Shardheld

By Paul E. Horsman

Shardheld, the third and final book in the great Shardheld Saga, epic fantasy for both Y.A. and Adults.

Muus’ fateful journey as the Shardheld nears its end. After braving the dangers of the desolate Sea of Rom, he and his friends reach the Empire of the Baljaren. Here, he decides to slip away decides to slip away from his friends and finish his fateful journey alone.
In the dead of night, he leaves the Imperial palace for the fast naval galley that will bring him across the sea to Gaul. From there he plans to cross the Barrier Alps into Falrom and seek for the Kalmanir stone he must revitalize.
Neither his friends, nor the Gods, nor even his bitter enemies, agree with his decision.
The druidess Moirra has sworn to stay with him till the end. She, by now wise to Muus’s ways, follows him secretly on board the Imperial galley just before she sails.
Hraab and Prince Ottil, shocked from their sleep by the angry God Iowynh, manage to lie their way into the next galley to Gaul and follow them.
Meanwhile from the North, Kjelle and Birthe travel toward the Barrier Alps. Kjelle wants to aid his former slave as best as he can and the Gods have given Birthe her own task in the whole undertaking.
Tuuri, finally free of his oath to the false Jarl Rannar, goes south as well, intend on warning the Shardheld of his former master’s plans.
Finally Rannar himself, with the Fynni high shaman Rev, slaughter their own way to the Barrier. They want the skyshard and feed its magic to their own Old Gods.

The last race is on. To Falrom!

Will the Shardheld win, and restore the world’s magic? Or will foul Rev succeed, and bring back the cruel primordial Age of the Gods Before?
Follow Muus’s final journey to its moving completion in this third book of The Shardheld Saga.

“The Shardheld’s world is vividly evoked and the characters have strong, individual personalities.” (Awesome Indies Review)

“Enthralls its readers with adventure, intrigue, whimsy, and suspense.” (The Readers’ Favorite Review)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paul E. Horsman
• Release date: Jul 19, 2014
• ISBN: 9789491730122

Paul E. Horsman

Paul E. Horsman (1952) is a Dutch and International Fantasy Author. Born and bred in the Netherlands, he now lives in Roosendaal, a town on the Dutch-Belgian border.He has been a soldier, a salesman, a scoutmaster and from 1995 till his school closed in 2012 an instructor of Dutch as a Second Language and Integration to refugees from all over the globe.He is a full-time writer of fantasy adventure stories suitable for a broad age range. His books are both published in the Netherlands, and internationally.His works are characterized by their rich, diverse worlds, colorful peoples and a strong sense of equality between women and men. Many of his stories, like The Shardheld Saga trilogy and The Shadow of the Revenaunt books, have mythological or historical elements in them, while others, especially Lioness of Kell and his current Wyrms of Pasandir books, contain many steampunk elements.You can visit him at his website: www.paulhorsman-author.com.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1 - THE SCOURGE OF ROM

Muus halted his horse in the middle of the road, looking past the cluster of houses and the small harbor of Levastra before him, past the expanse of slate-gray that was the Sea of Rom, to the faint, reddish glow in the distance. Over there it was—the goal of his travels, the burning lands of Falrom.

Behind him, Hraab and Prince Ottil were full of their usual banter, while Geir was silent as ever. Muus didn’t listen to the boys. The voice of the Kalmanir, the great stone he was seeking, drowned them out, calling him with a terrible insistence.

For a moment, Muus closed his eyes. ‘I know your urgency,’ he thought. ‘But I’m not ready. Stop pulling at me!

Moirra took his hand. He looked aside and smiled at her. ‘It’s all right. I was just thinking.’

‘I know.’

‘Come on,’ Muus said, with attempted gaiety. ‘Let’s see if we can find a boat for Kartakos.’ He set his horse to walking, toward the harbor.

Luck was with them, in the unlikely person of potbellied old Avaristos, captain of the merchant vessel Kassanda. The little cog ship lay moored at the jetty, looking gray and worn, and determined never to leave port again.

