Shards of a Broken Crown (17 page)

“Where’s
your camp?”

“A few
miles ahead.” Erik waved good-bye to Akee, and turned his horse
around as Jimmy urged his back to a walk. Erik moved his hand in a
half-circle and said, “We have control of all the woods for
miles on each side of the highway.”

“You
haven’t had a lot of problems in the last few weeks, have you?”

“No,
actually. A few bandits, some deserters, and a couple of run-ins with
some mercenaries from our neighbors to the south, but we’ve
seen little of Fadawah’s forces for a while.”

“Duko’s
looking to cut a deal with Patrick.”

“He’s
willing to turn coat?” asked Erik. Erik had served two tours
across the sea and was familiar with the Novindus mercenaries’
tradition of serving the highest bidder. The dependence on such
forces was one of the reasons, Erik was convinced, that no one had
successfully built an empire down there, until the Emerald Queen had
started her conquests.

“Not
exactly,” said Jimmy, filling in Erik on Duko’s proposal.

Erik whistled.
“I don’t think Patrick is going to be pleased with this
one. From what Grey lock’s told me and what I saw before I left
Darkmoor, the Prince is spoiling for a fight, Kesh, invaders, he
doesn’t care who.”

Jimmy said,
“I’ll leave it to my father and Owen to convince him.
It’s too good a turn of the cards for him to not agree. He
saves thousands of lives and accelerates the retaking of the Western
Realm by a year if he agrees.”

Erik said
nothing, but considering what he had seen of the hot-tempered young
Prince, he was not convinced Patrick would see it that way.

Dash regarded
the boots, trousers, and jacket that had been secured for him by the
Mockers. They were serviceable, but nothing remotely as good as the
ones taken from him by his captors.

Lysle Riggers,
the Upright Man, looked at him as he rose to leave. “Not yet,
boy.” The old man waved away Trina and the others of his
company in the room, leaving Dash alone with his great-uncle. When
the door was shut behind Trina, the old man said, “You must
understand something. I don’t think you’re going to get
your amnesty for us, so this conversation may have no meaning. If you
do not, shortly I will die. Healing priests can only do so much, and
I am an old man, anyway. Another will come forward to take the office
I hold. Who he will be I cannot know, though I have a couple of
guesses. John Tuppin might take the office—he’s strong
and shrewd and many are afraid of him. Trina might, if she’s
smart and silent, which she is, and can keep behind the scenes. But
whoever it is, the agreements you and I reach will not be binding
upon him. As I said, if you can’t get the Prince to agree to
giving us pardon for past crimes, it doesn’t matter.

“But if
you return with promises, they had best be kept, for if you are
forsworn to the Mockers, no matter how high you rise, where you live,
or what great office comes to you, eventually one of our brotherhood
will find you in the night and your life will end. Do you
understand?”

Dash said, “I
understand.”

“Know this
as well, Dashel Jamison: once you step through that door you have
taken blood oath not, by word or deed, to betray what you have seen
here, nor may you bear witness against any who you’ve met. It
is an oath made by silence, for you may not live to leave Mother’s
without such oath.”

Dash didn’t
like being threatened, but he had heard enough stories about the
Mockers from his grandfather to have no doubt that what Lysle was
saying was not an idle threat. Dash said, “I know the rules as
well as anyone born here.”

“No doubt
you do. My younger brother struck me as being a man with little
modesty. I suspect you know as much about the workings of the Mockers
as my own men.” The Upright Man waved a bony scarred hand at
Dash. “Before he came to my little shop, years ago, to tell me
how the land lay and how I would be required to conduct the business
of the Mockers, I would have wagered our ways and secrets were
inviolate. In moments I learned that Jimmy the Hand had been watching
us as we had been watching him, more, he had others watch us while he
was not about. In the end, he was a far better Duke than I was leader
of the Mockers.”

Dash shrugged.
“If Patrick does as I request, it all ends, anyway.”

The old man
laughed. ‘ “Think you that a pardon will take this ragged
brotherhood of ours and set our feet upon the straight and narrow
path? Within minutes of such pardon some of our more reckless youth
will be cutting purses in the market square or breaking into
warehouse cellars, young Dash. The dodgy path is as much a part of
who we are as it is a choice in life.

