Paul Kearney: The Heretic Kings

“You think a Pontifical bull could have arrived there already?”

“I do. Himerius will waste no time once he hears the news from Vol Ephrir. And therein lies your danger, sire. Refusing to obey the will of a few trumped-up, would-be princes is one thing, but remaining loyal to an absent heretic is quite another. The bull may be enough to sway the army and the fleet. You must prepare yourself for that.”

“If that happens I am finished, Golophin.”

“Nearly, but not quite. You will still have your own lands, your own personal retainers. With Astarac’s help you could reclaim the throne.”

“Plunging Hebrion into civil war while I do.”

“No one ever said this course would be an easy one, sire. I could wish that we had made better time in our journey, though.”

“I need agitators, Golophin. I need trusted men who will enter the city before me and spread the truth of the matter. Abrusio is not cut out to be ruled by priests. When the city hears that Macrobius is alive and well, that Himerius is an imposter and that Astarac and Torunna are with me in this thing, then it will be different.”

“I will see what I can do, lad, but my contacts in the city are growing thinner on the ground day by day. Most of them are ashes, friends of fifty years. May the lord God rest their souls. They died good men, whatever the Ravens might think.”

“And you, Golophin. Are you safe?”

Something in the yellow gleam of the bird’s eye chilled Abeleyn as it replied in the old mage’s voice.

“I will be all right, Abeleyn. The day they try to take me will be one to remember, I promise you.”

Abeleyn turned and stared back over the taffrail. Astarac was out of sight over the brim of the horizon, but he could just make out the white glimmer of the Hebros Mountains ahead, to the north-west.

Astarac, far astern of them: the kingdom of King Mark, soon to be his brother-in-law. If there were ever time for weddings again after all this. What was waiting for Mark in Astarac? More of the same, perhaps. Ambitious clerics, nobles leaping at the opportunity to rule. War.

A sea mile astern of Abeleyn’s vessel two wide-bellied nefs , the old-fashioned trading ships of the Levangore, were making heavy going of the swell. Within them was the bulk of Abeleyn’s entourage, four hundred strong; the only subjects whose obedience he still commanded. It was because of them he had taken the longer sea route home instead of trying to chance the snowbound passes of the mountains. He would need every loyal sword in the months to come; he could not afford to abandon them.

“Golophin, I want you to do something.”

The gyrfalcon cocked its head to one side. “I am yours to command, my boy.”

“You must procure a meeting with Rovero and Mercado. You must let the army and the fleet know the truth of things. If the Hebrian navy is against me, then we will never get to within fifty leagues of Abrusio.”

“It will not be easy, sire.”

“Nothing ever is, my friend. Nothing ever is.”

“I will do my best. Rovero, being a mariner, has always had a more open mind than Mercado.”

“If you must choose one, then let it be Rovero. The fleet is the most important.”

“Very well, sire.”

“Sail ho!” the lookout cried from the maintop. “I see five-no, six-sail abaft the larboard beam!”

Dietl, the master, squinted up at the maintop.

“What are they, Tasso?”

“Lateen-rigged, sir. Galleasses by my bet. Corsairs maybe.”

Dietl blinked, then turned to Abeleyn.

“Corsairs, sire. A whole squadron, perhaps. Shall I put her about?”

“Let me see for myself,” Abeleyn snapped. He clambered over the ship’s rail and began climbing the shrouds. In seconds he was up in the maintop with Tasso, the lookout. The sailor looked both amazed and terrified at finding himself on such close terms with a king.

“Point them out to me,” Abeleyn commanded.

“There, sire. They’re almost hull up now. They have the wind on the starboard beam, but you can see their oars are out too. There’s a flash of foam along every hull, regular as a waterclock.”

Abeleyn peered across the unending expanse of white-streaked sea while the maintop described lazy arcs under him with the pitch and roll of the carrack. There: six sails like the wings of great waterborne birds, and the regular splash of the oars as well.

“How do you know they’re corsairs?” he asked Tasso.

“Lateen-rigged on all three masts, sir, like a xebec. Astaran and Perigrainian galleasses are square-rigged on fore and main. Those are corsairs, sir, no doubt about it, and they’re on a closing course.”

Abeleyn studied the oncoming ships in silence. It was too much of a coincidence. These vessels knew what they were after.

He slapped Tasso on the shoulder and sidled down the backstay to the deck. The whole crew was standing staring, even the Hebrian soldiers and marines of his entourage. He joined Dietl on the quarterdeck, smiling.

“You had best beat to quarters, Captain. I believe we have a fight on our hands.”

At times it seemed as though the whole world were on the move.

From Ormann Dyke the road curved round to arrow almost due south through the low hills of northern Torunna. A fine road, built by the Fimbrians in the days when Aekir had been the easternmost trading post of their empire. The Torunnan kings had kept it in good repair, but in their own road-building they had never been able to match the stubborn Fimbrian disregard for natural obstacles, and thus the secondary roads which branched off it curved and wound their way about the shoulders of the hills like rivulets of water finding their natural level.

All the roads were clogged with people.

Corfe had seen it before, on the retreat from Aekir, but the other troopers of the escort had not. They were shocked by the scale of the thing.

The troop had passed through empty villages, deserted hamlets, and even a couple of towns where the doors of the houses had been left ajar by their fleeing occupants. And now the occupants of all northern Torunna were on the move, it seemed.

Most of them were actually from Aekir. With the onset of winter, General Martellus of Ormann Dyke had ordered the refugee camps about the fortress broken up. Those living there had been told to go south, to Torunn itself. They were too big a drain on the meagre resources of the dyke’s defenders, and with winter swooping in-a hard winter too, by the looks of it-they would not survive long in the shanty towns which had sprung up in the shadow of the dyke. Hundreds of thousands of them were moving south, trekking along the roads in the teeth of the bitter wind. Their passage had had a catastrophic effect on the inhabitants of the region. There had been looting, killing, even pitched battles between Aekirians and Torunnans. The panic had spread, and now the natives of the country were heading south also. A rumour had begun that the Merduks would not remain long in winter quarters, but were planning a sudden onslaught on the dyke, a swift sweep south to the Torunnan capital before the heaviest of the snows set in. There was no truth to it. Corfe had reconnoitred the Merduk winter camps himself, and he knew that the enemy was regrouping and resupplying, and would be for months. But reason was not something a terrified mob hearkened to very easily, hence the exodus.

The troop of thirty Torunnan heavy cavalry were escorting a clumsy, springless carriage over the crowded roads, battering a way through the crowds with the armoured bodies of their warhorses and warning shots from their matchlocks. Inside the carriage Macrobius III, High Pontiff of the Western World, sat with blind patience clutching the Saint’s symbol of silver and lapis lazuli General Martellus had given him. Nowhere in Ormann Dyke could there be found material of the right shade to clothe a Pontiff, so instead of purple Macrobius wore robes of black. Perhaps it was an omen, Corfe thought. Perhaps he would not be recognized as Pontiff again, now that Himerius had been elected to the position by the Prelates and the Colleges of Bishops in Charibon. Macrobius himself did not seem to care whether he was Pontiff or not. The Merduks had carved something vital out of his spirit when they gouged the eyes from his head in Aekir.