8

Thousands of birds darkened the watery sky.

They circled an area that had a comparatively sparse population, despite being in central Bhealfa. What drew them in such vast numbers was easy pickings. Not just the countless worms churned up, but the profusion of refuse left by the cavalcade they followed. For the birds, it was a never-ending banquet. Although it was not without its dangers. Wild dogs and feral cats were attracted by the feast, too. And the humans in the great procession used hawks and archers to reduce the flocks, and for sport.

The birds’ other rivals were the armies of scavengers living in the convoy’s wake. These men, women and children existed in a hierarchy as rigid as that of the wider society that shunned them. The lowliest, the dung gatherers, roamed on foot, their carts and wagons being employed to carry the valuable fruits of their labours.

The niche above them was occupied by the rag pickers. Notwithstanding their job description, they ferreted out anything of value from the general detritus. Fuelled by stories of discarded coins, and even jewels, many pickers had the mentality of gold panners.

Occasionally, they came across a dead body. These were the result of execution or exile, which amounted to the same thing if the accused was cast out from one of the convoy’s higher places. Some were suicides of people who came to prefer death to the regime’s haphazard cruelty. Once stripped, the bodies were left for the carrion crews. Spurned by everyone, these motley bands contained many outcasts; sufferers of unsightly diseases and the mentally unstable who could find no other employment. They survived by selling the corpses back to their often aristocratic families for decent burial.

The travelling artisans considered themselves far superior to the scavengers, pickers and body snatchers. Carpenters, builders, thatchers, wheelwrights, blacksmiths and a dozen other trades made up their ranks. Their bread came from offering to make good the damage caused by the passing of the procession. A handful of sorcerers of dubious repute were loosely affiliated with this group, promising the afflicted charms to avert such disasters in future.

Being more prosperous than the baser camp followers, the artisans could afford magic, if largely rudimentary. Glamoured bird scarers were part of their cache, and every so often they let one off to have a few minutes’ respite.

So it was this brisk dawn. A hex ignited an ear-splitting salvo. Flaming, multicoloured tendrils jabbed the sky, dispersing their squawking targets. The birds escaped to higher reaches, to regroup.

One scavenger took the racket as a signal to straighten his aching back for a moment. He raised a hand to mop his sweaty forehead, despite the morning chill. Grabbing a breath, he gazed at the source of his livelihood, perhaps a mile distant, and felt the familiar

thrump-thrump-thrump

through the soles of his feet as it slowly moved away. He never ceased to be awed at the spectacle, the chaos. Or to be grateful that

it fed him. It was a miracle, a gift from the gods. This clandestine economy built on the foolishness of one man widely considered insane.

Some likened Prince Melyobar’s roving court to a sow nurturing her incalculable litter. The less benevolent saw it as a bloated leech gorging on the blood of all around it.

Melyobar’s palace was a capricious affair. Huge, as befitted the ego of its master, the structure expressed his aberrations, too. It was a rare angle that struck the eye as true. There was an over-abundance of towers and spires. A host of statues stood on its battlements, uniformly freakish or alarming. It bristled with defences and scaling obstacles. Everything was embellished, carved, tinted, bedecked and overlaid with precious stones and valuable metals. The impression was of a spiky cake iced by a demented chef.

The palace-cum-fortress had never been still. It floated, under direction, and was powered by stupefyingly expensive magic. Its sole purpose was to accommodate the Prince in his craving to outpace Death, and thus cheat death.

In this endeavour he was alone, but not unaccompanied. To maintain their stature the aristocratic families had travelling palaces built too, though they were careful to make them less opulent. The guilds did likewise, along with various courtiers of influence and great wealth. All vied to squander their fortunes in the cause of keeping up appearances.

There were magically powered auxiliary structures to serve the Prince’s needs. The Royal Guardsmen, quartermasters, armourers, fletchers, administrators, scholars, diviners, sorcerers and a dozen other specialist groupings had their own transports.

Lesser functionaries and camp followers, who were legion, had to make do with more conventional ways of keeping up. The number on horseback were uncountable, including several detachments of cavalry and an entire division of

paladins. Wagons, carriages, coaches, gigs and chariots were present in hundreds. Their occupants had a relatively easy passage compared to those on foot, who numbered many thousands, and who had to rely on an elaborate system of horse-drawn sleeping rigs to take their rest. For the only rule was that the cavalcade stopped for nothing.

There had been suggestions, not entirely frivolous, that Melyobar’s nomadic folly should be officially recognised as a city.

Any such thought was far from the mind of the Prince himself. He was focused wholly on a scheme to defeat his deadliest adversary. To that end, he stood with a detachment of militia on a parade ground abutting one of the palace’s highest ramparts.

As monarch, Melyobar was automatically named Supreme Commander of the Combined Armed Forces, although the title was honorary, since Gath Tampoor effectively ran things. For no apparent reason, today the Prince chose to disport himself as Lord High Admiral of the Fleet, as was his right. His dark blue, shoulder-padded uniform jacket was smothered in gold braid. The coat didn’t quite meet over his paunch, so the gold buttons were undone. Breeches with gold stripes down the sides, and shiny, knee-high boots disguised his puny legs. He wore a tricorn hat with a white plume. Strands of greying hair poked from beneath the rim, giving his ashen, puffy face a cracked-egg impression. He had a splendid sword to wave about.

‘Now send over another one!’ he demanded, his voice too high-pitched to command respect in itself.

‘Sir!’ A sergeant smartly clicked his heels and, to his credit, maintained a granite expression. He marched off to bellow orders.

‘Over there!’ the Prince yelled. ‘

That

way!’ He pointed at a distant farmhouse gradually drawing level.

‘Hurry!’

A unit was manning one of the large siege catapults lined up near the parapet’s edge. Frantically, they wound back the arm, accompanied by the sound of creaking timber. Someone used a mallet to hammer home the chocks under the catapult’s front wheels.

Four men appeared, each holding a corner of a net containing a round, leathery object bigger than an ox’s head. It was heavy enough to make them stagger slightly. A blue-robed sorcerer followed, clutching a small velvet sack. Lank, bald and bearded, his features were set in the requisite austerity.

Melyobar clapped his hands like a petulant schoolmarm. ‘Come on, come on!’

They loaded the leather ball into the catapult’s scoop. The sorcerer rummaged in his sack and brought out a thin, square stone, about the size and reddish-brown colour of a fallen oak leaf. He slipped it into the coil of twine binding the ball, then began mumbling an incantation.

Watching with ill-concealed impatience, the Prince remarked caustically, ‘Let’s try to be a little more accurate this time, shall we?’

He took a glamoured spy tube from the pile on the bench beside him. Holding it to his eye, he saw the farmhouse in close-up, as though it had been moved to within a stone’s throw of the palace. He could make out people gathered on its porch. Some of them were waving.