Queen of the North (Book 3) (Songs of the Scorpion) (17 page)

“Rings of Dawn?” Erryn asked, intrigued.

“Aye,” One Eye Thal said. “If we hadn’t built them to guide the sun, the west would never have a springtime.”

Erryn smiled. “You should never lie to a queen.”

“Who says I’m lying?” One Eye Thal said fiercely, then burst out laughing.

Erryn laughed as well, but had a feeling One Eye Thal believed every word he spoke. As much as she would have enjoyed hearing more of Pryth, she had more pressing matters than her curiosity. “We need to get into the fortress.”

“She has the way of it,” Captain Romal said, coming up from the rear. He was slender for a Prythian, with fair hair and a long golden beard braided into a fork. He tugged at the knuckle of bone dangling by a loop of gold from what was left of one ear. The story Erryn had heard said that the rest of his ear had fed an enemy. “We’ve a dozen men with frostbite.”

Erryn didn’t wait to hear anymore. “I want everyone indoors within the hour.”

It took less than half that.

Chapter 14

At first, it was only a touch warmer within the dark and dusty reaches of Stormhold than without, but near a thousand men and half as many horses soon provided the overflowing great hall with warmth. The rumbling murmur of conversation and whickering horses worked as a lullaby on Erryn, forcing her to concentrate on keeping her eyes from sliding shut.

“Best if we set watch and send out scouts,” Aedran advised. “If there are any stores of food to be found—barrels of flour will keep a long time, even if they’re crawling with weevils—we will find them soon enough.”

Erryn nodded absently, holding her fingers above the flame of an oil lamp. One Eye Thal had found her an old chair to sit on and a smallish table covered with cracked ivory inlays to hold her lamp.
My throne and high table,
she thought, missing the equally crude accommodations of the Cracked Flagon back in Valdar.

Aedran turned and shouted for silence. The men quieted, and their combined breath turned into a fog that glowed like dark and ancient gold in the torchlight. Unlit doorways yawned like black mouths and marched around the graystone hall, each thrice the height of a man, their lintels engraved with images of dragons. Set deep in four walls, a dozen or more cold hearths waited for wood and fire to warm their iron grates. If the previous rulers of Stormhold had left behind anything telling who they had been, save a few odd pieces of furniture, thieves had cleared it all out in intervening years.

“Find anything of wood and start some fires,” Aedran called, the vaulted ceilings of the hall magnifying his voice. “Our good queen has demanded a feast—even if it is of horsemeat—and we shall have it.”

Roars of approval met the command and the promise of a hot meal, and the men dispersed.

~ ~ ~

The previous rulers of Stormhold might have taken away all the banners and devices that named who they had been, but they left plenty of furniture behind. Blackwood chairs, tables, and wardrobes burned hot and bright enough to push back centuries’ worth of gloom and cold, and those flames were more than hot enough to roast frozen meat hacked from the carcasses of the horses that had frozen to death.

Captain Romal found the kitchens. Besides a wealth of spices, he located all the makings for bread. The yeast had gone over, but as he said when he returned lugging two moth-eaten sacks of flour, “Bread is bread, whether it rises, or remains flat.”

One Eye Thal and his patrol plunged deep into the bowels of the mountain fortress, following corridors guarded by rusted armor and weapons draped with cobwebs. His search led to vast cellars filled with oaken casks and barrels. The wine and brandy they once contained had long since turned to pungent brown dust, but there had also been racks filled with earthenware jars brimming with strong but drinkable spirits.

A few draughts of blackberry brandy put General Aedran in a fine mood, and he insisted on building a proper throne for Erryn at one end of the great hall. It began with a stout table, atop which some of the men placed a high-backed, cushioned chair. When Erryn sat down at the rowdy urging of her army, the cushion split, belching a cloud of dust. Sneezing and laughing by turns—she had matched Aedran draught for draught of brandy, and was half-drunk already—she waved for the men to proceed.

