David Chandler: Honor among thieves

It was true. It was law. Morg was the Great Chieftain, but he ruled only by the consent of the clans. “I have the right, aye, to raid the West. But I don’t wish just to scare a few villagers and take their sheep,” Morget explained. “For two hundred years that’s all we’ve done, ever since the Skraelings sealed off the mountain passes. Now there is a new pass. Once, long before any of us were born, our warriors spoke not of raiding but of conquest. Of far greater glories. I wish, Great Chieftain, to make war. To take every mile of Skrae for our people, as has always been their destiny!”

Alone in that place, Morg carried iron, in the form of a sword at his belt. All other weapons had been stacked outside, for no warrior would dare bring a blade into the house of the Great Chieftain. Should he desire it, if his wishes countered those of his son, Morg could draw his sword and strike down Morget this instant. No man there would gainsay him for it.

They called him Morg the Wise, sometimes, when they wished to flatter him. Behind his back they called him Morg the Merciful, which was a great slander among the people of the East. If he struck the blow now, perhaps those whispering tongues would be silenced. Or perhaps they would only grow into a chorus.

The chieftains wanted this. They had made Morget their spokesman, and sent him here tonight to gain this audience.

And Morg was no king to thwart the will of his people for his own whims. That was the way of the decadent West. Here in the East, men ruled through respect, or through fear, but always honestly-because the men who served them believed in them. Morg was no stronger than the chieftains he’d united. He lived and died by their sufferance. If he did not give them what they wanted, they had their own recourse-they could replace him. And that could only be done over his dead body. Great Chieftains ruled for life, so murder was the sole method of their impeachment.

On his knees, Morget stared up at his father with eyes as clear and blue as a mountain stream. Eyes that never blinked.

Morg knew he must decide, now. There was no discussion to be had, no council to call. He alone must make this decision. Every eye watched his face. Even Hurlind had fallen silent, waiting to hear what he would say.

“You,” Morg said, rising and pointing at a thrall standing by the door. “Fetch boughs of wet myrtle, and throw them on the fire. Let them make a great smoke, that all will see, and thereby know. Tomorrow we march through the mountains to the west. Tomorrow we make war!”

There was a mountain, and then there was no mountain.

It had been called Cloudblade, for the way its sharp summit once cut through the sky, and it possessed a long and storied history. It stood at the eastern frontier of the kingdom of Skrae, tallest of the Whitewall Range. Beneath it, in centuries long gone, the dwarves had built a city they called the Place of Long Shadows. Later on elves-the last of their kind-moved into that hollow below the world. For eight hundred years they had hidden there, unknown to the humans above.

Then five fools from the West came along and ruined everything.

Cythera climbed up a high pile of rubble, picking her footholds carefully, testing each rock with her hands to make sure it was stable before she put her weight on it. She was sweating by the time she reached the top. There, she could see the new valley that lay where Cloudblade once stood. It ran as wide as a road right through the Whitewall, and a constant chill wind coursed over the endless field of stones like a river of air. Over there to the east lay the great steppes where the barbarians ruled. Behind her, to the west, lay Skrae, the country of her birth.

“How many years did Cloudblade stand? When we first saw it, I would have thought it could last forever,” Malden said, coming up behind her.

She turned and saw the thief leaping from one rock to another as nimbly as a goat. She couldn’t help but smile at the ease with which he moved. He was a small man, and skinny as an alley cat, but he had an effortless grace that always made her gasp.

“Cloudblade stood longer than you can imagine,” Cythera said. She was the daughter of a witch and thus privy to some of the secrets of the universe. She knew if she tried to explain to Malden just how long an eon was, his eyes would simply glaze over. Which was not to say he was a simpleton. He was bright enough in his own way, if reckless. “Here,” she said, and held out a hand. He took it, holding her fingers as delicately as he might a bundle of flowers. When he had climbed up beside her, he kissed her fingertips, one after another.

“Don’t,” she said, though her heart wasn’t in it. She wanted to embrace him, to drag him down behind these rocks and… well. She had to be careful now, at least for a while. She took her hand back and turned to face the west. Down there below the foothills of the Whitewall she could still see the column of elves as they made their way toward a distant forest. They were on foot but moved quickly, desperate to reach any shelter from the blue sky. She knew they found the broad stretch of the heavens terrifying, for none of them had ever seen it before. “Do you think they’ll make it?” she asked. The forest they headed for was only the first stop on a long journey.

“Their ancestors ruled this land before we came along and took it from them,” Malden pointed out. “They’re tougher than they look. And they have Slag to guide them.”

Cythera nodded. She’d been sad to see the dwarf go, but the elfin queen wouldn’t have followed anyone else.

“Croy will ride ahead of them for a while, to make sure they aren’t spotted,” Malden added. If any human authorities saw there were elves abroad in the kingdom again, it could only end in bloodshed. There was a reason the elves had hidden so long under Cloudblade. “He told me he won’t be back until tomorrow dawn.” His eyebrows lifted in what he must have thought was a suggestive leer. “It’s just the two of us left here now. I’m supposed to look after you while he’s away.”

He moved closer and reached out one hand to touch the small of her back.

For the second time she shied away, despite what she might have preferred. “We need to talk,” she said. “I’m still betrothed to Croy.” That had been the whole point of this adventure. The whole reason she left the Free City of Ness. Croy-Sir Croy-had made her promise to marry him. She demurred and evaded him as long as she could, but eventually the appointed day had come. At the last minute she decided she needed to see some of the world first, before he took her to his castle and she had to spend the rest of her life birthing his heirs. She hadn’t expected Malden to come along-frankly, he’d been a temptation she was trying to escape. Life, it seemed, could never be simple. “I made a promise to him-a legally binding promise.”

The expression on Malden’s face shifted through a complicated series of emotions. Everything from hope to fear to deep confusion. But then his eyes narrowed and he nodded sagely. “I see.”

“You do?”

He dropped his hand to his side. “Down below the mountain, when you thought I was going to die-when we thought we were all going to die-you told me you loved me. Sometimes people in dangerous situations will say things that they wouldn’t, otherwise.”

“You think me so inconstant?” she asked, hurt despite her better judgment.

“I’m trying to be noble,” he told her, in that frank way he sometimes had. Another endearing quality-a man who could speak honestly to a woman was as rare, in Cythera’s experience, as a hen with teeth. “I’m trying to give you an opportunity to change your mind.”

She smiled at him. His love for her came without conditions. He would never want to take away her freedom. It was why she had come to love him back. “Croy won’t be back before dawn, you said.” She looked up and saw the sun was still well above the horizon. “We have all that time?”