Only the Worthy (24 page)

Father
, he thought,
if I am your son, answer me. Be with me. Allow me to be King, as you were.
Allow me to instill justice once again.

Royce took a
deep breath, and he suddenly pulled the sword back with all his might.

A sound rose
through the air that stunned even him. It was the sound of sword slicing
through rock, a sound like a great earthquake, as though the entire world were
being reborn. Royce looked out in shock and found himself releasing the sword
from the rock, raising it high in the air for all to see, light and free above
his head.

There came an
audible gasp as the entire room of people stood there, frozen, staring.

Finally, the
silence was shattered.

“We have our
King!” Lord Jakoben called out.

“We have our
King!” the peasants in the room repeated, jubilant.

King
.

Royce’s world
was spinning. The word reverberated through his very soul.

As he held the
sword above him, high in his hand, it felt right. More right than anything he
had ever felt in his entire life. He was not just a boy anymore.

He was King.

Royce expected
to hear the entire room shout out in approval, to see the nobles join in, to
accept him as King.

But instead, he
looked upon their faces and saw them solemn, grave. Suddenly, the King nodded
to his men.

There followed a
series of confusing events, happening too quickly, that Royce tried to make
sense of: the sound of doors being barred; of hundreds of men panicking; of
peasants running; and then, finally, of swords being drawn.

Royce scanned
the room, still in a daze, trying to understand what was happening all around
him. Before he could determine how to react, he saw from the corner of his eye
a dozen knights race forward—and stab his people in the back.

The awful
shrieks of his people dying cut through the air, and Royce realized in one
horrible moment what was happening. It was an ambush. The King had lied. He had
never meant to keep his word at all.

Royce felt
consumed by a sudden rage. He lunged forward, the Sword of Might leading him,
and swung it. It was like wielding air, so light in his hand. And its power was
unbelievable: it cut through five knights at once, right through their armor,
slicing them in half.

Royce spun and
swung again and cut through five more. It was a weapon of magic. A weapon that,
now that it was finally released, cried out for blood.

Royce went to
spin again, but suddenly felt the weight of dozens of men on his back, pouncing
on him from behind. Royce felt himself shoved down to the Aleutian Stone, his
faced smashed into the stone, and before he could react, he felt the sword
stripped from him, shackles placed on his wrists.

And the last
thing he saw, before his world went black, was the Sword of Might, stripped
from his hand, skidding across the cobblestone with a hollow, reverberating
thud, the sound, as it echoed, like a dagger in his heart.

Coming Soon:

BOOK #2 IN THE
WAY OF STEEL

In
the meantime please
enjoy the first chapter of A
QUEST OF HEROES, book #1 in my 17 book series, THE SORCERER’S RING, a
free download on Amazon
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A QUEST OF HEROES

(Book #1 in the
Sorcerer's Ring)

AMAZON.COM

AMAZON.CO.UK

The boy stood on
the highest knoll of the low country in the Western Kingdom of the Ring,
looking north, watching the first of the rising suns. As far as he could see
stretched rolling green hills, dipping and rising like camel humps in a series
of valleys and peaks. The burnt-orange rays of the first sun lingered in the morning
mist, making them sparkle, lending the light a magic that matched the boy’s
mood. He rarely woke this early or ventured this far from home—and never
ascended this high—knowing it would incur his father’s wrath. But on this day,
he didn’t care. On this day, he disregarded the million rules and chores that
had oppressed him for his fourteen years. For this day was different. It was
the day his destiny had arrived.

The boy,
Thorgrin of the Western Kingdom of the Southern Province of the clan
McLeod—known to all he liked simply as Thor—the youngest of four boys, the
least favorite of his father, had stayed awake all night in anticipation of
this day. He had tossed and turned, bleary-eyed, waiting,
willing
the
first sun to rise. For a day like this arrived only once every several years,
and if he missed it, he would be stuck in this village, doomed to tend his
father’s flock the rest of his days. That was a thought he could not bear.

Conscription
Day. It was the one day the King’s Army canvassed the provinces and hand-picked
volunteers for the King’s Legion. As long as he had lived, Thor had dreamt of
nothing else. For him, life meant one thing: joining the Silver, the King’s
elite force of knights, bedecked in the finest armor and the choicest arms
anywhere in the two kingdoms. And one could not enter the Silver without first
joining the Legion, the company of squires ranging from fourteen to nineteen
years of age. And if one was not the son of a noble, or of a famed warrior,
there was no other way to join the Legion.

Conscription Day
was the only exception, that rare event every few years when the Legion ran low
and the King’s men scoured the land in search of new recruits. Everyone knew
that few commoners were chosen—and that even fewer would actually make the
Legion.