The horses and sledges were moved to an adjoining hall and put under rotating guard so no one would miss the festivities. After that, the men produced an assortment of hand-carved pipes, some of wood, others of bone, and struck up a series of jaunty tunes. Those not playing, danced and sang. Those not dancing or singing, stomped and clapped. Despite the bleariness of her eyes and her swimmy head, Erryn noted that these songs held more joy than those the Prythians had played while at Valdar.

“It’s the promise of hot food and coming glory that lightens their hearts,” Aedran responded when she asked, kneeling beside her on the table. He smiled and tapped her nose with a finger. She brushed him off, but when her hand touched his, it lingered, soaking in the heat of his skin. He grinned at her, his teeth white behind his blood-red beard.

“We had plenty of food and glory at Valdar,” she said, a little breathless.

“Aye,” Aedran said, turning to watch the dancing. Nearly too soft to hear, he added, “But now we march toward destiny.”

He’s drunker than I am
. Erryn found nothing particularly funny about the thought, but she laughed aloud. He joined in, his arm briefly wrapping around her shoulders and squeezing her close. When he leaped from the table and began dancing, she felt colder for the loss of his presence.

As Aedran spun around the great hall, Erryn sipped brandy from a dented pewter cup. His booted feet kicked higher and faster than any of the other men, his arms weaved intricate patterns as he twirled, and his beaming smile grew wider with each new turn.

When it seemed Aedran could do nothing more impressive, he suddenly leaped high, curled into a spinning ball, and hit the floor in a roll, only to bounce back to his feet in another graceful leap.

Round and round he went, the men cheering him on, until sweat shone on his brow, and his breath came in gasps. At last, he stopped, gave an unsteady bow, and climbed back onto the table with Erryn.

Across the great hall, now a hundred men imitated their leader. Some displayed great skill; others were sorely lacking. After some time, a bellow of command halted the dancing, and the men moved aside for Captain Murgan, who strutted shirtless before Erryn. Scars crisscrossed his lean frame. The worst was a raised pink oval where a nipple should have peeked through his chest hair. He spun to face her and bowed so low that his balding head nearly touched his outstretched knee.

Captain Romal came next, made a similar bow, then trotted a hundred strides to the opposite end of the great hall, the forks of his golden beard swinging. At some silent signal, Romal darted toward Murgan in great bounding leaps, and landed a boot in his companion’s cupped hands. Murgan heaved upward and Romal soared, legs straight, arms spread, chin lifted toward the black of the great hall’s high ceiling. He held the pose as he fell in a plummeting arc until the last second, then he curled in on himself and landed in a rolling somersault. Next it was Murgan’s turn to fly.

Not to be outdone, Captain Kormak splashed a generous gulp of wine down his throat, and made his bows to Erryn. Then, with his thick black braid whipping about the top of his head, he began spinning like a burly top. Round and round he went, the men clapping, until he lost his footing and tumbled drunkenly through a wall of soldiers. Curses and raucous laughter followed, but no fists were thrown, nor was steel bared.

After that, the carousing began in earnest.

“I’d no idea you Prythians could dance,” Erryn said, having to raise her voice over cheers, shouts, and trilling pipes. To her eyes, it seemed as if the army had doubled in size, but half of them were blurry ghosts. She set aside her cup of brandy.

“If a thing is worth doing, we’ve great passion to do it well,” Aedran said, his tone and smile suggesting more than his words.
Much more
. Erryn’s cheeks grew hot, her tongue dried, and it was something of a relief when Aedran looked away.

Food came piecemeal. First, there was piping hot flatbread and chilled wine, followed by more wine, followed by roasted slivers of horsemeat and more bread. To this, the Prythians added berry-and-lard cakes taken from the supplies. Salty and sweet, the cakes were fine, as was the horsemeat and bread. While she and Aedran ate and laughed, the dances changed to contests of strength.

When a pair of Prythians stripped down to their smallclothes and began circling each other with daggers, Erryn ordered Aedran to put an end to it.

