, could only be abandoned in favour of a greater threat. If she was going to chase off after the man who killed her parents, she needed to be sure her arguments stacked up. The pursuit of personal justice wouldn’t be enough.

Is it justice or revenge?

No time to worry about that now. She tugged her black hood farther down over her infamous face, even though deep shadows blanketed the common room corner. She’d chosen a table far from the tallow candles mounted in their stag-horn chandeliers. There was no point taking chances; the black hair and porcelain skin of a Tembran would be remarked here among the platinum-haired Dayhlish. Besides, someone might recognise her.

In Ahlleyn, sure as the spring comes after winter, Holiness. The narrow-faced man across from her grinned, baring teeth more brown than yellow. The acrid smoke from the candles didn’t cover his pungent breath.

She half-stood, making an urgent, negating gesture as she glanced around, but the hubbub of chatter from the patrons and the music covered his slip. No one even glanced their way. On the far side of the room, away from the two blazing hearths, tables were pushed aside for dancing. She dropped back into her seat, her black robes fluttering around her booted feet.

Ahlleyn lay on the other side of the continent, months of travel by horse. If her informant was right and a Rahmyrrim priest had been dispatched there, he would likely be gone long before she arrived—unless she begged a favour, but she’d not do that for a lark of her own. However, if it meant catching the man who killed her parents, well then maybe she could come up with an argument that would hold water for a god. Old grief and anger, stale from a decade or more, stirred in her gut, and her fingers curled around the edge of the table.

Releasing her grip, she reached to the inner pocket in her robes where rested the smudged charcoal drawing of a man. Hard work and luck had helped her obtain that picture of the man she believed killed her parents—a man she knew to be a priest of Rahmyr. If she decided to act against her standing orders, then she needed to be sure it was the man she was after, and that he was involved in some act heinous enough to attract her goddess’s attention.

Did you get the name of this priest? Or his description? An unknown number of priests served Rahmyr, but she knew six by sight—six still alive anyway.

The thin man shook his head. Nobody mentioned. I got the impression he’s already there, or on his way leastways.

She scowled. No way to be sure then that this was the man she wanted. Begging favours of Ahura for her personal satisfaction was a risky business, especially if she neglected her duties, and perhaps it would all be for nothing.

With one hand, she flattened the map that curled on the table between them. The patrons behind them exploded with laughter at something unheard. Ignoring the noise, she stabbed her finger at an unmarked portion of the map in the foothills of the Ahlleyn mountains. If he didn’t know who, maybe he knew the what. There, you say? What possible interest could Rahmyr have there? There’s nothing of interest at all.

She lowered her voice even further as she uttered the name of the goddess of decay, and glanced around again. That name spoken too loudly would bring unwanted attention. But nearly all the tavern patrons were busy whirling on the impromptu dance floor or lined up to watch the dancers, their backs to her.

The nameless man leaned forward, treating her to another stomach-clenching blast of foul breath, and touched a spot perhaps half an inch away from her finger. A tiny, unlabelled picture marked something there.

Here, Holiness.

She squinted at the picture, letting his lapse slide. The image represented a holy place. There was an old shrine to Ahura somewhere in the Ahlleyn Borders, wasn’t there? And a castle built over it. Caisteal Aingeal an Bhais.

That sounds like the name, he agreed. Never could get my mouth around them Ahlleyn words. Pink castle, I heard.

She grunted. That was the one. "There’s still nothing there."

Nothing of interest to Rahmyr anyway. The shrine wasn’t particularly important, and the castle held no political significance.

What’s there, the man said, is Lyram Aharris.

The premonition went through her like a blast of icy wind, stiffening her in her chair as the hand of the goddess brushed against her mind. A light caress, but from a giant, and so it sent her mind reeling. She clutched the table for support. Lyram Aharris’s reputation preceded him the length of the continent: eight years ago, at the age of twenty-seven, he’d brought an end to the centuries-long conflict between Ahlleyn and Velena through a series of brilliant military manoeuvres. He’d survived the Siege of Invergahr against near-impossible odds, brought the crown prince safely clear of the conflict, and fought the Velenese to a standstill using their own guerrilla warfare tactics against them. As a novice, she’d covered the tactics thoroughly as part of her studies. The man was a military genius. That he was third in line for the throne of Ahlleyn was the least there was to know about him—at least it was, until his king dismissed him from court. The rumours on everyone’s lips said he murdered his wife, even if no one could prove it.

