Shards of a Broken Crown (67 page)

The General
said, “If you think that display outside the gate will turn my
attention—”

A guard ran in
and said, “Highness, fighting has erupted!”

The General
said, “I am under a flag of truce!”

Patrick asked
the guard, “Where is the fighting?”

“Outside
the wall! It appears as if cavalry from both the north and south has
attacked the Keshians.”

Patrick said,
“General, those are units not presently under my command. They
are obviously riding to relieve Krondor and do not know of the truce.
You are free to rejoin your men.”

The General
bowed and turned to leave, but Pug said, “No!”

“What?”
asked both the Prince and the General simultaneously.

Pug said, “This
will end now!”

He vanished from
sight.

Nakor, who had
been standing in the corner near Miranda, said, “For a tired
man he manages to get around, doesn’t he?”

“Yes, he
does,” Miranda agreed with a faint smile.

Pug appeared
over the heart of the battlefield and saw that baggage wagons were
afire at the rear of the Keshian position and that a company of horse
was attacking along the coast road from the north, catching the
Keshians between two attacking columns.

Pug hovered a
hundred feet above the battle and clapped his hands together, and a
peal of thunder struck those below, knocking some of the riders
directly underneath him out of their saddles.

Men looked up
and saw a man floating in the air, and from that man a brilliant
light erupted, a golden glow that was as bright as the sun. His voice
carried to every man as if he were standing next to them: “This
ends now!”

With a wave of
his hand he sent a force through the air, a ripple which visibly
distorted the air. The wave hit horses and knocked them down,
throwing more men to the ground.

Men turned and
ran.

Jimmy sat firm
on a bucking, frantic horse, trying to bring the animal under
control. After two more kicks, the animal set out at a run, and Jimmy
let it, turning it and then bringing it to a halt. He turned the
animal around and saw more animals running in every direction as
Keshians raced back toward their burning wagons.

Then he glanced
up to where Pug hung in the air and again came Pug’s voice:
“This ends now.”

Then Pug
vanished.

Nakor said,
“Well, at least you got them to stop fighting for a while.”
The three of them sat in an abandoned room in the palace, after the
Prince had retired and the Keshian General returned to his army.

“I will
get them to stop for good,” said Pug.

“Or what?”
asked Miranda.

Pug said, “I’m
sick of killing. I’m sick of destruction. But more than
anything, I’m sick of the mindless stupidity I see on every
side of me.” Pug thought of the losses to war he had endured,
from his childhood friend Roland and Lord Borric to Owen Greylock, a
man he had not known well, but one whom he had found himself liking
from their winter together at Darkmoor. “Too many good men. And
too many innocents. It can’t go on. If I have to . . . I don’t
know, put up a wall between both armies, I’ll do it.”

Nakor said,
“You’ll think of something. When the Prince and the
General have time to calm down, you can tell them what you want.”

“When are
you meeting again?” asked Miranda.

“Tomorrow
at noon.”

“Good,”
said Nakor. “That gives me time to see if what I think has
happened has happened.”

“You’re
being cryptic again,” said Miranda.

Nakor smiled.
“Come along and see. We’ll get something to eat.”

He led them out
of the room, then out of the palace, past guards who stood an uneasy
watch knowing they might have to return to the walls and a terrible
fight at a moment’s notice.

As they left the
palace, they saw horsemen riding into the marshaling yard through the
southern gate. At their head Pug saw his other great-grandson and
waved.

Jimmy rode over
and said, “I saw that display, Pug.” He grinned and Pug’s
heart squeezed slightly when for a second he saw Gamina’s smile
echoed in it. “You saved a lot of my men’s lives. Thank
you.”

Pug said, “I’m
pleased you were among those who benefited.”

“Is Dash .
. . ?”

“He’s
inside, alive, and until Patrick regains his strength, in command of
the city.”

Jimmy laughed.
“Somehow I don’t think he enjoys that very much.”

“Go see
him,” said Pug. “We’re going to Nakor’s
temple and will be back in the morning. We have a general meeting at
noon to end this nonsense.”

