Richard Baker: Swordmage

“I’ll ask her when I see her, then.”

Grigor nodded. “Will you be staying long?”

“I don’t know.” Geran hadn’t intended to, but standing in the old castle, listening to the cold hard wind, and breathing in the sights and sounds and smells of home, he found that old memories were pressing close around him. Strange how he had never let his footsteps turn toward Hulburg in the long months since that last day in Myth Drannor. What was I avoiding? he wondered. Perhaps he had allowed himself to become bewitched in Myth Drannor, as Hamil thought, but that was over. He had lost that long waking dream that was his life for four years in the city of the elves, ending it in one dark moment he still did not understand. His heart longed for autumn in Myth Drannor, for Alliere’s musical laughter, but those things were not for him any longer. Geran closed his eyes to drive the image of her face from his mind, castigating himself in silence. It did his heart no good to dwell on her, but he seemed determined to anyway.

He must have frowned at himself. Grigor took his expression for disapproval and raised his hand. “I only meant that you’re welcome to stay as long as you like,” the old lord said. “There is always room for you here, Geran.”

“Forgive me, it’s been a long journey,” Geran answered. He mustered a small smile for his uncle. “I have no business in Tantras that can’t manage itself for a tenday or so. As long as I’m here, I might as well reacquaint myself with my kin.”

“Good,” said Grigor. “But Geran, please, be careful. The harmach’s writ doesn’t run so far as it used to in Hulburg. There are people in town who owe the Hulmasters no allegiance at all, much more so than when you were growing up. It was no accident when Isolmar was killed in that tavern quarrel, and I suspect that it was no accident that Jarad died alone out in the Highfells. When you set foot outside of Griffonwatch’s walls, you must watch your back.”

Hamil sketched a small bow. “That’s why I’m here, Lord Grigor,” he observed. “I have no use for a dead partner, so it’s in my interest to keep an eye on him. Why else would I venture so far from civilization?”

Grigor smiled, but his tone was serious. “If you are a friend of the Hulmasters, Master Alderheart, you may need to watch your own back as well.” He looked back up to Geran and indicated the study door. “Now, on to happier matters. Unless I am sorely mistaken, you have two young cousins who will be quite anxious to meet you. I expect they’re in the great room, resisting their mother’s efforts to put them to bed.”

The old lord took a mantle from a hook by the door, pulled it around his shoulders, and with the help of his short walking stick made his way to the covered walkway and court outside. Geran and Hamil followed. The wind sighed and hissed among the eaves of the old castle’s buildings, and the lanterns illuminating the way rocked in the breeze. Small yellow pools of light swayed and spun lazily beneath the wooden shakes.

“I’ve been meaning to have this enclosed,” Grigor remarked. “It’s a cold walk on a winter night.”

Then he led them into the small tower fronting the high court-a simple square, low building of somewhat sturdier construction than the rest of the castle’s upperworks. But as the harmach reached for the door, it opened from the inside, and a dark-eyed man with a pointed, black goatee and a crimson cape emerged, two armsmen at his shoulders.

“Ah, good evening, Uncle,” the dark-eyed man said with a small nod. “I was just-” Then his eyes fell on Geran and widened for an instant. He smiled, slowly and deliberately, and let out a small snort. “Well, I’ll be damned. Look what the wind’s blown up against our doorstep. Cousin Geran, you are the last thing I expected to see when I opened this door!”

“Sergen,” Geran replied. “You look well.” His stepcousin-if there was such a thing, he wondered-was in truth dressed quite well, with a red, gold-embroidered doublet, tall black boots of fine leather, and a gold-hilted rapier at his belt. In fact he looked more like a merchant prince of Sembia or the Vast than a son of northerly Hulburg. Geran remembered Sergen as a sullen, brooding young man, quick to find fault and take offense. But the man before him stood sharp-eyed and alert, brimming with self-confidence. “Ah, this is Hamil Alderheart, my friend and business partner. Hamil, this is my cousin Sergen Hulmaster.”

The halfling inclined his head. “I’m pleased to meet you, sir.”

“Likewise,” Sergen replied, but his eyes quickly returned to Geran’s. He stroked his pointed beard, and his brow furrowed. “I haven’t seen you in years, Geran. So where have you been keeping yourself?”

“Tantras, mostly. Hamil and I are proprietors of the Red Sail Coster, dealing in the trade between Turmish and the Vast-timber, silverwork, wool, linen.”

“Ah, of course. I’ve heard of it. But… why did I think that you were staying in Myth Drannor?”

Geran frowned. The question seemed innocuous, but he sensed a hidden stiletto in Sergen’s voice. “I lived there for four years, but as it happened I left about a year ago.”

Sergen’s eyes widened. “Ah, that’s right! I remember hearing something about that-a duel of some kind, love spurned, a rival suitor maimed, some sordid tale ending in your exile from the elf kingdom. Tell me, Geran, is any of that true?”

Geran stood in silence a long moment before he answered, “All of it.”

Sardonic humor danced in Sergen’s dark eyes. “Indeed! I would not have believed it if you hadn’t said so.” The rakish noble smiled to himself and reached out to clap a comradely hand on Geran’s shoulder. “Well, I’m eager to hear your side of the story, Cousin. I am certain there were extenuating circumstances. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a late dinner engagement this evening, and I must be going. Geran, you must promise me that you won’t leave town without a good long visit.” Sergen nodded to Harmach Grigor before he swept away across the bailey, his bodyguards in tow.

Grigor watched him leave. “A capable man, your cousin Sergen,” he mused aloud. “Clever and ambitious. He has grand designs for Hulburg. If only half of what he means to attempt works out, we will be well on our way to becoming a great city again. But he has a cruel turn to his heart, I fear.”

The dreams of a dragon, Hamil said silently. We know his type well, don’t we? Tantras, Calaunt, and Procampur are full of such men.

But Hulburg isn’t, Geran thought. Or at least, it never used to be.

The harmach shook himself and motioned to the door. “No reason to stand here in the cold,” the old man said. “Come, Geran, you must see your young cousins Natali and Kirr. They’ve heard quite a few stories about the Hulmaster who’s off seeing the wide world. You are something of a marvel to them, even if you don’t know it.”

The swordmage pulled his gaze away from his cousin’s back. He had a feeling that he would see more of Sergen soon enough, whether he wanted to or not. Instead, he summoned a wry smile for his uncle. “I’m no marvel, but I suppose I have seen some marvelous things in my travels,” he said. “I’ll try not to disappoint them.”

12 Ches, the Year of the Ageless One

Two hours before sunset, the orc-hold began to stir. Warriors rose from their pallets, stretching and yawning, heavy canines gleaming yellow in the dim light. Females stoked the cookfires, fed the livestock, and began their long round of drudgery and toil. The young scurried about underfoot, fetching water and firewood, emptying chamberpots, and tending to the scraggly goats, sheep, and fowl penned within the crudely built fortress. Orcs disliked the brightest hours of the day, and therefore the hold took its rest from shortly after sunrise to the late afternoon. Only the scouts, the sentries, and those young given the job of minding the herds in the fields nearby stayed awake through the bright hours of morning and midday.