A Key to a Throne: A Tale of Enadir

By Rhydian Pedr King

A country clinging to peace and order after a Cataclysmic War. A tyrant wrenching power from the weak. A rebellion desperately fighting for change. A prisoner struggling to belong. A Key to a Throne.

'Sometimes, they spoke of daemons. Don't trust them, shun them, fear them, for none of those tales ever ended happily.'

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Rhydian King
• Release date: Mar 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9781739699611

Book preview

Midlands of Nefarwy

Prologue: Betrayal

Thirty-two years earlier

‘Although less gruesome, a stab with a knife can be far more devastating than a cut with a sword, you know. Place it here, next to your sternum, and I can slip between your ribs to cut the vessels supplying your heart. A bit further along and I can collapse a lung, leaving you to suffocate. Or shall we be less obvious? Next to your pubis here, shall I place a finger? Ah! A lovely, bouncing pulse. A little cut there and you’ll be drained like a piece of game. Shouldn’t take too long with how quickly your heart is going. Try to calm down.’

‘Please,’ she whispered, her old lips trembling.

‘Or how about something else?’ he moved behind her, trailing the cold blade around her waist and up her spine. ‘A bit rougher, perhaps, but a sharp stab between your backbone and skull and I’ll sever your spine. It won’t take long after that.’

‘Please,’ she whimpered, keeping her head still against the blade.

‘Oh, but it’ll make you bleed too much, you’re right. How about we go slightly laterally, on either side? We’ll have to be careful not to nick the vessels travelling up your neck bones, but with a nice, slim blade like this, I might just get it in the right place to cut the nerves as they come out. At the right level, that’ll paralyse your diaphragm, you know. You’ll suffocate from two tiny cuts in your neck, but only if I’m precise.’

‘Why?’

‘You know why,’ he snapped. How dare she question him. ‘Yes, that might be a good way. Or we might go lower, to your kidneys. They receive a quarter of your body’s blood supply with each heartbeat, you know. How long do you think it’ll take for all that blood to fill up your belly? I imagine it’s quite painful to feel it pump away inside you. You won’t lose too much on the outside, of course, but on the inside…it’ll be like a wine-skin filled to bursting, sloshing about in there, like all those times you’ve over-indulged. Or how about I just stick it into your belly, twist it around to really open up all those intestines, let all the excrement out into places it shouldn’t go. You might survive for a few hours, maybe even days, waiting for the infection to take hold. How does that sound?’

A whimper, incomprehensible.

He grabbed her by the jaw. The whimpers turned into sobs.

‘I could break your jaw? Leave the gums open and torn… ever seen a man die of a broken jaw? It isn’t pretty. Once the infection sets in, all manner of pus and shit starts oozing out as the bone falls apart. You can taste the rot for the few weeks you have left. The infection gets most, but the others starve, too swollen to chew down their slop.’

‘Please don’t,’ she blubbered, tears streaming from her eyes, slime spilling from her nose.

Pathetic. They knew the risk when they defied him. Now to face the consequences.

Was it really that difficult to wait for his return? Two years, that was all he’d been away for. Two years and they’d forgotten him, turned back to their old ways, abandoned the laws he’d written. Or perhaps they thought he’d forgotten them, that his absence was permanent. Perhaps they hoped it. Hoped to one day come across his corpse, lying in a ditch, covered in loam, maggots eating his limp flesh. Funny how tables can turn.

Did he not promise to return? They should know by now that his word was his bond. He would be away for a while on a brief journey of discovery, but that was all. Duty would bring him back, as it did the first time. A leader did not abandon his people. Not unless they abandoned him first.

History, it seemed, was doomed to repeat itself. These villagers, these scum, they tried to cut him off once before, banished him for no other reason than fear of the change he heralded. Three years ago, the old village elders learned their lesson for standing in his way. Could the rest of them really be so stupid to think he would not do the same again if provoked? Last time, it was only eight elders he needed to make an example of. This time, everyone would learn.