‘You’ll find every comfort on board,’ her captain said expansively. ‘My beautiful ship used to be a royal transport, bringing important envoys of the Gaul king all over the Sea of Rom. No sleeping on the cold deck! You’ll enjoy the sea and Blessed Sun’s warmth, after a good night’s rest in your spacious cabin. And...’ He lowered his voice. ‘I can offer you a substantial discount if you bring your own provisions with you.’

The cabin wasn’t all that large; just an empty, wooden box with a heap of straw to sleep on. It did, however, offer them shelter against the rains that whipped the gray waters all day long. It even boasted a rear window that would have given a fine view over the sea, were it not screwed closed.

‘Does it always rain here?’ Ottil asked later that day, sitting with the boatswain and two sailors, learning how to mend a sail. ‘The captain promised us Sun’s comfort.’

‘Hah,’ the boatswain said. ‘He always does. No, young master, you’ll not see Sun over this sea, she won’t come. Before the Burning of Rom she loved it here, or so the old tales want us to believe. But no longer. The Firewall chased her away.’

Ottil rested his needle. ‘What is this Firewall?’

The three sailors looked at him as if he’d lost his mind, and the boatswain shook his head in perplexity. ‘You don’t know? You must come from far away then. They’re volcanoes, young master. A long row of fire-spitting mountains, which form a terrible wall all the way from the Barrier Alps in the north down the length of Falrom, across the Flaming Isle, through the sea to the coast past Baljaren. That’s the Firewall, cutting the Sea of Rom in halves and barring us from the rich lands in the East. The smoke of these mountains darkens the sky and chases Sun away to other lands. The clouds cry for her absence, and thus it rains.’

‘Was that how Rom fell? Volcanoes?’

The boatswain nodded soberly. ‘It must have been the wrath of the gods. My family came from Sardinha and the story moved with them to Levastra. A large mountain, hiding away on the bottom of the sea, erupted, and the waters boiled in anger. High they rose, and furious. The sea rolled all over Rom, the whole breadth of the land, smashing and drowning everything. Then the other mountains added their voices. The Stronbule, Vesuvio, Etna, even old White Mountain, all opened their mouths and spat their earthblood over the land. The earth heaved, broke open and belched poisonous gases. Together, these disasters wiped out all of Rom. The Great Burning, they call it; and The Day All Died. Sardinha’s quiet old mountains spared my forebears by keeping the sea away from the west coast. Still, when the ashes fell, the island became unfit to live on and they fled to Levastra. It was the end of the world, it was.’ He nodded at his own words and inspected the work under his hands.

‘Has anyone ever gone back to Falrom?’ Ottil said.

The boatswain stared at him. ‘Been there? You can’t even get near the coast. The vapors would kill you, if the heat didn’t. No, young Master, Falrom is lost to us forever.’

As the prince retold the story to the others that evening, Muus shivered. ‘I remember the volcanoes from my dreams. I see only fire, smoke and barren rock when I think of Falrom. Yet it must be possible to go there, or the shard wouldn’t send me. We’ll have to see.’ The memory of the heat his dreams caused on his skin, of the crackling fires and the smells coming from the burned earth, made him sick. Kartakos first. I’m not ready yet. Fire roared in his ears and mingled with the boiling of the earthblood lakes and the hissing sound of steam escaping the tortured soil. Stop it!

Five days out from Levastra, they woke early to a crashing sound on deck, followed by screams and curses. As Muus hurried from the cabin, he saw one of the big spars had come down from the mast, covering the deck with sailcloth and trailing lines.

Captain Avaristos stood waving pudgy fists, his face red with ineffective anger. A stream of curses rolled from his lips, many of them unintelligible, while on the main deck, the boatswain and his men were busy clearing away the wreckage. The yard lay fractured, two ragged endings like the broken bones of a long dead animal.

