The Silent House: A Chronicle of Aglirta
, by Greenwood
- ISBN: 9780765308177 | 0765308177
- Cover: Hardcover
- Copyright: 6/1/2004
sing a Micheneresque approach to chronicle the significant events and adventures of Aglirta history and the Silvertree clan, Greenwood creates a magical saga where purveyors of magic form an uneasy alliance with barbaric warlords in defense against non-human shapeshifters and practitioners of the dark arts. In the Band of Four series we were briefly introduced to the Silent House, the ancestral estate of the Silver-tree clan. This dungeon-like stronghold acts a a battery of enscorcellment and is powered by the family curse and all those trapped within. The Silent House itself becomes more than an armed stronghold-it becomes a living thing, dedicated to protecting its lord, drawing on his family's powers, and morphing to attack and protect invaders. But by doing so the house perpetuates a curse where the defended become the trapped, not just for now, but for all eternity. Filled with sorcery and battles between the dead and the undead, as well as plots of sinister deception and insidious manipulation, The Silent House is the first epic chronicle of the land and people of Aglirta.
Ed Greenwood is the bestselling author of the Band of Four series and creator of the bestselling and award-winning Forgotten Realms role-playing campaign setting. He lives in Colborne, Ontario.
Silent House
BOOK ONE
Ravengar Silvertree
Born 112 Sirl Reckoning, Died 156 SR First Baron of Silvertree to Be Made Lord Overbaron of Aglirta and How the Realm Turned Against Him1The Rise of the RavenThe fight is swift and furious. Blades skirl and clang on all sides as the panting men, stumbling with pain and weariness in their splendid but battered armor, hack and slash, too crowded in the churned mud of the hollow to back clear and fence with any care for the fate of their blades. Now all chases are ended, all proud taunts hurled, and it is slay or be slain.The black-haired, wild-bearded man with the handsome face, his cheekbones as high and his eyes as large and dark as many a beauteous lady of the realm, has led the charge into the hollow, under thick, thorny tangles that forced all the combatants to abandon their horses, to this last dancing-place of death. The dark, gloomy trees press in close around the lurching, gasping men, and more than one of them thinks fleetingly of what prowling beasts must be slinking closer, drawn by the clangor of battle, fully intending to soon feed ... .Fleetingly is all the time anyone dare give for any thought but the fray, or--"Ravengar!" one of his knights gasps at the black-bearded man. A dying man's desperate, futile pleading, a last despairing sob as the blade that's taking his life bursts out dark and wet from between the curved plates of his spurred and fluted armor, spraying lifeblood before it.Baron Ravengar Silvertree, beset in the thick of the fray by bull-necked, heavy-armored giants snarlingly seeking his life with ringing two-handed blows of their reaping swords, hears and whirls, leaping high to bring his own sweeping blade over the steel of a foe and into the man's face, its tip biting deep into hawk-nosed helm. He heeds this slayingnot, his gaze bent upon the dying Sorvren, who's been a true knight and a good friend, and rage sets his eyes afire.Sorvren's fading, dulling gaze fixes upon that fire and goes down into the Great Darkness, clinging to it, lips weakly struggling to form a smile--and Ravengar Silvertree glares into the grin of Sorvren's slayer, revealed behind the slumping knight, and springs to meet the man. As he leaps, he whirls both of his blades back behind himself to stave off the blows of the foes he's just burst out of, leaving his breast and face unprotected.Sorvren's slayer can't resist this bait, and leans forward in a roundhouse slash of his own, trying to slice out Ravengar's throat before the baron can reach him. As overbalanced as the Lord of Silvertree he's trying to slay, the man has no hope of keeping his feet as Sorvren crumples back into his thighs and knees, sending him sprawling helplessly forward--so both of Ravengar's armored knees can crash down on his head and neck, with a dull crack that can be felt more than heard in this forge-din of bloodshed.Baron Silvertree bounds to his feet with the force of his landing and whirls around again, blades slicing air defensively, in time to see Baron Auroun--the gasping, grunting boar of a man who's dared to proclaim himself "King of Aglirta" in the teeth of the rightful King Thamrain--lumber forward with a blood-dripping boar-spear in his hands.The two jutting points of Auroun's jowl-beard glisten with sweat and spittle, dripping like two tusks as the enraged baron abandons the shielding blades of his sycophants at last, rushing forward to strike at the unprotected back of his foe.And wavers, finding Ravengar Silvertree turned about and ready for him. Ravengar grows his own savage smile as Auroun slows and bellows to his knights for aid. Even before his shouts they're hastening to join him, shoulder-plates clanking, eager to hew down the man who scant breaths before had been trapped in their midst--but Ravengar doesn't wait for them.He lurches to the left, drawing the point of Auroun's spear,and then twists and ducks away to his right, so abruptly that his right elbow slams against his knee. Snarling, he hurls the borrowed-from-the-dead blade in his left hand into the baron's face. In its whirling wake, as Auroun shouts in alarm and pulls his head back and away, bringing his spear up, Ravengar's emptied left hand slaps down on the spear-shaft, tightens, and pulls.Off-balance and blinded in the spark-splashing buffeting of Ravengar's flung sword, the baron stumbles helplessly forward--and Ravengar drives the blade in his right hand up in a cross-throat slash that smashes aside Auroun's gorget, its straps flying, and bursts through the throat beneath in a spray of eagerly jetting gore.Silvertree continues both arm-swings, pulling his dying foe across in front of him by the spear to block the charge of one of Auroun's knights, and slapping at Auroun's greaves to bring his sword back past them and up to meet the other foremost knight.Who is a great burly, helmless grinning giant of a man, a sword-scarred veteran who loves blood and killing, and is roaring his glee as he brings his own long, heavy, much-notched sword up in a gutting thrust.That black blade hisses off the armored point of Ravengar's knee as the Lord of Silvertree turns side-on to the man, and rises up wickedly in front of Ravengar's nose. As the dying Auroun stumbles on Sorvren's corpse and falls, entangling the running knight behind him so that both plunge helplessly forward and down amid the shivering splinters of the bouncing boar-spear, Ravengar finds his own sword and the arm holding it free to swing--but beyond the thrusting blade that's flashing past his face.So he launches himself towards the sword-wielder, bringing his sword arm down on his foe's forearm even before his shoulder slams into the man's chest, driving forth the knight's wind with a tortured groan and a spray of foetid spittle.The man doubles up, or tries to, sinking down even as Ravengar lands hard on that extended sword arm and breaksit, rolling over atop its grinding ruin to drive his armored elbow into the helplessly shrieking knight's mouth.Shards of teeth fly as the man shudders back and away--and Ravengar continues his roll, after the knight, bringing his sword up and forward in a thrust that slides into that open and ravaged mouth with wet ease.Looking along it, he stares straight into the golden eyes of a huge, half-seen forest wolf watching the slaughter from between two gnarled tree trunks not six strides away. Ravengar kicks out and finds his feet, shaking his sword loose so as to menace the wolf--and the eyes are gone, winking out so suddenly that they might never have been there.The Lord of Silvertree turns, drawing breath in a sudden silence, to find himself gazing across bloody, trampled ferns strewn with armored bodies and at--the broad, armored mountain of King Estlan Thamrain, with two rumpled, bloodstained knights flanking him and a royal smile widening on that normally wintry face."By the Three, Raven, you've done it!" Thamrain shakes his head, half in admiration and half in disbelief, as he gazes around the hollow at all the sprawled dead. "Auroun and Belwyvrar and Galorfeather--all! Just as you promised!"Ravengar leans on his blade for a moment to catch his breath, and then goes to one knee, unable to keep a smile of his own entirely off his face. "Luck was with us this day, Majesty," he growls, fighting for wind enough to make his words measured and fair, "and the favor of the Three. Blood of Elroumrae, you are the only the rightful King of Aglirta, and the gods know this and have aided us this day!"Thamrain shakes his head again as he strides forward, stepping on the bodies of his foes with no care for dignity or lack of besmirchment. "I saw no gods fighting in this hollow now," he says thickly, eyes bright. "I saw my only loyal baron, the best warrior in all the realm, Ravengar Silvertree, carry the day with battle wits and fearless bladework. Raven, this day is yours.""My King," Ravengar replies, bowing his head, "I am and will remain true. A victory for you is a victory for us all--and I am proud and happy to have been of service to Aglirta.""Three Above," Thamrain says, drawing him up into a fierce hug, "but I seem to see both a matchless warrior and a bright-tongued envoy, in the same man! Your knights shall be barons in place of these dead traitors, and you shall be my 'Lord Overbaron.'""If it pleases Your Majesty, 'tis a title I shall be proud to bear.""It does," the king laughs, as they grin nose to nose. "It pleases me well!"