What did Rahmyr want with him?

The answer didn’t really matter. Any plot that interfered with a man who stood so close in the succession of a throne and who possessed such military genius was more important than the minor civil war in the north. The valkyr could deal with that adequately in her absence, with a priestess to serve as arbiter of justice. No one but Ahura’s Battle Priestess could handle a Rahmyrrim priest targeting a highly ranked noble.

And maybe, just maybe, the one sent to deal with a man as important as Lyram Aharris was also her quarry.

Your information, as always, is good. She pushed a gold Dayhlish dariz, the highest denomination of coin, across the table to the man.

He waited until she released the coin before snatching it up. Even a man brave enough to spy on the servants of the black goddess of decay hesitated to touch her, such was her reputation. After all these years, the over-cautiousness stung only a little.

Ellaeva climbed to her feet, drawing her black robes around her, as the informant vanished into the crowd as quick as his feet would carry him. She followed more slowly, winding her way around drinkers who instinctively avoided bumping into her even though they were ignorant of her identity. Most would take her for an ordinary priestess of Ahura, a common enough sight in any town or city where they served as magistrates and judges. One pair of dancers almost waltzed into her, the man jerking aside at the last moment and nearly knocking his partner off her feet. He stared as Ellaeva passed, while his partner scolded him loudly.

She needed to find somewhere less crowded than this tavern. If the goddess had deigned to give her a premonition, surely she would consent to speed her journey—and for that, Ellaeva required peace and silence enough to prepare the holy sword for mystic transit.

When she finally spilled out into the silence of the night-shrouded street, the noise of laughter from behind only heightened the empty ache of loneliness in her soul.

Dust rose into the sky, painting the sunrise red with a shepherd’s warning.

On the castle parapet, Lyram lowered the eyeglass and frowned. Beyond the ruined, outer wall of the keep, the terrain turned to densely wooded hills and then into mountains, but that much dust meant men and horses, and lots of them. No merchant caravans came past the remote Caisteal Aingeal, and he expected no supply train until the spring thaw reached the mountain passes, which would be two weeks or more. He turned to his aide-de-camp.

Have any of the scouts returned yet? The stiff wind whipped the words from his mouth and his auburn hair into his eyes.

Everard stood straight and stiff alongside him, impeccable in formal court jacket and kilt marked with the insignia of his rank. Before he could answer, a shout rose from further down the castle wall. A soldier pointed at the old gate.

Lyram pressed the glass back to his eye and swung to look, his basket-hilted broadsword banging against his leg at the sudden motion. With no trouble over the winter, and no reason to expect any, he wore only his gambeson and a leather tabard. The rest of his armour remained in his room—a lack that left him distinctly uneasy now.

A horse raced through the crumbling gate in the old vine- and grass-covered outer wall, the rider clinging to its neck. It galloped up the narrow dirt path that cut straight from outer gate to moat. This close to the tail end of winter, no cattle grazed in the waist-high grass between the two walls.

A hushed stillness spread along the soldiers lining the battlements. Tension squeezed a tight knot into Lyram’s gut. Nearly twelve months he’d waited here in exile, twelve months wondering if Drault would be true to his word—if he dared.

Now it began.

Open the gates. Lyram spun towards the gate-tower stairwell and hastened down the spiral steps to the triangular courtyard.

As he stepped from the darkness of the stairwell, the sound of hoof beats on timber echoed off the walls. After a long moment, the horse burst from the shadows of the barbican and clattered onto the cobbles of the inner courtyard, sweat-darkened chestnut flanks heaving and its rider half-hanging from the saddle. Lyram rushed forward, caught the falling man, and lowered him to the ground.

Everard appeared at his side, his glasses pushed hard to the bridge of his nose and lips pursed. A ring of faces pressed around them, the soldiers’ brows creased beneath their helms.

Galdron shoved through, helm in hand and the sun gleaming on his balding pate, and the soldiers fell back to allow their captain passage. He squatted alongside Lyram with a cursory sir.

