17878265 (7 page)

Loric eyed him suspiciously. “How do you know my name?” he demanded.

The stranger shrugged, not at all put off by Loric’s gruff question. “I watch. I listen,” he answered. “I pick up a few things that way.”

“You’re an eavesdropper,” Loric grunted, annoyed to be in the man’s presence.

“Some would say that,” the man agreed. “Some would be as rude as to tell me I am nosy,”

he went on, reading Loric’s next response and speaking it before he had the chance. “I like to think I’m observant.”

“Call it what you will,” Loric shrugged. “You’re minding business that’s not your own.”

The stranger’s half-smile kindly disagreed with Loric. He withdrew a handful of silver and copper coins and piled them on the table for barmaids to see.

“So what’s your business in Taeglin?” Loric asked, watching the man’s nimble fingers

shuffle the clinking discs about on the flat surface before him. Fair-haired Jillian brought a pitcher to the table to refill their mugs, as if summoned by magic.

“That is my own,” the man said in a low voice.

Jillian frowned.

Loric was not sure whether the expression was for his question or the stranger’s reply. “Oh,”

Loric replied dumbly.

As the barmaid moved away, the stranger studied the sway of her hips. “So you’re a farm boy, huh?”

Loric nodded. “What of it?” he asked.

“The red stallion.... is it yours?” the stranger inquired.

Loric was uncomfortable talking to the inquisitive fellow opposite him. He made to down his drink and leave, but Barag was standing near the door. Loric would endure any conversation to avoid an encounter with the bully. He decided that no answer was best.

“The reason I asked,” the stranger told him, “is because I know many a knight that would give their shield arm for a fine piece of horseflesh like that.”

Loric poked his index finger toward the man and rumbled, “Leave my horse alone.”

The stranger raised his hands defensively and chuckled. “Relax, Loric. Your horse is safe.”

Loric rose to check on Sunset.

“He is right where you left him,” the stranger promised. “Sit down. I am harmless. I am just curious what a farm lad needs with such an animal. That’s all.”

“My father gave him to me,” Loric conceded. “If he’s not where I left him....”

“He is there,” the stranger assured him. “So you are Loric, your mother is Adie, which is likely short for Adelaide, and your father?”

“Give me your name first,” Loric demanded.

The stranger laughed as he replied, “Nyck.”

“Palen,” Loric answered, pleased with himself.

“Palen,” the stranger mused. “That name reminds me of a bold knight, descended from a long line of bold knights.”

He suddenly had Loric’s attention. The lad suddenly cast off all of his suspicion and distrust for the man. Visions of the sword in the barn returned to his mind. “Really?” he questioned. He drained his tankard and set it aside.

“I am sure you are already familiar with the story of King Donigan,” the stranger went on.

“Everyone knows the story of the Great King, Donigan, who united Beledon,” Loric assured the man proudly. “But what does that have to do with this knight that you speak of?”

The storyteller’s eye twitched. It was a subtle motion that seemed to trigger a deep grin.

“Indeed, everyone knows that King Donigan of Highland Home united Beledon. Aye, every man alive knows of his deal with the dragons for his mighty sword, the Sword of the Dragon’s Eye.

They also know that the dragon Faethlenkandur--curse his name!--tricked Great Donigan into dragon worship and human sacrifice. And, who has not heard of the tragedy that befell the Great King and his beloved Queen Riana of Landolstadt, when King Donigan made his war upon

Faethlenkandur and his vile kindred?” The man shook his head, answering, “No one. But I will gladly tell you of King Donigan’s two sons and their posterity, so you will know what this has to do with the bold knight in question.”

Loric interrupted, “I am familiar with King Lornigan and his line, but I did not know he had a brother. Surely you make this up.”

“Sit tight, while I tell you a tale of two princes,” the man reproved him mildly. “Then you will know the whole story--the truth that has been denied you.”

“Sorry,” Loric apologized. “I guess my Da never knew of it, or he surely would have told me.”

The stranger looked uncomfortable with Loric’s assessment. He signaled for two more

drinks and began his story, saying, “After Great Donigan united the land, from his own Highland Home in the north all the way to the Sorling Sea in the south, beautiful Queen Riana bore him a son. The couple named the child Lornigan after a mythical god worshipped across the

Shimmering Sea. But the War of Dragons selected its casualties from amongst both the peasantry and the nobility.”