"The man soars like a hunting falcon," Raevrel murmured, his strong arms crossed as he stared out the high window.The darkly handsome man at the table whose left hand was always a taloned claw turned his head and told Raevrel's tall, straight back coldly, "Even falcons may be brought down, brother. Neither we nor the dead barons' kin are the only Aglirtans angered by Silvertree's rise.""He raids Flowfoam's coffers like a conquering outland lord," Raevrel murmured. "Spending our inheritance.""He does a lot of things, our proud and victorious Lord Overbaron," Thansel Snowsar said bitterly, setting aside his maps and parchments, and rising. "And our fool kinsman Thamrain is ever more grateful to him.""Little Toad Thamrain," Raevrel whispered, clenched fists trembling. "I should be King of Aglirta now, not him. He was the youngest and most stupid of us all--and only a shade away from being the laziest, too.""Aye, but he was normal," Thansel replied softly, raising his ever-present scaled claw in pointed reminder. "Free of the taint of Prince Koglaur.""Taint!" Raevrel almost spat, eyes like two gold flames as he whirled away from the window in a swirl of dark robes and darker hair. "The taint they still hunt us for! What makes them so right and so superior? Their fear of powers that can only have come from the Three?""Their numbers." Thansel shifted his shape, growing taller, a long fall of silken dark hair sprouting as breasts swelled beneath them, and hips. That taloned hand trailed behind one curvaceous leg as the beauty that never failed to take Raevrel's breath away glided near, and added in a purr, "Our time will come, Rae. Oh, yes, our time will come.""But when?" Raevrel growled as they embraced, bodies shifting subtly to almost meld together, skin to skin."Soon," Thansel whispered in his ear, growing a swift second mouth to do so while the first kissed him. "Very soon."
"Silvertree's castle is becoming a great expense," Irsrar Matchet remarked, turning from the map of Aglirta on the sloping desk to look out the window over the bustling harbor of Sirlptar. This house stood on the seaward side of the ridge, many tall mansions and many-spired houses hiding any view of Aglirta itself from him. "How're they going to pay for it all?"Feltorn chuckled and flicked a finger out from under his short, reddish beard as he always did, to wave it like a lecturing wand. "Ah, the eternal puzzlement of merchants in this city as they ponder any coffer but their own." He joined Matchet by the window."Baron Ravengar Silvertree has become Lord Overbaron Silvertree, remember, and 'tis fitting that his palace--begun, as he's essentially still but a wily lion of a warrior and back-forest hunter, as a defensible castle stronghold--be both large and luxurious. Large by our standards here in crowded Sirl-town, aye ... but not what we would call true luxury. Banish all thoughts of great shimmer-tapestries and hanging Sardastan glow-paintings from your mind. Think of large, cold, dim stone rooms with a few heavy wooden chairs and tables. Large shaggy dogs wandering freely to warm Silvertree's feet with their snoring on chill nights, and armor hung up to rust everywhere because backcountry Aglirtans can think of no other adornment. Pay for it all? Matchet, have you yet seen any end to the forests of Aglirta? Or ourSirl hunger for wood to build things with? Do you not eat--and does not the daily simple fare of all this proud city around us come from the farms of downriver Aglirta?"Matchet sighed in exasperation. "You goldsmiths look down your long noses at everyone, and see all as some sort of tapestry spread out before you, with folk of Darsar but ants scurrying about it. 'Tis all flows of coins and the doings of countries to you. I see a small, struggling realm ruled more by the great beasts of the forests than any of the armored barons who clank about Silverflow Vale shaking their swords at each other! A few riverbank farms here and a few there, endless war over who should rule, and the so-called 'royal' line spending half its time trying to slaughter its own kin who have the Beast-Taint ... I ask again: How are they going to pay for it all?""Pay whom, dear Matchet? They needn't pay profuse coin for Sirl crafters or the luxuries of all distant Darsar. The sweat of building is their own, and the stone, food, and timber are theirs--theirs for the taking. Have you not seen by now that we need them, but they don't need us? How do you think Sirlptar grew so wealthy, hey? What river do we sit at the mouth of? What comes down it, and why else would trade come here rather than to older, larger Carraglas, Ragalar, Urngallond, or Arlund?""Yes, yes, I know they feed us and have more good ship-timber left than anywhere else," Matchet replied testily, waving a dismissive hand as he strode back to the map again. "But you make your tapestry-gazing mistake again, Feltorn: they're not a single-minded, trade-cunning legion of merchants juggling debts, investments, and opportunities like the moneylenders of Urngallond! They're a bunch of brawling backwoods louts more interested in hunting each other than bringing down stags! They neither care nor consider where their timber and turnips go, so long as they can simply barge them downriver to us and receive handfuls of gold in return! How would they even know our ways, and how power is fought for in Sirlptar, and what's what in the wider world?""Ah, good clock-merchant," Feltorn replied softly, "you forget what the Beast-Taint is. They can walk among us, and we'll never know. They could take your face, or mine, at will. One could be standing here beside you right now, and you'd not know it. And as for not knowing about the rest of Darsar ... have you forgotten that this same brawling backwoods Silvertree has somehow taken to wife a sorceress of far Sarinda? A real beauty, too, with twice the wits of many wealthy and well-regarded merchants of Sirlptar; she could have wed almost anywhere, but chose your beast-roamed lout-pen of Aglirta. Have you forgotten that no less than six rich heiresses of Sirlptar took Aglirtan husbands this past decade? And left our crowded streets, every last one of them, to go live in backward, dangerous, baron-plagued Aglirta?"Feltorn shook his head as he stepped softly closer to the clock-merchant. "You shouldn't forget things, Matchet. Bad things happen to merchants who forget things."Irsrar Matchet stared at his colleague ... and found himself shuddering at Feltorn's quiet but suddenly sinister tone. Suddenly he recalled his unfinished drink--and just how much he needed it. A fine cordial, too, silken on the tongue ...He reached for it as Feltorn smilingly raised his own glass--and so never noticed that his sleeve had brushed the decanter in turning, causing it to spin and start to topple ... or how grotesquely long the fingers of the goldsmith's other hand momentarily grew to catch it and set it deftly back in place.Matchet sipped thankfully at his warming, soothing cordial and then shook his head. "Shape-shifters here, in Sirlptar? With all our wizards and their head-singing wards? Bah. That could never happen."Feltorn smiled faintly, and lowered his glass. "Indeed."
"Our descent from Queen Elroumrae is as clear and as strong as that of Thamrain, because it's the very same descent. If Prince Koglaur had survived that baronial ambush, he would have ruled as king--his shape-shifting then wasdeemed a curse laid on him by evil mages, not the 'taint' men talk of now. That word came to us from barons who desired to set aside House Snowsar and take the throne for themselves.""But those barons are all dead," Samraethe whispered, her eyes large and dark. "Silvertree killed them.""He killed the sons of the sons of those who first spread the tales of 'taint' and the Curse of the Three, and unfitness to rule. They used us as an excuse to challenge for the throne, and shed so much blood, and let the woods grow back and the monsters prowl unchecked. Ravengar Silvertree did us all that much service, in ending their bloodlines. There are no claimants for the throne now to rival Thamrain who can claim royal descent--save us. That won't stop Ravengar or his knights who now hold those baronies from considering themselves better fitted for the River Throne than 'tainted shape-shifters,' should something happen to Thamrain.""Things often seem to 'happen' to men who rule realms or cities," Samraethe murmured."Ah, you have been paying attention to Eldreth's histories. Good. That is why our way, what the more restless of you younglings have begun to foolishly deride as 'the skulking way,' is the best way. Let others hate and fear kings and Lord Overbarons, while we Faceless stand near but never on thrones, steering the fools as we please.""Raevrel and Thansel talk of doing murder in the Court, and stepping into the shapes of the senior courtiers and the king himself, and making war on Silvertree."The large, tentacle-faced head turned to regard Samraethe for a moment, and then slowly looked back into the gloom, features hidden from her again. "Raevrel and Thansel grow restless, too, and talk of more than they should. They tend to regard our dead kin as just names, but I remember faces, laughter, their dreams ... . Samraethe, along with the power to reshape ourselves, the Three have given us long years. Never forget that, or how deeply folk who lack our blood-powers hate and fear us, and how quickly and eagerly theyhave also helped to hunt us, when our 'normal' kin wanted us all dead. Hide, keep quiet, govern yourself with patience, and you can outlive the hunters. Stand forth in fury, as too many of us do and urge the rest of us to do, and you'll be marked, and watched, and intended for extinction.""Uncle Belmur, how did it all begin?"The tentacled head turned again. "You've begun to forget things, little one? So soon?""No, I've heard it often enough," Samraethe told him softly. "But I'd like to hear it from you.""No one knows how Prince Koglaur gained his powers, but 'twas he who could first shape-shift. Alterations of his face, the length and shape of his fingers, and the size and consistency of his feet.""Consistency?""Aye: sticky to walk up walls, hard to stride through fires ... and of course he could alter their size. I saw him walk across a stream once, making his feet like lily pads, only larger than shields. The coming of his powers surprised him, but to me they seemed inborn, erupting from him rather than visited on him by someone's spell. The whim of the gods, the flowering of an older dalliance in the royal line none of us can do more than guess at ... no matter. He had it, men knew about it, and all Aglirta started to watch us, to see if they could catch us at more of it."The tentacled head emitted a soft sigh, and added, "They meant our deaths, all of us. Those Snowsars who lacked the powers had to denounce us as 'other,' or be swept away from the throne in a slaughter of every last one of us, that would have taken Aglirta down into endless war. Brigandage. Savagery."They called us 'the fey,' and themselves 'the Clean,' or 'normal.' They hunted us--their brothers and sisters--almost to extinction ... and still do, when they can. Even if 'they' have now dwindled to just Thamrain, Ostel, Farlmeir, and their families.""While we have grown strong," Samraethe murmured."More than a score of us, many of us strong in our powers--and some of us have mastered sorceries, too."Belmuragath growled, "Aye, and grown bolder than those minor magics give us any right to be. 'Prudence' is but an amusing word to Thansel, Ammurak, Slaundshel, and those who study spells with them."Samraethe opened her mouth to reply, but then closed it again without a word, and kept silence.The tentacled head turned. "You rethink and leave words unsaid too loudly for me not to notice, little one. Speak truth, as things have always been between us."Samraethe sat still and silent for what seemed quite a long time, and then said very quietly, "Uncle Belmur, I learn and practice spells with Ammurak. And have learned boldness from him, too."Silence fell again, and stretched for a very long time before Belmuragath replied, not turning his head, "I see."
