Vaelin glanced down at the corpse, the sundered golden wheel on the bloodied breastplate gleamed dully in the gathering dawn light. A man of some importance, perhaps?
“Eruhin Mahktar!” Words spoken by a dismounted Alpiran, stumbling nearby, clutching at a wound in his arm, tears streaking his bloodied face. There was something in his tone, something beyond anger or accusation, a depth of despair Vaelin had rarely heard. “Eruhin Mahktar!” Words he would hear a thousand times in years to come.
The wounded man staggered forward, Vaelin making ready to knock him unconscious with his hilt guard, he was unarmed after all. But he made no move to attack, stumbling past Vaelin to collapse beside the body of the white-clad man, sobbing like a child. “Eruhin ast forgallah!” he howled. Vaelin watched in horror as the man pulled a dagger from his belt and drove it without hesitation into his own throat, slumping across the white-clad corpse, unstaunched blood gouting from his wound.
The suicide seemed to break the spell gripping the Alpirans, a sudden fierce shout rising from the ranks, every eye fixed on Vaelin, sabres and lances levelling as they stirred themselves and began to close, murderous hate writ on every face.
There was a sound like a thousand hammers striking a thousand anvils and the Alpiran ranks convulsed again, Vaelin could see men thrown into the air by the impact of whatever had struck their rear. The Alpirans struggled to turn their mounts and meet the new threat, but too late as a wedge of burnished steel skewered their host.
A hulking figure clad head to toe in armour and seated on a tall black charger smashed his way through the lighter mounts of the Alpirans, his mace a blur as it clubbed the life from men and horses alike. Behind him hundreds more steel clad men wreaked similar havoc, long-swords and maces rising and falling with deadly ferocity. The enraged Alpirans fought back savagely, more than a few knights disappeared under the mass of stamping hooves, but they had neither the numbers nor the steel to stand against such an onslaught. Soon it was over, every Alpiran dead or wounded. None had fled.
The hulking figure on the black charger hitched his mace to his saddle and trotted over to Vaelin, pushing his visor back to reveal a broad weathered face distinguished by a twice broken nose and eyes deeply lined with age.
Vaelin bowed formally. “Fief Lord Theros.”
“Lord Vaelin.” The Fief Lord of Renfael glanced round at the carnage and barked a laugh. “Bet you’ve never been so glad to see a Renfaelin, eh boy?”
“Indeed, my lord.”
A tall young knight reined in beside the Fief Lord, his handsome face smeared with sweat and blood, dark blue eyes regarding Vaelin with clear but unspoken malevolence.
“Lord Darnel,” Vaelin greeted him. “My thanks, and the thanks of my men, to you and your father.”
“Still alive then, Sorna?” the young knight replied. “At least the King will be pleased.”
“Still your tongue boy!” snapped Lord Theros. “My apologies, Lord Vaelin. The boy was ever spoiled. I blame his mother, meself. Three sons she bore me and this is the only one not still-born, Faith help me.”
Vaelin saw how the young knight’s hands twitched on the hilt of his longsword and the red flush of fury that coloured his cheeks. Another son who hates his father, he observed. A common ailment.
“If you’ll excuse me, my lord.” He bowed again. “I must see to my men.”
Striding back towards the beach, stepping over the dead and the dying as the morning sun rose on the field of blood, he reached again for the bluestone, lifting it to let the rising sunlight play on the surface, thinking about the day the king had pressed it upon him, the day Lord Darnel came to hate him, the day Princess Lyrna had cried.
The day the blood-song fell silent.
“Bluestone, spices and silk,” he said softly.
Chapter 2
The inclusion of Renfaelin knightly contests in the Summertide Fair was a relatively recent innovation but had quickly become hugely popular with the people. The crowd was roaring their appreciation for a particularly spectacular joust as Vaelin made his way towards the royal pavilion, his hood pulled over his face to spare himself the burden of recognition. On the field a knight sailed from his saddle amidst a cloud of splinters, his opponent tossing his shattered lance to the crowd.
“That’s one snotty bastard won’t be getting up again!” a florid faced man commented making Vaelin wonder if it was the spectacle of combat they appreciated or the chance to witness the maiming of rich folk.
The guards at the pavilion entrance favoured him with a deeper bow than his rank required and glanced only briefly at the King’s warrant he proffered, pulling the flap aside and bidding him entry with barely a pause. He was only two days back from the north but the legend of his supposedly great victory over the Lonak was already widespread.
After being relieved of his weapons he was led to the royal box where he was unsurprised to find Princess Lyrna, alone. “Brother,” she greeted him with a smile, holding her hand out for him to kiss. He was momentarily disconcerted, this was something she hadn’t done before, a sign of favour rarely bestowed, and made in front of the assembled population of the capital. Nevertheless he went to one knee and pressed his lips against her knuckles. Her flesh was warmer than he expected and he angered himself by enjoying the sensation.
“Highness,” he said straightening, attempting a neutral tone and not quite managing it. “I was summoned to your father’s presence…”
She waved a hand. “He’ll be along. It seems he mislaid his favourite cloak. Never ventures outdoors without it these days.” She gestured to the seat next to her own. “Will you sit?”
He sat, distracting himself with the knight’s contest. Two groups were assembling at opposite ends of the field, about thirty in each, one under a red and white cheque banner with an eagle motif, the other under a flag displaying a red fox on a green background.
“The melee is the climax of the Renfaelin tourney,” the princess explained. “The red fox is the banner of Baron Hughlin Banders, that’s him in the rusty armour, once chief retainer to Fief Lord Theros. The eagle belongs to Lord Darnel, the Fief-Lord’s heir. Apparently the melee will settle a long-standing grievance between the two.” She picked up a white silk scarf from a nearby table. “I have been begged to give this to whichever oaf I think more violent than the others. Apparently the sight of large men in metal suits beating each other senseless is supposed to make my womanly heart swell.”
“A singular misjudgement, Highness.”
She turned to him and grinned. “Not one you are likely to make, brother.”
“I would hope not.” He watched the two sides line out, exchange salutes then charge towards each other at full gallop, swords and maces whirling. They met in such a crash of metal and horseflesh that both Vaelin and the Princess winced. The subsequent fight was a confused morass of tumbling knights and clashing weapons. Vaelin knew the knights were only supposed to strike with the flat of the blade but most appeared to be ignoring this rule and he saw at least three steel-clad figures lying immobile amidst the chaos.
“So this is battle,” Lyrna commented.
“Of a sort.”
“So what do you make of him? The Fief Lord’s heir.”