Lyram eased the man from his grasp and onto his back on the cobbles. He sucked in a breath. Maddok. Though the young man was a farmer’s son, and Lyram was a duke’s, they’d known each other since boyhood and even played together a time or two. Blood slicked the partial cuir bouilli chest and shoulder harness he wore over his chainmail, its metallic stink filling Lyram’s nostrils. A crossbow quarrel had punched through the mail where the boiled leather plate ended and stood upright in Maddok’s chest, buried almost to the fletching.

Lyram met Galdron’s eyes, and the grizzled captain shook his head slightly. No rib had stopped that arrow from going in, only coming out. No doubt the arrowhead pierced the lung. Lyram closed his eyes momentarily and took a steadying breath. There was nothing to do except ease the lad’s passing to Ahura.

Everard handed a waterskin to Galdron, who lifted it to the scout’s lips.

Maddok sucked greedily, and water leaked down his chin. Sweat plastered thin blond hair to his skull.

Sir? The scout’s eyes fluttered open, seeking and holding Lyram’s gaze. Sir. Relief stained the words this time. An army, commander. An army comes.

What? Here? Lyram scooted closer, taking Maddok’s hand. Stupid question. Of course here. There’s nothing else for miles except trees and the odd cow.

His worst fear, an unspoken and foolish fear, was that an army raised that dust cloud. And yet why should there be an army here? Though technically part of the Borders, Caisteal Aingeal was some thirty leagues from the official boundary between kingdoms, and miles more to the nearest of the fortified keeps. This remote castle, built around a small shrine of Ahura, the goddess of death, truth and justice, contained nothing of value or interest.

Nothing except me.

Prince Drault would not use an army though, would he? Not inside his own father’s kingdom? He could never hope to get away with such audacity.

Lyram shook himself, as though to rid himself of surprise. Report, please, Maddok.

He surveyed the castle as he listened to the report, his eyes cataloguing fortifications. The knot tightened in his stomach with each passing word. Maddok paused intermittently to gasp through the pain. He was dying, and most likely more would die in days to come, men Lyram had known all his life. But Maddok was young, so very young, and though Lyram had lost men before, he hated it each and every time.

Two thousand men? Despite his best efforts, disbelief tinged Lyram’s words as Maddok’s report rolled to a close. A tiny castle, Caisteal Aingeal’s full strength was a barracks of a mere hundred soldiers. Currently, his own guard bolstered the permanent contingent to twice that. After the king dismissed him, they’d been loyal enough to follow him into exile, far from home and court, but had their loyalty brought them only to certain death? It seemed so, in the face of such overwhelming odds.

Drault is behind this. He insisted I be exiled, and he’s behind this, too—somehow.

He shunted the memory aside and pulled a half-empty whisky flask from his belt, but before he took a draught, Everard plucked it from his grasp.

Not where the men can see. His aide stuffed the bottle in his sporran.

Near enough two thousand. Maddok coughed, and bright, red blood flecked his lips. Near as I could count. Sir... they fly the gyrfalcon of Velena.

A murmur ran through the watching soldiers, and Galdron actually spit on the cobbles. Velenese bastards, the captain muttered through his ginger beard.

The interminable border wars between Ahlleyn and Velena had only recently come to a close, and some of these men had been with Lyram at the Siege of Invergahr, which started the uneasy peace. A great many more had died there.

An invasion? If he could snatch the words back, he would. Persuading Everard and Galdron this was directed at Lyram personally would be hard enough without offering up the convenient explanation of a Velenese invasion. Drault must be behind this army, somehow, someway, even though it made no sense. But an invasion made no sense either—there were more lucrative targets closer to the border than Caisteal Aingeal.

Maddok’s breathing grew more laboured, and fresh blood stained his lips.

Lyram clenched his jaw so hard his teeth hurt. Not the first, and not the last. Hold it together, man.

Right flags, the scout murmured, so softly that Lyram had to lean closer, his ear to Maddok’s lips. But they looked to me like... like Gallowglaighs. He drew in a deep, rattling breath.

Anyone could have hired the Gallowglaighs, Everard said behind him.

Gallowglaighs are led by Sayella, Galdron replied. She could be doing it for patriotism or it could be her daddy paying her men’s wages. That brings it back to Velena.

The earl never acknowledged her, Everard said. And she hates him for it.

Galdron grunted. You have a point. I heard she wouldn’t piss on him if he was on fire.

"I heard she told him so. Loudly."