"Nay, my King," Ravengar said urgently, "they'll not come that way, riding right into our bows. They'll take the old bridge, here, and come round by way of Athalstance, up behind Hawkroost Hill. From its height they can do bow-work on us, and charge down at us if we struggle up to meet them."Thamrain studied the map just in front of his Lord Overbaron's fingers, sighed, and sat back. "You've the right of it, aye," he said wearily, "but I'm too weary to remember, or think straight--or talk straight either. Let's meet again come morn, and go over it again."Silvertree rose smoothly. "Of course. Shall I send in your page?"The royal mouth yawned. "Nay, Raven. I'll just step out of my boots and into the arms of Alyss ... and let her take off whatever she desires."Silvertree gave him a tired smile. "In the morn, then.""In the morn," the king echoed, rising with a muffledgroan from his chair. He still wasn't sure if his Lord Overbaron disapproved of his bedchamber-lass; that weathered smile hid everything. Raven's eyes weren't cold or afire, at least, and he'd never said a word about finding a queen and fathering heirs, something his Lord Steward and his Seneschal managed to mention to him, oh so politely, every single Lady-curséd day.He waved at Silvertree, one warrior to another, as the man went out. Then Thamrain lurched into his bedchamber and groaned into the familiar low, warm lamplight, "Alyss?""Here, my King," her husky voice replied from the bed, its purr eager. Thamrain had a glimpse of bare flank and thigh as he turned his back to her to sit down heavily on the edge of the bed."This night, lovechild mine," he managed around a sudden urgent procession of yawns, "your raging lord wants nothing more than ... than to snore, as soon as the Three grant. Could you ... help me with my boots?""Of course," Alyss murmured from just behind him, her voice just a trifle strange. Deeper ... she must be angry, aye, that would be it. Well, by the Three, she'd just have to ..."My King," she purred, gentle fingers stroking his chin, trailing down his neck.Thamrain started to shake his head, and then shrugged and chuckled. Well, if she wanted to do it her way, well enough ... .Like gliding snakes her fingertips found his ears, his nostrils, his mouth, sliding in so caressingly ... ."Snore, my Thamrain," Alyss purred, her voice much deeper now, as the King of Aglirta roused into alarm: How many fingers did she--"Snore and DIE, LITTLE TOAD!"And the finger in his mouth bulged up in an instant into a thick, choking worm, stifling all breath and any cry he might make, in the brief moments before the tentacles in his ears and nose swelled, too, and the rich red blankets of his own bed were being whipped up around his head by still more tentacles ... .Thamrain's head burst like a rotten melon, spattering blood so profusely that the blankets were soaked in an instant, and the hissing shape-shifter was forced to pluck up the sheets beneath to contain the gore. The last semblance of Alyss melted away as its tentacles writhed and swirled, and a mouth that was sliding into something quite different hissed soft curse after disgusted curse."Rae," came a level voice from the doorway, "you're making near as much noise as if you were fighting him fists to fists. Let me take care of that, and shift yourself into Thamrain's likeness. There are guards just outside."The tentacled thing on the bed snarled something angry and wordless, breathing heavily. Tentacles writhed briefly and then sank back into melting, shifting flesh that flowed and thrust and shuddered, until--"That's it," Thansel said critically. "That's ... aye, just like that. Stay like that."Raevrel bared his teeth in a silent snarl, and got up from the bed, human-seeming arms coiling and flailing in distaste. Without a word the other Koglaur flung tentacles across the room and took hold of the slumping, blanket-shrouded body."Wait here for me," he muttered, sprouting so many tentacles that snake-like coils almost covered the dead king in a coccoon."What if someone sees you?"A dozen gesture-echoing tentacles made Thansel's shrug impressive indeed. "'Twill be the last thing they ever see," he said briefly, as he bundled his burden out.Raevrel looked back at the stripped bed thoughtfully, recalling the brief fun he'd had on it with the real Alyss before he'd broken her neck. She'd been ...He put those memories aside with a flare of anger and sent a pair of tentacles snaking into the next room in search of replacement boots. He'd forgotten to snatch them off before Thansel went out, and--"Here," Thansel's familiar voice said flatly. "I figured you'd be wanting the boots." The words were coming fromwhat looked to be a sleepy, irritated Lord Steward Narthar, in his night robe."Now we go together to Silvertree?" Raevrel asked, stamping his feet into the splendid-looking boots and looking around for a sword."We get your door guards to take us. That way we're brought to him without a lot of turning the palace upside down searching, and through whatever guards he might get here, with the smallest flasks of fuss and delay we can empty. Now look angry about something secret and urgent.""What?""Invent something," Thansel said flatly, every inch the haggard, tousled steward of advanced years and bright loyalty as he hastened into the forechamber. "Real kings do it all the time."
