Misery's Child (The Cadian Chronicles) (11 page)

The countryside
began to change even before he had actually crossed Kirrisian’s border. No
long, lazy dirt roads here, no gently undulating fields stretching to the
horizon, either. Hills became steeper, the land itself fragmenting into a
series of nooks and crannies overlooking tiny, deep green valleys. Foliage ran
riot. The Lord General, out of habit, saw it through military eyes and decided
he had never seen a place so easy to defend and impossible to attack. Lucky for
him, he thought with a chuckle, that he came in peace. There were too many
places for attackers to hide.

The Three Great
Walls divided Jeptalla, each with only one gate. The First Wall marked the
borders of Kirrisian and Gezana, the only entrance being on the Kirrisian side.
All the land between the First Gate and the Second comprised what the natives
called the Outer Kingdom of Jeptalla.

Whereas the First
Wall curved slightly inward, following the legal boundary of its neighboring
provinces, the Second Wall curved imperceptibly outward, its middle coming
within a mere five parsecs of the First at its closest point. At that narrow
point, the village of Midiron sat squarely buttressed between them.

Over the
centuries, a small group of hovels between the first and second walls had grown
into a thriving village of some four thousand souls, a rabbit warren of
dwellings on top of dwellings, terraced and storied. Hemmed in on two sides by
the walls, new dwellings wedged their way between, over and behind the older
ones. Some of the buildings and huts were in fact part of the walls themselves.
In spite of the single cobbled road that wove its crooked way past the stores,
taverns and markets nearest the gate to the houses and huts beyond and then
into the fields and finally into the countryside, passing through Midiron was
slow and laborious going.

To the southwest,
the next village, Trafala, laid some sixty parsecs away; in the other
direction, the larger seaport of
Fariste
rose into
view only after three days journey. A traveler who ventured off the main road
either found himself in a maze of dead ends or on the narrow road to Trafala or
Fariste
without even knowing it.

The Great Walls
were actually extended defenses of Tullus’ Seat, but so great was the distance
between them that an ignorant traveler would never guess that the walls were
connected with the Seat at all. Bastrop, as a student of military history, had
studied the Seat and its cunning defenses. He was fascinated to finally see
with his own eyes what he had read of in books. His old friend, Tullus, had
offered little detail, no matter how hard Bastrop had prodded back in the days
when they served together in the lower ranks; having grown up with the walls,
Tullus found no amazement in them.

“They’re just
walls, see?” he had shrugged. “You’ve seen a wall before, haven’t you? Well,
the Three Walls are just the same, only bigger. And there are three of them.”

So it was that
Bastrop passed through the First Gate and found himself abruptly on Jeptallan
soil, smack in the middle of Midiron. He lifted his hand at the heads that
peered silently over the wall. One of them nodded in return; the others only
watched him.

The villagers of
Midiron were not an overtly friendly lot. The Lord General of Tira felt eyes
summing him up as his tired horse plodded toward the common well.

“Water for your
mount, sire?” The young man’s tone was polite, but he did not smile until
Bastrop turned and revealed the crest on his tunic. The crest of Tira was well
regarded, even in Jeptalla. Bastrop was glad he had chosen not to wear his
purple cloak with the crest of the Guardians on this particular trip.

“Aye, and a drop
for myself as well.”

As horse and man
were tended, the
well-keeper
did not speak further.
Villagers who passed spared barely a glance and walked on.

Some feet away, a
small child pointed and whispered. His mother slapped his hand and jerked him
along. Bastrop could not make out her hissed words, but he understood the gist
of it: mind your own business. It might as well be the country’s motto,
inscribed in stone on the sanctuary portico.

Bastrop remounted
and picked his way through the village. From the number of people about, he
thought it must be a major market day. Twice the road became so congested that
he was forced to sit atop his horse, drumming his fingers with impatience,
while a wagon was unloaded or a cart of pigs driven into a waiting pen.