‘Damned luck,’ the captain said to his passengers. ‘This will take us all day to repair. Meanwhile we’re drifting, the gods know where. We can end up anyplace, helpless. We’re not that far from pirate territory.’ He cursed again, his face a mixture of anger and despair.

‘Pirates?’ Ottil looked up. Though he frowned upon murderers like Largassen, going on Viking expeditions had been a part of his culture for centuries, and it still evoked longing in the adventurous.

The captain nodded; his face fearful. ‘They’re from Sardinha, an island to the north of here. Terribly brutal they are, appearing out of nowhere in their galleys, boarding an unsuspecting ship. Then they murder the crew and ransom the passengers. It is said they have a fastness full of iron cages to lock up their prisoners.’ He shuddered.

‘How are you going to repair that?’ Ottil pointed at the broken yard. His practical soul refused to worry about what might be.

‘We’ll glue it, bolt it and bind it up with rope,’ the captain said. ‘And then we’ll pray it holds until we’re in Kartakos.’

Muus frowned. ‘You’re not carrying a spare?’

‘I don’t, these things cost money.’

‘But if you sink the ship, it’ll cost you much more.’

‘We won’t sink,’ Captain Avaristos said, turning beet red again. ‘We’ll repair that yard, sail to Kartakos, buy another used yard and replace it. We did it before.’

The sailors worked feverishly to get the yard back in place before they ended up on the rocky coast somewhere.

Near dark, the boatswain reported the repairs finished. Now the yard had to rest through the night to let the two glued halves settle.

‘It’s not a good repair,’ the boatswain said to Ottil’s question. ‘It’s a lousy repair. We should’ve used that yard for our cooking fires long ago. It’s too dry, too brittle. Too damn old, like some.’ He cast a furtive glance at his captain on the afterdeck and spat over the side. ‘We’ll keep watch tonight and tomorrow we’ll see whether it’ll hold.’

‘And if it won’t?’

‘Then we’re in deep trouble, young Master. Very deep trouble.’

Next morning, Ottil woke to the sounds of fighting on deck. He prodded Muus. ‘Something’s wrong.’

He made to go on deck, but Muus pulled him back. ‘Stay here, I’ll go.’

Grumbling, Ottil resheathed his sword, while Muus put on his boots.

‘Be careful,’ Moira said, as the runemaster stepped out of the cabin.

There was a pitched battle going on, Ottil saw from inside the door. Alongside the ship lay a sleek, black-painted galley, looking as deadly as any Norden dragonship. Avaristos’ fear of pirates had been justified. Under cover of the gray of dawn, they must’ve crept near undetected by the sleepy watch, and boarded while most of the Kassanda’s hands were still below. Now the old captain lay on his face halfway up the companion ladder, looking for all the world like a slaughtered sucking pig. Around him, his men fought with desperation clear on their faces, and, outnumbered three-to-one, were losing the battle.

‘Watch out!’ the prince cried.

Muus evaded a slashing pike and turned to go inside again, when a wild-eyed pirate jumped down from the afterdeck and cracked the runemaster on the skull. As Muus fell, Ottil darted outside, his sword at the ready, but the pirate had disappeared among the fighting. Without hesitation, Ottil gripped Muus’ ankle and dragged him back into the cabin. He slammed the door shut, while Moirra knelt by the unconscious body. Taut-faced, she sought for damage. Finally she sat back on her heels.

‘He lives. The skull is intact, but there’s a large bump. I don’t know how long he’ll be out, but he’ll have a concussion. He...’ Terrible screams from outside made her stop and everyone looked at the door. One after another, the cries broke off, until all was silent. Moments later, the door crashed open. A scarecrow of a man stood in the opening. He was tall and bone-thin, dressed in mismatched clothes that had seen better days, his hair in long rattails. It was the bloodied sword in his hand, though, that drew their eyes.

‘Passengers,’ the pirate said with some satisfaction. ‘I hope you make my efforts here worthwhile after all. Tell me, are you bait or booty?’