Jimmy said, “I
will be more than pleased to see that. Duko’s a marvel, and
he’s managed to keep the South under control, despite this
Keshian adventure, but we’re sorely tested along both borders,
and I haven’t any idea how things go in the North.”

“That war
is finished, too.”

Jimmy said, “I
am relieved to hear that, Greatgrandfather. I will see you in the
morning.” Nakor said, “Let’s go. I want to see
what’s happened.”

They hurried
through a city cautiously returning to normal activities as people
ventured out of their houses. With so few people about, they reached
the Temple Quarter of the city quickly.

No one was
visible outside the tent, but once they stepped through, they saw a
crowd sitting on the floor. In the center of the room the woman Aleta
sat on the floor, rather than floating in the air, and the light
about her was gone. So was the ill-aspected darkness which had
hovered in the air beneath her.

Dominic hurried
over and said, “Nakor! I am glad to see you.”

“When did
this happen?” asked Nakor.

“A few
hours ago. One moment she was floating in the air, and the next the
blackness below her vanished, as if it had been sucked down through a
hole, and she gently floated back to the ground, opened her eyes, and
began speaking.”

Pug and the
others turned their attention to what the woman was saying, and
instantly Nakor said, “Her voice, it’s different.”

Pug had no
knowledge of what the young woman had sounded like before, but he
knew it could be nothing like what he heard now, for her voice was
magical. It was soft, and yet easy to hear if one but took a moment
to listen: a musical voice.

“What’s
she saying?” asked Miranda.

“She’s
been talking about the nature of good since she awoke,” said
Dominic. He looked at Nakor. “When you first began this temple,
and when you told us what you would do, I was skeptical, but knew we
had to try. But what we see before us now is absolute proof the power
of Ishap needed to be shared with the Order of Arch-Indar, for there,
before us, sits a living Avatar of the Goddess.”

Nakor laughed.
“Nothing so grand as that. Come.” He led them through the
seated crowd and came to stand before the young woman. She ignored
him and continued talking.

Nakor knelt and
looked into her eyes. “Is she repeating herself?” he
asked.

Dominic said,
“Why, yes, I believe so.”

“Has
anyone written down what she’s said?”

Sho Pi was
sitting to one side and said, “I have had two acolytes
recording her words, Master Nakor. This is the beginning of her third
iteration of the same lesson she taught.”

“Good,
because I’ll bet she’s getting hungry and tired.”
He put his hand on her shoulder and she faltered in her speech.

She blinked and
her eyes seemed to change focus, and she looked at Nakor and said,
“What?” Her voice was different, what one might expect of
a mortal woman of her age, without the magic that had made it
soothing and wonderful a moment earlier.

“You’ve
been asleep,” said Nakor. “Why don’t you get
something to eat? We’ll talk later.”

The girl got up
and said, “Oh, I’m stiff. I must have been sitting like
that a while.”

Nakor said, “A
couple of weeks, actually.”

“Weeks!”
Aleta said. “You can’t be serious.”

“I’ll
explain everything to you later. Now go get some food and then a long
nap.”

After she left,
Dominic said, “If she’s not an avatar, what is she?”

Nakor grinned.
“She is a dream.” He looked at Pug and Miranda, and said,
“A wonderful dream.”

Miranda said,
“But Nakor, she’s still here. Zaltais is gone.”

Nakor nodded.
“He was a thing of the mind from that other world, projected
into this. Aleta is a normal woman, but something reached across
worlds to touch her and used her to hold back that blackness.”

“What was
that blackness?” asked Dominic.

“A very
bad dream. I’ll explain over dinner. Let’s find something
to eat.”

Dominic said,
“Very well. We have food in the kitchen.”

As they were
walking, Nakor said, “By the way, we have to change a few
things around here.”

“What?”
asked Dominic.

“To begin
with, you must notify the Ishapians you are no longer a member of
their order.”

“What?”

Nakor put his
arm around Dominic’s shoulder and said, “You look very
young, but I know you’re an old man like me, Dominic. Pug told
me the story of the time you and he went to the Tsurani homeworld. I
know you’ve seen lots of things.

“Sho Pi
over there is a perfect choice to teach the young monks how to be
monks, but you are the one who must teach Aleta.”

“Teach her
what?” asked Dominic.