Lyram waved their half-bantering debate to silence, waiting, but Maddok didn’t speak again. When he drew back, the scout’s eyes were fixed and staring.

He snatched the waterskin from Everard and flung it across the courtyard, scattering the soldiers, and then dropped his face into his hands. No tears pricked his eyes—after all those he’d shed for Zaheva, it sometimes seemed he had no tears left to cry. A waste, a god-damned waste: Zaheva, and Maddok, and every other life lost in the Border Wars. And how many more to come? Ahura would drink her fill here long before the crows came. Worried faces peered at him over shoulders as men scurried for their posts.

Across the courtyard, two women shrouded in loose black robes emerged from the well room, which also housed the stairwell to the catacombs, and crossed the cobbles. They knelt beside the body and, in unison, made the sign of the goddess, touching their brow, lips and breasts, to signify the mind, the breath and the heart of the departed, all of which eased in death. Heads bent, they began the ritual prayers of passing.

One of them, her face lost in the shadows of her deep cowl, glanced at Lyram, and he shivered as the chill gaze of death brushed against him.

She touched her hand to brow, lips and heart again.

An ill omen, Everard murmured, staring at the priestesses of death. Stork tall and scrupulously neat, he stood out in his formal kilt and plaid. For the start of a siege, a worse one is hardly possible, unless we find a company of Ahura’s valkyr or the Battle Priestess herself arrayed with the enemy.

Don’t joke. Lyram rounded on him, his voice rough. Don’t ever joke about that.

When the warriors of Ahura picked sides, the choice endorsed one and condemned the other.

I wasn’t trying to be funny.

If the Velenese have broken the treaty, Galdron said, in an obvious attempt to redirect the conversation, we’re not prepared, especially not if they strike here first. We’re not equipped to stave off a full assault, but once they neutralise us it’s a clear path to the inner kingdom.

Why would Velena invade right now, in the middle of the marriage negotiations? Lyram stared off into the distance. He only half-listened for the answer to his question, already absorbed in siege preparations. Ten to one odds, and there was so much to do. He needed to check the food stores, the water casks, the inner well, the armoury, the oil supplies... too many things to list. He’d have no chance to recall the cattle herds wintering in the highlands. His eyes lit on the chickens scratching outside the kitchen, near the small garden. They had eggs, and fresh meat, though not much of either. There was more salted and dried meat in the stores.

A small bevy of children kicked a ball near the kitchen door. Did he have time to get them out? What about the women? A castle under siege was no place for them, and the fewer mouths to feed the better, but where would they go? So many problems.

Galdron and Everard exchanged glances, the latter chewing his lip. Though both were lifelong bachelors, their resemblance ended there. Galdron was bluff-faced, red-bearded and balding, and wore lamellar armour over mail, while Everard never had a single greying hair out of place and wore his formal court dress like a uniform. As always, the braid marking his rank as Lyram’s aide-de-camp was pinned to his shoulder. Galdron shrugged.

Lyram nodded with satisfaction. Exactly. This isn’t an invasion. This is political.

Half a day doesn’t give us much time to prepare. Galdron spoke in a faultlessly deferent and almost too reasonable tone, adopting the attitude of a man talking to a mad king likely to order his head chopped off. He restlessly passed his helm from one ham fist to the other. All we can hope is to hold out here long enough for reinforcements. Not in time for most of us, maybe, but we can buy time for the king to muster a defence. You’ll need to send word to the king, warn him of the invasion.

It’s not an invasion! Lyram’s shout rang off the walls of the triangular courtyard, echoing slightly before fading away.

A stir ran along the walls as the men and women manning the battlements glanced towards them and away.

Everard’s lips thinned and his expression grew more pinched, but Galdron met Lyram’s gaze.

My lord. He said the words firmly, emphasising the title Lyram detested. Whether this is an invasion or not is moot. You must send word to the king. I will find volunteers willing to risk the ride. You should compose a message. He began to turn away, then stopped. And shave.

Seething, Lyram spun on his heel. Why hadn’t he said something to Galdron? He should have reprimanded him, not allowed him to... what? Scold him? Dragon balls, but Everard was right to take away his whisky. No matter how he fell apart on the inside, he needed to hold himself together before his soldiers, now more than ever. And he couldn’t dress Galdron down without drawing attention to his sorry state.

