The Warrior King: Book Three of the Seer King Trilogy Read online

  “But I’m confident that I … that we … can win, and when I use the word we, I mean you, Damastes á Cimabue, my bravest soldier.”

  “What is your plan? How will things be different?” I temporized.

  “First I must regain the throne, reunite Numantia behind me. Scopas, Barthou, their regime and especially the execrable Peace Guardians and the detestable Herne must be destroyed. There shall be no mercy, no surrender permitted. I made the mistake of being merciful once and allowing dissent. I will not make that error again.”

  “What about Maisir?” I asked. “Bairan will hardly stand by and allow you … Numantia … to return to its former glory.”

  “He will have no choice,” Tenedos said. “Of course he’ll call up his armies when he hears of my successes in the field and bring them north.

  “By the time he crosses the borders, makes his way through Sulem Pass or the other route through Dumyat, it will be too late. Once here in Numantia, he’ll be as we were in Maisir, campaigning in a foreign land, with everyone’s hand turned against him.

  “I’ll meet him in the field when and where he least expects it. Then the Maisirians … and their murderous king, the bastard who put you under a spell and forced you to become a murderer and near-regicide … shall be utterly destroyed.

  “Remember, we have a great advantage. You slew his greatest mage, the azaz, at Cambiaso. I was more powerful than he was then and am twice that now.

  “So let Bairan come north with his War Magicians. This time I know what I’m facing, and have begun to reassemble the Chare Brethren and ready my own battle wizardry.

  “Before he reaches the border, I’ll strike down all his sorcerers and leave him naked to my … our … hammer blows, material and spiritual!

  “Once he and his army are destroyed, I won’t make my other mistake of invading Maisir. No, I’ll let them fall into utter chaos for a generation, perhaps two, while they’re casting envious looks north at our peace, our contentment, our prosperity. Then they’ll beg to be allowed into my hegemony.”

  Again my memory flickered, remembering how Tenedos had told me peace must never be allowed to reign in Numantia, for a nation not fighting for its life, for its soul, falls into decay and ruin. But what Tenedos said brought a more important question.

  “Your Majesty,” and I confess the words still came easily. “You just said something strange, something I don’t understand. You said a generation or two must pass before the Maisirians want to serve you.”

  “Your mind is still as agile as always,” Tenedos said. “This is another secret I’m on the verge of discovering, a way to extend our lives double or double again normal, perhaps even longer.

  “This I find ironic, for as Saionji’s greatest servant, perhaps she’s going to permit me to remain free of the Wheel for a longer time as a reward, me and those I decide are worthy of this ultimate privilege.”

  I looked hard into those dangerously gleaming eyes I’d been held and commanded by for most of my life. I couldn’t tell if he was telling the truth, was raving, or was trying to entice me, as if a promise of more years in this hardly pleasant life was much of a lure.

  “I know you haven’t forgotten the oath you took to me, even though some might say you broke it when you struck me down.”

  I’d spent many hours puzzling about how much grief that arrogant motto, We Hold True, must’ve brought my family over the generations.

  “One thing, sir, I must settle now,” I went on. “I refuse to admit I broke my oath when I prevented you from bringing chaos to Numantia. For isn’t it the duty of an officer to keep his superior from breaking his oath? And you took one to your people, in front of me and the Great Gods Umar, Irisu, Saionji, to never treat your subjects with cruelty or disdain. Didn’t you?”

  The emperor’s face reddened, and his fist clenched on his glass. I waited for it to shatter, but he forced calm, put a smile on his lips, and laughed sharply, falsely.

  “I suppose,” he said slowly, “that’s why friends are so damnably uncomfortable. They keep reminding you of things that are … hard to accept. Very well, Damastes, my … my friend. We’ll call the matter of oaths and their breaking even.

  “Now I ask you once more. Will you revive your oath, your pride, Numantia’s pride, and serve me again?

  “Help us regain our rightful place in front of the gods, as the fairest, most favored nation on this world. Help me make Numantia even greater, so other worlds look on us with helpless envy.

  “Help me destroy Numantia’s enemies … before they unutterably destroy us!”