Torches guttered low in wall-brackets in many a passage of the royal palace in the chill hours before dawn, but a surprising plenty of courtiers were still up and awake, backs to the walls in watchful pairs or threesomes in those stretches of hall farthest from the light, muttering together in low, careful voices. Many of those urgent, angry near-whispers included the words "Ravengar's rise," as if it were a calamity of the weather.Their murmured discussions were hushed by the approach of hard-eyed guards with drawn swords in their hands, and Lord Steward Narthar and the King himself--bareheaded, sleepy, and grim, but striding with angry purpose. The courtiers' mutterings arose with fresh vigor in their wake, and a few of the most daring whisperers drifted along in the direction the royal procession had taken. The rest merely speculated on its destination.Most of them were correct in their suppositions. In Flow-foam, these latter nights, all endeavors sooner or later regarded and carefully avoided, or passed through the presence and scrutiny of, Lord Overbaron Ravengar Silvertree.Who'd discarded his sweat-damp shirt and unbuckled hisbelt with a weary groan, lying down on his bed with boots still on and hand clasped over the hilt of his still-scabbarded sword, to leave all cares behind for however long the Three granted this time, before--He came awake in an instant, sword half-out and sitting up alertly in the darkness. The sound came again, louder this time: someone pulling hard on the barred door to his room, causing the heavy wooden bar to thud against the wall and then fall back against its brackets.Silvertree buckled his belt and rose from the bed in one smooth movement, darting a glance at the archway into the next room and the motionless tapestry that filled it. The window of the room beyond the tapestry could be unshuttered with two sweeps of his hand, pivoting swivel-catches aside, to offer an escape.Of sorts. A long, hard fall onto a wooded hillside that plunged steeply to the river, with only a narrow guardwalk at the base of the palace wall--an unlit dirt track on this stretch of its run--between him and the cold rushing waters of the Silverflow.Drawing his sword, the Lord Overbaron of Aglirta walked as quietly as he could to the barred door and stopped to one side of it, not uttering a word."I must speak with him!" Thamrain's voice snarled from somewhere beyond it. "Get it open--now!""My King," the tremulous tones of the Lord Steward said disapprovingly from even farther away. "Surely we need not destroy the palace! Lord Silvertree is doubtless exhausted and deep asleep--a condition brought on by his diligent and loyal service. Perhaps if this man hails him, in your name?"Ravengar grinned in the darkness. Narthar loved him not, but liked doing things the right way more than anything else. But what urgent matter could the Lord Steward and the King together not deal with, that a newly anointed Lord Overbaron must be roused from his bed to deal with?"Open," a guard's voice snapped. "Open, in the name of the King!"Silvertree kept silent--and then, struck by a suddenthought, turned soundlessly on his heel, went to the tapestry, and thrust it aside with his sword. Utter darkness lay beyond, and no sound or movement."Open, I say!" the guard called more loudly, and slammed what was probably both fists or his shoulder against the door, so the wood thudded as loudly as stout stone and older, more massive wood framing allowed it. "Open for King Thamrain!"Silvertree kept silent. No man willingly opens the door to what could quite likely be his own death."Silvertree?" Thamrain barked, his voice as deep and as loud as if he'd been fresh and bright, rather than the tottering, yawning man Ravengar had left not long ago. "Open up, man! I must talk with you!"The King waited, and then called more loudly and sharply, "Raven?""Enough of this," the steward said angrily. "Depart, all of you. Leave us. Go on, we'll be perfectly safe. Return to your posts. If we can't rouse him, we'll call you back, never fear. Go on!"There was much shuffling of booted feet, men tramping away, swords and armored elbows scraping briefly against stone walls, and then silence."Lord Silvertree?" the steward called, his voice faint. He must have turned away from the door to speak down the passage, for the benefit of the departing guards. Stranger and stranger, this.Silvertree slowly drew in a deep, carefully soundless breath, raised his sword behind his shoulder so as to be ready to chop down, and waited. A little light from the nearest wall-torch in the passage was leaking in around the door; it was all he had to see by as he stared at that stout barrier--and waited.Abruptly, there was a flicker of movement in the gloom around the door. Around the door, aye, in the crack where it met its frame. Something--there! Something small and dark and wiggling, like a questing worm ...Like a snake. Silvertree took a swift step away and back,to best position himself for a swing, and peered at the dark, undulating finger of ... of whatever it was. It reached farther into the room, wriggling now and shifting its shape, bulges occurring within it and gliding together to meet at its tip, grow larger in their merging, and slowly stand forth from the ribbon-like body ... whereupon an eyelid flickered in one bulge. Eyes! Eyes blinking in the darkness, seeking him--In sudden fear he slashed out, spraying gore across the inside of the door and slicing those orbs away from the snakelike bulk that had grown them.It convulsed and thrashed the air wildly, trailing blood, as something on the far side of the door hissed and then sobbed in furious pain.Moving as quietly as he dared, Ravengar Silvertree returned to his stance, sword at the ready despite the slow drip, drip of unseen blood running down to his knuckles to seek the floor.What this had to do with the King, he wasn't sure. Did Thamrain--or more likely old Narthar--have some sort of pet snake-beast, that could spy on--?But nay, it mattered not, did it? Snake or not-snake or spell, this could mean nothing good for Ravengar Silvertree.Perhaps Thamrain was alarmed by the success of his Lord Overbaron, and had invited him here to the palace expressly to slay him, and blame the killing on Ravengar's own treachery against the Crown. With the other barons gone, Thamrain's throne was secure--and he might well judge it safer with the man whose sword had confirmed him there dead, rather than keep Silvertree as a loyal and capable guardian.A loyalty that had been heartfelt and unstinting until that--that thing had come wriggling through the door right in front of his face, a moment ago ...Yes, there 'twas again! More things, a dozen of them this time, or more, reaching through the door-seam like so many evil fingers ...He sliced and hacked in a brief fury, and heard a hoarse scream on the other side of the door this time--before something whipped around his ankle.He hacked down with savage swiftness, not daring to bend to put his full weight behind those blows as other tentacles came questing up under the door to join the first. His blade clanged sparks from the floor with one blow, but thank the Three, he cut the tentacle around his ankle.Without tarrying another instant, Silvertree raced away, ducking through the archway heedless of the tapestry, and plunging across the chamber beyond to thrust open the shutters in fumbling, do-this-quietly-damn-all-gods haste.The dim, pale gray foredawn showed him no bowmen or guards below, and no tentacles swooping out of nearby windows, either.Setting his teeth, Ravengar Silvertree scrambled up onto the sill as he heard his door-bar tumble to the floor in the darkness behind him. He swung his sword up and out into the air to gain some force for his leap, and followed the thrust of his blade into the empty night, plunging down, down--To a bone-bouncing, breath-snatching crash through branches and then a thambar-bush to strike the ground hard amid much snapping wood, and spring stumbling to his feet in a frantic rush down into the uneven, vine- and stump-choked wooded gloom beyond.Light blossomed above and behind him, flaring back sudden reflection from boughs and tree trunks ahead, and the Lord Overbaron of Aglirta ducked to one side and raced on in his bruising, tumbling flight down through half-seen trees, roots, and thorny tangles, panting for breath and sparing no time for a look back. He did not, he told himself fiercely, as he caught his sword on a branch with a blow that numbed his fingers and almost wrenched the weapon from his hand, need to see more tentacles, just now. Or ever.And then, quite suddenly, the thickly standing tree trunks gave way to a pale gray light, and--he was in the water.Its cold jolted him, clawing at his bare torso so fiercely that he shuddered for breath, almost lost his blade again, and then found the shock sliding away into numbness.Too long in the river would slay him as surely as any strangling tentacle or guardsman's blade ... .He struck out for the unseen shore, letting the current take him along the Flowfoam bank, swimming with it rather than trying to struggle against it, hoping no seeking arrows would come his way ... .He did risk one look back--and wished he hadn't. Long, pale streamers of many-winged, palely glowing things were arcing down through the trees from his windows, which now blazed with the light of many torches. Helmed heads were crowded along the sills, watching as the two monstrous things pursued him, growing long needle-snouts and sleek flippers moments before they struck the water.Ravengar Silvertree hurled a bitter curse at whatever gods might be listening in these chill moments before dawn, and started swimming for his life.Or whatever short stretch of it might be left to him. The swift river flow was carrying him away from Flowfoam far faster than his splashing attempts to reach the south bank, but the chill waters would be carrying a cold corpse if he didn't get clear of them soon ... or the blood and a few torn limbs of one, if those shape-shifting things caught up to him.There were sleek, purposeful ripplings behind him, and splashings. Too close and drawing swiftly closer ...Damn the Three, and Aglirta with them! He was going to die here, torn or bitten or stabbed horribly in mere moments, alone without his Yuesembra!"Sembra!" he gasped aloud, fighting his way towards the unseen riverbank. "My lady love, flee from this land before they take you, too! Oh, Yuesembra, may the Three spare you as they've spurned me, and--"Something in the water slapped against his foot then, and as he twisted desperately away from it, the night around him burst into a brightness as blue and pale as soft moonlight, and he saw two bulks rising menacingly in the swirling water just behind him--and beyond them, racing across the river like little flames, the advancing edge of the blue radiance.It was coming from the riverbank--where a lone, dark form stood, long unbound hair writhing and whipping