He pressed his fingers to his temples as he crossed the courtyard. How much sleep did he get last night? Midnight had come and gone before the whisky dulled the pain and oblivion took him.

Not enough, that’s for sure. Not enough to plan a war.

He entered the well room and turned left, climbing the winding stairs to the first floor and his suite. The brands that lined the walls were not yet lit, leaving the stairwell in dim shadows and hiding the shimmer of the pink limestone walls. The air here was cool, dank with moisture after the recent melting of the snow. His boot steps rang echoes off the distant stones.

With the castellan and his family occupying the more lavish suites in the east wall, Lyram had claimed the old lord’s rooms overlooking the gate. Displacing the resident family just because he’d fallen into disfavour at court would have been poor form. He passed the carved door to the family’s residence, took the two steps up to his own quarters, and shouldered through the heavy oaken door into his untidy sitting room.

He didn’t allow the servants in here. Everard tidied as much as he could, and that was all. In the near corner, his mail shirt and his moulded cuir bouilli plate armour rested on a stand. Stacks of papers swallowed the surface of a huge blackwood desk positioned to his right beneath the narrow arrowslit looking out towards the ruined outer wall. Straight ahead, through a wide, irregular archway, the covers trailed off the edge of a massive four-poster bed. He spent his nights sleeping inside the curved walls of the gate tower itself.

He crossed the room, boot heels echoing on the floorboards, to the washstand just inside the archway. His razor blade sat next to a silvered glass and pitcher of water. He dipped a finger into the water and shivered at the icy chill. Winter was barely past, and snow probably still persisted in the mountains, with every chance yet of a spring blizzard. The fire had burned low on the hearth and needed stoking to warm the room.

How many days since he’d last shaved? He didn’t recall. He picked up his razor and the mirror and examined his jaw. His chin and cheeks were covered in coarse reddish-blond stubble and his hair hung raggedly about his face, as if he’d hacked it off with a knife. When did I do that? No recollection even stirred. Must have been drunk out of his mind.

His bloodshot blue eyes stared back at him, mocking. He dropped the razor, letting it clatter into the washbasin, placed the mirror down with more care, and turned back towards the sitting room.

But above the desk, as mocking as his reflection, hung the portrait of his younger self, clean-shaven and square-jawed, with dark-red hair pulled back in a proper queue, staring imperiously with clear blue eyes out of the canvas. His shoulders were set and his plaid flung back to reveal the dragon-hilted clan sword still on his hip. That, at least, remained the same.

The solitary portrait was years old now. A more recent painting hung in the capital. That one included Zaheva.

He dropped into the chair at the desk and buried his face in his hands, as if hiding from the memories, or the portrait. Without raising his head, he groped for the desk drawer, opened it, and found the whisky bottle. As he lifted it to his lips, the fumes burning in his nostrils, the door opened.

Everard paused with one hand on the door handle. His expression didn’t change, but disappointment and reproof sharpened his gaze.

Lyram placed the bottle back on the desk with a muffled thud and wiped his chin with the back of his hand. Stubble scratched accusingly against the leather of his glove.

His aide dragged another chair across the bare floor to the desk, wood squealing on floorboards, and dropped into the seat. His wireframe glasses slipped down his nose, and he pushed them back up over grey eyes. Reaching out, he placed the flask he’d confiscated in the courtyard back on the desk. The castellan heard the news.

Lyram shrugged. I expect he did.

I believe you were writing missives for the king, sir? Everard’s tone, as always, was formal and inflectionless, the recrimination in his voice too subtle for detection by anyone who didn’t know him well. With crisp movements, he pulled a sheet of paper free of its stack and placed it on the desk. He unstopped an ink well with one hand, removed the whisky bottle with the other, and positioned the ink next to Lyram’s elbow. Galdron is picking out volunteers, fast riders all, to carry word, sir.

Lyram took the bottle back from Everard and dropped it into the drawer, where the glass rattled around before coming to a stop. He stared at the blank paper with unseeing eyes, aware of the flask still sitting alongside the inkwell. What difference will it make? Drault will speak against sending aid to us.

Fortunately the antipathy between yourself and his highness matters not a whit in this instance, sir. Prince Drault has no say in military matters, least of all when an unknown army is at large within our borders.

No, but Traeburhn does, and he’s Drault’s dog. He’ll fake an investigation, arrange false reports of no unrest, and no aid will come.

