War of Princes | Chapter Twelve | "Moralann Will Be Bathed in Fire"

Connal has finally decided to leave Gallodel, when Moreana the sorceress arrives in Orthen’s court with a word of warning.

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CONNAL SAT IN Orthen’s hall, watching the king hold court. Today he would tell Orthen. Today he would leave for home.

It had been far too long already—nearly a month since he had entered Gallodel, bursting with righteous fury. The weeks that followed had seen the simple clarity of that anger fade, as his mind clouded with intrigue and mysticism. It was time to go. This would be the last he watched the king dispensing justice in his hall.

The supplicants were of the usual sort. A middle-aged knight of low rank whose lands had been encroached upon by the late Earl of Blackstone, a mighty bloodquencher, who fell with Branok at Aderyndol. A fisherman’s widow from one of Gallodel’s poorer districts facing eviction from a ruthless landlord. And a young peasant of Esting, outlawed years ago for poaching royal quail, driven desperate by his hunger.

The young king dealt with them swiftly, returning land to the knight, settling the widow’s debt, and pardoning the young poacher. One and all they thanked him, heaping praise on Orthen the Merciful.

Then came a pause to the procession, unusual at this hour, and those gathered began to stir.

Joffrey the herald entered, the same who had announced Connal’s entrance weeks ago. He strode towards them and bowed before the king, speaking in a low voice, as if he did not want to be overheard.

“There is a visitor, your highness, waiting to speak to you in the hall.”

“Well, what are you waiting for?” demanded Orthen. “Bring him in.”

“But my liege,” the herald’s face was pale. “It is Moreana.”

The king’s eyes widened and he bowed his head, saying nothing for a few moments. Then he leaned forward. “Show her in.”

As the doors opened, the hall fell silent. The woman who entered was like none Connal had ever seen. She was tall and striking; long black hair fell uncovered and unfastened down her back. Her face, lean and angular, as if chiseled from marble, demanded his attention. Beauty seemed too delicate a word for her, yet the stern face that swept the room with dark, piercing eyes was not unbeautiful. She wore a simple robe of smoky grey edged with an intricate knot of golden thread, which hung loosely from her shoulders, adorned only by a simple girdle of tawny rope. In her hand she carried a long smooth staff, carved from the heart of an ibar tree, a pale and ghostly wood that, with each tap along the tiled floor, sent shimmering echoes throughout the hall.

Connal tore his gaze from her to look about him, where it seemed the eyes of every man and woman were riveted upon her. He leaned over to his right, whispering in Kierran’s ear, “Who in Drog’s name is this?”

Kierran’s eyes remained fixed upon her as he spoke. “A sorceress, it would seem.”

That much was obvious. Connal had lived his life among the island conjurers and knew them by their robes and staves. Over a month ago, he had battled the sorcerers of Halgar’s crew. And, despite the priests’ complaints, Craedon had kept a handful of seers on the nearby islands, seeking their auspices before major decisions. But this woman who stood before them seemed a different sort altogether.

“Moreana,” the king said at last, breaking the spell of silence. “What brings you to my court?” His face was hard and grim, the spark of merriment gone from his eyes.

“King Orthen.” Holding him with her stern gaze, she neither bowed nor lowered her eyes in deference. “You have no joy at my coming, I know. Yet from my master you took much counsel.”

Orthen frowned, the furrows of his brow deepening. “That was a long time ago.”

“Not so long,” she said. “Yet I do not blame your misgivings. I have let you be these several months, keeping from Eburneum as Adhlac required of me. Yet there are happenings now that have compelled me to come to you despite his wishes.”

“What do you speak of?”

“Destruction, my king. Greater than any Branok wrought before you, greater than that begat before the walls of Gallodel. You won a battle against Daras, it is true, but your brother is not defeated. Do you know where he is now?”

Orthen nodded. “He is in the west. My scouts tracked him as far as the River Arveon.”

“And he is well entrenched in Logren now. You should have slain him when you had the chance.”

“I have no wish to hunt my brother like a wounded beast! We have fought and he has lost. Let that be enough. Let him keep some dignity and carve for himself a kingdom there. Perhaps in time we will be reconciled.”