Thor studied the
horizon intently, looking for any sign of motion. The Silver, he knew, would
have to take this, the only road into his village, and he wanted to be the
first to spot them. His flock of sheep protested all around him, rising up in a
chorus of annoying grunts and urging him to bring them back down the mountain,
where the grazing was choicer. He tried to block out the noise, and the stench.
He had to concentrate.

What had made
all of this bearable, all these years of tending flocks, of being his father’s
lackey, his older brothers’ lackey, the one cared for least and burdened most,
was the idea that one day he would leave this place. One day, when the Silver
came, he would surprise all those who had underestimated him and be selected.
In one swift motion, he would ascend their carriage and say goodbye to all of
this.

Thor’s father,
of course, had never considered him seriously as a candidate for the Legion—in
fact, he had never considered him as a candidate for anything. Instead, his father
devoted his love and attention to Thor’s three older brothers. The oldest was
nineteen and the others but a year behind each other, leaving Thor a good three
years younger than any of them. Perhaps because they were closer in age, or
perhaps because they looked alike and looked nothing like Thor, the three of
them stuck together, barely acknowledging Thor’s existence.

Worse, they were
taller and broader and stronger than he, and Thor, who knew he was not short,
nonetheless felt small beside them, felt his muscular legs frail compared to
their barrels of oak. His father made no move to rectify any of this—and in
fact seemed to relish it—leaving Thor to attend the sheep and sharpen weapons
while his brothers were left to train. It was never spoken, but always
understood, that Thor would spend his life in the wings, be forced to watch his
brothers achieve great things. His destiny, if his father and brothers had
their way, would be to stay here, swallowed by this village, and give his
family the support they demanded.

Worse still was
that Thor sensed his brothers, paradoxically, were threatened by him, maybe
even hated him. Thor could see it in their every glance, their every gesture.
He didn’t understand how, but he aroused something, like fear, or jealousy, in
them. Perhaps it was because he was different from them, didn’t look like them
or speak with their mannerisms; he didn’t even dress like them, his father
reserving the best—the purple and scarlet robes, the gilded weapons—for his
brothers, while Thor was left wearing the coarsest of rags.

Nonetheless,
Thor made the best of what he had, finding a way to make his clothes fit, tying
the frock with a sash around his waist, and, now that summer was here, cutting
off the sleeves to allow his toned arms to be caressed by the breezes. His
shirt was matched by coarse linen pants—his only pair—and boots made of the
poorest leather, laced up his shins. They were hardly the leather of his
brothers’ shoes, but he made them work. His was the typical uniform of a herder.

But he hardly
had the typical demeanor. Thor stood tall and lean, with a proud jaw, noble
chin, high cheekbones, and gray eyes, looking like a displaced warrior. His
straight, brown hair fell back in waves on his head, just past his ears, and
behind the locks, his eyes glistened like minnows in the light.

Thor’s brothers
would be allowed to sleep in this morning, given a hearty meal, and sent off
for the Selection with the finest weapons and his father’s blessing—while he
would not even be allowed to attend. He had tried to raise the issue with his
father once. It had not gone well. His father had summarily ended the
conversation, and he had not tried again. It just wasn’t fair.

Thor was
determined to reject the fate his father had planned for him. At the first sign
of the royal caravan, he would race back to the house, confront his father,
and, like it or not, make himself known to the King’s men. He would stand for
selection with the others. His father could not stop him. He felt a knot in his
stomach at the thought of it.

The first sun
rose higher, and when the second sun, mint green, began to rise, adding a layer
of light to the purple sky, Thor spotted them.

He stood
upright, hairs on end, electrified. There, on the horizon, came the faintest
outline of a horse-drawn carriage, its wheels kicking dust into the sky. His
heart beat faster as another came into view; then another. Even from here the
golden carriages gleamed in the suns, like silver-backed fish leaping from the
water.

By the time he
counted twelve of them, he could wait no longer. Heart pounding in his chest,
forgetting his flock for the first time in his life, Thor turned and stumbled
down the hill, determined to stop at nothing until he made himself known.

*

Thor barely
paused to catch his breath as he sped down the hills, through the trees,
scratched by branches and not caring. He reached a clearing and saw his village
spread out below: a sleepy country town packed with one-story, white clay homes
with thatched roofs. There were but several dozen families amongst them. Smoke
rose from chimneys as most were up early preparing their morning meal. It was
an idyllic place, just far enough—a full day’s ride—from King’s Court to deter
passersby. Just another farming village on the edge of the Ring, another cog in
the wheel of the Western Kingdom.