‘I gave you your chance last time,’ he sighed, turning back to the old fonex. Her grey skin was dark, like his, drinking in the torchlight, concealing her in shadows. The only difference between them were the scars on his skin to the wrinkles and blemishes that came with her age. Her silver hair was lank, streaked with smoke, dirt, and sweat. A tribute to her failed attempts to crawl from her fate.

Her husband groaned softly beside her, his arms bound in an identical way to hers above his head, suspended from a roofbeam. How he ever thought to place himself as an elder was beyond comprehension. The old snake barely had enough cognitive ability to take himself to the latrine when the urge struck, let alone lead a village. It was an insult. To choose this senile snail as his replacement? He stood for everything Stolach hated, everything he’d cast down when he took leadership three years ago. Tradition, meekness, complacency, lack of ambition. The fool was content for them all to live and die in the few hundred square metres of their village. He didn’t care about the rest of the Midlands, he didn’t care if they could help bring it back to order. As long as this insignificant village was relatively content, that was enough for them, for all the elders. Sickening.

‘Please, Stolach, don’t– ’ the woman pleaded again.

‘Silence!’ he snarled. ‘You had your chance. You have already been found guilty. The only question is your sentence.’

‘Mercy.’

‘Mercy? This knife is mercy. You have wounded me deeply, far deeper than any blade can reach. I punish you with a smaller wound than the one inflicted on me. That is your mercy.’

‘Stolach, this isn’t you!’

‘You know nothing of me. You stood aside when they first sent me away, you let them throw me out into the cold. They wanted me dead, you know. All of them, those skeletons in their unmarked graves, they thought banishing me was a death sentence, and you let them do it. You all did. I showed you mercy when I let you live then. How kind am I, to give you mercy again?’

She didn’t answer, only stared at him with those tearful, frightened eyes. His stomach lurched. How dare she try to manipulate him with her weakness, her frailty.

‘Am I not kind?’ he shouted, inches from her face.

She flinched, trembling, but didn’t answer. He pressed the knife against her husband’s inner thigh, making him gasp as the point broke the skin.

‘Yes!’ she cried. ‘You’re kind, and sweet, and honourable. And you wouldn’t do this to us!’

‘I wouldn’t?’ He laughed, pent-up emotion spilling over. ‘You know nothing. Hiding here in your little homes. Soft. Weak! I have survived the harshness of the wilderness beyond our holes and tree-houses. But I am honourable, unlike you, stealing power while I was away. You know the punishment for thievery in some places? They cut off a hand, so they don’t steal again. You stole my village with your words, I think I’ll take your tongue.’

She resisted. It was too difficult to keep her mouth propped open, so he forced it with both hands until it popped out of its sockets. Tongue lolling out of her dislocated jaw, it didn’t take him long to remove the liar’s tool. Her sobs turned to gurgles and splutters as she choked on the blood flooding her mouth. He stared down at her in disgust.

‘This seems fitting enough for you. Your husband can watch you drown, and wait for smoke and flame to take him. Justice is served.’

He left them, locking the front door of their home behind him. The rest of the village burned brightly, ash and cinder filling the air. Bodies of dozens of fonex littered the floor, their dark grey complexions nearly invisible in the shadows, blending in with the ash. The smell of burning wood nearly masked the metallic stench of blood and the oddly-familiar scent of roasting flesh. Taking a burning branch from the ground, he set the door alight.

The damp winter night would prevent the fire from spreading, but it wouldn’t save the village. It didn’t deserve saving. They had all betrayed him by accepting the new elders. He served justice to them all.

Covering his mouth and nose, he fought through the blaze to the forest, relishing in the cool shadows beyond the fire’s reach. Turning one final time to the slaughtered village, Stolach nodded quietly to himself.

‘Farewell mother, father. I deserved better.’

1

Would today be the day for liberation? From the shadows of the alcove, Lidan narrowed his eyes at the question, and stepped into the dwindling light of sunset. Red skies promised the opening of the city gates, but would they be open for him?

