Prince of Thorns tbe-1 Read online

I went to the chain that held his cage up. “Brace yourself, Father.”

  The sword I drew had slit old Bovid Tor not twenty-four hours before. Now I swung it to free a priest. The chain gave beneath its edge. They’d put some magic, or some devilry, in that blade. Father told me the Ancraths wielded it for four generations, and took it from the House of Or. So the steel was old before we Ancraths first laid hands upon it. Old before I stole it.

  The birdcage fell to the path, hard and heavy. Father Gomst cried out, and his head hit the bars, leaving a livid cross-work across his forehead. They’d bound the cage-door with wire. It gave before the edge of our ancestral sword, twice stolen. I thought of Father for a moment, imaged his face twist in outrage at the use of so high a blade for such lowly work. I’ve a good imagination, but putting any emotion on the rock of Father’s face came hard.

  Gomst crawled out, stiff and weak. As the old should be. I liked that he had the grace to feel the years on his shoulders. Some the years just toughened.

  “Father Gomst,” I said. “Best hurry now, or the marsh dead may come out to scare us with their wailing and a-moaning.”

  He looked at me then, drawing back as if he’d seen a ghost, then softening.

  “Jorg,” he said, all full of compassion. Brimming with it, spilling it from his eyes as if it wasn’t just the rain. “What has happened to you?”

  I won’t lie to you. Half of me wanted to stick the knife into him there and then, just as with red-faced Gemt. More than half. My hand itched with the need to pull that knife. My head ached with it, as if a vice were tightening against my temples.

  I’ve been known to be contrary. When something pushes me, I shove back. Even if the one doing the pushing is me. It would have been easy to gut him then and there. Satisfying. But the need was too urgent. I felt pushed.

  I smiled and said, “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned.”

  And old Gomsty, though he was stiff from the cage, and sore in every limb, bowed his head to hear my confession.

  I spoke into the rain, low and quiet. Loud enough for Father Gomst though, and loud enough for the dead who haunted the marsh about us. I told of the things I’d done. I told of the things I would do. In a soft voice I told my plans to all with ears to hear. The dead left us then.

  “You’re the devil!” Father Gomst took a step back, and clutched the cross at his neck.

  “If that’s what it takes.” I didn’t dispute him. “But I’ve confessed, and you must forgive me.”

  “Abomination . . .” The word escaped him in a slow breath.

  “And more besides,” I agreed. “Now forgive me.”

  Father Gomst found his wits at last, but still he held back. “What do you want with me, Lucifer?”

  A fair question. “I want to win,” I said.

  He shook his head at that, so I explained.

  “Some men I can bind with who I am. Some I can bind with where I’m going. Others need to know who walks with me. I’ve given you my confession. I repent. Now God walks with me, and you’re the priest who will tell the faithful that I am His warrior, His instrument, the Sword of the Almighty.”

  A silence stood between us, measured in heartbeats.

  “Ego te absolvo.” Father Gomst got the words past trembling lips.

  We walked back along the path then, and reached the others by and by. Makin had them lined up and ready. Waiting in the dark, with a single torch, and the hooded lantern hung up on the head-cart.

  “Captain Bortha,” I said to Makin, “time we set off. We’ve got a ways before us till we reach the Horse Coast.”

  “And the priest?” he asked.

  “Perhaps we’ll detour past the Tall Castle, and drop him off.”

  My headache bit, hard.

  Maybe it was something to do with having an old ghost haunt its way through to the very marrow of my bones, but today my headaches felt more like somebody prodding me with a stick, herding me along, and it was really beginning to fuck me off.

  “I think we will call in at the Tall Castle.” I ground my teeth together against the daggers in my head. “Hand old Gomsty here over in person. I’m sure my father has been worried about me.”

  Rike and Maical gave me stupid stares. Fat Burlow and Red Kent swapped glances. The Nuban rolled his eyes and made his wards.

  I looked at Makin, tall, broad in the shoulder, black hair plastered down by the rain. He’s my knight, I thought. Gomst is my bishop, the Tall Castle my rook. Then I thought of Father. I needed a king. You can’t play the game without a king. I thought of Father, and it felt good. After the dead one, I’d begun to wonder. The dead one showed me his hell, and I had laughed at it. But now I thought of Father, and it felt good to know I could still feel fear.