“They’ll not hurt each other,” he said around a bite of food. “Not much, at least.”

Erryn was surprised to see that he was right. The longer she watched, the more she saw patterns in the dramatic thrusts and parries, throws and blows. By the time the contestants’ corded muscles were glistening with sweat, it became obvious this, too, was a sort of dance.

“They’re acting something out,” she murmured.

Aedran nodded excitedly. He was now sitting cross-legged on the table beside her, one elbow propped on the armrest of her chair, his fingers brushing her leg as he spoke. “
The Conflict of Kings
tells the story of the king of night and the king of day, and their ceaseless battle.”

She leaned forward. “Who is who?”

“At different times, each represents night
and
day, for one cannot live without the other. Also, the changing roles ensure that no one gets stuck with the mantle of darkness.”

Several more dance-battles followed, some light-hearted, the comical tumbles and falls egged on by jaunty tunes; some full of sadness, with brother standing victorious over brother, while the rest of the Prythians chanted a lament to somber pipes.

As the final round of wine and brandy was doled out, the remaining scraps of meat and bread eaten, the last dance of the night promised to be wholly different from the rest. Erryn saw the men’s faces change when they doused the candles and lamps, and banked the hearth fires, casting the great hall in a darkly sullen and shifting light.

“What’re we watching now?” she asked.

Aedran touched the back her hand, sending a thrill up her arm. “
Soul of the Dragon
tells the story of my people,” he said softly.

“The same you told me before we came into Stormhold?”

“Aye.”

As the bulk of her army knelt around the edges of the great hall, Erryn settled into her chair. One by one, the men began beating their fists against their thighs and raising their voices in a joyful chant. Those not drumming and chanting, perhaps a hundred in all, mimicked the actions of farmers and craftsmen. They smiled and joked as they labored, never noticing a group of stern-faced men drawing near with swords and spears and hammers poised.

The drumming slowly changed into a clamorous rhythm, and the chanting became howls and cries when the warriors attacked. The blows were false, but Erryn cringed to see the one-sided battle played out.

After the workers were subdued and dragged away, the drumming slowed to the beat of a dying heart and the chant became low, grief-stricken. The workers returned, but now there was no joy in their labor. They crawled about on hands and knees, heads bowed, backs contorted as if from a great weight, their hands scraping listlessly at the floor of the great hall. The stern-faced warriors returned as well, but now they laughed and jested as they watched over the enslaved. Erryn searched the faces of those around the great hall, and was stunned to see tears wetting many cheeks.

The drumming and chants changed again, and all at once the workers’ backs straightened and they rose up as one to rip the weapons from their captors. For a long time afterward, they made war.

When at last it seemed the final battle had been fought, the former slaves began circling the great hall, knees bent, weapons thrusting and slashing. They added their voices to their chanting brothers. Fists hammered against thighs, louder than before.

Erryn recalled Aedran’s tale, but what she saw was unfamiliar. “What do they do now?”

“They seek after our birthright, the Soul of the Dragon. Such is the destiny and purpose of all true Prythians.”

The words were on her tongue to ask what that meant, but the drumming rhythm increased until the warriors were running about the great hall. Then, without warning, they broke apart and joined their brethren. No cheers and rowdy calls filled the hall as before, only reverent quiet.

Erryn looked to Aedran and saw the sheen of tears in his eyes. Impulsively, she used the ball of her thumb to brush one glimmering line of dampness from his cheek. “If your destiny brings such sadness, why follow it?”

He caught her hand. “The sadness comes from having to follow this road at all. As I told you before, if our ancestors hadn’t failed us and themselves, we’d not have to search for our lost destiny now.”

She wanted to ask more, but One Eye Thal presented himself. The sheen in his remaining eye had nothing to do with sorrow or regret, but anger. Some of that emotion fled when he looked at Erryn. “The men and I thank you for the feast, and for not letting us freeze off our stones out in that murderous whore of a storm.”