He gathered his thin cloak around him and walked swiftly through the narrow streets of Crastalan. The city’s black granite foundations had soaked up the sun’s rays all day, making his armpits and groin damp with sweat. His worn shoes padded softly along the ground. He kept his head lowered. It was wise to keep his face hidden. The glistening brand on his cheekbone was a beacon to those who understood its significance.

The city was only just coming to life. Crastalan was a nocturnal place, the boiling heat of summer making it nigh impossible to survive the streets during daylight hours. It was only once the sun was set and the torches lit that the inhabitants came bursting forth from their cool homes. At this hour, it was just about cool enough to move around, but still so hot that most decided to stay inside for a while yet. That suited Lidan just fine, as he had no desire to be seen.

Of course, it wasn’t as though anyone would recognise him. He was nobody. A ghost, a distant memory even in the minds of those who cared, or used to care. But still, he preferred to go about his business when there was less company. Crowds irritated him; too many people spouting rubbish and yelling at each other, and crowds tended to attract guards, of whom he had no particular fondness.

Four men bustled past, their flabby stomachs bouncing beneath loose tunics, sagging over their straining belts. He shrank back into the shadows, lip curling at their wealthy arrogance. The high stone walls of the building behind him pressed into his back. He glanced through one of the thick glass windows to see shelves of candles and tallow; a chandler. The concept of devoting an entire store to something as simple as candles made him sigh. This place was so different to his home, how could he have ever hoped to survive its complexities?

Weaverlodge had been – and presumably still was – a poor village, far to the south of the capital, in the grassland plains to the west of the Pine Woods. Back then, life seemed so mundane, so dull. He’d give anything to return to it now. Not just him, of course, all of them. Not that he ever could go back, not now. Their faces were a blur in his memory, lost in pain, save for one. Such memories were likely all that remained of them after their folly.

Leaning forward from the wall, he could see the tower. The keep. Reaching high into the sky, always visible, wherever you were in the city. No matter how dark or twisted your alley, how small and enclosed your den, you could never escape its shadow. He turned his head away, tried to ignore it, but it was impossible. To live in Crastalan was to be constantly reminded of the tower, the king, and his minions.

He wandered through the streets, heading for the market square. For as much as was possible, he stuck to the alleys; the twisting, coiling, pathways that snaked through the underside of the city like a thousand streams in a forest. Looking around, he couldn’t help but shake his head at calling them alleys. Built by giants in a time lost to legend, the scale of the city matched its former masters. Alleys were wider than the roads of Weaverlodge, roads as broad as rivers, buildings like castles. Running his hand along the walls of the ‘alley’, his fingers glided across the stone, worn smooth as a sheet of polished quartz by the passing of two thousand years, or so they claimed. For all those centuries, this place had endured. He had hardly endured three weeks before it claimed him for another three years in its dungeons.

His alley brought him to a crossroads. Five paths, each paved in the same black granite that constituted the entire, sprawling city. From the first level to the fifth, to the tower at its heart, there was no exception. It was only the later additions of modern inhabitants that were built of an alien material; wood and grey stone extensions jutting from the higher levels like tumours, in an attempt to find more space to hold their wealth.

The alley to his immediate right led to an abrupt dead-end. It served only as the backdoor passage for the stores on its side. The one beside it reeked of sewage and was covered in grime. Even from his limited time here, he knew it led to one of the gateways of the extensive, labyrinthine waste system beneath the city. It was best avoided. Not only because it circled around to completely the wrong direction, but also the stench would soon have his eyes watering.

The second alley to his left looked harmless enough, and would have led to the market, but he shied away. The rolls of cinnamon dangling from twin torches at the alley’s corner deterred him. It was the universal mark for the whorehouses of the city. Along with the dried nettles for the fighting pits, and the sprigs of rosemary for the poppy-dens, these marked alleys were best avoided, unless you sought their particular offerings.

