“This isn’t healthy, Malcolm,” Christof said finally. “You need to get out of your rooms, out of yourself. Look, why not come hunting with me? I’m sure I could round up some hearty sorts to keep us company. And you know you’re always welcome here. If you feel you just want to talk to someone . . .”
Malcolm nodded slowly and started to get to his feet. Christof immediately let go of the Champion’s hands and stood up with him. And then Malcolm surprised Christof by embracing him briefly.
“You’re a good friend, Chris. Probably better than I deserve.”
He turned abruptly and left. Christof stared after him.
“A good friend. Yes.”
• • •
The sorcerer Van Fleet had his own private room in Castle Midnight, so he could always be ready if the King felt a sudden need for his services. And the King did seem to need him more and more these days. For all kinds of reasons. Now here was the sorcerer’s brother, the Prime Minister Gregory Pool, sitting uncomfortably in one of his comfortable chairs, looking around at the room the King had so kindly provided, and not even trying to hide his disapproval. Van Fleet sighed, very quietly. He was going to have to do something about his brother.
Van Fleet had filled most of his room with glass tubing and bell jars, and flaring marsh gas jets, and all kinds of alchemical equipment. He always had some experiment or another on the go, usually involving boiling liquids and unpleasant smells. Always something bubbling in the cauldron or cooking in the small stone oven. One wall was hidden behind rows of metal cages, set one upon the other; containing animals and birds and reptiles and a few other things not so easily identified. Because you never knew when you’d need a subject to try something out on. And of course there were shelves and shelves of glass jars, holding herbs and insect parts, mandrake root and other disturbing things. Some of the things in the jars were still moving. Because alchemy’s like that.
Gregory Pool sniffed loudly, and then rather wished he hadn’t. The air smelled strongly of chemicals and fresh dung. Some of the animals in the cages looked out at Pool miserably, and even pushed their paws plaintively towards him through the steel mesh. Patting the air in mute entreaty. Gregory did his best not to notice. He didn’t know what Van Fleet did in this room, on his own, and he felt very strongly that he didn’t want to know. In fact, he was pretty damned sure he was better off not knowing. He took out his delicately chased silver snuffbox, tapped a small quantity of cocaine out onto the back of his hand, and sniffed it up. And then addressed his brother without looking up, as he put the box away.
“Yes, I know. Don’t lecture me, Van. We all need a little something to keep us going. Do I lecture you on how often you need to send out for fresh animals?”
“You’ve seen for yourself how useful they can be,” Van Fleet said equably. “You held the black cat while I slit its throat to get enough blood to make a decent scrying pool.”
Gregory Pool glanced unhappily at the large pool of drying blood on the table before him. Only a few moments before, it had been a magic mirror through which he could spy on the King and his Court, and then on Prince Christof and his treacherous friends. Knowledge was necessary, and Gregory had always been willing to pay the price. He just didn’t like to get blood on his hands. He had listened carefully to every word spoken at the private meetings, studied the reactions on everyone’s faces. And none of it would have been possible without his brother’s help. He knew that. And so did his brother. Gregory glared at Van Fleet.
“Are you sure what we just did was High Magic? Sacrifice and spilt blood were always marks of Wild Magic in all the songs and stories.”
“It’s all a matter of attitude,” Van Fleet said easily. “I have made no pacts with demons or devils, and my soul is still my own. You worry too much, Brother. High Magic is a science, just like alchemy.”
Gregory sniffed, unconvinced, but he tacitly agreed to change the subject. “I knew Christof and his little friends were plotting, but I didn’t think they’d pull the Champion and General Staker in with them! This is a combination that could prove very dangerous: an unstable Prince, a heartbroken Champion, and an overambitious General! If they wanted to know what was really going on, they should have come to me!”
“And would you have told them?” said Van Fleet, genuinely interested.
“Of course not! But it would have been the proper thing to do. And I would have told them some comforting and very convincing lies, put their hearts and minds at rest, and they would have gone away perfectly happy! The current situation is complicated enough without them sticking their well-meaning noses in where they’re not wanted. I’m really quite disappointed in Prince Christof. I thought he had more sense . . .”
“He’s never felt secure as heir,” said Van Fleet. “Not while his older brother is still alive. With Catherine sent away to the Forest Land, he must have felt his father had finally committed himself to naming Christof as his official heir. But if Cameron does return . . .”
“The Broken Man can never be King!” Gregory said flatly. “He just can’t.”
“Stranger things have happened,” said Van Fleet. “The King really should have executed Cameron, rather than just banishing him from the Castle. Ended the problem then and there.”
“It’s no easy thing for a father to order his son killed,” Gregory said coldly. “And anyway, who would you send to kill such a man? We didn’t have the Sombre Warrior then. No, we all discussed the situation at length, and everyone agreed that banishment was the best option. If only because we might need the Broken Man’s skills as a soldier at some future time. And just maybe we were right about that.”
“Is war inevitable?” said Van Fleet.