“The time for reconciliation is long past.” Moreana punctuated her statement by striking her staff against the floor, the clack reverberating all about them. “As is the time for half measures. You have usurped your brother’s throne, have taken from him both pride and title, and have broken with the traditions of your father. Can you really be so foolish as to think Daras will forgive you? If ever he were to, it would have been before he raised the barons against you. Now that you have added the humiliation of defeat to the insult of taking the crown, he will never relent.”

Orthen bowed his head, and again Connal saw him as a man in pain, not an impudent youth nor a crazed ascetic, but a grieving son, a wounded brother, struggling under the burden of family pain and social obligation.

“Is this what you came for?” the king murmured. “To tell me how I have wronged my brother and disgraced my family name?”

“No.” For the first time, Moreana’s eyes betrayed a glimmer of softness. “I have come to complete what Adhlac began before he fled into obscurity. I have come to guide you. You are brave but you are young, and the forces which rise against you are old beyond reckoning. Aged as the land on which we stand.”

“What forces? I have crushed Daras’s league of barons. They follow him no longer. And Norick still lies trapped in Slephold.”

“I speak not of barons but of dragons, my king. Of the eldest guardians of Moralann, from which the first men learned to tame and cultivate the land. The source of the wyrmcrafter’s power.”

“Dragons?” Orthen’s voice rose in disbelief. “What do dragons have to do with Daras?”

Moreana sighed. “Daras has fled into the wilderness of Logren, a ‘wounded beast’ as you said, and, in his desperation, he seeks new allies. For now the lords of Eburneum, ever mindful of strength and power, seeing he is wrapped in failure, have withdrawn from his cause. They watch from the sidelines to see what manner of king you will be. The march lords still follow him, but their support is not enough to take the throne. And so, it is not with men that he shall swell his army but with monsters, the accursed creatures that haunt the darkest depths of Logren.”

“Wodwos,” Orthen said, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Perhaps, but the wildmen are loath to form allegiances with our kind. He will raise up worse than they, worse even than the Uthag, their mighty cousins who once made their dwelling upon the rocky heights of Mynythang. For Daras has bound himself to a powerful wyrmcrafter: Nivan, the Third Acolyte.”

“Your sister?”

“Yes, my sister. A necromancer of great skill. She joins herself to Daras’s cause, as does another of the Athwyr: the stormkindler Caelran. And even now, to the farthest west of Logren, she leads Daras, beyond the march forts, away from Ffairdin and Llanwel and Turòlas. It is through the peaks of Mynythang, along a long-forgotten path that they will go, until they reach the abandoned city of Marbhglyn. And deep within the mountains, beyond the Telian baths and villas, an antique city lies, one buried beneath the earth by heaven’s wrath. Cêldinas, doomed by God to undying pain, sealed by Athewain’s might. There are legions there of untold number, the Scalthir, restlessly pacing their shadowed prison, slavering for mortal blood.”

Connal shuddered and saw Orthen pale.

“Nivan plans to free these creatures?”

“Only as a last resort. Even she fears the erratic cruelty of Rhiun, king of Cêldinas, lord of the Scalthir. She will begin with dragons. For the mighty beasts went to rest among the Telian tombs, world-weary and wounded. She will raise them to be vanguards of Daras’s host. He promises a mount for each of his Talons; every one shall ride a wyrmsteed into battle.”

The room was silent as she spoke and silent when she stopped. It was as if every person held their breath, weighing her dark and mysterious words, strewn with the mention of awful names, of dark powers and those who strove to master them.

Orthen rose slowly from his throne and rounded the table. Clasping his hands behind his back, he paced in silence before the dais. At last, he stopped and fixed his gaze on Moreana. “But if the dragons serve Daras,” he said, “how are we to defeat him? How will mere swords and arrows fend off such an army?” He spoke slowly, as if trying to process the enormity of this information.

“The dragons will not serve him.” Moreana stepped closer to him. They were of the same height, though she seemed taller. “Perhaps a younger wyrm might submit for a time, but the elder Drakau will not be bound to any mortal man. They have each their private feuds and will no doubt visit destruction on any who now dwell on their ancestral land. It will mean death and desolation for all of Moralann. Yet all hope is not lost, not if we act now. For it will take time to raise them, and Nivan must throw all her strength into the task, rousing them one by one from deathly slumber. You must strike now, my king, while there is still time. With every passing day, Daras’s strength grows. Soon, all of Moralann will be bathed in fire.”

At this, a tremble ran through Connal’s limbs. He reached for his goblet, then set it down as he saw the shaking of his hand.