To his immediate left, the alley took a detour to the partition wall between the city levels. Again, it was the wrong direction, there were no gates there, nothing but cold stone walls rising thirty metres into the air as a battlemented palisade, one of the many that divided the city into its five distinct tiers, each one encircling the next. This level, the second, was the largest, and where the majority of the inhabitants lived. It had the market squares, the stores, the houses of the wealthy, the inns, the gambling dens, the breweries, everything a city needed to survive. Or at least, if you had the money to do so. Within the second level was the third; the healing level, full of apothecaries and infirmaries. It was one he knew well. Beyond this was a garden level, supplied by natural springs and wells far underground. This oasis, made fertile by the hidden water and massive carts of manure brought from the stables, was not openly accessible to the masses. He’d been through it a few times, but could hardly remember anything about it. Beyond this, was the fifth level. He shuddered. Three years of his life spent in that level. He vowed never to return. Never.

He took the middle alley. It was longer than the one marked with the cinnamon, but he had no desire to come to blows with the men who frequented such establishments. Not for fear of what they might do to him, such violence seemed trivial after what he’d endured, but rather for fear of attracting the attention of guards.

He clutched his money pouch as he padded along, his worn shoes flapping softly with each step. Two men were on the other side of the road, watching his approach. It was perfectly possible they were harmless citizens. But then again… he held his pouch tighter as he passed, feeling their eyes follow his path. It was two days since he’d last eaten anything, he needed this money to pay the innkeeper, and eventually the gatekeepers to buy his passage out the city. It would not do to lose what little he had left.

It was a week since he’d stepped through the partition wall between into the second level from the third. A week of searching for an opportunity to leave this place, at last.

Such an opportunity was yet to present itself. Cautious, weak, and weary as he was, he wasn’t sure where the best place to leave the city was, and spent his days waiting by the gates, taking note of the guards. He knew which were observant, and which were nonchalant, looking for the ones least likely to notice the brand on his cheek. Nothing more than a small circle with a bisecting horizontal line. Nothing less than the mark of the damned, sentenced for lifetime imprisonment, or worse.

At first, he considered hiding the mark with a scarf, but his first day of watching put that idea to rest, as the guards checked the faces of anyone leaving the city, and paid even more attention to any who tried to conceal their features. There was also the question of what time to leave. Early in the evening or late in the morning, there were fewer people going through the gates and therefore fewer guards. However, this meant each person was observed more closely, while later in the evening when there were tides of people going through the gates and the guards doubled, they were less attentive. It would be risky either way, he simply had to determine which was riskier.

Of course, there was also the question of what to do once his did buy his way through the gates. Beyond the enormous curtain wall, surrounding the city for miles around, was a sprawling, stinking, dusty shanty town. A town to welcome each new traveller to the city, as it had once welcomed him. Men, hanex, fonex, goblins, juggernauts, dreyads, and satorrs who came to Crastalan with no wealth, and were condemned to live their lives at the foot of its walls. A miserable place. Not only for its physical properties, but for its sense of lost opportunity, of hopeless poverty next to the wealth of the city proper. Most who came searching for a better life ended up there, cursing the four winds for their misfortune. Personally, he considered their fates to be far more fortunate than they realised.

Finally, the alley opened to a wider road leading to a great market square. A good fifty square metres of bare stone floor, with four fountains at each corner, marking the points of a compass. Even at this hour, when he expected to be the only one awake, there was activity in the square, as traders set up their stalls for another day selling their wares. From one small kiosk came the delicious, tantalising aroma of hazelnuts roasted in honey and spices, in the style of the Jagged Isles. His mouth watered, but he couldn’t afford it.

He’d entered the square from the street nearest the southern fountain, bearing a statue of a ship sculpted from red marble, and turned to his right to make for the eastern fountain, marked by a small juniper bush rising from the waters. It was at the eastern face of the great outer curtain wall that the city’s gatehouse was situated, and the only way he knew in and out of Crastalan. Naturally, this was the best way out, with the least amount of time spent in the heavily-garrisoned first circle. It was the military circle, housing the barracks, training grounds, smithies, stables, and armouries of the city garrison.

He left the square, keeping to the shadows as much as possible. He passed several servants, hurrying to light the lamps, torches, and candles adorning the walls. Eventually, more and more citizens emerged from their homes and set about their nightly businesses. By the time he reached the east gate, the moon was high in the sky, barely visible over to the light cast by the countless torches.

