Dreams of Darkness Rising (49 page)

After about five minutes the trees became sparser and the estate opened up before them. The driveway wound half a mile to where the main mansion sat at the base of a gentle incline. The grass either side of the road was long and wild. Close to the mansion were the ruins of an old fort and adjacent to that some small buildings: stables, a tiny barn and an outhouse. On the opposite side of the main house were well kept gardens and to Aldred’s surprise a hedge maze. At the fringe of the hedges could be seen a broad span of fruit trees and vegetables patches.

“Looks like we’re in luck,” Aldred said. “Lights are on.”

“Bit of a dump isn’t it, m’lord?” Relium said.

The mansion exhibited signs of wear and tear: flaked paint on its wood and stone walls, chipped mullioned windows stained with green moss and its turreted roof spattered with bird droppings. The driveway widened to a sizeable pebbled area in front of the mansion, bathed in the glow from the ground floor windows.

Aldred handed the reins to Otius as he approached the door. A hiss of air sounded in his ear and an arrow sprouted from the wood of the post that supported the grand porch. The young Thetorian leapt back as if burnt, his hand reaching for his sword.

“Make another move and the next one is through your eye,” a female voice said.

The three turned, squinting in the gloom. The glare from the windows put them at a disadvantage; they could not see their assailant.

“We’re not here to cause any trouble. Can you step into the light so we can see you?” Aldred said.

“You’re fairly well armed for those not wanting trouble. If it’s a bed you desire I’d advise you take your chainmail covered backsides and trot back to the fork. You’ve taken a wrong turn.”

“No, no wait,” Aldred said. “It is here we want. We’ve come to talk about Hunor.”

The silence was prolonged.

Finally the voice said, “And who is Hunor to you?”

“A friend. Look, the weapons are for the road. They’re for bandits. You know?”

“Well then, friend, why don’t you give your sword to your trained monkeys? The two of them can then walk their horses to the stables. There’s some straw for food and bed and if they’re good boys and stay put then maybe there will be stew later.”

Aldred nodded and with his heart thumping he undid his belt and gave his sword to Otius. He indicated for them to follow the instructions and the pair, with obvious relief, retreated to the other side of the mansion. Aldred felt very alone, the rain soaking into his silver and black surcoat and onto his mail.

A figure emerged into the light, her bow lowered. She was in her late twenties and dressed in a short green gown. The quiver rested on her slender hip. Her hair was a deep brown, like the darkest barks of the forest and her eyes a flashing green. Her long face was elegant and determined.

“And you would be?” she asked.

“Lord Aldred Enfarson, son and heir to Baron Argon Enfarson.”

“My lord,” the woman said. “If I’d known you were coming I would have raised the flags. Did you bring one of the princes to visit too?”

Aldred smiled thinly. “And whom do I have the pleasure of addressing on this magnificent Thetorian night?”

The woman walked past Aldred into the huge porch. “I would have thought such a good friend of Hunor’s would know. I am his sister, Hela.”

Aldred tried not to look at Hela’s shapely bottom—augmented by the rain-soaked cloth—as she walked ahead. She propped up the bow within the entrance hall and then passed through a door into the kitchen.

“Cook is attending my mother upstairs, before dinner. With my husband absent this eve I am sure another place can be set, Lord Enfarson,” she said over her shoulder. She pulled a loaf of bread across the granite surface adjacent to the large stone oven.

“Aldred, just call me Aldred.”

This was going well, he thought. This didn’t seem the likely breeding ground for a dark wizard’s accomplice, though. Could Guntir have been mistaken?

“As you wish, Aldred. How is Jem faring? Is she well?” Hela said, sawing at the loaf.

“She’s…ah…she’s fine.”

Hela moved in a flash, shoving into Aldred. He staggered back and the small of his back struck the edge of a table. Hela was pressed against his front and with a tingle of fear he felt the cold edge of a knife at his throat.

“Now that was stupid, m’lord. Who in the name of the Pale are you? How come you’re here? And what do you want with Hunor?”

“L-Lady Hela, I’m telling the truth. About my name. I am Lord Aldred from the north. I’ve come for…well, for some clues about what in the Pale is happening in my father’s lands.”

“And what in the four moons has that to do with Hunor?”