Everard’s hand darted out, faster than Lyram thought him capable, and slapped him. Lyram jerked back in his chair, knocking the inkwell over.

What the—? Everard! How dare you! The blow had stung more than hurt.

His aide righted the ink bottle and mopped at the spilled ink with a cloth usually used to clean armour. "I would not strike my lord, but a foolish boy who is sulking and drowning his sorrows in a whisky bottle as an army marches to kill us all? Our lives depend on you, and you, my lord, are only in love with death."

The exaggerated sarcasm was impossible to miss. Lyram rubbed his cheek and scowled. You make it sound like I am a drunkard.

You weren’t sent out here for exemplary service, sir.

No, I was sent out here because someone murdered my wife, and because Drault wants me dead!

Everard folded his hands neatly in his lap, managing to look prim. The small bald spot in the crown of his head gleamed in the sun coming through the arrowslit. You were sent out here because you foolishly punched a prince in the nose and thought you could get away with it, if I may say so, sir.

No, you may not say so. But an aide had more leeway than any other, and Everard spoke only the truth. It still warmed him, remembering the shock spreading across Drault’s face as bright blood bloomed against his skin; the satisfying pain in his hand; the way Drault tumbled to the ground. He’d broken a knuckle on the prince’s head, but Drault’s nose was no longer as straight as it used to be, nor was his face as pretty as he liked.

You didn’t hear what he said. That came out sulky, and Lyram gritted his teeth.

Nobody heard what he said, sir, except you. And while I would never doubt my lord’s word, I must observe, sir, that any such accusation would carry more weight coming from the sober son of a duke than from the whisky-soaked commander of a minor castle. Everard’s gaze darted towards the portrait.

Lyram drew a deep breath. Drault’s words that day still seared him, had burned deep into his memory: Where is your whore of a wife today? At home entertaining your vassals?

Dead. She was already dead and cold when the prince spoke his hateful words, lying abandoned in the snow with an arrow in her back and her throat slit. She’d died alone.

Lyram curled his fingers into fists until his nails dug into his palms, then let his fingers spring open. "I’ll dictate. You write. Three copies. To be handed to the king, and the king alone."

The missive was straight-forward, a bald recounting of matters as they stood: a force of either Velenese troops or the Gallowglaigh mercenary company marching under Velenese colours.

Hired mercenaries would be exactly Drault’s style. They’d make it impossible to trace the gold back to their employer, and then he could lay the blame at the Velenese door. But would he really destroy the newly minted peace just for his own personal satisfaction?

Of course he would. Drault would do anything for his own satisfaction.

The irony was that the prince didn’t even realise this was part of what made him so hated.

Everard cleared his throat. Flushing, Lyram resumed his dictation, noting the enemy numbers, their fit-out, the fortifications of the castle as he knew them, a conservative estimate of how long they might hold out, and an appeal for help.

As Everard started on the second copy, Lyram’s mind drifted. Almost absently he picked up the flask from the desk and took a sip. The whisky seemed strangely sweet and didn’t burn like it should, but he took another swallow anyway. Everard was wrong. Lyram’s grief and resultant attack on the prince had given Drault the opening needed to have him dismissed from court, but it wasn’t the real reason. But how to prove it? He had no evidence, nothing beyond a longstanding antipathy between himself and the crown prince, one born of Lyram’s popularity and the fact his father stood next in line for the throne behind Drault... and the prince’s attitude to his Tembran wife. That, and Drault’s parting words.

On that late summer day of his departure from the capital, rain sliced down out of a grey sky, soaking the cavalcade to the bone as they waited patiently to be off, sluicing from the armour of his guard and leaving pennants hanging raggedly. Thundering rain on cobbles muffled all sound more than a foot away, and Drault must’ve known his words would be inaudible to bystanders when he came.

The rumours have started, he said. That you killed your own wife. Inevitable, really, when the killer cannot be found to be brought to justice, and you yourself unaccounted for at the time.

Lyram opened his mouth, then snapped it shut, grinding his teeth so hard it would have been audible if not for the rain. On the day Zaheva lost her life, Drault had absconded from his own hunting party, forcing Lyram to break up the guards in a futile search for the prince in the woods. That he wound up beating the bushes alone that afternoon seemed unremarkable—until his wife turned up dead. But Drault knew all that.