“Some,
like your grandfather, find an escape, a way to better themselves,
but most are confined to Mother’s and the sewers of the city,
the rooftops—the Thieves’ Highway—and a short life
ending with a hangman’s rope. It is as much a prison as the one
in the basement of the palace, this life, for there is little chance
of escape.”

Dash shrugged.
“At least everyone, you, Trina, the rest, will have a choice.
Most men can’t ask more than that.”

The old man
laughed his dry laugh. “You’re wise beyond your years,
Dash, if you really understand that and are not merely mouthing words
heard at the knee of another. Now go.”

Outside Dash
found his three companions from the work gang waiting. Gustaf and
Talwin were together, while Reese stood next to some Mockers. “You
coming with me?” asked Dash.

Reese shook his
head. “Not me. I was a Mocker before they caught me, and these
are my people. This is my home.”

Dash nodded.
Looking at the other two, he said, “You?”

Gustaf said,
“I’m a swordsman without a sword. I need a job. You
hiring?”

Dash smiled.
“Yes, I’ll hire you.”

Talwin said, “I
just want to get out of the city.”

“Then it’s
the three of us.”

Trina came and
stood before Dash. “Well, Puppy, I’ll show you back to
the safest way out. Wait until nightfall, then get out of the outer
camps. Rumors are starting to circulate that the Prince’s army
is getting close and men are sleeping close to their swords. There
aren’t many friends to be found in a place like that.”

Dash nodded and
asked, “Weapons?”

“We have
some for you,” said the heavy set man who had been his first
captor, the man Dash knew as John Tuppin. “We’ll give
them to you just before you leave.”

Dash nodded.
“Then let’s be off.”

He glanced over
his shoulder at the closed door, behind which sat the old man who
claimed one of the most mysterious names in the history of Krondor,
the Upright Man. Dash wondered if he’d ever see the old man
again.

They set off in
the gloom.

Pug sat quietly
considering the choices that were rapidly approaching. Miranda
watched him.

After a few
moments, he turned his attention from whatever image hung in the air
outside his window and said, “What?”

She laughed.
“You were millions of miles away, weren’t you?”

He smiled at
her. “Not really. Just a few hundred. But I was years away.”

“What were
you thinking of?”

“My past,
and my future.”

“Our
future, you mean.”

He shook his
head. ‘ “There are still some choices left to me alone.”

She rose up from
her seat next to the fireplace. A small fire, more for comfort than
warmth, which had been allowed to burn down to coals, smoked there.
She glanced at it, and came to stand before her husband. She settled
easily into his lap and said, “Tell me.”

“Gathis’s
choice. The Gods’ choice, really.”

“Have you
decided what you must do?”

He nodded. “I
think for me there is only one choice.”

After a moment
of silence, she said, “Care to share it with me?”

He laughed,
kissing her on the neck. She squealed appreciatively, then playfully
pushed herself away. “You’ll not divert me that easily.
What are you thinking?”

Pug smiled.
“When I lay in Death’s Hall, I was given the choice to
become your father’s heir.”

At mention of
Macros the Black, Miranda frowned. She had never had a close
relationship with her father, and the primary reason for that had
been his association with great powers. His role as human surrogate
for Sarig, the lost God of Magic, had reduced his role in her life to
a scant decade out of nearly two hundred years she had lived so far.

Pug continued.
“I can’t be Sarig’s agent on Midkemia. That’s
not my role.”

“From what
you told me, your other choices weren’t that appealing.”

Pug looked
worried. “I didn’t die, so that narrows my choice down to
one: I must live and watch destruction and death and lose that which
is most dear to me.”

She returned to
his lap, and said, “That has already been fulfilled. Your
daughter and son were taken from you, weren’t they?”

Pug nodded, and
she could see the echoes of pain still not dulled within his eyes.
“But I fear there is more to lose.”

She settled into
his arms, resting her head on his shoulder. “There is always
the potential for loss, my love. Until we are at last dead, we can
lose. That is the irony of life. Nothing is forever.”

Pug said, “I
am almost a hundred years old, yet I feel like such a child.”

