The Iron Wars

THIRTEEN

They had forgotten that he had been blinded. His ravaged face was a shock which rendered them dumb. He wore the simple brown robe of an Antillian, a single ring and a fine Saint’s symbol of silver and black wood. A dozen Knights Militant, watchful, hard-faced men, ringed the walls of his chamber. There had been rumours of assassination attempts.

“Holy Father,” Alembord said, bowing deep to kiss the ring, “those whom I told you of are here.”

The High Pontiff Macrobius nodded and then spoke in a quavering voice, that of an old, tired man. “Strangers, introduce yourselves. And no ceremony, I beg. I hear your errand is most urgent.”

Albrec it was who spoke up. Siward was eyeing balefully the surrounding Knights, and Avila seemed taken aback, almost disgruntled.

“Holiness, we are monks fleeing Charibon, under the protection of a Fimbrian soldier. Our names are unimportant, but what we bear may seal the fate of nations.”

There was a long pause. Macrobius waited patiently, but Alembord snapped at last: “Well?”

“Forgive me, Monsignor, but what I have to say is for the Pontiff’s ears alone.”

“Merciful heavens, who exactly do you think you are? Holiness, let me take care of these upstarts. They are clearly eccentric adventurers, perhaps even in the pay of the Himerians. I will get the truth out of them.”

Macrobius shook his head with the first touch of asperity they had seen in him.

“Step forward, young man-the one who spoke to me.”

Albrec did so. As he came close to the Pontiff he heard the slight metallic grate of swords being gently loosened in sheaths as the Knights tensed. He moved slowly and deliberately until he was two feet from the Pontiff’s face.

And here Macrobius reached out and laid his hands on Albrec’s features, his old fingers feather-light as he traced his eyes, cheeks, lips-and the gaping hole which had been his nose.

“Your voice…I thought there was something amiss. What happened, my son?”

“Frostbite, Holiness, in the Cimbrics. We would have died had the Fimbrians not found us. As it was, we did not come away untouched.”

“A disfigurement can be a heavy trial,” Macrobius said with his blind smile. “But cruelty to the flesh can also refine the spirit. I see more now than I ever did when I had two eyes and sat in a palace in Aekir. Tell me your errand.”

Taking a breath, Albrec told him in a low tone of the ancient document he had found in the bowels of Charibon, a biography of the Blessed St Ramusio written by one of his contemporaries, Honorius of Neyr. In it Honorius stated that Ramusio had not been assumed into heaven in the twilight of his life as the Church had taught for over four centuries, but had set off alone to proselytize among the heathen Merduks of the east and had become revered among them as Ahrimuz, the Prophet. The two great religions of the world, which had battled each other for centuries and piled up a million dead in their names, were the handiwork of one man. The Saint and the Prophet were one.

The expression of an eyeless man is hard to read. As Macrobius leaned back again Albrec could not be sure if he were shocked, angry, or merely bewildered.

“How do I know you are not an agent of Himerius, come here to sow the seeds of heresy and discord in the foundations of our New Church?” Macrobius asked gently.

Albrec sagged. “Holiness, I know it sounds like the merest madness, but I have the document here, and it is genuine. I know. I was a librarian in Charibon. This is the work of Honorius himself, written in the first century and hidden away by the Founding Fathers of the Church to suit their own ends. This is the truth, Holiness.”

“These tidings, if they are indeed the truth, could tear up the world. I am an old blind man, Pontiff or no. Why should I act on your convictions? The world is in enough turmoil as it is.”

“Holy Father,” Albrec said hesitantly, “we met a man on the Western Road, a soldier who was going out to fight the Merduks, though he knew he was hopelessly outnumbered. He did not know if he would be coming back, but he went out anyway because it was his duty. And he knew you. He told us you were a good man, a humble one, and he bade me tell you to remember the retreat from Aekir.”

“What was his name?” Macrobius asked, suddenly eager.

“Corfe, a colonel of cavalry.”