‘Bait?’ Ottil said. ‘Explain, please.’

‘Food for the fishes,’ the pirate said. ‘Like the crew. Or else you’re important enough to warrant a ransom.’

‘In that case we’re booty,’ Ottil said. ‘I’m the nephew of the King of Gaul.’

The pirate grinned. ‘Good try, boy. The King of Gaul has but one nephew, and he’s in the Norden.’

‘He is not. The Norden is rife with rebellion. I am Prince Ottil Vidmersen.’

The pirate gripped Ottil’s chin and peered in his eyes. ‘You’re not a-lying, boy?’

‘Unhand me,’ Ottil said as frostily as he could manage.

With a laugh, the pirate stepped back. ‘At least you’re not afraid, I like that. You bought a bit of life with your claim, boy. I’ll take you to Sardinha. We have some Nords who can ask the right questions. Who are the rest of you?’

‘My retinue, of course,’ Ottil said haughtily. ‘Even in exile you can’t expect me to travel alone. My uncle will pay well for every one of them.’

‘All of them? Even that redhaired beanpole with the looks of a farmer?’

Ottil threw Geir a reassuring smile. ‘Captain, he’s not a farmer. His father is a proper Norden nobleman.’

‘Is he now...? Well, you’ll all stay here. There is no lock to the door, but we’ll gut the first one who sets a foot on deck.’ The chill look in their captor’s eyes told them he wasn’t joking.

Ottil stared back at him. ‘In that case, have someone bring a bucket. You can’t expect me to crap in a corner.’

The pirate threw his head in the neck and roared with laughter. ‘A bucket, alright, lad.’ Then he gave the prince a narrow-eyed look. ‘What’s with that yard?’

‘It split yesterday morning,’ Ottil said. ‘The men spent the whole day gluing and bolting it and they were planning to hoist it again early today.’

‘Right, then we’ll see if they did a good job of it.’ The pirate turned to go.

‘I told you my name, eh... Captain,’ Ottil said. ‘May I have yours?’

The pirate stared at him. ‘You may, youngling. I’m Austu Threefingers, Captain of the Rejusta. The sea bottom is littered with my victims.’

‘Are you really pirates?’

Threefingers laughed. ‘Really. The Scourge of Rom they call us. Feeding on bloated merchants for as long as there are ships at sea.’

‘Thank you, Captain Austu.’

Abruptly, the pirate left the cabin.

Ottil sighed and Moirra clasped him in her arms for a moment. ‘You were wonderful.’

‘Indeed.’ Hraab patted the prince’s shoulder. ‘I’m proud of you, son.’

‘Son!’ Before Ottil could say more, the door opened and a big man with a scarred face dropped a bucket in their midst. He said something they couldn’t understand, but his gestures and fat grin were explanation enough.

‘That’s it, then,’ Ottil said as the man had left. ‘We’re in a fine mess. Now would be a good time for that divine friend in your head to come to our aid.’

‘I told you Iowynh is not in my head,’ Hraab said, irritated. ‘He’s somewhere else, doing something else, and he doesn’t want to speak to me. The god is damned cagy again. I hate it when he does that.’

Outside, loud orders and a creaking noise told the prince the pirates were hoisting the yard into place. The Kassanda shuddered and gathered speed.

‘Let’s do something useful,’ Hraab said after a while. He studied the screws that held the boards for the window. ‘We’ll get those out; then we can jump ship.’

‘We’re a long way from land,’ Ottil said doubtfully. ‘Even you can’t swim that far.’

‘No, but perhaps we’ll pass by an island or whatever.’

Ottil shrugged, but he got out his knife and started on a screw.

‘Don’t take them fully out; the pirates don’t have to know of our back door. Leave them just enough in place that we can remove them in a hurry.’

The lower screws were easy, but the upper rows were out of their reach.