Miranda laughed
and held him close. “We are children, my love, and I’m
twice your age. Compared to the Gods we are infants, just learning
our first steps.”

“But
infants have teachers.”

“You had
teachers,” she said. “So did I.”

“I could
use one now, I think.”

Miranda said, “I
shall teach you.”

Pug looked at
her. “You will?”

She kissed him.
“And you shall teach me. And we shall teach your students on my
father’s island, and they shall teach us. We have books yet to
be read and understood, and we have the Hall of Worlds, through which
we can reach out to wisdom undreamed of on this tiny orb. And we have
ages to do it.”

Pug sighed. “You
make me feel as if there’s hope.”

Miranda said,
“There is always hope.”

There came a
knock at the door and Miranda stood, allowing Pug to rise to answer
the door. Outside stood a royal page, and he said, “My lord,
the Prince requests your presence at once.”

Pug glanced at
Miranda, who shrugged in curiosity but said nothing. He nodded to
her, and followed the page.

He wended his
way through Castle Darkmoor, until he came to the old Baron’s
quarters, being used presently by Prince Patrick. The page opened the
door and stepped aside, allowing Pug to enter.

Patrick looked
up from old Baron Otto’s desk and said, “Magician, we
have a problem I hope you can deal with.”

“What may
that be, Your Highness?”

Patrick held up
a rolled-up parchment. “A report in from the North. The Saaur
have decided to put in an appearance.”

“From the
North?” Pug looked puzzled. When he had persuaded the Saaur to
quit the field in the final battle for Darkmoor, their leader, the
Sha-shahan, had vowed a blood price would be extracted for the wrongs
done the Saaur. But to the North lay the armies of Fadawah, the most
likely object of that vengeance. How could the Saaur have returned to
their old allies after withdrawing? Pug said, “Where in the
North, Highness?”

“The
northeast! They’ve wintered north of us, between the mountains
and the woodlands of the Dimwood. They’ve occupied the southern
end of the Thunderhell Steppes, and now they’ve struck
southward.”

“Southward!”
Pug echoed, alarm in his voice. “They’ve attacked us?”

Patrick threw
down the parchment. “Read about it. They overran a detachment
held in reserve in the foothills, to reinforce whichever gap Fadawah
might attempt to breach along Nightmare Ridge. They slaughtered every
man in the company.”

“Are they
continuing to move?”

“No,”
said Patrick. “That’s the good news in this. They seem
content to butcher three hundred of my soldiers, then withdraw. They
left us a warning, though.”

“What is
that?”

“They left
three hundred stakes in the ground. Atop each was a man’s head.
It’s a clear challenge.”

“No,
Highness,” corrected Pug. “It’s not a challenge.
It’s a warning.”

“A warning
to whom?” Patrick said, his anger barely held in check.

“To
anyone. To us, to Fadawah, to the Brotherhood of the Dark Path, any
creature of intelligence who is near enough to see the skulls. Jatuk
is telling us that the Saaur are claiming the Thunderhell Steppes for
themselves and for us to stay out.”

Patrick
considered it and said, “Save nomads, weapons runners, and
outlaws, no one lives there I would care to name Citizen of the
Kingdom, but it’s still our Realm. I will be damned to the
lower hells before I allow an army of aliens to overrun my troops and
declare themselves an independent nation within our borders.”

“What
would you have of me, Highness?”

“In the
morning I’m sending a detachment of soldiers northward. I would
appreciate it if you’d accompany them. You were the one to get
the Saaur out of the war. If this Jatuk wants to turn his anger
against Fadawah, I’ll withdraw my soldiers along the northern
ridge and even give him supplies to go assault Fadawah in Yabon. But
I can’t have this bloody business go unchallenged.”

“What
would you have me tell them?”

“Tell them
they must cease this hostility against us, and withdraw from our
lands.”

“To where,
Highness?”

Patrick said, “I
don’t care where. They can have safe conduct to the coast, and
they can swim home for all I care, but I won’t have them
telling me to stay out of any part of my own Principality! There’s
been too damn much of that lately!” Patrick’s voice was
rising and Pug could tell anger was getting the best of him.