The appetizing
aroma of roasting meat wafted from a tavern’s smoking chimney. Hearty male
laughter rang from the open windows.

Bastrop was
tempted to stop. Delicious as the smell was, he was leery of tavern fare. One
could never be sure they were really serving what they claimed. He remembered
stories of one innkeeper in Bethosa who routinely passed off rat and hedgehog
as venison. Besides, eating strange food often gave him terrible indigestion.
Traveling was no time for cramping bowels.

He sighed and
slapped at the reins, moving forward. He had made good time so far and hoped to
reach the Seat before nightfall.

The village
disappeared at the Second Gate, inside which Bastrop observed carefully
terraced fields burgeoning with shooma, corn and some sort of cabbages he could
not name. It was a beautiful country but there was a wildness here that made
Bastrop uneasy. Everything was too close, too crowded. Everywhere he looked was
leafy and green, sunlight dappled with
shadows.
The
mingled scents of wild flowers tickled his nose. Somewhere nearby a brook
gurgled, but he could not see it for the vines that climbed trees and strangled
fences. Forests rose to the west, dark and dense and impenetrable as if the
trees themselves formed another barrier.

Beyond the fields,
the Third Wall loomed higher than the two before.

The
Seat had been built by an ancient people at war
since the moment they set foot on the continent.
Bastrop was not alone in believing that its architects had been military
geniuses. Of the twelve Omani allied provinces, only Jeptalla had withstood Tor
invasion. And before the Tors and the Great Alliance of Omani, Jeptalla had
repelled armies from Gezana to the east and Kirrisian to the north, as well as
any number of mercenaries and renegades lured by the rumors of great treasure
behind the Three Great Walls.

The Third Wall was
actually a fortress in itself, a quarter of a parsec thick and ninety parsecs
in width, stretching from one side of the jutting peninsula to the other. On
either side, the land fell away in steep rocky cliffs to the Calla Sea on the
east and the Far Sea to the west. The Third Wall was separated from the Middle
Kingdom by a moat of murky water. The only entrance was across a stone bridge
and through the Third Gate, an enormous wooden door covered completely in iron.
The hinges were as big as a man.

The wall was
hollow with three windowless stories of barracks and storage rooms for grain,
fuel and weaponry. Thin slits served as windows on the fourth story, where
defenders could rain death upon any foolish enough to lay siege to the
stronghold. A labyrinth of tunnels ran underground, and these were the Seat’s
greatest defense. The entrances were almost impossible to detect.

Only once had
invaders found their way inside. Forty Gezana soldiers, dreams of treasure
filling their heads, had charged into the tunnels; all forty died in the
darkness. Some were trampled when the torches flickered and died. The rest
perished of thirst and hunger, unable to find their way out. Legend said their
bones rested down there still, left as a warning to any foolish enough to
enter.

Bastrop drew his
horse to a halt and folded his hands over the saddle horn patiently. Unlike the
First and Second Gates, the Third Gate was always closed and guarded by
Jeptallan troops. He could see no one on the parapet, but he knew they were
there.

“Proclaim your
name and your business,” rang the command from far above him.

“I am Lord General
Bastrop of Tira, Commander of the First Arm of the Omani Legions, Supreme
Commander of the Guardians of Omana Teret,” Bastrop declared in a booming
voice. “I come in friendship to King Tullus.”

“And your
business?”

The Lord General’s
spine stiffened. Oh, the impertinence of these cursed Jeptallans! Any other
door in the realm would have swung wide at the mere mention of his name.

“My business is my
business!” he cried in the voice that caused his own hardened veterans to
quake.

He was stunned to
hear laughter from the parapet. He was about to bark in fury when the gate
swung inward with scarcely a sound from the oiled hinges.

A giant of a man
strode towards him.

“Bastrop, my old
friend! That’s an answer fit for a native! Are you quite sure your mother
didn’t get you by some Jeptallan rogue passing through Tira?”