I want you to stop denying those rumours. Rain streamed down the prince’s face and his eyes glittered through the raindrops clinging to his eyelashes.

What? Lyram couldn’t hold the explosion back. Why would I do that?

"Because if you don’t, I will produce evidence you did kill your wife, and ruin you and your entire family."

The cold filtering through Lyram came from more than the rain. There were ways and means to manufacture such false evidence, and Drault had the power, money, and connections to do so. With all that he possessed, there wasn’t much he couldn’t do.

Taking Lyram’s hand, Drault smiled without showing his teeth. It’s uneventful in the borderlands, I hear. I will pray to Ahura to keep it that way.

And he widened his smile, teeth gleaming now, though with not a hint of warmth reaching his eyes. His grip tightened until Lyram feared his bones would surely crack.

Around them, the nobles of the court and various soldiers watched, no doubt believing they witnessed a reconciliation and forgiving of all wrongs.

The prince said no more, but the prayer to Ahura for safekeeping was unusual, though not entirely nonsensical. Death, after all, belonged to her; she possessed the power to stop it—or cause it. But Ahura wasn’t Drault’s patron god, nor Lyram’s, and he could not shake the memory of that fox’s smile, all predatory cunning.

Still, if Drault could frame him for murder, why would he send an army here to kill him? For that matter, why even demand his silence instead of producing the damning evidence? The obvious answer was that Drault would not want to be even incidentally connected to Lyram’s downfall. The common people despised Drault, all while loving and feting Lyram with wild abandon. Even a passing association with his downfall would reflect badly on Drault, and his marriage was pending now. The quickest way for Drault to end his insecurities would be to settle down and father a child or two, putting that many more rungs in the ladder between Lyram and the throne.

As if Lyram wanted to be king anyway.

Your seal? Everard said, already spilling red wax on the first copy of the missive.

Lyram pulled his glove off to reach his signet and pressed the gold into the soft wax, leaving an impression of a coiled dragon encircled by the family motto.

Let sleeping dragons lie.

Lyram strode back down the stairs to the courtyard with the folded missives clutched in his gloved hand, turned the corner out of the stairwell, and stopped when he almost ran into the back of the castellan, Sir Janun, blocking the door to the well room.

This is a disgrace, father! The castellan’s son, Kastyn, stood facing Sir Janun. The young man—almost a boy really, with the soft blond fuzz of a youth’s beard—was clad in court attire that, while dignified on Everard, appeared ridiculous on him. "This is your castle, he said, almost spitting the words at the castellan, and his face twisted with its customary sneer, and you shouldn’t give it over to him just because he’s the jumped-up son of the Duke of Habrodeen."

On the contrary, Kastyn, I am handing over command because Lord Aharris happens to be the ablest military commander and canniest fighter in the whole of Ahlleyn. If your political knowledge is so scant, you’ve obviously not been applying yourself to your studies. Return to your room and we will speak shortly.

The castellan wheeled away and started when his gaze fell upon Lyram and Everard, standing in the shadow of the Cortswood suites built along the eastern wall.

Kastyn pushed past them both, shoving his shoulder hard into Lyram as he squeezed past into the stairwell.

Murderous bastard. Kastyn’s voice was so low the words barely reached Lyram’s ears. Like as not you’ll murder us all in our sleep like your foreign bitch wife.

The heat of a wildfire temper flashed through Lyram and he lunged, only to be pulled up short by Everard’s surprisingly iron-hard grip on his elbow.

That shit-eating little tit! Lyram kept his voice low. Aware the castellan was still watching, he plastered a grim smile on his face.

Kastyn disappeared into the stairwell, and Everard released his elbow.

There’d be less of that if you spoke up in your own defence, Everard said in a sharp undertone.

And if I did that, I’d ruin the entire family. Lyram sagged, all the fury drained from him.

My lord. Sir Janun made an apologetic bow, made all the more formal by the court garb he’d donned shortly after Lyram’s initial arrival at the castle—or perhaps more importantly, after the arrival of Everard with Lyram’s retinue, in his formal kilt and coat. His blond hair was liberally sprinkled with white. The boy is young, and I fear I’ve neglected his education. I should’ve sent him away to court or to be fostered.