Thor burst down
the final stretch, into the village square, kicking up dirt as he went.
Chickens and dogs ran out of his way, and an old woman, squatting outside her
home before a cauldron of bubbling water, hissed at him.

“Slow down,
boy!” she screeched as he raced past, stirring dust into her fire.

But Thor would
not slow—not for her, not for anybody. He turned down one side street, then
another, twisting and turning the way he knew by heart, until he reached home.

It was a small,
nondescript dwelling like all the others, with its white clay walls and
angular, thatched roof. Like most, its single room was divided, his father
sleeping on one side and his three brothers on the other; unlike most, it had a
small chicken coop in the back, and it was here that Thor was exiled to sleep.
At first he’d bunked with his brothers; but over time they had grown bigger and
meaner and more exclusive, and made a show of not leaving him room. Thor had
been hurt, but now he relished his own space, preferring to be away from their
presence. It just confirmed for him that he was the exile in his family that he
already knew he was.

Thor ran to his
front door and burst through it without stopping.

“Father!” he
yelled, gasping for breath. “The Silver! They’re coming!”

His father and
three brothers sat hunched over the breakfast table, already dressed in their
finest. At his words they jumped up and darted past him, bumping his shoulders
as they ran out of the house and into the road.

Thor followed
them out, and they all stood watching the horizon.

“I see no one,”
Drake, the oldest, answered in his deep voice. With the broadest shoulders,
hair cropped short like his brothers’, brown eyes, and thin, disapproving lips,
he scowled down at Thor, as usual.

“Nor do I,”
echoed Dross, just a year below Drake, always taking his side.

“They’re
coming!” Thor shot back. “I swear!”

His father
turned to him and grabbed his shoulders sternly.

“And how would
you know?” he demanded.

“I saw them.”

“How? From
where?”

Thor hesitated;
his father had him. He of course knew the only place Thor could have spotted
them was from the top of that knoll. Now Thor was unsure how to respond.

“I…climbed the
knoll—”

“With the flock?
You know they are not to go that far.”

“But today was
different. I had to see.”

His father
glowered down.

“Go inside at
once and fetch your brothers’ swords and polish their scabbards, so they look
their best before the King’s men arrive.”

His father, done
with him, turned back to his brothers, who all stood in the road looking out.

“Do you think
they’ll choose us?” asked Durs, the youngest of the three, a full three years
ahead of Thor.

“They’d be
foolish not to,” his father said. “They are short on men this year. It has been
a slim cropping—or else they wouldn’t bother coming. Just stand straight, the
three of you, keep your chins up and chests out. Do not look them directly in
the eye, but do not look away, either. Be strong and confident. Show no
weakness. If you want to be in the King’s Legion, you must act as if you’re
already in it.”

“Yes, Father,”
his three boys answered at once, getting into position.

He turned and
glared back at Thor.

“What are you
still doing there?” he asked. “Get inside!”

Thor stood
there, torn. He didn’t want to disobey his father, but he had to speak with
him. His heart pounded as he debated. He decided it would be best to obey, to
bring the swords, and then confront his father. Disobeying outright wouldn’t
help.

Thor raced into
the house, out through the back and to the weapons shed. He found his brothers’
three swords, objects of beauty all of them, crowned with the finest silver
hilts, precious gifts for which his father had toiled years. He grabbed all
three, surprised as always at their weight, and ran back through the house with
them.

He sprinted to
his brothers, handed each a sword, then turned to his father.

“What, no
polish?” Drake said.

His father
turned to him disapprovingly, but before he could say anything, Thor spoke up.

“Father, please.
I need to speak with you!”

“I told you to
polish—”

“
Please
,
Father!”

His father
glared back, debating. He must have seen the seriousness on Thor’s face,
because finally, he said, “Well?”

“I want to be
considered. With the others. For the Legion.”

His brothers’
laughter rose up behind him, making his face burn red.

But his father
did not laugh; on the contrary, his scowl deepened.

“Do you?” he
asked.

Thor nodded back
vigorously.

“I’m fourteen.
I’m eligible.”

“The cutoff is
fourteen,” Drake said disparagingly, over his shoulder. “If they took you,
you’d be the youngest. Do you think they’d choose you over someone like me,
five years your elder?”

“You are
insolent,” Durs said. “You always have been.”

Thor turned to
them. “I’m not asking you,” he said.

He turned back
to his father, who still frowned.

“Father,
please,” he said. “Allow me a chance. That’s all I ask. I know I’m young, but I
will prove myself, over time.”

His father shook
his head.