Moreana seemed to sense it, for she turned suddenly, held him with her steely eyes. “Yes, Lord Connal,” she said in his own tongue, “Cregeirann too will be razed by wyrmfire.”

An angry murmur arose among the Ellani: Fionn, Veruc, and the others. Connal sat and watched her, stunned.

“Lies and treachery,” Kierran grumbled. “The sole virtues of this accursed land.”

“You think I lie, Lord Kierran?” she asked, turning on him. With long, deliberate strides she came to stand before their table. Moreana spoke still in the island tongue, and many of the Eburneans in the hall looked about anxiously, unable to follow her meaning. “You think the waking of the Drakau no threat to you? Then let me ask you if the name Gabhail holds any meaning?”

“Gabhail,” Connal answered, “The Lord of Avarice.” It was a name every child of Cregeirann knew, a name engraved upon the hearts of his people. He knew that long ago, when the Ellani were but a migrant people, the Iron Rock was Gabhail’s. After defeating the mighty serpent, Wealan founded the city of Dumóir, and raised Rigtalla’s lofty beams.

“The wounded Gabhail fled south,” Moreana said. “And does your lore say where he went to rest?”

Connal shook his head. But by now, he could see her point. “To Marbhglyn?”

“You are cleverer than you appear, Beastmaster,” the sorceress said, betraying the hint of a smile. “And when Nivan wakes him, as she surely will, where do you think the old dragon will go? What feud has lain dormant in his heart, moldering in the grave for centuries?”

Connal was silent and Kierran too.

Moreana turned from them, stepping back towards the center of the hall. “And Cregeirann shall not burn alone,” she said in her grim, even voice, now in the common tongue of Eburneum. She scanned the room, binding every lord and lady. “Every city in Eburneum and Logren will fall beneath the dragons’ shadow. Again I say, you must act now, while the time to act presents itself. A week’s delay might see Daras’s power grow unstoppable.”

Again a heavy silence reigned. Orthen had resumed his seat, and, leaning against the back of his throne, he clasped his hands as if in prayer, bowing his head low. In that stillness, Connal could hear his breathing, heavy like a man in pain.

At last Orthen spoke, “Alas that it should come to this. My own brother.”

“You are a king,” Moreana said. “You cannot afford the luxury of sentiment. For your subjects, for the people you would rule, you must destroy him. There can be no mercy now.”

Orthen sighed, hunched forward in his throne. And in those few moments, it seemed to Connal as if the young man aged several years. He raised his eyes to Moreana’s. “And there will be none. The crown weighs heavily upon my brow, yet I am unable to tear it from me.” He rubbed at his naked chin. “And you, Moreana, why have you come to me with this news? Surely, I am no friend to your kind. Why betray your sister to aid me?”

“I do not lightly turn against her.” Moreana’s voice grew quiet and her eyes fell to the floor. “Yet I have seen too much of this world’s misery, the violence and desolation wrought by wyrmcraft. Adhlac saw it too, and it drove him mad, so slick with blood already were his hands. Nivan and I both heard our master’s final words. And now we both strive to honor them. Yet she follows one path and I another. Thus fortune goes. I cannot throw my lot in with Nivan and her Dragon Prince. Like you, I too must raise a hand against my own flesh.”

“My liege.” The Aonemb Goran came to stand beside his king. He placed a possessive hand on Orthen’s shoulder. “You cannot join with this heretic. Remember your mission. The Purification of Moralann. Leave Daras to his own devices. Let Aonel deal with him as he sees fit.”

“Careful, priest.” Moreana turned her grave countenance upon Goran. “Best not to make an enemy of an ally.”

“Sire,” the Aonemb persisted, glaring contemptuously at Moreana. “I warn you. Pay the witch no heed. She can bring nothing but doom upon us.”

Orthen brushed away Goran’s hand. “You have spoken, Goran.” He cast his eyes over his assembled lords. “Now hear my word. What chance do I have of purifying this land while my brother and his sorcerers raise up the very symbols of evil to our west? Moreana has come to us with warning. We are of the same purpose. I see that this union must be. It was Adhlac himself who set me on this path; let it be Adhlac’s acolyte that helps me see it through. We will make haste to leave Gallodel.”

He clapped his hands and Joffrey jumped to attention. “Gather the heralds. Proclaim it in the city and throughout every fief: we leave at the first thawing of snow in six months’ time. Let every vassal, every knight and yeoman, make ready for war!”