  7

  We rode through the night and the Lichway brought us from the marsh. Dawn found us at Norwood, drear and grey. The town lay in ruin. Its ashes still held the acrid ghost of smoke that lingers when the fire is gone.

  “The Count of Renar,” said Makin at my side. “He grows bold to attack Ancrath protectorates so openly.” He shed the roadspeak like a cloak.

  “How can we know who wrought such wickedness?” Father Gomst asked, his face as grey as his beard. “Perhaps Baron Kennick’s men raided down the Lichway. It was Kennick’s men who caged me on the gibbet.”

  The brothers spread out among the ruins. Rike elbowed Fat Burlow aside, and vanished into the first building, which was nothing but a roofless shell of stone.

  “Shit-poor bog-farmers! Just like fecking Mabberton.” The violence of his search drowned out any further complaint.

  I remembered Norwood on fete day, hung with ribbons. Mother walked with the burgermeister. William and I had treacle-apples.

  “But these were my shit-poor bog-farmers,” I said. I turned to look at old Gomsty. “There are no bodies. This is Count Renar’s work.”

  Makin nodded. “We’ll find the pyre in the fields to the west. Renar burns them all together. The living and the dead.”

  Gomst crossed himself and muttered a prayer.

  War is a thing of beauty, as I’ve said before, and those who say otherwise are losing. I put a smile on, though it didn’t fit me. “Brother Makin, it seems the Count has made a move. It behoves us, as fellow soldiers, to appreciate his artistry. Have yourself a ride around. I want to know how he played his game.”

  Renar. First Father Gomst, now Renar. As though the spirit in the mire had turned a key, and the ghosts of my past were marching through, one by one.

  Makin gave a nod and cantered off. Not into town but out along the stream, following it up to the thickets beyond the market field.

  “Father Gomst,” I said in my most polite court-voice. “Pray tell, where were you when Baron Kennick’s men found you?” It made no sense that our family priest should be taken on a raid.

  “The hamlet of Jessop, my prince,” Gomst replied, wary and looking anywhere but at me. “Should we not ride on? We’ll be safe in the homelands. The raids won’t reach past Hanton.”

  True, I thought, so why would you come out into danger? “The hamlet of Jessop? Can’t say I’ve even heard of it, Father Gomst,” I said, still nice as nice. “Which means it won’t be much more than three huts and a pig.”

  Rike stormed out of the house, blacker than the Nuban with all the ash on him, and spitting mad. He made for the next doorway. “Burlow, you fat bastard! You set me up!” If Little Rikey couldn’t find himself some loot, then somebody else would pay. Always.

  Gomst looked glad of the diversion, but I drew his attention back. “Father Gomst, you were telling me about Jessop.” I took the reins from his hands.

  “A bog-town, my prince. A nothing. A place where they cut peat for the protectorate. Seventeen huts and perhaps a few more pigs.” He tried a laugh, but it came out too sharp and nervy.

  “So you journeyed there to offer absolution to the poor?” I held his eye.

  “Well . . .”

  “Out past Hanton, out to
the edge of the marsh, out into danger,” I said. “You’re a very holy man, Father.”

  He bowed his head at that.

  Jessop. The name rang a bell. A bell with a deep voice, slow and solemn. Send not to ask for whom the bell tolls . . .

  “Jessop is where the marsh-tide takes the dead,” I said. I saw the words on the mouth of old Tutor Lundist as I spoke them. I saw the map behind him, pinned to the study wall, currents marked in black ink. “It’s a slow current but sure. The marsh keeps her secrets, but not forever, and Jessop is where she tells them.”

  “That big man, Rike, he’s strangling the fat one.” Father Gomst nodded toward the town.

  “My father sent you to look at the dead.” I didn’t let Gomst divert me with small talk. “Because you’d recognize me.”

  Gomst’s mouth framed a “no,” but every other muscle in him said “yes.” You’d think priests would be better liars, what with their job and all.

  “He’s still looking for me? After four years!” Four weeks would have surprised me.

