Blossomstide 1924
“Master Aldred? Master Aldred? Begging your pardon, sir, it’s almost midday.”
Whilst he lay completely immobile Aldred’s headache was controllable, but the mere contemplation of lifting his head from his pillow sent lancinating pain through his brain. He was aware of a rank smell in his nostrils, which he rapidly realised was his breath, condensed into a little pool of dribble.
His awareness spread out from him, rolling out like the early morning mists he had seen on his return to the castle. He was face down, on his bed, fully clothed and his left arm was trapped under him, numb and useless. With his one functioning arm he strained and rolled over with a gasp and then a moan as the nausea struck. The room swam and he sank deeper into what must be the ocean of all hangovers.
Aldred scrabbled for some vessel to vomit in; his hands clasped around the wash bowl that his manservant, Jirdin, had just brought. He had just enough time to gesture Jirdin back before heaving into the water.
Jirdin waited for the retching to cease.
“Would the master want a fresh bowl for his ablutions this morn?”
Aldred nodded sheepishly, an acidic trail trickling down from his nose. He glanced with dismay at his bedchamber: mud streaked bed clothes, his knee length leather boots still on his feet, two shattered chamber pots, his best Feldorian cloak torn and tossed across his mirror and the remnants of some bread and cheese he’d scrounged from the kitchens on the way back in.
He cringed as he considered what Jirdin would be thinking. Jirdin had been Aldred’s manservant for so long that he couldn’t imagine him ever having being young. No, in all honesty, he speculated Jirdin had been born wrinkled, that he’d emerged into this world with skin looking like a dried apple.
The sun was streaming through the curtains. Flecks of dust danced as if at a ball. He had a similar recollection of spinning and weaving the night before, a blur of velvet ball gowns and towering wigs.
Jirdin re-entered and approached the table in the corner of the room. He placed a fresh porcelain bowl and towels atop it. The steaming water had been flavoured with rose, its odour as warm and fresh as a summer’s day.
“May I assume the Spring Ball a success, master?”
“From what I remember. The blisters in my boots attest to my exuberance on the dance floor and my head to the hospitality of Lord Ordon. Half of father’s barony was there and a good proportion of Baron Benrich and Latimer’s lords.”
“And the ladies I am sure,” Jirdin said, carrying a crisp white shirt, leather trousers and wool jacket to the table.
“Latimer’s niece was there, for certain, and her friend, Lady Gizele Harken. My word, what a pair. They can scent a plump purse from eighty paces.”
Aldred hobbled over to the table, slipping his dress shirt off.
“Did Livor return with me in the carriage?”
“I’m uncertain, Master Aldred,” Jirdin said, bending to help Aldred remove his mud-caked boots. “One could quite appreciate he might feel reluctant to return to the castle. I imagine the carriage took him back to the estate near Oldston.”
Aldred sighed and nodded. Livor’s father, Lord Korianson, had been dismissed from his residence at the castle whilst Livor and Aldred were studying in Thetoria city. The circumstances seemed mysterious but Aldred was under no doubt that Quigor was somehow involved.
The young lord finished his wash, scrubbing the dried sweat of the prior night from his skin. He dressed in a fresh outfit, choosing a favourite pair of brown leather boots to compliment his dark leather trousers.
“There’s precious few of you old guard left, isn’t there, Jirdin?” Aldred asked, as he selected an apple to eat for his breakfast.
“As you say, master, the baron has seen fit to entrust the care of his castle to a fresh pair of hands. Those of us that remain are, of course, honoured to continue in his service. Will there be anything else, master?”
Aldred shook his head and watched the servant hobble out into the corridor. Jirdin’s answer no doubt concealed bitterness at the systematic deconstruction of a staff that had taken generations to form. Aldred had been back from the city for only two weeks and this castle full of strangers still disconcerted him. It was as if the gods had taken the skeleton of the fortress, stripped it of its flesh and blood and then filled it with some facsimile, some imitation of the place he once called home.
None within the echoing corridors talked of the changes. Yet ten minutes ride from the walls of Blackstone Castle the tongues of the peasants flapped like thirsty dogs. It was the dark Azaguntan at the root of it all, they said, bringing in his ebony-hearted cronies.