Aldred was pinned by her weight. To move now would open up his windpipe.

“Most of North Thetoria thinks he’s in league with a demon spawning black wizard and that he’s responsible for the death of a score of men, some of noble birth.”

“What? That’s insane.”

She stepped back, releasing Aldred. Then she erupted in laughter and flipped the knife playfully in her hand.

“And you, Aldred Enfarson, what do you think?”

“I think your brother has been dragged into this somehow. Beyond that I have no idea. We’ve got Eerian knights, demons of the Pale, necromancers, omens and a dead maiden two days north of this house and…”

Hela raised an eyebrow.

“..and I’m petrified my father is somehow tied up in all of this,” Aldred said.

The woman stared with curiosity at the young Thetorian and suddenly Aldred felt an urge to cry. Why was he telling this woman all his fears and concerns? For all he knew she was in league with some necromancer too. Yet he knew, as soon as he thought it, that although this house was strange and eccentric it was no lair of evil. He had encountered enough of those places these last few weeks to recognise them.

“They say the sins of the father are oft visited on their kin. I should know. Come have some dinner, Aldred Enfarson, and I’ll try help, though I am not certain how.”

She jabbed the knife into the wood table as she walked past him. Aldred paused in the kitchen, dabbing the trickle of blood on his neck, before following.

***

Lady Inger Markson’s long face and well bred features resembled her daughter’s but her looks had faded more than simple age could account for. It was as if she was a gown that had been washed once too many times, the fibres worn thin, the pattern indistinct. Her hair was a wiry grey and though arranged in a tight bun in the style of the elder generation of Thetorian ladies a few wild wisps had escaped.

Lady Inger chewed the roast lamb and smiled at Aldred as if seeing him for the first time.

“Well I don’t know where Orgar can have got to—I’m terribly sorry. Perhaps he hunts with his father. Have you had the pleasure of my husband’s company before?” Lady Inger asked.

“Err—I’m afraid not. It’s actually Hunor I’m interested to meet,” Aldred said.

“Hunor? Do I know…oh, silly me. Yes…Hunor. Can I perchance ask why?”

“It’s a complicated matter, Lady Inger.”

“Well, how intriguing. I expect he’ll be about somewhere—up a tree scrumping apples when he should be studying the scriptures. I’ll call Nanny.”

“Mother—perhaps later,” Hela said. She indicated for the ruddy cheeked cook to begin clearing the main course away.

“Oh. Yes. Of course. Sorry, who are you again?” Lady Inger asked, peering at Aldred down her half-moon glasses.

“Aldred Enfarson, m’lady.”

“Enfarson? My husband visited Blackstone Castle with the boys once. Dreadful place I hear. He was delivering books. Tell me, do you read?”

“Certainly, when I get opportunity. I prefer fairly immediate yarns.”

“Of course you do. Young ones, always in a rush...eh, Millicent? Have you met my sister? Err—master Al—sorry what was your name again?”

“Aldred. Your...sister? Sorry, I’m…”

“No, mother—I’m Hela, your daughter, not your sister. This is Lord Aldred, from Blackstone Castle,” Hela said with a sigh. She poured Aldred another glass of red wine.

Lady Inger smiled. “Silly old me. Well, I’m sorry Orgar is delayed. Such a good lad—a fine swordsman too. And so pious. Tell me, do you study the Nine Sacred Scrolls?”

“Not as much as I should, Lady Markson.”

“Well it’s trickier to be faithful these days, what with the tithe on the clergy. The king is far too harsh if you permit a woman to speak thus.”

“Certainly, I must agree…”

“Did you know this was once a mighty fort? Artorian. Annihilated in the civil war by Yidris and Yidran, the two chief mages of the Praetor.”

“Yes, I saw the ruins as I came in.”

“Still...no use living in the past. Oh bother, where is Orgar? And—and you are…?”

Hela stood, her chair scraping on the wooden floor. Her expression was grim.

“Mother, I think perhaps it is time for a rest. I’ll entertain Lord Aldred until Orgar arrives.”

Lady Inger’s head had begun to loll like a marionette with severed strings and Hela gestured for the cook. Aldred sipped his wine as his eyes followed Lady Inger out of the great hall. Her sandals slapped on the oak floor, echoing strangely in the sparse room. There was little furniture beyond the long table they ate at and a mahogany cabinet adorned with vases from the Northern Isles.