  Gomst edged back in his saddle. He spread his hands helplessly. “The Queen is heavy with child. Sageous tells the King it will be a boy. I had to confirm the succession.”

  Ah! The “succession.” That sounded more like the father I knew. And the Queen? Now that put an edge on the day.

  “Sageous?” I asked.

  “A heathen bone-picker, newly come to court.” Gomst spat the words as if they tasted sour.

  The pause grew into a silence.

  “Rike!” I said. Not a shout, but loud enough to reach him. “Put Fat Burlow down, or I’ll have to kill you.”

  Rike let go, and Burlow hit the ground like the three-hundred-pound lump of lard that he was. I guess that of the two, Burlow looked slightly more purple in the face, but only a little. Rike came toward us with his hands out before him, twisting as though he already had them around my neck. “You!”

  No sign of Makin, and Father Gomst would be as useful as a fart in the wind against Little Rikey with a rage on him.

  “You! Where’s the fecking gold you promised us?” A score of heads popped out of windows and doors at that. Even Fat Burlow looked up, sucking in a breath as if it came through a straw.

  I let my hand slip from the pommel of my sword. It doesn’t do to sacrifice too many pawns. Rike had only a dozen yards to go. I swung off Gerrod’s saddle and patted his nose, my back to the town.

  “There’s more than one kind of gold in Norwood,” I said. Loud enough but not too loud. Then I turned and walked past Rike. I didn’t look at him. Give a man like Rike a moment, and he’ll take it.

  “Don’t you be telling me about no farmers’ daughters this time, you little bastard!” He followed me roaring, but I’d let the heat out of him. He just had wind and noise now. “That fecker of a count staked them all out to burn already.”

  I made for Midway Street, leading up to the burgermeister’s house from the market field. As we passed him, Brother Gains looked up from the cook-fire he’d started. He clambered to his feet to follow and watch the fun.

  The grain-store tower had never looked like much. It looked less impressive now, all scorched, the stones split in the heat. Before they burned them all away, the grain sacks would have hidden the trapdoor. I found it with a little prodding. Rike huffed and puffed behind me all the time.

  “Open it up.” I pointed to the ring set in the stone slab.

  Rike didn’t need telling twice. He got down and heaved the slab up as if it weighed nothing. And there they were, barrel after barrel, all huddled up in the dusty dark.

  “The old burgermeister kept the festival beer under the grain-tower. Every local knows that. A little stream runs down there to keep it all nice and cool-like. Looks like, what, twenty? Twenty barrels of golden festival beer.” I smiled.

  Rike didn’t smile back. He stayed on his hands and knees, and let his eye wander up the blade of my sword. I imagined how it must tickle against his throat.

  “See now, Jorg, Brother Jorg, I didn’t mean . . .” he started. Even with my sword at his neck he had a mean look to him.

  Makin clattered up and came to stand at my shoulder. I kept the blade at Rike’s throat.

  “I may be little, Little Rikey, but I ain’t a bastard,” I said, soft, in my killing voice. “Isn’t that right, Father Gomst? If I was a bastard, you wouldn’t have to risk life and limb to search the dead for me, now would you?”

  “Prince Jorg, let Captain Bortha kill this savage.” Gomst must have found his composure somewhere. “We’ll ride on to the Tall Castle and your father—”

  “My father can damn well wait!” I shouted. I bit back the rest, angry at being angry.

  Rike forgot about the sword for a moment. “What the feck is all this ‘prince’ shit? What the feck is all this ‘Captain Bortha’ shit? And when do I get to drink the fecking beer?”

  We had ourselves as full an audience then as we’d get, all the brothers about us in a circle.

  “Well,” I said. “Since you ask so nice, Brother Rike, I’ll tell you.”

  Makin raised his brows at me and he took a grip on his sword. I waved him down.

  “The Captain Bortha shit is Makin being Captain Makin Bortha of the Ancrath Imperial Guard. The prince shit is me being the beloved son and heir of King Olidan of the House of Ancrath. And we can drink the beer now, because today is my fourteenth birthday, and how else would you toast my health?”

  Every brotherhood has a pecking order. With brothers like mine you don’t want to be at the bottom of that order. You’re liable to get pecked to death. Brother Jobe had just the right mix of whipped cur and rabies to stay alive there.