“Not if I have anything to say about it,” growled the Prime Minister. “All the most powerful and influential minds in Redhart and the Forest Land agree that peace is necessary. We all put our names to the wedding, and the agreement, because the endless border skirmishes were draining our treasuries dry. But all it would take is one tragic accident, one unacceptable insult to our honour, and everything we’ve achieved would be swept away in a moment! And there are certain factions, certain people, in both countries . . . who cannot be trusted to leave well enough alone.”
“What do you want me to do?” said Van Fleet.
“Keep an eye on Christof, and his people, and everyone the Prince meets with. Let me know immediately if they start doing things, as opposed to just talking about doing things.”
“What, all of them?” said the sorcerer. “The Prince, the Champion, the General, and all their people? And everyone they might talk to? You don’t want much, do you, Brother? How many eyes do you think I’ve got?”
“I’m paying you enough, aren’t I, Brother?” said the Prime Minister. He rose to his feet and made to leave, then stopped as Van Fleet was suddenly there to block his way.
“There is one more thing, Gregory. Before you arrived, I sensed the presence of some powerful force, in conversation with the King. A most secret and unnatural presence. I took it upon myself to investigate further, and I have to tell you: the King has been talking with the Stalking Man.”
The Prime Minister swore loudly. “Of course William did it secretly . . . because he knew I wouldn’t approve! No good can ever come of dealing with Hell’s agents. What did the King want with Leland Dusque?”
“Beats the hell out of me,” said Van Fleet. “I can just about detect the Stalking Man’s presence, past his shields, but there’s no way I can listen in on him without his knowing I was there. And I am not about to pick a fight with the Stalking Man.” He broke off, frowning. “The dimensional door I made for the King has just reappeared at Court. The Steward must be back, with the Broken Man’s answer.”
“I need to speak to the King,” said the Prime Minister.
• • •
The Steward arrived back in King William’s Court, pale and shaking and somewhat out of breath. The door disappeared quietly behind him. The King
waited impassively on his throne until the Steward regained his breath and his self-control, and bowed formally.
“Talk to me, Steward,” said the King. “What did he say?”
“Prince Cameron requires me to tell you that if there is a war, if you need him . . . you have only to ask and he will return,” said the Steward.
The King nodded slowly. “Of course. He couldn’t just come back. I have to ask him . . . How would you describe his condition, Steward? Physical and mental?”
“He seemed . . . comfortable as a hermit, Sire.”
The King glared at him. “Is he sane?”
“I would say so, yes, Sire.”
“And how does he feel about me? About what I did to him?”
“It’s hard for me to say how he feels about anything,” said the Steward carefully.
“Yes,” said the King, settling back on his throne. “I know. The Broken Man . . . I’m not even sure he has emotions, as we understand them. But I must know, Steward. Does he bear me any animosity for ordering his banishment from this Court?”
“I would say not, Sire,” said the Steward. “He seems to be content where he is.”
“My first son, my oldest child . . . and I had to send him away,” said the King. “Because he could never replace me as King. And now it seems I need him. To do the one thing he does better than anyone else. Win battles.”
At the sudden sound of raised voices outside the closed doors of the Court, they both looked round sharply. They recognised the Prime Minister’s voice, demanding to be allowed entry. The King smiled slightly.
“Why not?”
He sent the Steward to the doors, to pass along his order to the guards, and the King watched coldly as the Prime Minister burst through the opened doors and strode down the empty Court towards him. The King smiled sardonically as the Prime Minister bowed to him as briefly as protocol would allow.
“You’ve been listening in again, haven’t you, Prime Minister? Spying on me, through that sorcerous brother of yours. If he wasn’t so useful, I’d have his head taken off right here in front of me, and then stuck on a spike over my gates as a warning to others. And then we’d see whether he’s got enough magic in him to put his head back on again . . . Be warned, Prime Minister. There is a thin line between arrogance and treason.”
“Is it treason to care about the safety of the realm?” Gregory Pool demanded furiously. “You cannot seriously be considering bringing Prince Cameron back, Sire! You must know there are still factions present in this Court who would place him on the throne as their figurehead!”
“And you must know I would never suffer such a thing to happen,” said the King. “The Broken Man can never be King. But he can lead our armies to victory. If necessary. We do not want to go to war, Prime Minister. It is unthinkable. But unthinkable things have happened before. And so we must be prepared for all eventualities. Because that is the duty of a King. To do what is necessary.”
SEVEN
THE THINGS WE DO FOR LOVE AND HATE
Round the back of Forest Castle, where hardly anybody goes because it’s just scrubby woodland and really poor hunting, there is another large and carefully maintained artificial clearing. Nowhere near as large, or as old, as the clearing made to contain Forest Castle, but still pretty important in its own right. It was hacked out of the woods by the Brotherhood of Steel, some sixty years previously, specifically so they could have somewhere to hold their annual Grand Tourney. The Brotherhood didn’t do it themselves, of course, manual labour being beneath their dignity. Instead they rounded up a whole bunch of local peasants, who didn’t seem to be doing anything important, paid them a pittance, and put them to work. Along with whoever happened to be on punishment detail in the Brotherhood’s Sorting Houses. These people came back so determined never to be put on punishment detail again, that even after the clearing had been established the Brotherhood continued to send whatever people they had on punishment detail to keep the clearing open and stop the woodland from creeping back.
