R. Salvatore - The Dragon King

Luthien did not immediately reply, trying to collect his wits in the face of such disturbing news.

“We know in our hearts that Greensparrow uses the cyclopians to daunt the solidarity of our kingdom,” Brind’Amour went on, “and to destroy any potential alliance between Eriador and DunDarrow. I suspect that the king of Avon has not in any way surrendered Eriador to the Eriadorans, as the truce would indicate.”

“And thus you believe that Greensparrow might also be in league with the Huegoths,” Luthien reasoned.

Brind’Amour shook his head halfheartedly. He did indeed fear that to be the case, but he honestly couldn’t see how the wizard-king of Avon could have forged such an alliance. Huegoths respected physical might. They had little use for the “civilized” folk of Avon, and open hatred for wizardry. Brind’Amour, a sturdy northman himself, might be able to deal with them, but by all appearances Greensparrow was a fop, a physical weakling, who made no secret of his magical powers. Furthermore, even though an alliance with the Huegoths would strengthen Avon’s position, Brind’Amour didn’t believe that Greensparrow would want to deal with the barbarian Isenlanders.

“The man will gladly deal with cyclopians,” Luthien reminded him when he spoke that thought aloud.

“He will gladly dominate stupid one-eyes,” Brind’Amour corrected. “But no king who is not Huegoth will bend the will of the fierce Isenlanders.”

“Even with wizardry?”

Brind’Amour sighed, having no answer. “Go to Gybi,” he bade Luthien. “Take Oliver and Katerin with you.”

The request disappointed the young Bedwyr, who sorely wanted to go into the mountains in search of the raiding cyclopian forces, but he did not complain. Luthien understood the importance of handling the Huegoths, though he wanted badly to believe that the raid on Gybi might be a coincidence, and not a long-term threat.

“I have already sent word to the Riders of Eradoch,” Brind’Amour explained. “A fair-sized force is nearing Gybi now, to bolster their defenses, and watches have been ordered along all the eastern coast as far south as Chalmbers.”

Luthien saw then how important Brind’Amour considered the appearance of the Huegoths, and so the young Bedwyr did not argue the command. “I will make my preparations,” he said and bowed, then turned to leave.

“Siobhan and the Cutters will accompany Shuglin into the mountains,” Brind’Amour said to him, “to gather as much information as possible on the cyclopians. They will be waiting for you when you return.” Brind’Amour gave a wink. “I will use some magic to facilitate your journey, that you might get your chance to put Blind-Striker to good use on the bloodshot eyes of cyclopians.”

Luthien looked back to the old king and smiled, genuinely grateful.

Brind’Amour’s return smile disappeared the moment Luthien was out of sight. Even if Greensparrow wasn’t behind the Huegoth raid, the fledgling kingdom of Eriador was in serious trouble. Brind’Amour had brought about his victory over Avon in large part through hints to Greensparrow from the Gascons that they favored a free Eriador, that they might even enter the war on Eriador’s side. But Brind’Amour had received such subtle aid from the vast southern kingdom of Gascony only by promising some very favorable port deals. Now, with the presence of the Huegoths, the new king had been forced to send word south to Gascony that the eastern stretches of Eriador, including the important port of Chalmbers, were not to be approached without heavy warship escort.

The Gascons would not be pleased, Brind’Amour knew; they might even come to the conclusion that Eriador was a safer place for their merchant ships under the protective rule of Greensparrow. One word to that effect from Gascony to the Avon king might launch Eriador back into an open war with Avon, a war that Brind’Amour feared they could not win. Avon had many more people, with a better trained and better equipped army and vicious cyclopian allies. And though Brind’Amour believed himself a wizardous match for Greensparrow, he couldn’t ignore the fact that, as far as he could tell, he was Eriador’s sole magical strength, while Greensparrow had at least four wizard-dukes and the duchess of Mannington in his court.

And if the mighty Huegoths, too, were in Greensparrow’s hand . . .

The situation in Gybi had to be dealt with at once and with all attention, Brind’Amour knew. Luthien, Katerin, and Oliver were his best emissaries for such a mission, and the king had already dispatched nearly two-score of his own warships, almost half of his fleet, from Diamondgate, to sail around the northern reaches of Eriador and meet up with Luthien in Gybi.

The king of fledgling Eriador spent all that night atop the Ministry, thinking and worrying, looking for his answers in the stars, but finding nothing save potential disaster.

She was a small woman, slender and with her golden hair neatly cropped. She wore many valuable jewels, including a diamond hairpin and a brooch that glittered in the softest of lights. By all measures, Deanna Wellworth, the duchess of Mannington, was most elegant and sophisticated, undeniably beautiful, and so she seemed out of place indeed in the cold and rugged Iron Cross, surrounded by smelly, burly cyclopians.

The one-eyed leader, a three-hundred-pounder that stood halfway between six and seven feet, towered over Deanna. The brute could reach out with one hand and squash her flat, so it seemed, and, considering the tongue-lashing Deanna was now giving, the cyclopian appeared as though it wanted to do just that.

But Deanna Wellworth was hardly concerned. She was a duchess of Avon, one of Greensparrow’s court, and with Duke Paragor of Princetown killed by Brind’Amour of Eriador, she was perhaps the strongest magician in all of Avon except for the king himself. She had a protection spell ready now, and if Muckles, the cyclopian leader, swung a hand out at her, it would burst into flames that the one-eye could not extinguish in any way short of leaping into the Avon Sea.

“Your murderers are out of control,” Deanna ranted, her blue eyes, soft in hue to appear almost gray, locked on the face of ugly Muckles.

“We kill,” the cyclopian responded simply, which was about the only way Muckles could respond. What flustered Deanna most about this assignment in the God-forsaken mountains was the fact that stupid Muckles was probably the smartest of the cyclopian group!

“Indiscriminately,” Deanna promptly added, but she shook her head, seeing that the one-eye had no idea of what that word might mean. “You must choose your kills more carefully,” she explained.

“We kill!” Muckles insisted.

Deanna entertained the thought of calling in Taknapotin, her familiar demon, and watching the otherworldly beast eat Muckles a little bit at a time. Alas, that she could not do. “You killed the dwarfs,” she said.

That brought howls of glee from all the cyclopians nearby, brutes who hated dwarfs above anything. This tribe had lived in the Iron Cross for many generations and had occasionally run into trouble with the bearded folk of secret DunDarrow. The cyclopians thought that the woman’s statement was the highest compliment anyone could pay them.

Deanna hardly meant it that way. The last thing Greensparrow wanted was an alliance between Eriador and DunDarrow. By her reasoning, any threat to DunDarrow would only strengthen the dwarfs’ resolve to ally with Brind’Amour.

“If the result of your killing the dwarfs . . .”

“Yerself helped!” Muckles argued, beginning to catch on that Deanna was truly angered about the massacre.

“I had to finish what you stupidly started,” Deanna retorted. Muckles began to counter, but Deanna snapped her fingers and the brute staggered backward as though it had been punched in the mouth. Indeed, a small line of blood now trickled from the side of Muckles’s lip.