  8

  So we sat on the tumbled stones of the burgermeister’s house and drank beer. The brothers drank deep and called out my name. Some had it “Brother Jorg,” some had it “Prince Jorg,” but all of them saw me with new eyes. Rike watched me, beer-foam in his stubbled beard, the line of my sword across his neck. I could see him weighing the odds, a slow ballet of possibilities working their way across his low forehead. I didn’t wait for the word “ransom” to bubble to the surface.

  “He wants me dead, Little Rikey,” I said. “He sent Gomsty out to find proof I was dead, not to find me. He’s got a new queen now.”

  Rike gave a grin that had more scowl than grin in it, then belched mightily. “You ran from a castle with gold and women, to ride with us? What idiot would do that?”

  I sipped my beer. It tasted sour, but that seemed right somehow. “An idiot who knows he won’t win the war with the King’s guard at his side,” I said.

  “What war, Jorg?” The Nuban sat close by, not drinking. He always spoke slow and serious. “You want to beat the Count? Baron Kennick?”

  “The War,” I said. “All of it.”

  Red Kent came over from the barrels, his helm brimming with ale. “Never happen,” he said. He lifted the helm and half-drained it in four swallows. “So you’re Prince of Ancrath? A copper-crown kingdom. Must be dozens with as good a claim on the high throne. Each of them with their own army.”

  “More like fifty,” Rike growled.

  “Closer to a hundred,” I said. “I’ve counted.”

  A hundred fragments of empire grinding away at each other in a never-ending cycle of little wars, feuds, skirmishes, kingdoms waxing, waning, waxing again, lifetimes spent in conflict and nothing changing. Mine to change, to end, to win.

  I finished my beer and got up to find Makin.

  I didn’t have to look far. I found him with the horses, checking his stallion, Firejump.

  “What did you find?” I asked him.

  Makin pursed his lips. “I found the pyre. About two hundred, all dead. They didn’t light it though—probably scared off.” He waved toward the west. “They came in on foot, up the marsh road, and over the ridge yonder. Had about twenty archers in the thicket by the stream, to pick off folks that tried to run.”

  “How many men altogether?” I
asked.

  “Probably a hundred. Foot soldiers most of them.” He yawned and ran a hand from forehead to chin. “Two days gone now. We’re safe enough.”

  I felt invisible thorns scratching at me, sharp hooks in my skin. “Come with me,” I told him.

  Makin followed me back to the steps and fallen pillars at the burgermeister’s doors. The brothers had Maical staving in a second barrel.

  “What ho, Captain!” Burlow called out at Makin, his voice still hoarse from Rike’s strangling. A laugh went up at that, and I let it run its course. I felt the thorns again, sharp and deep. Sharpening me up for something. Two hundred bodies in a heap. All dead.

  “Cap’n Makin tells me we’re going to have company,” I said.

  Makin’s brows rose at that but I ignored him. “Twenty swords, rough men, bandits of the lowest order. Not the sort you’d like to meet,” I told them. “Idling along in our direction, weighed down with loot.”

  Rike got to his feet all sudden like, his flail rattling at his hip. “Loot?”

  “Slugs, I tell you. Growing rich off the destruction of others.” I showed them my smile. “Well, my brothers, we’re going to have to show them the error of their ways. I want them dead. Every last one. And we’ll do it without a scratch. I want trip-pits in the main street. I want brothers hidden in the grain-tower and the Blue Boar tavern. I want Kent, Row, Liar, and the Nuban here, behind these walls, to shoot them down when they come between tower and tavern.”

  The Nuban hefted his crossbow, a monstrous feat of engineering, worked in the old metal and embellished with the faces of strange gods. Kent tossed the dregs from his helm and set it on his head, ready with his longbow.

  “Now they might come over the ridge instead, so Rike’s going to take Maical and six others to hide in the tannery ruins. Anyone comes that way, let them past you, then gut them. Makin will be our scout to give us warning. The good father here and you five there, you’re going to stand with me to tempt them in.”

  The brothers needed no telling. Well, Jobe did, but Rike hauled him out of the beer quick enough and he wasn’t gentle about it.