“How to be
High Priestess of the Order of Arch-Indar, of course.”

“High
Priestess? That girl?”

“That
girl?”
repeated Nakor. “She was an Avatar of the
Goddess a moment ago, wasn’t she?”

Miranda laughed,
and Pug put his arm around her shoulders. It was the first time in a
long while he had felt like laughing.

Erik said, “We
can only assume Subai got through to the magician. By all reports
they simply stopped fighting everywhere about the time all the
corpses fell over.”

Earl Richard
said, “Thank the Gods for that.”

“I wish we
still had cavalry,” Erik said reflectively. “I have a
hunch we could get men up to Ylith without much trouble.”

“Well,
order up a unit on foot and see how far they get.”

Erik smiled. “I
already have. And I’m sending Akee and his Hadati through the
hills toward Yabon.”

Richard said,
“Do you think we’ll ever know what happened, truly?”

Erik shook his
head. “Probably not. I’ve been in battles where I still
don’t know what happened. We’ll probably read more
reports on this fight than we want to, and I’ll write a few of
them myself, but truth to tell, I have no idea what really occurred.

“One
minute we were struggling to beat back an army of dead men and crazed
killers, and the next the dead men all fell over and the killers were
walking around slack-jawed and apparently without minds. I’ve
never heard of a fight going from hopeless to easy in a second
before.” The very tired young Captain said, “But to tell
you the truth, I don’t really care now that the fighting’s
stopped.”

“You’re
a remarkable young man, Erik von Darkmoor. I’ll mention that in
my report to the King.”

“Thanks,
but there are a lot of men out there deserving of praise more than
I.” He sighed and looked out the tent door. “And many of
them won’t be going home.”

“What
should we do now?” asked Earl Richard.

“Without
cavalry, I’m inclined to sit tight until we get word of the
situation down in Krondor. But my instinct tells me we need to
advance northward as fast as we can. Fadawah may have fled or been
killed, but that doesn’t mean some other petty captain won’t
try to grab power and fashion a modest little Kingdom for himself.
And as far as we know, Yabon City is still under siege.”

Earl Richard
said, “I’m tired of sitting around, myself. Give the
order to advance.”

Erik smiled and
stood up. “My lord,” he said with a bow. He went outside
and found Jadow Shati near the Crimson Eagles’ campsite. “Break
camp!” he ordered. “And ready to march!”

“You heard
the man!” said the former sergeant. “I want every man
ready to march in an hour!”

Jadow turned and
grinned at his old companion, and Erik found once more he couldn’t
resist that man’s smile; he grinned in return.

Patrick showed
every sign of being on the way to a full recovery. His color had
returned to normal and he sat firmly upon his throne.

The Keshian
General Asham ibin Al-tuk again stood before the throne, looking even
less pleased than the last time he had appeared. Now he faced a
Kingdom army reinforced by cavalry units from Port Vykor and from the
North.

Pug walked in.

Patrick said,
“You demanded we be here at noon, Pug. What have you to say to
us?”

Pug looked at
Patrick, then at the General, and said, “This war is over.
General, you will refresh your soldiers outside one more day, then at
first light tomorrow you will return to the South. You will return
beyond the original borders south of Land’s End. You will carry
orders to all Keshian units to cease their attacks on Land’s
End and you will relay the following message to your Emperor: should
Kesh come north again, uninvited, no man crossing the border under
arms will survive.”

The General
stood ashen-faced and shaking with rage, but he nodded.

Patrick beamed.
His smile was one of victory. “Dare to linger, Keshian, and my
magician will destroy your army where it stands.”

Pug turned.
“Your magician?” Pug advanced upon the young Prince and
walked up the stairs to stand before him. “I am not your
magician, Patrick. I loved your grandfather and counted him among the
greatest men I’ve known, and I treasured the love of your
great-grandfather Borric, who gave me the name conDoin, but you don’t
own my soul. There are forces loose in the universe so far beyond
your petty dreams of power and wealth they are a flood to a drip of
water. It is those forces who command my attention. I just refuse to
sit idly by any longer and see innocent women and children
slaughtered and brave men die because rulers are too foolish to see
they have abundance.”