Lyram grimaced. He despised the political machinations of the majority of the court nobles more than much else in life and did his best not to get mired in their games, but sometimes it wasn’t easy. The court would eat him alive.

The castellan bowed his head in acknowledgement. No doubt. Lord Aharris, I have heard the news, and I trust you will take command in these troubled times? Your reputation precedes you, and I can only thank Ahura and Chalon for bringing the kingdom’s foremost military genius here in our time of need. Most fortuitous!

Lyram grimaced again, belatedly turning it into a smile. Maybe the castellan wouldn’t notice. Statements like that ruffled Drault’s feathers and were what had caused all the trouble in the first place—those, and the whispers that Lyram would make a better king. Why couldn’t Drault be at least half-competent at something so that the people might love him even a little? Competent at something besides scheming and double-crossing, that is.

If it is your desire, I shall accept graciously. The capitulation saved him the effort of needing to persuade the man to allow him command. Could Janun’s son cause him trouble though? Kastyn was sixteen, hot-headed and impetuous, and he clearly didn’t like this decision. Sir Janun, if I may impose, I’ll need a full accounting of the stores, of food, water, oil, and anything else necessary to withstanding a siege.

The castellan inclined his head again. Certainly.

Lyram watched him rush off, his red-and-green tartan kilt fluttering in the breeze of his passing.

Turning, he spotted Galdron on the far side of the courtyard, standing in its truncated top point nearest the gate with what looked like the castle’s entire contingent of horses gathered around him.

Nicely done, sir, Everard murmured.

Back to sir, is it? Lyram gave him a rueful smile as he scrubbed the growth on his chin. Maybe he should grow a beard. Galdron would have kittens. Maybe even hatchlings. He smirked at the image.

Of course, sir. Everard stared back with such a smooth expression no one would believe him guilty of even pinching flowers.

I didn’t do anything, anyway. He just surrendered everything to me.

Such is the nature of your reputation.

Lyram grunted, and strode across to Galdron. If his reputation were a little less stellar, Drault might fear and hate him a little less. But Drault had fought at the Siege of Invergahr as well. He could have broken the enemy line against all odds, could have held the men together until help came; instead, he’d spent the long eleven days of the siege shivering in fear in the top of the broken tower they’d fortified against the sudden border incursion. Few Ahlleyn troops survived that last day, and fewer Velenese, but every last one of them remembered Lyram leading what they all believed to be a doomed last charge while Drault whimpered in the tower. When the Ahlleyn army arrived and drove off the Velenese, they’d found Drault still there with his head between his knees.

Three soldiers huddled nervously beside the horses, while Galdron stood at parade rest. Two were long-standing soldiers from Lyram’s guard, Obrim and Terihna, a man and woman he knew well for they had served for going on ten years now. The other was Phelip, barely more than a lad. The blood had drained from the young soldier’s face, leaving him chalky white, and he clenched his reins in a white-knuckled grip. All wore standard issue armour for Lyram’s guard: full boiled leather plate over mail, with plaids in assorted colours tossed over the top for warmth, and open-faced helms on their heads.

Galdron clapped his helm on over his red fringe of hair and saluted. Sir. Two volunteers to ride for the capital, sir, and one for the border castles.

Everard distributed the missives, while Lyram clapped shoulders and exchanged soft words. Eyes watched from the ramparts, though when he glanced around, each soldier on the walls stood with his or her back to the courtyard. Palpable tension filled the castle.

"Phelip, ride for whichever border castle you can get to and deliver your message to the castellan. Obrim, Terihna, hand your message to the king, and the king alone. Not to Chancellor Traeburhn, not to Prince Drault, not even to my father, Duke Habrodeen. Only to the king. Understand?"

The two older soldiers exchanged confused glances.

Terihna snapped a salute, her mail rattling. Yes, sir!

Obrim followed her lead, and all three tucked their dispatches away safely in their saddlebags.

Galdron hustled them on to their horses, then passed each the lead rein of a spare horse.

Chalon speed you, and the cradle of life carry you. Lyram lifted a hand in benediction, and the messengers turned their horses for the barbican and its multiple gates.

Everard beckoned to him from the foot of the tower stairs.

Lyram followed his aide up to the top of the turret. They stood on the eastern of the two gate towers, which afforded them a view directly down to the bridge spanning the moat, out over the northern hills and the marsh to east and west.

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