Macrobius was silent for a long time, his face bent into his breast. A hush fell in the chamber, and Albrec wondered if he had fallen asleep. How could one tell, when he had no eyes or eyelids to shut? Finally, however, the Pontiff stirred. He rubbed his temples with his fingertips, raised his head, and said, “Monsignor Alembord!” in a voice that was startlingly clear and strong. Alembord actually flinched.

“Yes, Holiness?”

“Find suitable quarters for these travellers. They have journeyed a long way, bearing a heavy burden. And assemble the best scribes, scholars and copyists in the capital. I want them all gathered here tomorrow by noon, and quarters cleared in the palace for them also.”

Alembord’s mouth opened and closed like that of a landed fish for a few seconds, then he said, “It shall be done at once,” and shot a look of pure hatred at Albrec. The little noseless monk felt a wave of relief flood over him, leaving him drained and exhausted.

“Corfe saved my life when it was not worth saving,” Macrobius said quietly. “It was God’s will that it be so, and it is God’s will that you have come here to present me with this last task. What is your name?”

“Albrec, your Holiness.”

“You shall be a bishop in the New Church, Albrec, and you are to have unhindered access to me any time you need it. Introduce your companions to me.”

Albrec did so. “I knew your father,” said Macrobius to Avila. “He was a rake and a spendthrift, but he had a heart as big as a mountain. He would never pay his tithes without a grumble, but no peasant on his lands ever wanted for anything. I honour his memory.”

Avila kissed the Pontiff’s ring, speechless.

“And I meet a Fimbrian at last,” Macrobius went on. “You have my thanks, Siward of Gaderia, for preserving my brothers-in-faith. You have done the world as great a service as any ever performed on a battlefield. So it is true that a Fimbrian army marches to the aid of poor, embattled Torunna.”

“It is true,” Siward told him. “But only through the efforts of your friend Corfe will any of my people survive. Small thanks do we receive for shedding our blood on your battlefields.”

“You have my thanks, for what it is worth.”

Siward bowed, and managed to muster up some courtesy in return. “For myself, it is enough.”

Macrobius nodded. “The audience is over. Monsignor Alembord will show you to your quarters. We will sup together tonight. Albrec, you shall sit by me and tell me what transpires in Charibon. It is time I concerned myself with the turning world again. For now, I must retire. I feel the need to pray as I never have before.”

A young Inceptine came forward to help the Pontiff out of his chair and through a door in the rear of the chamber. The three travellers were left with Monsignor Alembord and the surrounding Knights.

“Your platitudes may have convinced him,” Alembord told Albrec in a venomous whisper, “but I am not so simple. You had best watch your step, Brother Albrec.”

There had been rumours flying about the capital for the past two days, travelling faster than any courier. A great battle had been fought up north, it was said, and Martellus was destroyed. The Merduk light cavalry which of late had been patrolling almost to the very walls had withdrawn, and the land to the north was uneasily quiet, scouting parties reporting it utterly deserted by man and beast. What this tense hush presaged no one could say, but the wall sentries had been doubled on the orders of the King himself.

The gates of Torunn were closed, and Andruw and his men had to cajole and threaten for fully a quarter of an hour in the pouring rain before the guards would admit them to the city. Their horses clopped noisily through the gloom of the barbican with the gore of the North More battle still upon them, ten riders looking like warriors out of some primitive bloodstained myth.

The haptman of the gatehouse accosted them on the street below the walls, demanding to know their names and their errand. Andruw fixed him with a weary eye. “I bear dispatches for the High Command. Where do they meet these days?”

“The west wing of the palace,” the haptman said. “Whose command are you with? I’ve never seen your like. That’s Merduk armour your men wear.”

“Very observant of you. I’m with Colonel Corfe Cear-Inaf’s command. He’s a day’s march behind me with seven thousand men, two thousand of them Fimbrians.”

The haptman’s face lit up. “Is Martellus with him? Has he got through?”

“Martellus is dead, so is the Fimbrian marshal. The greater part of their armies lie slain up on the North More. Now are you satisfied?”

The officious haptman nodded, horrified. He stepped aside to let the sombre cavalcade pass.