about bare spread limbs as if in a gusty gale--and eyes two points of blue fire."Sembra!" Ravengar gasped, and clawed at the water in a fresh frenzy, trying desperately to reach his wife.Her hands were weaving a spell, clawing the air in intricate gestures that trailed brief glows and swirls of sparks. Words tumbled from her lips in a swift, precise flow as she started to dance--not alluringly, but in a sequence of odd, briefly frozen poses in which arcs of fire sometimes briefly formed around her ... and her murmured incantation never stopped.Something that had more teeth than seemed possible raked along Silvertree's ribs and thigh, plunging him into burning agony. He thrashed, convulsed, swallowed water, and tried to scream.Somehow he got his face up out of the water again and struck out blindly with his sword, even as tentacles, some of them growing eyes and eager fanged mouths with fearsome speed, thrust into his view, curving over and around him ... .The night caught sudden ruby fire, a blaze almost bright enough to hide the blood boiling into ragged red smoke as tentacles burst into tatters and melted away in midair, swept away in a struggling instant, waters hurled back in a great bowl of warm death that left Ravengar Silvertree suddenly on his knees on the stones of the exposed riverbed--and then, as the waters rushed back, snatched him ashore in a drenched and gasping heap, shivering around the slender ankles of his wife."Yuesembra," he managed to sob through his agonies, as silvery fish flopped and arched in the wet wrack around him.Long-fingered hands dragged him to his feet with more sheer strength than he'd known she possessed, and familiar dark eyes looked into his from less than a finger-length away."Raven, my Raven," she whispered, and kissed him fiercely.Warm healing arose in his mouth and seemed to bubblethrough him, like a flood of caressing fire. As he arched and bucked helplessly in her arms, the woman folk of Aglirta called the Witch of Sarinda said into his bleeding ears, "Do you really think I'd let you sleep in yon palace, surrounded by dagger-wielding courtiers--and wantonly ambitious maidservants, too--without watching over you?"Ravengar blinked at her, dazedly trying to form a smile. She shook her head, giving him a wry half-smile in return, and gave him a tug that cost him his hold on his sword at last and nearly sent him sprawling."Now come," she ordered, dragging the Lord Overbaron of Aglirta away up the riverbank in a tottering stumble before he could sag against her, "let's be away from here!"Copyright © 2004 by Ed Greenwood
BOOK ONE
Ravengar Silvertree
Born 112 Sirl Reckoning, Died 156 SR First Baron of Silvertree to Be Made Lord Overbaron of Aglirta and How the Realm Turned Against Him1The Rise of the RavenThe fight is swift and furious. Blades skirl and clang on all sides as the panting men, stumbling with pain and weariness in their splendid but battered armor, hack and slash, too crowded in the churned mud of the hollow to back clear and fence with any care for the fate of their blades. Now all chases are ended, all proud taunts hurled, and it is slay or be slain.The black-haired, wild-bearded man with the handsome face, his cheekbones as high and his eyes as large and dark as many a beauteous lady of the realm, has led the charge into the hollow, under thick, thorny tangles that forced all the combatants to abandon their horses, to this last dancing-place of death. The dark, gloomy trees press in close around the lurching, gasping men, and more than one of them thinks fleetingly of what prowling beasts must be slinking closer, drawn by the clangor of battle, fully intending to soon feed ... .Fleetingly is all the time anyone dare give for any thought but the fray, or--"Ravengar!" one of his knights gasps at the black-bearded man. A dying man's desperate, futile pleading, a last despairing sob as the blade that's taking his life bursts out dark and wet from between the curved plates of his spurred and fluted armor, spraying lifeblood before it.Baron Ravengar Silvertree, beset in the thick of the fray by bull-necked, heavy-armored giants snarlingly seeking his life with ringing two-handed blows of their reaping swords, hears and whirls, leaping high to bring his own sweeping blade over the steel of a foe and into the man's face, its tip biting deep into hawk-nosed helm. He heeds this slayingnot, his gaze bent upon the dying Sorvren, who's been a true knight and a good friend, and rage sets his eyes afire.Sorvren's fading, dulling gaze fixes upon that fire and goes down into the Great Darkness, clinging to it, lips weakly struggling to form a smile--and Ravengar Silvertree glares into the grin of Sorvren's slayer, revealed behind the slumping knight, and springs to meet the man. As he leaps, he whirls both of his blades back behind himself to stave off the blows of the foes he's just burst out of, leaving his breast and face unprotected.Sorvren's slayer can't resist this bait, and leans forward in a roundhouse slash of his own, trying to slice out Ravengar's throat before the baron can reach him. As overbalanced as the Lord of Silvertree he's trying to slay, the man has no hope of keeping his feet as Sorvren crumples back into his thighs and knees, sending him sprawling helplessly forward--so both of Ravengar's armored knees can crash down on his head and neck, with a dull crack that can be felt more than heard in this forge-din of bloodshed.Baron Silvertree bounds to his feet with the force of his landing and whirls around again, blades slicing air defensively, in time to see Baron Auroun--the gasping, grunting boar of a man who's dared to proclaim himself "King of Aglirta" in the teeth of the rightful King Thamrain--lumber forward with a blood-dripping boar-spear in his hands.The two jutting points of Auroun's jowl-beard glisten with sweat and spittle, dripping like two tusks as the enraged baron abandons the shielding blades of his sycophants at last, rushing forward to strike at the unprotected back of his foe.And wavers, finding Ravengar Silvertree turned about and ready for him. Ravengar grows his own savage smile as Auroun slows and bellows to his knights for aid. Even before his shouts they're hastening to join him, shoulder-plates clanking, eager to hew down the man who scant breaths before had been trapped in their midst--but Ravengar doesn't wait for them.He lurches to the left, drawing the point of Auroun's spear,and then twists and ducks away to his right, so abruptly that his right elbow slams against his knee. Snarling, he hurls the borrowed-from-the-dead blade in his left hand into the baron's face. In its whirling wake, as Auroun shouts in alarm and pulls his head back and away, bringing his spear up, Ravengar's emptied left hand slaps down on the spear-shaft, tightens, and pulls.Off-balance and blinded in the spark-splashing buffeting of Ravengar's flung sword, the baron stumbles helplessly forward--and Ravengar drives the blade in his right hand up in a cross-throat slash that smashes aside Auroun's gorget, its straps flying, and bursts through the throat beneath in a spray of eagerly jetting gore.Silvertree continues both arm-swings, pulling his dying foe across in front of him by the spear to block the charge of one of Auroun's knights, and slapping at Auroun's greaves to bring his sword back past them and up to meet the other foremost knight.Who is a great burly, helmless grinning giant of a man, a sword-scarred veteran who loves blood and killing, and is roaring his glee as he brings his own long, heavy, much-notched sword up in a gutting thrust.That black blade hisses off the armored point of Ravengar's knee as the Lord of Silvertree turns side-on to the man, and rises up wickedly in front of Ravengar's nose. As the dying Auroun stumbles on Sorvren's corpse and falls, entangling the running knight behind him so that both plunge helplessly forward and down amid the shivering splinters of the bouncing boar-spear, Ravengar finds his own sword and the arm holding it free to swing--but beyond the thrusting blade that's flashing past his face.So he launches himself towards the sword-wielder, bringing his sword arm down on his foe's forearm even before his shoulder slams into the man's chest, driving forth the knight's wind with a tortured groan and a spray of foetid spittle.The man doubles up, or tries to, sinking down even as Ravengar lands hard on that extended sword arm and breaksit, rolling over atop its grinding ruin to drive his armored elbow into the helplessly shrieking knight's mouth.Shards of teeth fly as the man shudders back and away--and Ravengar continues his roll, after the knight, bringing his sword up and forward in a thrust that slides into that open and ravaged mouth with wet ease.Looking along it, he stares straight into the golden eyes of a huge, half-seen forest wolf watching the slaughter from between two gnarled tree trunks not six strides away. Ravengar kicks out and finds his feet, shaking his sword loose so as to menace the wolf--and the eyes are gone, winking out so suddenly that they might never have been there.The Lord of Silvertree turns, drawing breath in a sudden silence, to find himself gazing across bloody, trampled ferns strewn with armored bodies and at--the broad, armored mountain of King Estlan Thamrain, with two rumpled, bloodstained knights flanking him and a royal smile widening on that normally wintry face."By the Three, Raven, you've done it!" Thamrain shakes his head, half in admiration and half in disbelief, as he gazes around the hollow at all the sprawled dead. "Auroun and Belwyvrar and Galorfeather--all! Just as you promised!"Ravengar leans on his blade for a moment to catch his breath, and then goes to one knee, unable to keep a smile of his own entirely off his face. "Luck was with us this day, Majesty," he growls, fighting for wind enough to make his words measured and fair, "and the favor of the Three. Blood of Elroumrae, you are the only the rightful King of Aglirta, and the gods know this and have aided us this day!"Thamrain shakes his head again as he strides forward, stepping on the bodies of his foes with no care for dignity or lack of besmirchment. "I saw no gods fighting in this hollow now," he says thickly, eyes bright. "I saw my only loyal baron, the best warrior in all the realm, Ravengar Silvertree, carry the day with battle wits and fearless bladework. Raven, this day is yours.""My King," Ravengar replies, bowing his head, "I am and will remain true. A victory for you is a victory for us all--and I am proud and happy to have been of service to Aglirta.""Three Above," Thamrain says, drawing him up into a fierce hug, "but I seem to see both a matchless warrior and a bright-tongued envoy, in the same man! Your knights shall be barons in place of these dead traitors, and you shall be my 'Lord Overbaron.'""If it pleases Your Majesty, 'tis a title I shall be proud to bear.""It does," the king laughs, as they grin nose to nose. "It pleases me well!"