He kept a fair distance away from the gate so as not to attract unnecessary attention. He watched carefully as countless individuals made their way in and out of the city, their heavily-laden wagons teetering behind. He might have considered smuggling himself through the gates in one of them, but the guards checked each one thoroughly, stabbing spears into wagons of hay and swords into carts of fruit, ignoring the protests of the owners at the damage to their stock.

In total, there were twelve men guarding the gate. He recognised a few of them from his time spying. The man with an ugly pointed goatee was sharp and merciless, while the fat hanex was laughably inattentive, probably dreaming of his next meal as he leaned on his spear. Whether he recognised them or not, they were all his enemies. After three hours, the guards were relieved, and a new dozen stood in their place, in addition to a dozen more for added protection in the swollen midnight crowds. Of these, only one was familiar to him; a short, wiry young lad, around his age. He recognised this one because of his youth, and because of his uncommon pleasure in catching potential thieves. Only two days ago, down at the south gate, Lidan saw him pick up a squirming child, probably a pickpocket, and hack off her right hand with his axe in front of a crowd of onlookers. When he walked back to his inn the following morning, he saw the girl again, sprawled next to a pile of waste, bled to death, as a dog gnawed away at her leg.

He imagined killing him, but knew he wouldn’t. It wouldn’t accomplish anything, it wouldn’t help him in his cause. Indeed, if he were to attempt it, he could expect to end up like the girl, and the wiry young guard would simply go on. He doubted he even remembered her.

It was three years ago when he witnessed first-hand the horror of such punishment, and the rage, the grief, the emptiness that followed. It was an attempted retaliation against such ‘justice’ that ultimately led to his current situation. Shuddering, he rubbed his hands. Ten fingers, all working. Bless the North winds.

He stayed where he was all night, watching the gate. The guards halved again at four o’clock to the original twelve. Eventually it was time to leave. The city was packed, and he had to shove his way through the suffocating crowds. It took him nearly an hour and a half before he ducked back through the inn’s doorway, breathing in the cool air, beautifully fresh and cold after the already scorching heat of the morning sun. He nodded to the landlord, walked up the granite steps to his room, and collapsed on the bed.

*         

Somebody shoved his leg. Again. More aggressively this time. Groaning, his eyes blinked awake. He stretched, and propped up on his elbow. At the foot of his bed was a woman, perhaps in her mid-forties, a sour expression on her face. She shoved him again, harder.

‘Wake up, you. You need to pay us for the day’s rest. The money you gave us yesterday was not enough.’

Lidan sighed and stuck his hand into the leather pouch at his belt. ‘How much do I owe you?’ he mumbled, wearily.

‘Four coppers for today, and another one for yesterday. You only gave us three yesterday.’

He frowned, all that was left in his pouch were eight copper coins and one silver, for the main gate. ‘It only cost three coppers yesterday.’

‘The price has gone up. Now it’s four coppers per night. Pay up, or we’ll call soldiers,’ she leered. Ever since he arrived, he felt that the innkeeper’s wife was a foul woman. Now it seemed she’d taken it upon herself to rob him as well. But he had no choice, as she knew, so he gave up the money.

‘Now I don’t have enough to stay for another night,’ he complained.

‘Then you’ll have to leave, prisoner, otherwise-’

‘Yes, I know,’ he interrupted. ‘You’ll call soldiers.’

She gave him a mocking grin and left. He closed his eyes. Fate had spoken. Today was the day. Two coins would have to be paid to get into the first city circle, and then his silver to get through the outer gate, which meant he had one coin to spare. His stomach rumbled. There was only one thing worth spending it on.

He left the inn, earlier than usual, and walked to the market square. Hardly any of the stores were open, but thankfully, the one selling the roasted hazelnuts was. The trader smiled broadly as he flicked him the coin, and shoved a scoop of nuts into a wooden bowl. He sat down at a table in the kiosk, savouring the taste of the sweet ginger and cinnamon, the honey, the crunchy nut at its centre. When he was done, he handed the trader back his bowl and headed to the east gate.