Andruw was kept waiting half an hour in an antechamber despite the urgency of his errand. His normally sunny outlook was soured by grief and exhaustion. The North More had been a victory of sorts, he knew-Corfe had saved part of an army from destruction and was bringing it to the capital. But the rest, including men Andruw had served with along the Searil River, friends and comrades, had been wiped out. And he could not get out of his mind the vision of the Fimbrian pike phalanx advancing to its doom. It was the most admirable and terrible thing he had ever seen.

At last the door opened and he was admitted to the council room. A score of tall beeswax candles burned in sconces, and there was a trio of lit braziers glowing along one wall. A long table dominated the chamber. It was piled with maps and papers, quills and inkwells. At one end sat King Lofantyr in a fur cloak, his chin resting on one ring-glittering hand. A dozen other men were present also, some sitting, others standing, all in the resplendent finery of the Torunnan court. They looked up as Andruw entered, and he saw the distaste on more than one face as they took in his squalid condition. He bowed, the mud-stained dispatch Corfe had dashed off with a saddle for a desk clenched in one fist.

“Your Majesty, sirs, Haptman Andruw Cear-Adurhal, bearing dispatches from Colonel Corfe Cear-Inaf.”

Andruw distinctly heard someone say “Who?” as he laid the dispatch before his monarch and retreated, bowing again. A series of chuckles rustled through the gathering.

“Is it true Martellus is dead?” Lofantyr said suddenly, quelling the buzz of talk that had arisen. He made no move to read the crumpled scroll.

“Yes, sire. We came too late. He and the Fimbrians were already heavily engaged.”

“Fimbrians!” a voice barked. Andruw recognized the broad form of Colonel Menin, now a general, and the commander of Torunn’s garrison.

“On whose orders did Colonel Cear-Inaf take his command north?” Lofantyr demanded querulously. Andruw blinked, shifting his feet.

“Why, on yours, sire. I saw the Royal seal myself.”

Lofantyr’s face twisted. He whispered something which might have been “Damned woman.” And then: “Are you aware, Haptman, that your commanding officer was sent orders to turn over his command to Colonel Aras the morning your men left for the north?”

“No, sire. We received no such orders, but we did move out before dawn. Your courier must have missed us.” God almighty, Andruw thought.

“And you arrived too late to save Martellus and his men, you say,” Menin accused Andruw.

“We saved some five thousands, sir. They will be here in one, perhaps two days.”

“Why were you late, Haptman? Was not this mission deserving of some urgency?”

Andruw flushed, remembering the breakneck forced marches, the bone-numbing weariness of men and horses, tribesmen tumbling asleep from their saddles.

“No one could have gone any faster, General. We did our best. And”-his voice rose, and he looked Menin in the eye-“We were only thirteen hundreds, at the end of the day. Had Corfe been given more men, he might have saved the whole damned army, and Martellus might yet be alive to serve his country!”

“By God’s blood, you insolent puppy!” General Menin raged. “Do you know who you are talking to, sir? Do you know?”

“Enough,” the King said sharply. “Bickering amongst ourselves will lead us nowhere. I am sure that the full facts of this disaster will become known in time. Haptman, what in God’s name are you wearing? And how do you come to present yourself before this council in such a state of filth? Have you no inkling of respect for your superiors?”

Andruw’s blood was up, but he bit on his tongue to silence himself. He saw the drift of things. They needed a scapegoat, someone to off-load the burden of their own incompetence and cowardice upon. Corfe had not saved part of an army, he had lost the rest. They would twist the facts to suit themselves. Lord God, he thought. They would wrangle at the very gates of hell.

“My apologies, sire. I thought my news warranted great haste. I am come straight from the field.”

“Ay, but whose field, I wonder?” a voice said mockingly.

Andruw turned to see the dapper form of Colonel Aras. He bowed, very slightly. “Sir. I am happy to see you well after your… endeavours, in the south of the kingdom.”

“I’m sure you are, Haptman. I brought thirty of your wounded savages north with me when I had finished thrashing the rebels there. Your commander really should take better care of his men. I’m sure I shall.”

Andruw stared at him, and something in his eye made Aras cough and bury his nose in a wine goblet.