"The man soars like a hunting falcon," Raevrel murmured, his strong arms crossed as he stared out the high window.The darkly handsome man at the table whose left hand was always a taloned claw turned his head and told Raevrel's tall, straight back coldly, "Even falcons may be brought down, brother. Neither we nor the dead barons' kin are the only Aglirtans angered by Silvertree's rise.""He raids Flowfoam's coffers like a conquering outland lord," Raevrel murmured. "Spending our inheritance.""He does a lot of things, our proud and victorious Lord Overbaron," Thansel Snowsar said bitterly, setting aside his maps and parchments, and rising. "And our fool kinsman Thamrain is ever more grateful to him.""Little Toad Thamrain," Raevrel whispered, clenched fists trembling. "I should be King of Aglirta now, not him. He was the youngest and most stupid of us all--and only a shade away from being the laziest, too.""Aye, but he was normal," Thansel replied softly, raising his ever-present scaled claw in pointed reminder. "Free of the taint of Prince Koglaur.""Taint!" Raevrel almost spat, eyes like two gold flames as he whirled away from the window in a swirl of dark robes and darker hair. "The taint they still hunt us for! What makes them so right and so superior? Their fear of powers that can only have come from the Three?""Their numbers." Thansel shifted his shape, growing taller, a long fall of silken dark hair sprouting as breasts swelled beneath them, and hips. That taloned hand trailed behind one curvaceous leg as the beauty that never failed to take Raevrel's breath away glided near, and added in a purr, "Our time will come, Rae. Oh, yes, our time will come.""But when?" Raevrel growled as they embraced, bodies shifting subtly to almost meld together, skin to skin."Soon," Thansel whispered in his ear, growing a swift second mouth to do so while the first kissed him. "Very soon."
"Silvertree's castle is becoming a great expense," Irsrar Matchet remarked, turning from the map of Aglirta on the sloping desk to look out the window over the bustling harbor of Sirlptar. This house stood on the seaward side of the ridge, many tall mansions and many-spired houses hiding any view of Aglirta itself from him. "How're they going to pay for it all?"Feltorn chuckled and flicked a finger out from under his short, reddish beard as he always did, to wave it like a lecturing wand. "Ah, the eternal puzzlement of merchants in this city as they ponder any coffer but their own." He joined Matchet by the window."Baron Ravengar Silvertree has become Lord Overbaron Silvertree, remember, and 'tis fitting that his palace--begun, as he's essentially still but a wily lion of a warrior and back-forest hunter, as a defensible castle stronghold--be both large and luxurious. Large by our standards here in crowded Sirl-town, aye ... but not what we would call true luxury. Banish all thoughts of great shimmer-tapestries and hanging Sardastan glow-paintings from your mind. Think of large, cold, dim stone rooms with a few heavy wooden chairs and tables. Large shaggy dogs wandering freely to warm Silvertree's feet with their snoring on chill nights, and armor hung up to rust everywhere because backcountry Aglirtans can think of no other adornment. Pay for it all? Matchet, have you yet seen any end to the forests of Aglirta? Or ourSirl hunger for wood to build things with? Do you not eat--and does not the daily simple fare of all this proud city around us come from the farms of downriver Aglirta?"Matchet sighed in exasperation. "You goldsmiths look down your long noses at everyone, and see all as some sort of tapestry spread out before you, with folk of Darsar but ants scurrying about it. 'Tis all flows of coins and the doings of countries to you. I see a small, struggling realm ruled more by the great beasts of the forests than any of the armored barons who clank about Silverflow Vale shaking their swords at each other! A few riverbank farms here and a few there, endless war over who should rule, and the so-called 'royal' line spending half its time trying to slaughter its own kin who have the Beast-Taint ... I ask again: How are they going to pay for it all?""Pay whom, dear Matchet? They needn't pay profuse coin for Sirl crafters or the luxuries of all distant Darsar. The sweat of building is their own, and the stone, food, and timber are theirs--theirs for the taking. Have you not seen by now that we need them, but they don't need us? How do you think Sirlptar grew so wealthy, hey? What river do we sit at the mouth of? What comes down it, and why else would trade come here rather than to older, larger Carraglas, Ragalar, Urngallond, or Arlund?""Yes, yes, I know they feed us and have more good ship-timber left than anywhere else," Matchet replied testily, waving a dismissive hand as he strode back to the map again. "But you make your tapestry-gazing mistake again, Feltorn: they're not a single-minded, trade-cunning legion of merchants juggling debts, investments, and opportunities like the moneylenders of Urngallond! They're a bunch of brawling backwoods louts more interested in hunting each other than bringing down stags! They neither care nor consider where their timber and turnips go, so long as they can simply barge them downriver to us and receive handfuls of gold in return! How would they even know our ways, and how power is fought for in Sirlptar, and what's what in the wider world?""Ah, good clock-merchant," Feltorn replied softly, "you forget what the Beast-Taint is. They can walk among us, and we'll never know. They could take your face, or mine, at will. One could be standing here beside you right now, and you'd not know it. And as for not knowing about the rest of Darsar ... have you forgotten that this same brawling backwoods Silvertree has somehow taken to wife a sorceress of far Sarinda? A real beauty, too, with twice the wits of many wealthy and well-regarded merchants of Sirlptar; she could have wed almost anywhere, but chose your beast-roamed lout-pen of Aglirta. Have you forgotten that no less than six rich heiresses of Sirlptar took Aglirtan husbands this past decade? And left our crowded streets, every last one of them, to go live in backward, dangerous, baron-plagued Aglirta?"Feltorn shook his head as he stepped softly closer to the clock-merchant. "You shouldn't forget things, Matchet. Bad things happen to merchants who forget things."Irsrar Matchet stared at his colleague ... and found himself shuddering at Feltorn's quiet but suddenly sinister tone. Suddenly he recalled his unfinished drink--and just how much he needed it. A fine cordial, too, silken on the tongue ...He reached for it as Feltorn smilingly raised his own glass--and so never noticed that his sleeve had brushed the decanter in turning, causing it to spin and start to topple ... or how grotesquely long the fingers of the goldsmith's other hand momentarily grew to catch it and set it deftly back in place.Matchet sipped thankfully at his warming, soothing cordial and then shook his head. "Shape-shifters here, in Sirlptar? With all our wizards and their head-singing wards? Bah. That could never happen."Feltorn smiled faintly, and lowered his glass. "Indeed."
"Our descent from Queen Elroumrae is as clear and as strong as that of Thamrain, because it's the very same descent. If Prince Koglaur had survived that baronial ambush, he would have ruled as king--his shape-shifting then wasdeemed a curse laid on him by evil mages, not the 'taint' men talk of now. That word came to us from barons who desired to set aside House Snowsar and take the throne for themselves.""But those barons are all dead," Samraethe whispered, her eyes large and dark. "Silvertree killed them.""He killed the sons of the sons of those who first spread the tales of 'taint' and the Curse of the Three, and unfitness to rule. They used us as an excuse to challenge for the throne, and shed so much blood, and let the woods grow back and the monsters prowl unchecked. Ravengar Silvertree did us all that much service, in ending their bloodlines. There are no claimants for the throne now to rival Thamrain who can claim royal descent--save us. That won't stop Ravengar or his knights who now hold those baronies from considering themselves better fitted for the River Throne than 'tainted shape-shifters,' should something happen to Thamrain.""Things often seem to 'happen' to men who rule realms or cities," Samraethe murmured."Ah, you have been paying attention to Eldreth's histories. Good. That is why our way, what the more restless of you younglings have begun to foolishly deride as 'the skulking way,' is the best way. Let others hate and fear kings and Lord Overbarons, while we Faceless stand near but never on thrones, steering the fools as we please.""Raevrel and Thansel talk of doing murder in the Court, and stepping into the shapes of the senior courtiers and the king himself, and making war on Silvertree."The large, tentacle-faced head turned to regard Samraethe for a moment, and then slowly looked back into the gloom, features hidden from her again. "Raevrel and Thansel grow restless, too, and talk of more than they should. They tend to regard our dead kin as just names, but I remember faces, laughter, their dreams ... . Samraethe, along with the power to reshape ourselves, the Three have given us long years. Never forget that, or how deeply folk who lack our blood-powers hate and fear us, and how quickly and eagerly theyhave also helped to hunt us, when our 'normal' kin wanted us all dead. Hide, keep quiet, govern yourself with patience, and you can outlive the hunters. Stand forth in fury, as too many of us do and urge the rest of us to do, and you'll be marked, and watched, and intended for extinction.""Uncle Belmur, how did it all begin?"The tentacled head turned again. "You've begun to forget things, little one? So soon?""No, I've heard it often enough," Samraethe told him softly. "But I'd like to hear it from you.""No one knows how Prince Koglaur gained his powers, but 'twas he who could first shape-shift. Alterations of his face, the length and shape of his fingers, and the size and consistency of his feet.""Consistency?""Aye: sticky to walk up walls, hard to stride through fires ... and of course he could alter their size. I saw him walk across a stream once, making his feet like lily pads, only larger than shields. The coming of his powers surprised him, but to me they seemed inborn, erupting from him rather than visited on him by someone's spell. The whim of the gods, the flowering of an older dalliance in the royal line none of us can do more than guess at ... no matter. He had it, men knew about it, and all Aglirta started to watch us, to see if they could catch us at more of it."The tentacled head emitted a soft sigh, and added, "They meant our deaths, all of us. Those Snowsars who lacked the powers had to denounce us as 'other,' or be swept away from the throne in a slaughter of every last one of us, that would have taken Aglirta down into endless war. Brigandage. Savagery."They called us 'the fey,' and themselves 'the Clean,' or 'normal.' They hunted us--their brothers and sisters--almost to extinction ... and still do, when they can. Even if 'they' have now dwindled to just Thamrain, Ostel, Farlmeir, and their families.""While we have grown strong," Samraethe murmured."More than a score of us, many of us strong in our powers--and some of us have mastered sorceries, too."Belmuragath growled, "Aye, and grown bolder than those minor magics give us any right to be. 'Prudence' is but an amusing word to Thansel, Ammurak, Slaundshel, and those who study spells with them."Samraethe opened her mouth to reply, but then closed it again without a word, and kept silence.The tentacled head turned. "You rethink and leave words unsaid too loudly for me not to notice, little one. Speak truth, as things have always been between us."Samraethe sat still and silent for what seemed quite a long time, and then said very quietly, "Uncle Belmur, I learn and practice spells with Ammurak. And have learned boldness from him, too."Silence fell again, and stretched for a very long time before Belmuragath replied, not turning his head, "I see."
