Forge of Darkness (The Kharkanas Trilogy 1)

‘The king,’ Galdan gasped, ‘is always free with his bounty.’

One arm, only the one. Where is the other one? She took it — no, she didn’t. But she can give it back. She can do that.

There is danger. Someone is screaming, here in my head. There is danger. She’s in danger.

The Legion is awake. The Legion is on the rise.

Lord Draconus. She’s in danger.

He would leave his kingdom for a time. The realm would thrive without him. Wealth in unending repast. It was time to set out in search of more wine.

Galdan staggered out from the alley, into the street. He paused, reeling as the bright sunlight assailed him. Few people in sight; and those he saw moved quickly, fearfully, with all the furtiveness of hunted vermin. Soldiers filled the tavern and the fine inn down the street. They occupied houses that had been abandoned in the wake of the war. The community pasture was crowded with horses and the air stank of their shit. Smoke rose from unchecked fires at the town’s rubbish heap in the old Denier temple — the one that had been torn down years ago when the monastery went up — out at the western edge where there had once been a grove of old trees. Wood from that grove now held up the ceiling of the fine inn.

He heard laughter from the front steps of the tavern as he stumbled across the street.

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‘The king,’ Galdan gasped, ‘is always free with his bounty.’

One arm, only the one. Where is the other one? She took it — no, she didn’t. But she can give it back. She can do that.

There is danger. Someone is screaming, here in my head. There is danger. She’s in danger.

The Legion is awake. The Legion is on the rise.

Lord Draconus. She’s in danger.

He would leave his kingdom for a time. The realm would thrive without him. Wealth in unending repast. It was time to set out in search of more wine.

Galdan staggered out from the alley, into the street. He paused, reeling as the bright sunlight assailed him. Few people in sight; and those he saw moved quickly, fearfully, with all the furtiveness of hunted vermin. Soldiers filled the tavern and the fine inn down the street. They occupied houses that had been abandoned in the wake of the war. The community pasture was crowded with horses and the air stank of their shit. Smoke rose from unchecked fires at the town’s rubbish heap in the old Denier temple — the one that had been torn down years ago when the monastery went up — out at the western edge where there had once been a grove of old trees. Wood from that grove now held up the ceiling of the fine inn.

He heard laughter from the front steps of the tavern as he stumbled across the street.

The old lady’s bribe had failed. There was no more wine. The deal was finished with. Galdan was finished with it. This is what came when things emptied out.

He wanted nothing to do with horses. But we knew that. He would have to walk. He needed to find her. He needed to save her. Behold, the one-armed king. We go to find our queen. The one hand that reached for wealth now reaches for love.

Galdan knew that the rats would bless him, if they could.

Wreneck wandered up on the high hill overlooking Abara Delack. His ma had told him about the soldiers and this reminded him of the last time he had seen an armed man, the one who’d come for Orfantal’s mother. But that man had been a Houseblade, in the service of a lord. Soldiers were different. They served something else, something vast and maybe even faceless. But his ma had said that these ones who now stayed in the village were here to start trouble.

Lady Nerys Drukorlat was virtually alone in that big house. She had taken to hatred for even the sight of Wreneck, and the night before last she had beaten on his back with a cane. He wasn’t sure what he’d done to deserve it, but she’d said terrible things about him, things that weren’t even true. Although maybe they were and he just didn’t know it yet.

With the last horse gone, Wreneck had no work. He had already collected up the last of the dried dung from the pastures, to stock up on fuel, but there wasn’t nearly enough to last the winter. Once the soldiers were gone, she’d said, his laziness would end and he would have to go down and collect in the community fields, but he would have to do that at night, so no one saw. ‘ House Drukorlas shall not be poor in their eyes. Do you understand me, you brainless oaf? Spare me, dear Abyss! Look at those dull eyes — Orfantal had more wits in one finger than you have. You’ll collect in the fields at night.’ He had nodded to show that he understood, thankful for the promise that he’d still be one of the household staff, even if she never let him into the house.

But the soldiers hadn’t left yet, leaving him nothing to do, and that frightened him. She might see how lazy he was and forget what she’d said. He needed to get to those fields, somehow. Though it was probably already too late. The dung wouldn’t even be cured by the time the rains and snows came, and they had nowhere dry to store it except for one blockhouse and that was full of drying brush and sheaves of bark.

He hadn’t eaten yet today. He scanned the high grasses, switch in hand. He’d taken to hunting jump-mice, and if he caught a few he would make a small fire from twigs and grasses, roast the fur off them and finally put something in his aching belly.

Distant motion caught his eye and he looked up to see a half-dozen soldiers coming out from the village, up on the keep road. They were riding at a slow canter, unevenly. As he watched, he saw one loosen the sword in the scabbard at her side. The effort almost toppled her from the saddle and the others laughed upon seeing that, the sound drifting up to where Wreneck stood.

The Lady didn’t like visitors. There was nothing to feed them.

If he ran, he might reach the house in time, to at least warn her. Switch still in one hand, he set off at a lumbering run. He had been clumsy all his life, not like Orfantal, who was like a jackrabbit under the shadow of an owl or a hawk. His knees sometimes knocked together when he ran and that was painful, and the work shoes he had been given were too big, driving his toes hard forward with each stride, and at any moment one of them might fly off.