After that he was ignored, left to stand there in his bloody armour as the council debated the news he had brought. No one dismissed him, and he seemed to have been forgotten. His hauberk pressed down on his shoulders. The heat of the chamber seemed stifling after the chill air out of doors, and his head began to swim. Someone nudged him and he gave a start just as his knees had begun to buckle.

“Here, drink this, Haptman,” a voice said, and a glass of dark liquid was pressed into his hand. He gulped it down, feeling the good wine warm his innards. His benefactor was a young officer in the blue of the artillery. He looked vaguely familiar. Perhaps they had been at gunnery school together. His mind was too fogged to remember.

“Come into a corner. They won’t miss you.”

He followed the officer to the far corner of the spacious chamber, and there set down his helm, unbuckled his sword baldric and with the other soldier’s help levered off his breast and back plates. Feeling more nearly human, he accepted another glass. By this time there was a group of four or five other officers clustered about him, and the droning voices at the council table went on and on over their shoulders.

“What was it like?” the artilleryman asked him. “The battle, I mean. The city’s been running with talk for days. They say you slew twenty thousand Merduks up there.”

“This Corfe-what manner of man is he?” another asked.

“They say he is John Mogen come again,” a third said in a low voice.

Andruw rubbed his eyes. He had never really sat back and considered Corfe before, the kind of man he was, the things he had done. But he saw something in the eyes of these young officers, something which startled him. It was a kind of awe, a reflected glory. At a time when all hope for the future was being ground down into the winter mud, and the once-great Torunnan military was decimated, cowering behind walls, this one man had raised an army out of thin air and with it had fought to a standstill the invincible Merduk horde.

“He’s a man like any other,” Andruw said at last. “The greatest friend I have.”

“By God, I’d give my right arm to serve under him,” one of the young men said earnestly. “He’s the only officer we have who’s doing anything.”

“They say he’s the Queen Dowager’s bedmate,” another said.

“They don’t know what they’re talking about,” Andruw growled. “He’s the best officer in the army, but those stuffed fools over there cannot see it. They pule and prate about precedent and decorum. They’ll be huddled over a brazier arguing when the Merduks are setting light to the palace itself.”

Some of the young officers looked over their shoulders nervously. The stuffed fools were barely ten yards away on the other side of the chamber.

“We’ll stand siege here soon,” the artilleryman said. “Then there will be glory enough for all.”

“But no one to make songs about it once the walls are breached and your wives and sisters are carried off to Merduk harems,” Andruw said savagely. “The enemy needs to be beaten in the field, and Corfe is the only man in the kingdom who might be able to do it.”

“I fancy half the army are beginning to think so too,” the artilleryman said in a whisper. “It’s common knowledge that he beat the rebels down south single-handed, and Aras did nothing but a little mopping up. It doesn’t do to say so, although-”

He broke off as Andruw was called back to the council table by his King.

“Be so good as to inform us of the strengths of the Merduk army your command encountered,” the King said with a wave of his hand.

“At least forty thousand, sire, but our impressions were that it was but the van of the whole. More formations were coming up as we pulled out. I should not be surprised if the final number were double that.”

A stir of talk, disbelief, or rather an unwillingness to believe.

“And how badly mauled was the enemy by the battle?”

“We did not see the end of the Fimbrians, sire-we left them still fighting, though surrounded. I would wager the Merduk general has lost perhaps a quarter of his strength. Fimbrian pikemen die hard.”

“You sound almost as though you admire these mercenaries.”

“I never saw men die better, sire, not even at the dyke.”

“Ah! So you were at the dyke. We had forgotten.” Several officers in the room seemed to warm to Andruw somewhat. He received a few approving nods.

“Corfe was at the dyke also, sire. He led the defence of the eastern barbican.”

“The first place to fall,” Aras murmured.