‘Climb on my shoulders,’ Ottil said to his henchman, and obediently, Geir piggybacked him. Finally they got the board so prepared, that a firm tug would bring it down.

‘We can’t do more,’ Hraab said, and he dropped down next to Moirra, who was cradling Muus’s head in her lap.

‘How is he?’

‘Still out,’ Moirra said. ‘Normally I’d say that’s bad, but with Muus I’m not sure. It could be the shard or the runes are holding him asleep. Damn! Damn it all, pirates, skyshard, that stupid captain with his rotten yard.’

‘He has paid for it,’ Hraab said.

‘If I could, I’d call him back and kill him a second time,’ the druidess snapped. ‘The miserly fool.’ Her hand went to Muus’ head, and she stroked it tenderly.

The remainder of the day passed in boredom. Ottil spoke of the Norden and they discussed what changes he should introduce, when he got his throne back. Geir talked about the farm, his family and the problems of a smallholder, things the prince knew little about.

‘My mother had twelve kids,’ Geir said. ‘Seven died. I’m the youngest one, the third son. There was no land for me; all will go to my eldest brother. Olf was the second son; he had the choice of joining Rannar or going to sea. He wasn’t too fond of the jarl, so he chose the latter. My eldest brother had a son by then and I became another mouth too many. That’s why I went with Olf. There aren’t too many choices for the likes of Olf or me.’

‘What would you have wanted to do?’ Ottil said curiously. ‘Would you’ve liked taking over the farm?’

Geir shrugged. ‘Farming is hard work and terribly dull. A sailor’s life isn’t much better and I’m not precisely built like a fighter. What else is there?’

‘You have no powers I can feel,’ Moirra said. ‘So you won’t be a druid or a... a wiseman. Can you sing?’

Geir looked sad. ‘I must not. My father expressly forbade it. He found it... unfitting for a poor farmer’s son.’

‘Sing something,’ Ottil said. ‘You’re my man now, not your father’s. If you can sing, I want to know.’

Hraab looked at Geir, his head cocked. ‘You’ve a nice speaking voice, those few times you open your mouth, and I’ve heard you make a good story of our adventures. Forget your father’s commands; your loyalty is now for the prince. Sing, mate.’

Geir closed his eyes and was silent for a moment. Then he started a familiar drinking song.

Ottil sat up straight in amazement. At his father’s court he’d heard several of the Norden’s best bards, and Geir’s voice could vie with any of them. He didn’t sound like a boy, either; more... Drat it, how could he describe it? Then he stopped thinking and listened.

‘That’s great,’ Moirra said, when the boy fell silent. ‘You shouldn’t hide a voice like that.’

‘She’s right.’ Hraab bobbed up and down like a robin. ‘Your father must’ve been jealous or tone deaf. I said you had a great voice, didn’t I? Well, you have!’

‘That’s right,’ Ottil said grandly. ‘You will be my court bard. You’ll beat them all, mate. Every one of them. We’ll show them. I as king and you as skald. We’ll show them how it’s done.’ Geir sat quietly under all the praise, his head bowed, and his ears tinged red.

Not for the first time Ottil wondered what his henchman was thinking. He was such a funny fellow, you never knew if he was happy or not.

But Geir must have been content, for the remainder of the day they spent exchanging songs, of which Moirra had a large collection. Not that her voice was exceptional, but she was competent enough to teach Geir the notes. The boy lapped it all up like a sponge. He couldn’t read or write, but his memory for music proved exceptional.

Thus, they sang and slept, ate sparingly and waited. The pirates seemed to have forgotten all about them—at least, no one came. The bucket by now overflowed with wastes and the smell inside the cabin became rapidly unbearable.

‘They must be shorthanded,’ Hraab said. ‘Perhaps it takes more men to sail this tub than they’d reckoned.’

‘They haven’t even searched us.’ Ottil patted his sword. ‘Seems mighty careless of them.’

‘They’ll not expect trouble from a bunch of kids,’ Hraab said with a big grin.