  I felt his words shake me, shake my world, barely kept from falling to my knees.

  “If I do, sir,” I managed, “what about my present predicament?”

  Tenedos smiled, the smile I’d seen often when he won a hard point, defeated a stubborn foe. Again he stretched his arm into nothingness, came back with what looked like a coin or an amulet.

  “Here,” he said, and cast it toward me. If I doubted I wasn’t dreaming, the clink of the coin on the floor gave final proof. I reluctantly picked it up. It was warm, rapidly grew cold.

  “Rub it, think of me, and I’ll send magic to assist you in whatever escape you deem feasible,” he ordered. “Once you’re free, point it until it grows warm, and follow in that direction until you find me.”

  He stood. “Remember the good times,” he said. “Remember what it was like, knowing we were the center of the world, and everyone listened to us? Obeyed us? Obeyed us gladly, for we were the shining light of the universe, tearing away the dull darkness of the past. Now it’s time to return to those days. You and me, the way it was, the way it shall be.

  “Welcome back, Damastes,” he said softly. “Welcome back, my friend.”

  And I was alone, looking at the far wall of my chamber.

  • • •

  I stared long at the amulet, worked in strange figures not of this world’s geometry, and carved with what I guessed were letters in an equally strange language.

  So the Emperor Tenedos assumed I would return to his side, while the Grand Council dallied and I stalled them.

  Slowly the thought came — I didn’t want either of them, nor did I want to be a warrior any longer. Maybe after some time had passed I’d be willing to return to my calling, but not now. Not in this confusion.

  “Remember the good times,” the emperor had said. But I couldn’t. I remembered battlefields strewn with bodies, cities aflame, demons rending warriors whose bravery was nothing against their fangs and talons. I remembered Amiel Kalvedon, dying with an arrow wound in her side, dying full of hope for the morrow, dying carrying my child. I remember Alegria, wanting to make love in the frozen nightmare of the road north of Jarrah, then dying quietly, a trickle of blood runneling from her lips.

  No, not good times, but gore-drenched nightmares.

  All I wanted was to escape to somewhere completely peaceful, where no one would bother me and I would raise a hand against no one. I thought wistfully of the quiet, peaceful jungles of Cimabue, where I’d been but seldom since childhood, and now wished I’d never left.

  Of course there was no way I would ever see them again, so I tried to put the thought from me.

  At least, I consoled myself, there was a possibility I could escape the Council’s vengeance if I told them no. Tenedos’s magic would help. Then I’d only have to get away from the revenge of the world’s most powerful wizard.

  And did I really believe that Tenedos, the wizard who never forgot nor forgave an enemy, except so long as he needed him, would truly forget that blow I struck before Cambiaso? Did I believe if I helped him regain the throne, he wouldn’t turn on me and wreak the most ghastly revenge for what I’d done at Cambiaso that a devils-haunted mind could devise?

  Gloom fell, and I forced it away by going back to my dreams of Cimabue, the embracing jungle, gentle rain falling, a pool with mossy rocks growing out of it, being a boy curled under a leaf twice his size, a tiny fire glowing und
er my pot of rice and the fruit I’d gathered. I remembered the bark of a sambur, the cough of a distant tiger, and contentment in the moment, not fearing the morrow but looking forward to its promise.

  I found my lips moving in a prayer, a prayer to small gods, to Vachan, the monkey god of Cimabue, and to Tanis, my family’s private godling.

  I must’ve slept, for the next thing I remember is Dubats calling to me and bright sunlight blazing in my windows. I had visitors.

  “Send him … or her up,” I called, feeling unwarrantedly cheerful.

  My callers were Guardian of the Peace Herne and his aide, a bemuscled, scar-faced hearty named Salop.

  I didn’t know if the Councilors knew Herne loathed me for many reasons, the most recent my discovery of carriages of his private luxuries when we were fleeing Jarrah, while his soldiers were lucky if they had a frozen chunk of long-dead horsemeat every two days as they stumbled barefoot through the snow. I’d ordered these delicacies given out to the troops and told Herne if he disobeyed my order I’d have him stripped of his command and reduced to the ranks — a death sentence.