For generations afterwards, the local peasants passed down stories of the great clearing they helped make. With an added moral to the tale: if you see the Brotherhood of Steel coming, run.
Permission to open up such a large clearing so close to Forest Castle had been provided by Parliament, on the grounds that it was better to have the Brotherhood’s greatest warriors fighting it out in one place rather than in the streets and bars of the towns and the cities. (Parliament and the Brotherhood agreed to split all the costs, and the merchandising revenue, between them, and that also helped to move things along.) No one even thought to inform King Rufus about any of this, until the deal was safely signed and settled. By which time it was far too late for anyone at Court to make any useful objections. This was perhaps one of the first real signs that no one outside the Court gave a damn what the King thought anymore.
And now the seasons had passed, and the time had come round again for the annual Grand Tourney to take place. People had been working out in the clearing from the moment the rising sun had provided enough light for the workmen to see what they were doing. There was a great deal to do, and not a lot of time to do it in. Tents and marquees had to be set up, and all kinds of stalls; fighting circles had to be marked out, and the single jousting lane. Several sets of raked seating had to be carefully assembled. And somebody really low down in the pecking order had to dig a whole bunch of latrines. The people in charge of all this were of course professionals, and very well paid for their services. The people who did the actual hard labour were also pretty well paid, because by this time they’d organised themselves into unions and guilds. And there were any number of unpaid volunteers, happy to labour for hours, in return for free passes and guaranteed good positions in the raked seating, with really good views of all the major events.
The Grand Tourney, so called to distinguish it from the four lesser seasonal tourneys, took place once a year, and allowed the very best fighters and warriors and magicians to show off in public. A marvellous setting, where the best of the best were allowed and even encouraged to beat the crap out of one another in front of baying crowds, and prove once and for all that they really were the greatest in their own personal field. Theoretically, the Grand Tourney was open to everyone. But it was a long way to come, to turn up, fight and lose, and walk all the way home again . . . so most people preferred to prove themselves in the seasonal tourneys first. Still, it was a point of pride, and long tradition, that nobody who turned up ready to compete would ever be turned away. Although a lot of the people in charge, most definitely including those august personages who ran the Brotherhood’s Sorting House, would have very much liked to ban anyone who’d ever attended the Hawk and Fisher Memorial Academy. Partly because they didn’t have the proper attitude or show the proper respect, but mostly because when they did turn up they always won everything.
And they weren’t even gracious about it.
There were golden and silver cups to be won, and extravagantly worded bronze plaques, in a whole bunch of categories. And any number of bags of gold and silver coin, for those who distinguished themselves. But mostly it was all about the winning. About proving who was the very best at what they did, in front of an admiring crowd. Preferably while grinding some hated enemy’s face into the mud while you did it. Nothing like settling an old score or a long-running feud in front of a crowd and the people who mattered. A lot of politicians got their start at the various tourneys, by performing deeds of an unquestionably heroic nature in public. And a lot of politicians who’d been kicked out of Parliament for being useless, or ethically or morally or financially corrupt, often turned up to fight again, in the hope of rebuilding their reputations. The Tourney organisers never tried to keep these people out; you had to provide someone for the crowds to boo and hiss at. There were always a few goodhearted stallholders selling rotten fruit to throw, too, because if the Tourney didn’t provide the right kind of things to throw, the crowds would start using their own a
mmunition. Everything from fresh manure to large, heavy things with jagged edges. And that could get out of hand really quickly. Crowds do so love to escalate.
The organisers also provided individual tents, for the Big Names and Major Players, brightly decorated with exaggerated scenes of previous triumphs at previous Tourneys. Then there were the larger tents, where up-and-comers and promising talents could get together and exchange good-natured banter, rough camaraderie, and death threats. And, of course, there were a couple of really big marquees for everyone else. The hopefuls, and the ambitious. Finally, there were hospital tents, gathered together and placed to one side, for the injured, the seriously damaged, and those on the way out. A large number of surgeons, healers, and priests could always be relied upon to turn up every year to man these tents, to do charitable work for the good of their souls and show off their various skills. A lot of the medical schools sent their most talented interns here, to learn things the schools couldn’t teach. Nothing like sawing off a smashed limb, while the patient was still very much alive and aware and screaming his head off, to teach you what battlefield medicine was all about. (The Big Names and Major Players brought their own surgeons and healers, of course. They wouldn’t be caught dead in one of the common medical tents.)
Crowds of eager onlookers started queuing up very early on, watching everything with keen interest but held back at a respectful distance by a larger than usual presence of armed and armoured security guards. Regular visitors to the annual Tourney passed the time swapping well-rehearsed tales of old battles and marvellous triumphs, and all the famous faces they claimed to have seen. These were not the kind of people who could afford the expensive advance tickets for the raked seating; they were waiting to be herded into the standing-room-only enclosures surrounded by strong wooden fences. To keep the overexcited in their place.