"Nay, my King," Ravengar said urgently, "they'll not come that way, riding right into our bows. They'll take the old bridge, here, and come round by way of Athalstance, up behind Hawkroost Hill. From its height they can do bow-work on us, and charge down at us if we struggle up to meet them."Thamrain studied the map just in front of his Lord Overbaron's fingers, sighed, and sat back. "You've the right of it, aye," he said wearily, "but I'm too weary to remember, or think straight--or talk straight either. Let's meet again come morn, and go over it again."Silvertree rose smoothly. "Of course. Shall I send in your page?"The royal mouth yawned. "Nay, Raven. I'll just step out of my boots and into the arms of Alyss ... and let her take off whatever she desires."Silvertree gave him a tired smile. "In the morn, then.""In the morn," the king echoed, rising with a muffledgroan from his chair. He still wasn't sure if his Lord Overbaron disapproved of his bedchamber-lass; that weathered smile hid everything. Raven's eyes weren't cold or afire, at least, and he'd never said a word about finding a queen and fathering heirs, something his Lord Steward and his Seneschal managed to mention to him, oh so politely, every single Lady-curséd day.He waved at Silvertree, one warrior to another, as the man went out. Then Thamrain lurched into his bedchamber and groaned into the familiar low, warm lamplight, "Alyss?""Here, my King," her husky voice replied from the bed, its purr eager. Thamrain had a glimpse of bare flank and thigh as he turned his back to her to sit down heavily on the edge of the bed."This night, lovechild mine," he managed around a sudden urgent procession of yawns, "your raging lord wants nothing more than ... than to snore, as soon as the Three grant. Could you ... help me with my boots?""Of course," Alyss murmured from just behind him, her voice just a trifle strange. Deeper ... she must be angry, aye, that would be it. Well, by the Three, she'd just have to ..."My King," she purred, gentle fingers stroking his chin, trailing down his neck.Thamrain started to shake his head, and then shrugged and chuckled. Well, if she wanted to do it her way, well enough ... .Like gliding snakes her fingertips found his ears, his nostrils, his mouth, sliding in so caressingly ... ."Snore, my Thamrain," Alyss purred, her voice much deeper now, as the King of Aglirta roused into alarm: How many fingers did she--"Snore and DIE, LITTLE TOAD!"And the finger in his mouth bulged up in an instant into a thick, choking worm, stifling all breath and any cry he might make, in the brief moments before the tentacles in his ears and nose swelled, too, and the rich red blankets of his own bed were being whipped up around his head by still more tentacles ... .Thamrain's head burst like a rotten melon, spattering blood so profusely that the blankets were soaked in an instant, and the hissing shape-shifter was forced to pluck up the sheets beneath to contain the gore. The last semblance of Alyss melted away as its tentacles writhed and swirled, and a mouth that was sliding into something quite different hissed soft curse after disgusted curse."Rae," came a level voice from the doorway, "you're making near as much noise as if you were fighting him fists to fists. Let me take care of that, and shift yourself into Thamrain's likeness. There are guards just outside."The tentacled thing on the bed snarled something angry and wordless, breathing heavily. Tentacles writhed briefly and then sank back into melting, shifting flesh that flowed and thrust and shuddered, until--"That's it," Thansel said critically. "That's ... aye, just like that. Stay like that."Raevrel bared his teeth in a silent snarl, and got up from the bed, human-seeming arms coiling and flailing in distaste. Without a word the other Koglaur flung tentacles across the room and took hold of the slumping, blanket-shrouded body."Wait here for me," he muttered, sprouting so many tentacles that snake-like coils almost covered the dead king in a coccoon."What if someone sees you?"A dozen gesture-echoing tentacles made Thansel's shrug impressive indeed. "'Twill be the last thing they ever see," he said briefly, as he bundled his burden out.Raevrel looked back at the stripped bed thoughtfully, recalling the brief fun he'd had on it with the real Alyss before he'd broken her neck. She'd been ...He put those memories aside with a flare of anger and sent a pair of tentacles snaking into the next room in search of replacement boots. He'd forgotten to snatch them off before Thansel went out, and--"Here," Thansel's familiar voice said flatly. "I figured you'd be wanting the boots." The words were coming fromwhat looked to be a sleepy, irritated Lord Steward Narthar, in his night robe."Now we go together to Silvertree?" Raevrel asked, stamping his feet into the splendid-looking boots and looking around for a sword."We get your door guards to take us. That way we're brought to him without a lot of turning the palace upside down searching, and through whatever guards he might get here, with the smallest flasks of fuss and delay we can empty. Now look angry about something secret and urgent.""What?""Invent something," Thansel said flatly, every inch the haggard, tousled steward of advanced years and bright loyalty as he hastened into the forechamber. "Real kings do it all the time."
Torches guttered low in wall-brackets in many a passage of the royal palace in the chill hours before dawn, but a surprising plenty of courtiers were still up and awake, backs to the walls in watchful pairs or threesomes in those stretches of hall farthest from the light, muttering together in low, careful voices. Many of those urgent, angry near-whispers included the words "Ravengar's rise," as if it were a calamity of the weather.Their murmured discussions were hushed by the approach of hard-eyed guards with drawn swords in their hands, and Lord Steward Narthar and the King himself--bareheaded, sleepy, and grim, but striding with angry purpose. The courtiers' mutterings arose with fresh vigor in their wake, and a few of the most daring whisperers drifted along in the direction the royal procession had taken. The rest merely speculated on its destination.Most of them were correct in their suppositions. In Flow-foam, these latter nights, all endeavors sooner or later regarded and carefully avoided, or passed through the presence and scrutiny of, Lord Overbaron Ravengar Silvertree.Who'd discarded his sweat-damp shirt and unbuckled hisbelt with a weary groan, lying down on his bed with boots still on and hand clasped over the hilt of his still-scabbarded sword, to leave all cares behind for however long the Three granted this time, before--He came awake in an instant, sword half-out and sitting up alertly in the darkness. The sound came again, louder this time: someone pulling hard on the barred door to his room, causing the heavy wooden bar to thud against the wall and then fall back against its brackets.Silvertree buckled his belt and rose from the bed in one smooth movement, darting a glance at the archway into the next room and the motionless tapestry that filled it. The window of the room beyond the tapestry could be unshuttered with two sweeps of his hand, pivoting swivel-catches aside, to offer an escape.Of sorts. A long, hard fall onto a wooded hillside that plunged steeply to the river, with only a narrow guardwalk at the base of the palace wall--an unlit dirt track on this stretch of its run--between him and the cold rushing waters of the Silverflow.Drawing his sword, the Lord Overbaron of Aglirta walked as quietly as he could to the barred door and stopped to one side of it, not uttering a word."I must speak with him!" Thamrain's voice snarled from somewhere beyond it. "Get it open--now!""My King," the tremulous tones of the Lord Steward said disapprovingly from even farther away. "Surely we need not destroy the palace! Lord Silvertree is doubtless exhausted and deep asleep--a condition brought on by his diligent and loyal service. Perhaps if this man hails him, in your name?"Ravengar grinned in the darkness. Narthar loved him not, but liked doing things the right way more than anything else. But what urgent matter could the Lord Steward and the King together not deal with, that a newly anointed Lord Overbaron must be roused from his bed to deal with?"Open," a guard's voice snapped. "Open, in the name of the King!"Silvertree kept silent--and then, struck by a suddenthought, turned soundlessly on his heel, went to the tapestry, and thrust it aside with his sword. Utter darkness lay beyond, and no sound or movement."Open, I say!" the guard called more loudly, and slammed what was probably both fists or his shoulder against the door, so the wood thudded as loudly as stout stone and older, more massive wood framing allowed it. "Open for King Thamrain!"Silvertree kept silent. No man willingly opens the door to what could quite likely be his own death."Silvertree?" Thamrain barked, his voice as deep and as loud as if he'd been fresh and bright, rather than the tottering, yawning man Ravengar had left not long ago. "Open up, man! I must talk with you!"The King waited, and then called more loudly and sharply, "Raven?""Enough of this," the steward said angrily. "Depart, all of you. Leave us. Go on, we'll be perfectly safe. Return to your posts. If we can't rouse him, we'll call you back, never fear. Go on!"There was much shuffling of booted feet, men tramping away, swords and armored elbows