  Both men were armed with sword and dagger and wore the gray-red of the Guardians, except properly tarted up with gold filigree here and there, as befitted men for whom position meant everything and honor nothing. Herne had a package which he put on a table.

  “My man Catalca informed me you’d been brought to Nicias,” Herne said coldly. “Our Grand Councilors are the fools they’ve always been to think they could use my Guardians and I wouldn’t find out about it.”

  “I had no idea you weren’t privy to their decision,” I said.

  “Don’t expect me to be a fool,” Herne said. “I knew they’d already discussed bringing you back and ordering the lapdog to lunge at his former master.”

  “One whose lips are firmly wrapped around a foreign king’s cock has little reason to call another a lapdog,” I snapped back.

  Salop growled, started forward. Herne held out his hand.

  “No,” he said. “That isn’t our way.”

  Salop grunted, stepped to the side, glaring.

  “Yes,” Herne went on, “not only bring you back, but let you steal my glory, let you take over my Guardians. Those arrogant shits!”

  “Perhaps they sensed you couldn’t lead a horse out of a burning building,” I said, not giving a damn what Herne thought, able for the first time to kick back at those who’d put the boot into me for such a long time. “Not that I’m agreeing with your lunatic assumption that the Council plans to relieve you.”

  “And you will be able to destroy the emperor?” Herne said. He snorted. “The only thing that will bring that bastard down is for King Bairan to return and finish the task he left half-completed.”

  “Spoken like a true Numantian,” I said sarcastically. “And then what? Do you think after he destroys Tenedos he’ll obediently bounce back into Maisir as he did the last time, like a child’s toy on a rubber string?”

  “Of course not,” Herne snapped. “This time, let him incorporate Numantia into his own realm, as he should’ve done before. I believe, Cimabuan, in the inexorable judgment of the gods. We were tried by Irisu and found wanting, and Bairan should’ve realized that and taken the gift so generously presented.”

  I stared at Herne in total loathing.

  “I thought I’d enjoy baiting you,” I said. “But there’s no pleasure in badgering slime-worms. Go on. Get out. Even a prisoner is entitled to have some standards.”

  Herne rose. “No,” he said quietly, his rage vanished. “For there are matters to be dealt with.”

  I had an instant to notice the emphasis, realize it was a signal, when Salop jumped me, pinning my arms at my waist with his strength. Bigger, stronger, and younger than I was, he held me immobilized.

  “A pity,” Herne said, “you attacked me when I came on a friendly visit to discuss how we could mutually help the Council. Scopas and Barthou won’t believe the story, but they won’t have any choice, and the masses will eat anything we tell them to.

  “We should have killed you after Cambiaso,” he said, drawing his sword. For some reason, I had all the time in the world to consider its elaborately worked blade, its ivory grip, its golden, gem-encrusted guard, hilt, and pommel. With his free hand, he took the bundle from the table, opened it, and a shortsword clattered onto the floor.

  “That,” he said, “is what you attacked me with. I barely saved myself, and only because of my aide Shamb Salop’s quick wits. I’ll have to punish your warders most severely for allowing one of your accomplices to smuggle in the sword.

  “I wish I could draw out your doom, former First Tribune, for your arrogance and how you shamed me in front of lesser beings,” he said. “But my story must have some credibility, and someone missing eyes, nose, and cock might increase the difficulty of my explanation.”

  He drew his sword back, and I smashed my head back into Salop’s face. The cartilage of his nose crunched, and his teeth snapped. The man screeched, loosened his hold, and I sent my elbow back into his ribs, hearing them crack, sidestepping as Herne struck.

  His lunge went home, keen blade driving into Salop’s guts. The man gasped agony, grabbed the blade, eyes wide in disbelief, then fell, almost tearing the weapon from Herne’s grasp.

  I had no time to grab Salop’s still-sheathed sword, nor to reach my own dagger. Herne’s teeth were bared in a silent snarl.

  “So you managed to kill my finest soldier,” he hissed. “That shall make the story better.”