Aldred was inclined to agree. He had been sat with Livor on the college common, reading poetry with gusto to an audience of society girls, when the missive from Lord Korianson had arrived. He had seen the flicker of hurt on his best friend’s face despite Aldred swearing there must be some mistake or misunderstanding. But the letter was very clear; the master of arms was no longer in service.
With that letter something altered between Livor and Aldred too. The letter had tainted their friendship and Aldred’s dislike of the Azaguntan Quigor had gained far greater momentum.
The midday sun seared his eyes as he pulled back the curtains. He looked out from his mullioned window, with all the relish of the undead. His room commanded a view over the courtyard and its walls and down the steep hill of Garan’s Motte. From the base of the Motte the bailey spread outwards, a green carpet stretching from the dry moat to the dark stone of the curtain wall. The grass was smattered with buttercups and bluebells and Aldred’s mind drifted to the riverbanks of the college he had just left.
Aldred wandered out of his chamber into the corridors of the castle, smiling in reminiscence. He drank in the view as he passed each window, tasting the air, feeling the tranquil scents corrode his hangover like brine on an ancient anchor.
Oh, to be back on the college greens in the air of anticipation that spring created. Thetoria city was spectacular at this time of the year. Across Nurolia it was known as the City of a Hundred Bridges and Aldred fancied that he had punted under every one and jumped naked off a fair few as well. The bifurcation of the Whiteforce River created the River Birin and divided the city into three sections. Alcansford College sat within the south-eastern segment, its expansive estate enjoying the warm winds that drifted from the Bay of Thetoria some two hundred miles to the east.
Aldred had thrived in the college, ricocheting from lessons on literature, art, economics, history and philosophy to tutorials on swords craft and war. He soaked up the teaching with the eagerness of the young, as if he had been starved of life’s entire colour in his monochrome home.
Many were the lessons learned in those three years and many the lips he had kissed and laughter he had heard, catching the giggles of the maidens like butterflies in a net. He could still smell the aroma of spring flowers, still hear the bubble of the river, still sense the last kiss planted on his lips almost absent mindedly, like a post-script on a letter. An aching for those vibrant times arose in him and he paused to gain his bearings in the gloom of the castle.
He looked around with a twinge of annoyance, momentarily confused as to his whereabouts. Had he been gone so long that he got lost within his own home? Then he realised that a rearrangement of tapestries had changed the appearance of the hallway he now stood in; he was at the south staircase, a spiral set of steps that descended within the circular tower deep into the depths of the castle. He had just decided to retrace his steps when he realised that he had not visited his mother since he had returned.
Guilt crept into his heart at this oversight; he was sure a day had not gone past without his morose father descending into the crypts and paying his respects. Yet his father, the baron, was a man of dark places, hewn from the same stone as the castle. The meals at night were agonising, a selection of topics spread as thin as pauper’s butter. His father smiled thinly at Aldred’s tales of Thetoria and, in return, Aldred nodded politely at the ever present subject of goblins on the borders.
He began to descend the stairs. Sputtering torches gave illumination to his path. Aldred reached the base of the stairwell and walked forth into the crypt, taking a torch from its sconce.
The crypts under Blackstone Castle were vast, a half-dozen corridors sprouting from the central hall like the legs of a giant insect. The oldest part was the central hallway and its statues flanked the aisles like a silent army. These were the mighty lords of old; the first warriors of a castle built to withstand the onslaught of the goblins and trolls of the mountains. Their appearance was distinct: exquisitely detailed faces with smooth almost featureless bodies, imposing and proud. This was the style of the First Empire, the Eerian, and contrasted with the warrior poses of the second Artorian Empire.
His mother’s tomb was at the neck of the sixth corridor for she was its first and only occupant. Aldred considered whether that had made her lonely in the afterlife. His fingers traced the inscription on the black stone:
Cecila Adrelia Enfarson
1885-1919 post-magi
A mother and wife for eternity
Your wisdom and love remains
Father Mortis guard your soul well
She would have been thirty-four when Mortis had taken her to his iridescent arms. What wisdom had he lost in his mother; what would she have taught him? Would she have counselled him to leave this cold place and forage into the far reaches of Nurolia, to explore its myriad lands and see its many creatures? Or would she have advised prudence, to take a seat at the right hand of his father and one day rule his lands?