Andruw stepped forward until he had Aras penned against the long table. “I should be very sorry, sir, to hear anyone impugn the good name of my commanding officer. I feel I would have to ask for satisfaction in such a case.” His eyes blazed, and Aras looked away. “Of course, Haptman, of course…”

The King seemed to have missed the exchange. “Gentlemen,” he said, “with the addition of these men salvaged from Martellus’s command, we will have almost forty thousand available to defend the capital, though it means denuding our southern fiefs of troops. Thanks to the work of Colonel Aras, however, the rebellious provinces of the south are once again recalled to their ancient allegiance, and I think we need not fear for our rear in the struggle to come.”

Aras graciously accepted the mutter of approbation from the assembled officers.

“All bridges over the River Torrin, right up to the mountains, have been destroyed. The geography of our beloved country favours the defender. Our rivers are our walls.”

Like the Ostian and the Searil rivers, Andruw thought, both of which had failed to hold back the Merduk advance. Now that Northern Torunna had been evacuated, the Merduks might even send an army through the Torrin Gap and take Charibon if they chose, or cross the Torian Plains and assault Almark, even Perigraine. Those places were under the sway of the Himerian Church, however, and Andruw did not think that the men present would shed many tears if Charibon were sacked, or Almark-now rumoured to be Church-ruled-invaded. With the present religious schism dividing the Ramusian kingdoms, there could be no question of them presenting a united front to the invaders. Corfe was right: if the enemy were not crushed before Torunn, he would be able to send columns across half of Normannia. And if the Torunnan army allowed itself to be bottled up in the capital, besieged as Aekir had been besieged, then it would take itself out of the reckoning entirely. Almark and Perigraine were not great military powers. They could not withstand the Merduk and the troops of the Prophet would conquer the continent as far west as the Malvennor Mountains.

A palace courtier entered, interrupting Lofantyr’s rosy predictions of Merduk disaster. He bent and whispered in the King’s ear, and his sovereign shot up out of his seat, an outraged look on his face. “Tell her-” he began, but the doors of the chamber were thrown open, and the Queen Dowager entered with two of her ladies-in-waiting. Every man present bowed deeply, save for her son, who was furious.

“Lady, it is not appropriate that you be present here at this time,” he grated.

“Nonsense, Lofantyr,” his mother said with a winning smile, waving a folded fan. “I’ve sat in on meetings of the High Command all my life. Is that not true, General Menin?”

Menin bowed again and murmured something incomprehensible.

“In any case, Lofantyr, you left something behind when you visited me in my apartments the other day. I wished to make sure you received it.” She held out a scroll heavy with the scarlet wax of the Royal seal.

Lofantyr took it as gingerly as if he expected it to bite him. His eyes were narrow with suspicion. As he opened and read the document his face flushed red.

“From whence did this come?”

“Come now, my sovereign, it bears your own seal-one which I no longer possess. Pray read it out to this august company. I’m sure they are with child to hear the good news it contains.”

“Another time, perhaps.”

“Read it!” Her voice cracked like a gunshot, the authority in it making every man there wince. Lofantyr seemed to shrink.

“It… it is a general’s commission, for one Corfe Cear-Inaf, confirming him second-in-command of Martellus’s army or, if Martellus no longer lives, he is appointed sole commander.”

Andruw thumped his gauntleted fist into his palm with delight, and behind him several of the junior officers cried “Bravo!” as if they were watching a play. The Queen Dowager glided over to Colonel Aras, who looked as though he had just swallowed a bolus of foul-tasting medicine. “I hope you are not too disappointed, Colonel. I know how much you looked forward to commanding those red-clad barbarians.”

“No… no, not at all. Delighted, happy to…” He trailed off in confusion. Odelia’s concentrated regard was hard to bear.

“This is a mistake,” King Lofantyr managed, regaining his poise. “I sealed no such orders.”

“And yet they exist. Countermanding them is tantamount to breaking one’s word, my son. You are a busy man-you have merely misremembered that you issued them. I am sure the recollection will come to you. In time. Gentlemen, I will leave you to your high strategies. I, a poor, incompetent woman, am obviously out of my arena here. Haptman Cear-Adurhal, pray stop by my chambers before you return to your command.”

Andruw bowed wordlessly, his face shining. The other men there followed suit as the poor, incompetent woman made a regal exit.