  He closed in in the careful steps of a skilled swordsman, and I was doomed.

  I’d known soldiers who were known for battle rage, an uncaring frenzy that took them so they cared only about destroying their enemies, even if it came at the cost of their own life. In the final frenzy at Cambiaso I’d known that blood fever as well, in my complete despair, seeing my entire world shattered around me.

  Now it came again, after the long months of confinement, fear, and hopelessness, a target I hated in front of me, a man who’d sold everything he should have held dear, from pride to honor to country, and I laughed in pure joy. Everything was easy, everything was mine.

  Herne’s expression of glee changed to fear, and he flailed his blade back and forth, forgetting his swordsman’s training of calmness, direction, trying to create a steel web between us.

  I had time, all the time in the world, stepped away from his slash, and struck hard with the back of my fist at his blade, which hung motionless before me.

  The steel snapped in three parts, and they pinwheeled slowly up and around us, and Herne goggled at the stub of his sword.

  He dropped it, fumbled for his dagger, but he was too late, far too late, and I had him by the throat, fingers digging into the sides of his neck, feeling the thrum of blood, fingers like the seizing talons of the eagle, and his face went red, his mouth opened and his tongue bulged and I was holding him, a man not much smaller than I, clear of the ground, shaking him like a trapped bear shakes a hound.

  I felt a snap, and Herne’s head lolled, and I smelt shit as his dead body voided. I dropped the limp corpse, stepped back.

  The red thunder against my temples died, and I stared at the bodies of two men, one the highest-ranking soldier of Numantia.

  Now I was indeed for it.

  THREE

  ESCAPE

  I’d rather be cut down like a running boar than make a sambur’s last noble stand. I stripped off Salop’s uniform, tried to ignore the wet, dark stain around its middle as I pulled it on.

  I checked both men’s pouches, cursed when I found Herne’s empty, but Salop’s was full of gold and silver. The Guardian of the Peace must’ve been one of those pretenders who felt it’s an underling’s job to pay … or perhaps he was merely an inveterate freeloader.

  I took my own coins, the dagger Perak had given me, and tucked that innocently deadly iron pig into a pocket.

  I fastened Salop’s weapons belt on, tore braid from Herne’s uni
form and tied Salop’s boots together and strung them around my neck, and was ready to go. Then I caught myself and took Herne’s gem-crusted dagger and, as a second thought, the stub of his sword, tucking them inside my tunic.

  The last bit of corpse robbing was Herne’s sword belt, which I stripped of its sheaths and looped around my neck. I considered the three possible escape routes, decided on the one I knew to be easiest and most likely to get me killed.

  From the sun’s position, I wouldn’t have more than half an hour to wait, hoping Dubats wouldn’t come to see if his commander needed anything. But Herne must’ve given orders to be left strictly alone, which made sense, not particularly wanting anyone to wander in while he was in the middle of murder.

  Bugles sounded, marking retreat, when the guards would assemble in the inner keep, and the prison commander would deal with announcements, punishments, rewards, assign details, the night’s duties would be told off, the watch would be inspected and changed, and the rest of the garrison would be dismissed to the dining rooms in the upper part of the keep. While they kept busy with the details of my captivity, I proceeded to begin ending it.

  I crawled backward out of the window and started down the tower’s face. The rock was rough-cut, with large cracks between each heavy boulder, and I picked my way down it, feeling fingers and toes bruise but paying no mind. A Man of the Hills like Yonge would have run up and down this craggy face one-handed, blind drunk, fondling a kidnapped damsel with the other hand and probably yodeling the Kaiti national anthem to boot.

  I contented myself with not falling, which was one of the two worries I had. The other, more obvious, was that someone would look up at the tower, see this gray-clad fool about to fall, and sound the alarm. At least the sun was lowering, and I had the occasional shadow to hide me. I glanced down once and saw a boy on the Latane River’s banks, gaping up. I prayed he was a nasty little urchin who was hoping to see me splatter on the stones below, rather than a good Irisu-blessed soul who’d trot to the guard post in front of the tower and ask what was going on up above.