He shook his head in frustration. Four years away had filled his head with such romanticism; his place was surely as the future baron.
A strange sound interrupted his thoughts, echoing eerily in the chamber. He placed the torch on the floor and doused its flame with his foot. He peered out into the gloom, around the corner of the sixth corridor and into the wide central hall.
A vestige of light was entering the chamber from the base of the stairwell. Just enough illumination was provided to see a figure emerging from behind one of the statues. Aldred’s heart leapt into his mouth as he caught a glimpse of the pale features of Quigor. What on earth was the Azaguntan doing down in the crypt?
Quigor shuffled out into the centre of the hall, looking furtive and rat-like. He turned to walk towards the stairwell then paused and slowly turned to look over towards where Aldred was concealed.
Aldred caught his breath, feeling a trickle of sweat worm down his spine. He was certain Quigor could not see him yet he still shook.
After a minute, Quigor turned and slipped off towards the stairwell leaving Aldred alone in the crypt. The statues stared at him, as if to call him craven at his decision to hide. He emerged shivering, and then curiosity pulled him towards the statue that Quigor had just emerged around. It was smoothed by time and lichen had settled across the face giving the stone sentinel a ghoulish demeanour.
Behind the statue was an alcove, a recess with a worn granite seat. There was nothing else. Aldred looked in confusion; had Quigor simply being skulking in the shadows of the Castle or was he missing something?
Unbidden, he had a recall of his mother’s bedtime stories. A lump came to his throat as he remembered her soft scent and smile. She had spoken of Blackstone Castle in its earliest days, in the Era of Empires. She had told of the Castle’s many mysteries: hidden rooms and passages that wormed through the rock of the fortress, whose secrets died with the builders and architects.
His breathing quickened as he examined the alcove. The light was poor. His hands probed for any irregularity, either in the stonework or on the granite seat. The rock was chill and before long his fingers were sore and aching and his headache and nausea were sidling back.
Then Aldred’s hand found a small divot under the seat. He pushed his fingers into it and there was an audible click. With a faint hiss the back wall of the alcove slid open, the rock door retracting into the stone wall. A faint red glow emanated from a passage on the other side. Aldred’s heart was pounding like a blacksmith’s hammer as he stepped over the seat and into the secret passage.
The passage was short and it emerged into a low ceilinged chamber. Crimson light shone from a dozen lanterns that seeped acrid smoke into the room. The scent of the smoke did little to conceal the stench of the chamber, the sickly sweet smell of rotted flesh. Aldred looked with wide eyes around the chamber.
The room was cluttered with stained oak tables and cupboards that leant against the walls. Every surface was home to a collection of dirty bottles, jars, bowls, tubes and tiny braziers. Aldred leaned to look at the filthy jars then recoiled in horror as he saw floating viscera suspended in turbid yellowish liquid.
He staggered back, his eyes overwhelmed by the sight of pickled animal foetuses, jars of long green tongues and bottles of unseeing eyeballs. He put down his hand to steady himself and felt it sink into something soft and slimy. Snatching his hand back he saw the dripping green of a goblin brain on a wooden board.
Aldred heaved and scrabbled to grab a bowl from the adjacent table. For a full minute he retched, sweat pouring from his face. It finally ceased and he took a deep breath then sat shaking on a seat in the centre of the chamber. It was plush and comfy with a high carved back. A small table adjacent to it was clear of the foul receptacles that characterised the rest of the room. On it was a platter of bread and cheese and a flagon of red wine. Aldred peered with concern: at least he thought it wine.
Aldred surveyed the rest of the room from the chair. It was square, with numerous alcoves and recesses secluded from the light of the lanterns. One corner was residence to a battered cauldron. The opposite corner contained a long table with the goblin corpse atop it. Then his eyes fixed on the contents of the third corner and he shuddered.