Hela rested her head on her hand. “It’s terrible to admit, but it’s easier at times to humour her. You must forgive my mother, Aldred. She never really recovered from the shock of my father and elder brother’s deaths. Her nerves were troubled. Then about six years back her memory began fading. Seems it runs in the females in her family. I’m hoping my father’s stock is more resilient.”

“I lost my own mother to a wasting disease several years ago…though I feel she is often with me still.”

“We’ve had no end of remedies foisted upon us by the apothecary at Benscastle. The latest was some concoction involving iron filings and manticore hair. All at a cost that would outdo King Dulkar’s taxes.”

Aldred laughed. Clearly he was not in a royalist stronghold here.

“Lady Hela, is there anything you can tell me about your brother that might help the strange situation in my father’s barony?”

“You need to know two things from the start. One, I’ve not seen my brother in fifteen years. And two there is no way in the four moons that he will be involved with a dark wizard or demons. No way.”

“Oh—right. Well if you’ve not seen him in fifteen years how can you be absolutely certain?”

Hela smiled and shrugged. “I didn’t say I hadn’t heard from him in that time, just he hasn’t been back here.”

“My apologies. Speaking before thinking again.”

“You’re a Thetorian man. It’s fine. Look Hunor was very different to Orgar, our eldest brother. Orgar was cut from the same cloth as our father. Father extolled knightly virtues of daily worship, discipline and loyalty to his baron—Benrich the Elder at that time. Father had supplemented the family’s wealth by dealing, of all things, in books. Despite this rather atypical pursuit he remained a knight at heart. When the Summer War came father served valiantly with his men and gained great accolade against the Goldorians.

“After the war was finished, my father lost a lot of faith in his liege, as did Benrich. Father’s recourse was to piety. Hunor, in contrast, used his scripture lessons with the pastor in the village as an excuse to get out of the house and chase the local girls.”

“I can empathise with that. I understand your father died in the Uprising.”

“Yes, both Orgar and father did. Baron Benrich lost his head for his mutiny and his craven brother took the seat and with it the coin from all the lords who had supported the Uprising.”

“That must have hit you hard.”

“It still does. We were doubly devastated,” Hela said. “Our land was diminished and most of our men had died in the battle near the capitol. We had no gold for the women so by the next spring they had all left for the village or for Benscastle.

“Hunor was left as heir to a hovel and a debt no honest man could pay. For my part I was promised to one of my father’s captains, Algrek, a good man with less wealth than an Azaguntan beggar’s flea. He’d caught an arrow in his arm in the final battle and they had taken it off at the elbow lest the poison from the wound reach his heart.”

“So what did Hunor do?”

“He left. We had no money and were selling every possession in order to make enough to survive. He could not secure work anywhere south of here, such was the animosity to those who had been part of the Spring Uprising. Benrich the Younger would offer him neither way out of the debt nor any work in his castle or lands. So he left to seek his fortune, like some character from one of father’s books. He took nothing but his looks and his charm and I feared as he went that I would never see my only remaining  brother again.”

Hela hesitated, her voice thick with emotion. Aldred wondered where her husband was and then immediately chastised himself at such a wine driven thought.

“The first money came with a letter four months later,” Hela said. “I recall that missive was from Bîrin in east Thetoria. It wasn’t much but it made all the difference that spring. He had taken up with a Shorvorian hêtar and the pair were working as mercenaries to local merchants.”

“What is a hêtar?”

“They are the part of the Shorvorian warrior caste that does not have a Jitkn—a lord. I think this hêtar took him under his wing. Most of the letters for a few years mentioned him and then some other vagabonds he journeyed with, mainly in the South Khullian Mountains and Artoria. There were two trackers, a monk, a knight and two mages.”

“A mage? A wizard?”

“Aye and I know where you’re heading with this. One was a Fire-mage and the other a Wild-mage. Not often you get two of those together without a spark. Before you start twittering and lighting a Goldorian pyre I can appreciate your main exposure to magic has been the baby-eating black wizard you mentioned earlier. Hunor’s merry bunch put their fair share of dark mages to the sword in those years. He’s not one to fall in with that sort of wizard, take my word on it. Or don’t. It’s your call.”