scraping briefly against stone walls, and then silence."Lord Silvertree?" the steward called, his voice faint. He must have turned away from the door to speak down the passage, for the benefit of the departing guards. Stranger and stranger, this.Silvertree slowly drew in a deep, carefully soundless breath, raised his sword behind his shoulder so as to be ready to chop down, and waited. A little light from the nearest wall-torch in the passage was leaking in around the door; it was all he had to see by as he stared at that stout barrier--and waited.Abruptly, there was a flicker of movement in the gloom around the door. Around the door, aye, in the crack where it met its frame. Something--there! Something small and dark and wiggling, like a questing worm ...Like a snake. Silvertree took a swift step away and back,to best position himself for a swing, and peered at the dark, undulating finger of ... of whatever it was. It reached farther into the room, wriggling now and shifting its shape, bulges occurring within it and gliding together to meet at its tip, grow larger in their merging, and slowly stand forth from the ribbon-like body ... whereupon an eyelid flickered in one bulge. Eyes! Eyes blinking in the darkness, seeking him--In sudden fear he slashed out, spraying gore across the inside of the door and slicing those orbs away from the snakelike bulk that had grown them.It convulsed and thrashed the air wildly, trailing blood, as something on the far side of the door hissed and then sobbed in furious pain.Moving as quietly as he dared, Ravengar Silvertree returned to his stance, sword at the ready despite the slow drip, drip of unseen blood running down to his knuckles to seek the floor.What this had to do with the King, he wasn't sure. Did Thamrain--or more likely old Narthar--have some sort of pet snake-beast, that could spy on--?But nay, it mattered not, did it? Snake or not-snake or spell, this could mean nothing good for Ravengar Silvertree.Perhaps Thamrain was alarmed by the success of his Lord Overbaron, and had invited him here to the palace expressly to slay him, and blame the killing on Ravengar's own treachery against the Crown. With the other barons gone, Thamrain's throne was secure--and he might well judge it safer with the man whose sword had confirmed him there dead, rather than keep Silvertree as a loyal and capable guardian.A loyalty that had been heartfelt and unstinting until that--that thing had come wriggling through the door right in front of his face, a moment ago ...Yes, there 'twas again! More things, a dozen of them this time, or more, reaching through the door-seam like so many evil fingers ...He sliced and hacked in a brief fury, and heard a hoarse scream on the other side of the door this time--before something whipped around his ankle.He hacked down with savage swiftness, not daring to bend to put his full weight behind those blows as other tentacles came questing up under the door to join the first. His blade clanged sparks from the floor with one blow, but thank the Three, he cut the tentacle around his ankle.Without tarrying another instant, Silvertree raced away, ducking through the archway heedless of the tapestry, and plunging across the chamber beyond to thrust open the shutters in fumbling, do-this-quietly-damn-all-gods haste.The dim, pale gray foredawn showed him no bowmen or guards below, and no tentacles swooping out of nearby windows, either.Setting his teeth, Ravengar Silvertree scrambled up onto the sill as he heard his door-bar tumble to the floor in the darkness behind him. He swung his sword up and out into the air to gain some force for his leap, and followed the thrust of his blade into the empty night, plunging down, down--To a bone-bouncing, breath-snatching crash through branches and then a thambar-bush to strike the ground hard amid much snapping wood, and spring stumbling to his feet in a frantic rush down into the uneven, vine- and stump-choked wooded gloom beyond.Light blossomed above and behind him, flaring back sudden reflection from boughs and tree trunks ahead, and the Lord Overbaron of Aglirta ducked to one side and raced on in his bruising, tumbling flight down through half-seen trees, roots, and thorny tangles, panting for breath and sparing no time for a look back. He did not, he told himself fiercely, as he caught his sword on a branch with a blow that numbed his fingers and almost wrenched the weapon from his hand, need to see more tentacles, just now. Or ever.And then, quite suddenly, the thickly standing tree trunks gave way to a pale gray light, and--he was in the water.Its cold jolted him, clawing at his bare torso so fiercely that he shuddered for breath, almost lost his blade again, and then found the shock sliding away into numbness.Too long in the river would slay him as surely as any strangling tentacle or guardsman's blade ... .He struck out for the unseen shore, letting the current take him along the Flowfoam bank, swimming with it rather than trying to struggle against it, hoping no seeking arrows would come his way ... .He did risk one look back--and wished he hadn't. Long, pale streamers of many-winged, palely glowing things were arcing down through the trees from his windows, which now blazed with the light of many torches. Helmed heads were crowded along the sills, watching as the two monstrous things pursued him, growing long needle-snouts and sleek flippers moments before they struck the water.Ravengar Silvertree hurled a bitter curse at whatever gods might be listening in these chill moments before dawn, and started swimming for his life.Or whatever short stretch of it might be left to him. The swift river flow was carrying him away from Flowfoam far faster than his splashing attempts to reach the south bank, but the chill waters would be carrying a cold corpse if he didn't get clear of them soon ... or the blood and a few torn limbs of one, if those shape-shifting things caught up to him.There were sleek, purposeful ripplings behind him, and splashings. Too close and drawing swiftly closer ...Damn the Three, and Aglirta with them! He was going to die here, torn or bitten or stabbed horribly in mere moments, alone without his Yuesembra!"Sembra!" he gasped aloud, fighting his way towards the unseen riverbank. "My lady love, flee from this land before they take you, too! Oh, Yuesembra, may the Three spare you as they've spurned me, and--"Something in the water slapped against his foot then, and as he twisted desperately away from it, the night around him burst into a brightness as blue and pale as soft moonlight, and he saw two bulks rising menacingly in the swirling water just behind him--and beyond them, racing across the river like little flames, the advancing edge of the blue radiance.It was coming from the riverbank--where a lone, dark form stood, long unbound hair writhing and whipping about bare spread limbs as if in a gusty gale--and eyes two points of blue fire."Sembra!" Ravengar gasped, and clawed at the water in a fresh frenzy, trying desperately to reach his wife.Her hands were weaving a spell, clawing the air in intricate gestures that trailed brief glows and swirls of sparks. Words tumbled from her lips in a swift, precise flow as she started to dance--not alluringly, but in a sequence of odd, briefly frozen poses in which arcs of fire sometimes briefly formed around her ... and her murmured incantation never stopped.Something that had more teeth than seemed possible raked along Silvertree's ribs and thigh, plunging him into burning agony. He thrashed, convulsed, swallowed water, and tried to scream.Somehow he got his face up out of the water again and struck out blindly with his sword, even as tentacles, some of them growing eyes and eager fanged mouths with fearsome speed, thrust into his view, curving over and around him ... .The night caught sudden ruby fire, a blaze almost bright enough to hide the blood boiling into ragged red smoke as tentacles burst into tatters and melted away in midair, swept away in a struggling instant, waters hurled back in a great bowl of warm death that left Ravengar Silvertree suddenly on his knees on the stones of the exposed riverbed--and then, as the waters rushed back, snatched him ashore in a drenched and gasping heap, shivering around the slender ankles of his wife."Yuesembra," he managed to sob through his agonies, as silvery fish flopped and arched in the wet wrack around him.Long-fingered hands dragged him to his feet with more sheer strength than he'd known she possessed, and familiar dark eyes looked into his from less than a finger-length away."Raven, my Raven," she whispered, and kissed him fiercely.Warm healing arose in his mouth and seemed to bubblethrough him, like a flood of caressing fire. As he arched and bucked helplessly in her arms, the woman folk of Aglirta called the Witch of Sarinda said into his bleeding ears, "Do you really think I'd let you sleep in yon palace, surrounded by dagger-wielding courtiers--and wantonly ambitious maidservants, too--without watching over you?"Ravengar blinked at her, dazedly trying to form a smile. She shook her head, giving him a wry half-smile in return, and gave him a tug that cost him his hold on his sword at last and nearly sent him sprawling."Now come," she ordered, dragging the Lord Overbaron of Aglirta away up the riverbank in a tottering stumble before he could sag against her, "let's be away from here!"Copyright © 2004 by Ed Greenwood
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