On a black stone plinth was sat a large book, bound in dark crimson leather. Aldred rose and approached the book and as he did so he brushed against a tall object covered in a black cloth.
Aldred jumped in terror as a loud squawk sang out and split the silence like an axe. Ingor’s nuts, he cursed, there was a bird underneath the cloth. The caws rang out with hideous volume and Aldred turned to run; he did not relish Quigor returning to find him here.
The contents of the room blurred past as he bolted for the exit. He sprinted into the passageway with such speed that he could not stop before hitting the rock wall. The impact sent him sprawling, the breath expunged from his body. He gasped like a landed fish, whilst the calls of the bird mocked his helplessness.
Aldred gradually recaptured his lost breath and limping he returned to the passage. The door was closed and there was no apparent way of opening it from this side.
He was trapped in the lair of a necromancer.
***
Eight hours later and two hundred miles to the east the contrast to the silence of the crypt could not have been greater. The north Thetorian town of Silverton was in a riotous mood as the Spring Festival began in earnest. Thousands of lanterns twinkled in the streets of the mining town, lighting the hordes of revellers. The din of the drunk mixed with the pipes and horns of the street musicians.
The Silver Hills rose sharply above the town, a sombre brow frowning at the merriment. The eight thin towers of Baron Exiki’s castle could be seen on the horizon, lit by the blue light of the waning Aquatonian moon. The castle was a parody of a baron whose obesity was legendary and who only infrequently deigned to honour his chief town with his corpulent presence.
Droves of entertainers would nonetheless migrate the eight miles to the castle to seek a fraction of his wealth, a product of the rich iron, silver, and even gold mines that populated the hills to the north.
Like a corpse would attract flies, the rich excesses of nobles compelled those with an eye for exploitation and money to Silverton and the merchant Kurgin Goldersen was no exception.
The dark figure who eased past the revellers that evening contemplated all this and more. He gravitated to the shadows, much of the time the only hint of his presence being his shaven head. He paused at a well in the square, observing eight drunken miners whose coarse songs were making a gaggle of girls blush and giggle.
Goldersen’s buildings ran along a lane two streets removed from the main road south out of Silverton. The seven buildings were a mixture of heights and sizes. The shuttered windows were barred, giving some clue as to the fact they were used for the storage of Goldersen’s vast stocks; not that any fool would seek to steal from a man whose influence ran from the world of commerce to the world of crime as smoothly as a river runs to the sea.
Yet the price for crime was that your opponents don’t play by the rules, considered the black clad man. He slipped into an alleyway then leapt to grab a handhold on the irregular stone of the building. He scuttled like a spider up the wall then pulled himself onto the slope of the one storey roof. A twinge came into his left elbow from an old wound, the memento from a card game gone wrong four years ago.
He bounded across the rooftops, leaping with ease from one to the next and landing with barely a sound. The clamour from the streets would allow him a large margin for error but he was a professional: this was his vocation, this was business.
He spotted the first guard as he peered over the edge of the two story roof he lay on. The guard was a big man, armoured in a chainmail hauberk and holding a spear. He stood alone at the edge of a small courtyard between three buildings. The dark man loosened a rope, threaded it through the eaves with a loop and then carefully lowered it.
The noose slipped around the guard’s neck and the dark man rolled from the roof and dropped. The guard shot upwards with a splutter, his legs kicking spasmodically. The dark man landed and then held tightly onto the rope, his left foot neatly catching the shaft of the spear as it toppled, before easing it to the ground. Within a minute the jerking on the rope stopped and with some effort the black garbed man lowered the dead guard to the ground. He rolled him quickly behind a collection of six barrels.
The guard had left a crossbow propped against the wall which the dark killer procured. Then he slowly opened the door and entered.
There was a small hallway beyond which then opened into a large warehouse, some two stories high and thirty feet by fifty feet across. The interior was a maze of barrels, sacks, chests and crates, stacked into columns, like a temple to commerce. Sounds of laughter drifted along the avenues between the containers. Light was scanty, provided by a few smouldering lanterns. This suited him perfectly.