“In but two months,” Moreana interjected, “Nivan will have raised a dragon. In six months, she will raise yet more. You do not have till spring, my king.”

“But what can we do?” Orthen threw his hands into the air. “The levies have returned to their villages. And I dare not strip the city of its garrison.”

“Take what men you can,” she said. “Raise the levies and give orders to follow you into Logren. But do not wait for them.”

“It takes only a few days to sail to Marbhglyn,” said the king.

“No. You must not go by water. Caelran watches the seas, and from his wild gales your ships will find no escape. It is by land you must go, over the Arveon and through the fortress of Bryngoch.”

At this, Sir Baldren rose from his seat at Orthen’s left. “But Bryngoch is a stronghold without peer. It was built to stand against the fiercest assault and the longest siege. It might take years to breach it.”

“Even so,” Moreana countered. “That is your only path. You must find a way to take it.”

Orthen sighed. When he spoke, his voice was bitter. “It seems I have no choice then. Sir Baldren, how many men do we have at our disposal?”

“Not many, sire.” The knight sounded wary. “Within these walls are seventy knights and a thousand men-at-arms. And barons, hostile to your rule, surround us still.”

“Choose fifty knights to follow us. And three hundred archers. The rest shall remain in defense of our walls.”

“My liege.” Baldren rose from his chair, bowed, and strode from the hall.

“Chancellor Goran,” Orthen said, turning to the Aonemb. “Send word to my Earls Winock, Lircaster, and Eorland. They must follow us with whatever retainers they can quickly muster. There is no time for a full levy.”

Goran grimaced, his hands with their jeweled fingers clasped together, knuckles white. He looked as if he would protest further, then at last he bowed. “It shall be done, my king.” Casting one last malevolent glare at Moreana, he swept from the hall.

By now, the Ellani had risen from their seats, forming a tight knot at the end of the table. “Bloody madness,” Kierran murmured. “All of it. The sooner we’ve left this land the better.”

Connal nodded, but within him two opposing forces struggled: the draw to stay with Orthen and the pull of home. “And yet,” he said, “I am troubled by all this. Didn’t you hear what Moreana said?”

“The sorceress? Gaillag take her and her lies! Surely, you do not believe her?”

“I do not believe she lies,” Connal said.

Kierran sighed. “I feared all this time with Orthen would only cloud your judgement. We must return before the Suid elects a new king without us. Or what if Ganwae returns?”

Again Connal nodded. Yet he was not so sure. If Gabhail should rise again, then it would not matter what king sat on Cregeirann’s throne. But he could delay their return no longer. His mother’s warning lay always below the surface of his consciousness, stoking his fear.

“Come, Connal,” Fionn urged. “We’ve done all we came to do and more.”

“Aye,” Connal answered. He saw Orthen leaning against his high seat, his head bent, conferring with a small huddle of knights. Moreana stood as before, in the center of the hall, watching the splintered conversations with the stillness of a pillar.

As Connal headed for the door, the king lifted his head and strode towards him. Orthen’s face was drawn and haggard, laden with stress. “Ah, Lord Connal. I’m afraid I must prove an uncivil host after all. We leave for war.” He leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “Have you given thought to my offer? I could surely use your help with this campaign.”

“I have.” Connal’s stomach churned. “But I cannot accept it now. I must return. Perhaps when we are both more secure in our power.”

“Perhaps.” Orthen’s countenance clouded. “Though fortune is ever changing. There may not be another time.”

“Aye.” He felt a sharp pang of guilt.

“Farewell, Lord Connal.” Orthen sighed and stretched out his hand. “May Aonel bless and keep you on your life’s road, wherever it takes you.”

Connal clasped his hand. “Farewell, Orthen. Urient be with you.” He turned away, feeling sorrow for the foreign king who had become his friend. And there was something more, something he could not quite express. It was as if he turned his back on destiny.

Connal followed his shipmates from the hall. As they crossed the world’s-map floor, he passed by Moreana. She stared at him with a face like the carved marble of Orthen’s statues.

“Safe journey, Lord Connal,” she said. “We will meet again.”

Connal shuddered, averting his gaze as he hurried from the hall. The sea awaited them. It would bear them to his people, soon to crown him king.

END OF PART ONE

This concludes Part One of War of Princes! There will be an intermission for the next several weeks while I prepare Part Two for serialization.

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