“The War of Dragons?” questioned Loric.

Before he could ask whether that was the name of Donigan’s crusade against the dragons, the man across from him questioned incredulously, “Has your education been entirely neglected on the farm?” He raised his hand to forestall Loric’s reply and explained, “That was the name of King Donigan’s effort to exterminate the great dragons of the north, to drive them away from Beledon for all time.”

“Oh,” Loric answered dumbly. “That led to the dragon leader capturing and slaying King Donigan’s queen.”

“That is correct,” the stranger conceded, with a sad look dimming his face. “King Donigan slew Motkinildora, the Dragon-Queen. Evil Faethlenkandur sought retribution. He drew the king away from his castle, so he could capture Queen Riana. He bore her away to his lair, and during King Donigan’s rescue attempt, the dragon blew her to her death with wind from his wings.

Sorrow ruled over the monarch for a long time afterward. He vented his anger and rage by carving dragon hide throughout the Wyrm Mountains. It is said that he eventually came to feel empty and lonely, so he sought the comforting embrace of a new lover. That unknown peasant woman also brought forth a son of Donigan. He was the boy Logant.”

“Logant?” Loric asked.

“The most famous of knights,” the stranger assured him, as he toyed with his coins.

“How come I’ve never heard of him?” Loric inquired. He watched the man as he erected his tower of coins, with the fat coppers on the bottom.

“That is a fair question,” the man said, eyeing him strangely. The edge on his voice hinted at agitation. “Perhaps we’ll find the answer to that some other time,” he decided. For now, suffice it to say that Logant founded the Logantian Knights, which was the most famous order of knights to walk this land.” Loric raised his hand to object, but the stranger would hear none of it. “Let me finish the tale!” he snapped.

“All right,” Loric agreed, as Jillian stopped by to refill his tankard, and then ducked away in haste.

“Logant was King Donigan’s son and Prince Lornigan’s half-brother,” the stranger affirmed.

“Lornigan was five years Logant’s senior, but he never knew aught of his younger half-brother until the entire island was embroiled in the succession war that still divides Beledon to this day.”

“How did they come to know one another?” Loric asked.

“Listen, so you can learn,” was the stranger’s firm response. He went on to say, “King Donigan and Andokandazur the Black slew one another as the dragon flew the captured ruler over the Highlands en route to his lair. Ten-year-old Prince Lornigan was left behind to be king, until a regency-related squabble between Sir Bornan and Sir Sturgeon “Storm-Hand” escalated to full combat. Other power-hungry lords soon joined in, so that by the time Lornigan reached adulthood there was no diplomatic way to settle the conflict. Lornigan then pressed his honest right by might, like the others.”

“A terrible shame,” Loric remarked. “They were still fighting, even after they had forgotten what they had begun fighting for in the first place.”

The stranger agreed, as he finished building his second coin tower, “Indeed. Though,

perhaps they were fighting for their own hearts’ ambitions from the beginning.”

Loric sat in silence after the stranger’s grim explanation, allowing him to go on, “Now to conclude the tale. The dragons have dwindled, but there are still some few known to us. One of them, named Bakazandur, attacked Skytower Castle during the regency of Sir Sturgeon. The creature still lives there, where it lies upon the wealth of Beledon.”

“Luckily, King Lornigan was at Moonriver Castle during the dragon’s attack and occupation of Skytower. He went on to marry, have children and live to a respectable age before he was slain at the First Battle of Darbin’s Field. His eldest son was Lord Farnigan, who fathered Lord Farig. Farnigan refused the title of king, saying, ‘There will be no king in the land of Beledon until Skytower Castle is rebuilt. So the prophets have declared:
The stones of Skytower shall be
united once more, so also shall Beledon be restored. And the new ruler shall be seated upon his
throne: he who wields the fire of kings.
His line honors his wish to this day.”

“Of those who followed Farnigan and Farig you are probably well learned. They are

Lolderic, Loldigan, Malric, Modigan, Lantric, and Falric,” the stranger named them. “Each of those men was a great lord in his own right. Each man among them had a strategy in mind by which he could unite Beledon under his leadership once more, but every one of them failed in that aim. Now, Lord Falric’s son, Garrick, seeks the same prize his fathers before him sought.”