The two guards at the door at the far end of the warehouse were chatting as he crept around the corner, discussing the finer points of the cathouse they were to attend later that night. Had he been a kinder man the idea that their last thought may be of such carnal pleasures may have given him some joy. But he had never been accused of kindness, even by the few he had ever called friend.
The first guard died silently as the crossbow bolt transfixed his head to the wall; the second managed a gasp as the dark man was upon him, slicing his blade across the guard’s neck. He crumpled to the floor with a grisly gurgle.
Wiping his blade on the cloth of the guard’s trousers the dark figure pushed open the door into the next room. It was a small chamber, with a door on the far side and dark mahogany furniture cluttering its interior. Its sole occupant was a short bearded man dressed in a crimson silk shirt and black silk trousers. His stumpy digits glittered with gold and jewels. He rooted through a pile of papers on his desk. He glanced in irritation at the interruption.
“Who in the Pale’s name are you?” Goldersen asked, his beady eyes glancing at his possible escape routes.
The dark man smiled, the pale scar on his face creasing. “But a thespian, treading the boards of the intricate saga of this life. A player. But a professional player, at that.”
“Your visit surprises me then. I have only a ten-year old claret from the nether regions of Feldor to offer you.”
“Your hospitality is not in question, sir. Sadly I refrain from drinking whilst I work, though it would please me immensely if you indulge yourself.”
Goldersen shrugged and poured a goblet of the blood red liquid.
“Surely you mock me with talk of theatricals?”
The dark man stepped forwards, his cold eyes fixing Goldersen’s.
“Indeed not, sir. I have long subscribed to the philosophy that we merely act on the whims and designs of the many gods that direct us through this mortal charade. One day our scene may be as doting husband or furious father, yet on another we may stand alone in the tranquility of a soliloquy, contemplating the purpose of our allotted time. For you I understand the higher purpose has been that of gold and as many men before you and after you, your desires have clashed with those far more devious.”
Goldersen was shaking as he sipped. “We are all slave to the seductive touch of wealth, for all it is a mistress. Do not pretend you do it for another purpose, assassin. I will triple what they are paying you.”
“Your final scene should perhaps be better spent recounting words that shall live beyond you, a condensation of a lifetime’s wisdom. Instead you bow out to misguided attempts to divert the inevitable. The long rest comes to all, merchant, and for you it is now. There is no honour amongst thieves, it is said, but there is a code amongst brothers of the Silent Knife.”
“Then tell me who? Who sent you so I may damn them with my last breath?”
“That is a far greater swan song! That’s the spirit! ‘I damn them as I die.’ That would be a great line. A touch of panache. A bit of venom. Sadly I’m not at liberty to reveal my guild’s client, but you could narrow it down to one of perhaps twenty given your many indiscretions over the years. One of your six sons, greedy for their inheritance? Your grasping wife? Another merchant, eager for your stock? Perhaps the king, bored at court with the parade of powdered wigs and wanting the metallic smell of blood on his hands? Who can be sure? All have roles and all will have their own grand exit.”
“You sadist,” Goldersen said and flung the goblet at the assassin. He bolted for the door, his feet slipping on the stone flags. With a sigh the dark man drew back his arm and threw his knife. It struck with a thud into Goldersen’s spine; he floundered and then fell against the door.
The assassin strode forward as Goldersen lay twitching on the floor. He retrieved the goblet and filled it with wine then sipped with a surprising daintiness as he bent over the dying figure. He placed one gloved hand over Goldersen’s mouth, his strong fingers sealing the airway. Goldersen feebly scrabbled at the arm as the assassin looked into the fading light of his eyes.
“I know, I know. I don’t drink on the job. Yet it is festival night and the zenith of spring is upon us, the chill stroke of winter but a faded memory. No, don’t fret, kind sir, there is no dint in the armour of my legendary professionalism. For, to be fair, the job’s over. Please realise it was nothing personal. It was just business.”
A mist had begun to form in the street when, five minutes later, he emerged in a differing garb. Gone were the dark clothes and in their stead the brighter outfit of a circus man. He patted revellers on their backs, all smiles and laughs, entertaining passing girls with his dexterity and juggling.
Life was a charade indeed.
(c) Ross M Kitson 2012