The Lord General
laughed as he slid down from his horse. He wondered how long the king of the
land had been waiting to play this little joke. Certainly, Tullus’ men would
have sent word of his approach hours ago, probably since the first moment he
crossed into Jeptalla.

“By the beard,
Tullus, you leave my mother out of this!”

The king’s escort,
waiting just inside the gate, looked on in disinterest as the two greatest
military minds of the Realm slapped each other on the back and disparaged each
other’s mother like a couple of stable boys.

***

“She has a fair
enough face, I suppose,” Tullus allowed. He tugged at his beard with one hand
while the other held the small portrait of
Toyva
,
Bastrop’s niece. “Is it a true likeness?”

“Nay, it doesn’t
do her justice. She’s a lively little thing, perhaps a trifle silly as all
girls are at that age, but obedient and well trained in household skills. She
would be a good match for Scearce.”

“It seems too soon
to be thinking of such things.”

“For pity’s sake,
do stop tugging your beard like that! The boy is almost twenty summers. What
are you waiting for?”

“I know, I know. I
just always assumed his mother would handle all this... dickering and
matchmaking.” Behind the flowing gray beard, mustache and thick,
shaggy eyebrows, the king’s face was
lined and weary. He
waved his hand tiredly at his old friend across the table.

“Alaida is gone
and your only son needs a wife.”

And,
Bastrop thought,
your house needs a
mistress.
The servants had grown slipshod and disorganized with no one to
guide them. When Alaida was alive, not only the house
but
the entire Seat ran as smoothly as a military campaign, so tirelessly and
graciously had that tiny woman devoted herself to her duties. Bastrop always
left the Seat feeling faintly envious; his own house was chaotic, his wife the
least organized person he’d ever met. Somehow such a flaw hadn’t seemed
important all those summers ago when he’d fallen in love with an ample bosom
and an engaging smile.

When Tullus did
not speak, Bastrop continued. “Look, I say this in the spirit of friendship. I
do not mean to be harsh.”

“Good Bastrop, I
know. I know. I have neglected my obligations long enough in this matter. I
promise to give serious thought to your niece. But do you think she could be
happy here? Jeptalla is much different from Tira.”

“You have a gift
for understatement! But it is not so different in the things that matter.
Scearce will make a good husband—”

“A good husband
for whom, Uncle?” A young man stood in the doorway.

“Scearce!” Bastrop
rose to embrace him. “I’d swear you’re two jackles taller than the last time I
saw you!”

The young man
smiled in obvious pleasure, his neatly clipped beard parting to show remarkably
white teeth, even though he returned the embrace somewhat reluctantly. Bastrop
did not take it personally; Scearce was at that age where displays of physical
affection were embarrassing.

Scearce was as
tall as his father without the girth that made Tullus such an overwhelming physical
presence. Instead, he possessed the willowy grace of a dancer or an athlete.
Scearce had always been small for his age, almost dainty. Small hands and feet
had come from his mother, along with the thin, straight nose of the House of
Ahornet
. Tullus had wondered if his blood would ever show
until the boy had shot up like a stalk of shooma searching for the sun, and the
Jeptalla king had smiled to see his son reach a height of nearly six jackles.
Men of the Omani Realm seldom reached five.

Scearce’s
was a sensitive, open face made striking by the
deep-set, light brown eyes as long-lashed as a girl’s. Boys from the village
had taunted him, calling him pretty. They had not yet learned the danger of
judging a book by its cover. With a fury that stunned his tormentors, he
bloodied noses, broke bones and blackened eyes until no one dared to call him
anything but Prince Scearce.
 

He was headstrong,
stubborn and proud, confident in a way that only the royally born can be. But
he took his duty as Tullus’ heir quite seriously. He studied swordplay and
warfare with a diligence that left little room for any man to doubt his
capability. He could ride faster and farther than any man in his father’s
troops, he could pluck an eagle from the sky with his bow and wrestle an
opponent twice his size to the ground and pin him there. Duty demanded no less
of him. Honor pushed him to be better, stronger, faster.