David Gemmell - Morningstar

‘In front of the congregation?’ asked Mace, amazed.

‘In the middle of his sermon. Called him a fornicator.’

‘She said that in church? For a nun she has little shame. Spirited, though. I don’t suppose the priest is campaigning for her release.’

Wulf chuckled. ‘Says she’s demon-possessed and ought to burn.’

‘What about the meeting?’

‘You were right. It is at a barn on the western side of the town. They’ll be heading there now.’

‘Then let’s join them,’said Mace.

I was baffled by Mace’s actions, but I said nothing as we walked through the town. The streets were empty, but there was blood upon the hard-baked clay of the town centre.

The barn was tall, used to house all the winter feed for the local cattle, and it was situated in a wide meadow surrounded by trees. As we approached it, a militia soldier carrying a spear stepped out into our path.

‘What’s your business here?’ he asked.

‘We have come for the meeting,’ said Mace.

The soldier stared at him for a moment. ‘I don’t know you,’ he said.

‘Yes, you do, my friend,’ responded Mace, with a broad smile. ‘For I am the Morningstar. And this is Wulf the Hunchback and Owen Odell the bard.’ He did not introduce Ilka.

The man stepped back, mouth open. ‘If this is some kind of jest

‘You think I would jest while my friend is a prisoner in the keep — while they prepare Brackban for hanging?’

The man was impressed — as well he might be. Mace was an inspiring figure, tall, handsome and rakish, the very fabric of legend. The soldier hesitated. ‘I’ve been told to keep all strangers away. But not you, sir. They’d not want me to stop you, God bless you!’

Mace patted the man’s shoulder and we walked on. He turned to me. ‘Make my entrance dramatic, Owen.’

Two more soldiers stood guard at the double doors of the barn, but they had watched us walk past the first sentry and therefore greeted us more warmly.

‘You are a little late,’ said one. The meeting has already started.’

Mace said nothing but strode inside. Some forty men were present, seated on bales of hay, listening to a grey-headed elder who was talking of making an appeal to Azrek in Ziraccu. Mace walked to the front while Wulf, Ilka and I remained behind the listeners.

‘Who are you, sir?’ demanded the greybeard.

I let fly the spell and golden light flared around Mace’s head, rising to form an arched rainbow beneath the rafters.

‘I am the Morningstar!’ thundered Mace. He let the words hang in the air for several heartbeats. Then: ‘And I am here to see if you will allow the enemy to hang Brackban.’

‘No, we won’t!’ shouted one of the guards, but the assembled townsmen sat silently. These were hard-nosed men of business, traders, merchants, landowners. They might have been unhappy over the fate of Brackban, but they would sacrifice him in an instant to save their livelihoods.

Mace shook his head. ‘All over the north the banner of rebellion is being raised. The Angostins are finding that the Highlanders do not make willing slaves. They pay a toll now to travel our roads. They pay it in blood. They will go on paying it in blood until we are free of them.

‘I know what you are thinking — each and every one of you. You do not want war to visit this town. You do not want to see your buildings burning, your wives raped and your children murdered. You want life the way it was. There is nothing shameful in that, my friends; that is what we all want. But is too late. In the south of the forest the Angostins have burned and pillaged the settlements. They are bringing in Ikenas to settle the land. Look at the events of today! You are a free town, yet foreign soldiers can ride in, arrest your captain of militia and take their swords to innocent citizens. What will come next? Taxes will be doubled, trebled. They will take everything you have.’

‘And what do you suggest?’ asked the elder who had been addressing the men when we arrived. ‘War? We have just lost a war-all our knights and nobles slain.’

‘Angostin knights!’ stormed Mace. ‘Angostin nobles! North against South. Who cares what happens to Angostins? How many Highland knights were there? How many Highland nobles? But this war we will not lose. Even now I have an army building that will sweep the enemy from our lands. A Highland army!’

‘Where is this army?’ asked another man. ‘I see no warriors.’

‘You will see them, my friend. But they are not needed here — not where there are Pasel men of stout heart and great courage. Highlanders! Or has Angostin wealth eaten into your souls, turning your blood to water?’

‘It hasn’t turned mine to water!’ shouted a stocky bearded man, rising to his feet. ‘What would you have us do?’

'Sit down, Jairn,’ ordered Greybeard. ‘No one here has given this man the right to speak for us.’

‘Yes, sit down, Jairn,’ said Jarek Mace. ‘Sit down for the injustice. Sit down while they slay your captain. Sit down while they break their promises and rape your wives. Sit down and listen to spineless old fools like this one.’

‘No!’ roared Jairn. ‘I’ll be damned if I will. When my leg was broke the Fall before last, it was Brackban who came to my farm and brought in my crops. And you, Cerdic, who was it that gathered the men to help you rebuild when the fire gutted your home? It was Brackban! And when raiders took the prize cattle, who was it that hunted them down? Who was it that brought them back to their owners? Is there any man here who would sleep well at night knowing that he did nothing to help Brackban in his hour of peril?’

Several of the men shouted agreement but the majority began to talk among themselves, arguing in loud voices. Mace raised his hands for silence, but he had lost the attention of the crowd.

I sent up a swift spell-sphere, dark and small, that exploded like a thunderclap.

There was silence then all right!

‘Now there is no more time for talk,’ said Jarek Mace. ‘All those who will fight to see Brackban freed, walk to the left. Those with no stomach for justice can remain seated.’

Jairn was the first to stride across the barn. Others followed until only seventeen were still seated. Mace called the sentries to him. ‘Make sure none of these cowards leave this barn until morning,’ he said.

‘You can’t imprison us!’ a balding sandy-haired merchant complained.

Mace dragged the man to his feet. ‘I can do what I like with you, you gutless piece of horse-dung! Be thankful I’m leaving you alive!’ Hurling the man from him, he swung on the remaining sixteen. ‘There comes a time when a man has to choose sides,’ he told them. ‘When the day of freedom comes the Highlanders will know who fought for them — and who left them to rot. Then there will be a reckoning. Prepare yourselves for that day!’

I think he was unfair on them. Several were old and as to the others — well, it is no crime for a man to know fear, or to need time to reach weighty decisions. Some, no doubt, were family men concerned for wives, children or infirm parents. But he left them feeling ashamed.

We walked into the sunlight where Mace sat down with Jairn and the others. For some minutes I sat with them, but battle plans and strategies were of little interest to me then and I wandered away with Ilka to sit on a stone wall and stare out over the mountains. I had no idea as to why Mace should suddenly become the hero, and it unsettled me. I felt I had missed something of import — as indeed I had.

Ilka sat beside me and pointed to the harp-bag slung from my shoulder.

‘I am in no mood for music,’ I told her. She looked crestfallen and I relented. ‘What would you like to hear? A ballad? A dance melody?’ She shook her head. ‘What, then? A marching tune? A battle song? No? Then I am at a loss, lady.’