He continued, “During the reign of King Lornigan, Logant learned that he was also the son of Donigan, but the youngest, and therefore without truthful claim to the throne. He sought an audience with Lornigan and presented himself, saying, ‘Do not think me one who seeks your crown, lord, for I am but a commoner. Yet, the blood of your father flows rich in my veins.’ He fell to his knees and said, ‘I have come to commit myself to your service and to do all that I may to aid you, brother and king--if brother I may call thee.’ He remained prostrate before the king, awaiting his judgment.”

“At first, the elder son was angry and confused. However, when he commanded Logant to look at him, he could see that his claim was true. Logant’s features were so similar to his own that he saw his father’s face before him, only it was much younger. ‘Give me your sword,’ King Lornigan commanded, so Logant obeyed. He spoke again, citing, ‘In the name of the Temple, King Donigan, and His Queen, I knight thee Sir Logant. Rise, brother. Welcome home.’ Then he embraced his brother and took him into his counsel.”

“Sir Logant was grateful for Lornigan’s acceptance. He became the king’s champion, for his skills in combat were unmatched by any man. He too married, and had sons and daughters. His line is as follows: Logandar, Logornigan, Ganigan, Galendrigan, Palric, Galric, Palendrigan, and Galendar. Sir Palendar was the last. He disappeared while he was on a quest of great importance, leaving the High Seat of Belgandost vacant.”

“Sir Palendar?” Loric questioned. He knew nothing of Logantian rule in Belgandost.

Civilized men had abandoned the land long ago. Loric thought of Lord Garrick, who had authority over Taeglin and its surrounding townships and inquired, “The High Seat of

Belgandost?”

“Sir Palendar was the greatest of the Logantian Knights,” the stranger answered Loric’s first question with a wink. In answer to his second query, “Belgandost was the land belonging to those knights, who once governed the People of Taeglin. I told you your father’s name reminded me of a great knight.”

Loric stared at a black knot in the table’s surface, as if the deep dark swirl of wood grains could help him sort out all that he had learned. There were no answers to help him understand why his father had the gear of a noble knight hidden beneath a trapdoor in the barn. He garnered no new insights as to why his father shared a name with a Logantian Knight, who had

disappeared. The stranger had shaken pieces of a puzzle into a portrait of his father that before now he never could have imagined. Palen’s admission of participating in many battles, his decision to purchase Sunset and his collection of armor and weapons all pointed to one conclusion: Palen and Sir Palendar were the same man.

Loric wanted to know more. There were rough edges to file off, even as the pieces began to form a new picture of Palen, the bold knight. There were details that were incomplete, or somehow failed to fit together. If his father was Sir Palendar, why had he left his seat of authority? Why had he come to Taeglin, to build a farm and plow fields?

“What was the knight’s quest?” Loric demanded, desperate to learn all that he could of these matters. When no answer came to him, he looked across the table.

The stranger was gone. He had left three silver and copper towers to cover the cost of drinks, but like Sir Palendar, he had disappeared, leaving Loric to sip his king’s tonic and wonder about the trapdoor and the stranger.

Chapter Three

The Bully and the Knightly Log

Loric awoke to a cold splash. The sun was bright, even in the shadows where he lay, which was on the floor of the barn. His father was stern of face as he stood over him with wooden bucket in hand. Loric was trying to remember how he had come to be there when Palen informed him, “I’ve begun working the lower field. Get moving, before I mistake you for a drunken lout.”

Loric knew that face, that tone. It was going to be a hard day. He downgraded his groan to a wince as he rolled onto his side and set his recollections of last night aside in favor of meeting his father’s present demand.

Palen spoke what Loric already knew, saying, “Sort yourself out and meet me at the plow, boy. I’ll show you how to work off your irresponsibility.” He turned and strode away, his agitation evident in every twitch of his stride.

Loric esteemed that his father would discuss his overnight foray later, while he listened. He was looking forward to that about as eagerly as he was his coming workday. His head was throbbing, and he was stiff from cold. In-between the pounding beats inside his skull, images of the previous night played themselves out.
He saw the trapdoor and the secret beneath it....