‘I’m not a kid,’ the prince said, irritated, and he lapsed into silence.

CHAPTER 2 - THE TEUTON NOBLE

Kjelle paused at the foot of the narrow mountain path leading down from the Lithan’s cave.

‘Phew,’ he said, rubbing the neck of his horse. ‘I’m a Nord and used to mountains, but that trail is the worst I’ve seen.’

‘Agreed.’ Ajkell’s face was calm. On the way up, the bear warrior had nearly slipped to his death, and only Birthe’s physical power had saved him from a thousand-foot fall.

‘It does make your stronghold pretty secure,’ he added with one of his slow grins. ‘I could defend that path almost single-handed against an army.’

‘You wouldn’t stop Rev.’ Birthe stared at the others with empty eyes. ‘He’s terrible. Rev would throw his whole Fynni army at you, even if he had to kill them all.’

Kjelle glanced at his love. Rev... That Fynni bastard was all she had on her mind these days. The Old Gods’ tool, High Shaman Rev, she was to kill. Damn the gods, why she? Every time he thought about it, his soul turned into frozen fear for her and for the three-month-old child inside her. Swallowing a curse, he mounted and cleared his mind of all but the journey before them.

‘Over there begins Lotharn.’ He nodded towards the road, disappearing between a dark mass of pine trees. ‘I wonder if it’s as backward as they say.’

‘Worse, probably. Our people don’t go that way.’ Elbrich shifted in the saddle and the mail shirt he’d made for himself jingled softly. ‘We’re not exactly welcome among Teutons. They’re even worse bigots than most Nords and their dislike of us Un-a-Rhan can be violent.’ He grimaced. ‘Still, I’m not going to run away from them. If we must pass through Lotharn, pass we will.’

‘Of course we will,’ Annlith, the Un-a-Rhan healer, said stoutly.

Together, the five rode away from the mountains, into the Kingdom of Lotharn.

The path they followed was narrow, hardly more than a track, with ancient oak forests on both sides, moss-grown like the lumpy ground they rose up from. These were raven woods, the raucous cawing adding to the gloomy atmosphere. Wolf woods, too, but they’d only found tracks; the beasts themselves slunk away when the five riders approached.

Kjelle rode in silence, trusting his instincts, while his mind wandered to that land of might-have-been—to Eidungruve, Muus and happiness—where it too often went when he was depressed. He still missed Muus, his thrall and constant companion for so many years, and the memory of the way he had mistreated him was a constant regret.

In front of him, Ajkell squirmed in the saddle. ‘I don’t trust it,’ muttered he, looking at the sky.

‘You don’t trust what?’ With some effort, Kjelle dragged himself back to the here and now.

‘The weather.’ Ajkell was a squat and muscular young fellow, a bear warrior from a long line of famous berserkers. ‘We’re in for a thunderstorm.’

Kjelle blinked

Reviews for Shardheld

[westkayla1221 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I have been writing reviews for a while now on various book websites, so therefore it should get easier, right? Wrong. While some books are amazingly simple to write reviews for, there are those that take some time. And in the case with this book, I had to mull it over for a couple of days before I could write my review. This book rounds out the Shardheld series. It is the final part of the story and brings with it a sense of closure regarding the return of the Skyshard to its rightful place but also great hope in regards to the future. The ending left me smiling with the thought that the possibilities for the various lands we have been introduced to throughout the story are infinite and endless and, most importantly, prosperous. One of the reasons I took a few days before writing this review was the bombs that were basically unleashed in the story. I think it was only a couple, it felt that way to me, but I must say the second one was HUGE in my eyes. And while it was so simply explained, I still am reeling over it. I love how this book is an example that even if the reader is in the last dregs of a series, even in the last pages, a twist can still be slipped in, one that could end that series on almost the perfect note. And this book indeed ended on a perfect note. I feel immensely privileged to have been asked to review these books by the author and will definitely be checking out some of his other work in future.