He arrived later than expected and the gate was already busy. There were only twelve guards, and he waited for the moment to approach. It came sooner than expected, as a gaggle of scantily-clad women shuffled through, giggling childishly. The guards were distracted by the whores, and Lidan pushed his way through. The soldier hardly looked at him, took the two coppers and pushed him through without a question, eager to stare at the women. He hurried through. North winds be praised for the distraction!

His gratitude was short-lived. Now he was in even greater danger. Totally surrounded by guards. He considered lifting his hood to shroud his face and remain inconspicuous, but nobody else wore theirs. To lift it would draw attention. He kept his head bare, but turned his cheek to the ground, as if suffering from a sore neck. Anything to hide his brand.

This was only his second time on this road, the Eastern Trench. So-called because it was built on granite blocks set two feet lower than the rest of the first city level, so the guards positioned along the sides were constantly looking down on the travellers. It served two purposes. First, it ensured nobody could accidentally stray into the first level, which was strictly reserved for the soldiers. Second, it gave the guards an elevated position, and an advantage against anyone attempting to attack them from the trench. The road was perfectly straight, leading form the east gate to the gatehouse. Travellers were commanded to always keep to the left, leaving two constant streams of travellers going in opposite directions.

In front of him were three men, each one fatter than the next, swaggering down the road. Their mail shirts jingled like purses, ornate scabbards bumping their thighs rhythmically. Lidan supposed they were mercenaries of some kind, perhaps hired as the personal guards for a merchant. Such a thing wasn’t uncommon, and although no man was permitted to hire any more than four men as bodyguards there were more than enough merchants to hire the sell-swords. He stepped into their shadows and followed them closely. The watching soldiers were likely to have their eyes drawn towards the three fat men themselves and ignore the skinny, dirty street urchin scurrying along behind them.

It seemed to work. Nobody challenged him. Hope spread like poison in his gut. He might make it.

He reached the halfway point, and his plan failed.

One of the mercenaries stumbled over a stone, and Lidan walked straight into him, nearly toppling him over. The mercenary spun around, glaring. A round face, small blue eyes, a large nose, and fat, wet lips. A sheen of sweat plastered his greasy forehead, and small flecks of spittle gathered at the corner of his mouth.

‘What in the four winds are you doing?’ the mercenary blazed, froth flying from his mouth.

He recoiled, stammering his excuses. ‘Forgive me, sir, it was an accident, I didn’t see you stumble.’

‘Didn’t see? You didn’t see? Oh, you are a stupid little swine if you expect me to believe that. You were trying to rob me!’

‘No!’ he shouted, stepping back.

‘Pickpocket! I know your games!’

‘No!’ he cried again, panicking, aware of the attention they were drawing. ‘It was an accident! I swear!’

The fat man lashed out. He was surprisingly swift, and vicious. The mailed, gauntleted fist struck hard. His head snapped back, his cheek exploding in pain. He collapsed to the ground, dazed, while the mercenary stood above him, calling the soldiers to make an arrest. Lidan lay where he fell, head spinning. He could already feel his cheek swelling, and there was a dampness to it; either blood or tears, he didn’t know.

A soldier pointed a spear at the mercenary. ‘Silence! I saw it, clumsy oaf. You slipped, the skinny one wasn’t looking where he was going and walked into you.’

‘Aye,’ barked the mercenary. ‘Walked into me! A common trick used by thieves to distract your mind while their hand slips to your money purse! Cut off the cur’s hand!’

‘Enough, pig,’ snapped another soldier. ‘I saw it too. You stepped on a slick part of stone, your weight betrayed you, and you slipped. The skinny one was looking at his feet, not at you. Now move along. Move along!’ He waved his spear at the mercenaries, and at the small crowd gathering at the commotion dissipated.

A soldier knelt down and offered the butt of his spear into the trench to Lidan.

‘Hold on to this, boy, I’ll pull you to your feet.’

He did as he was told, heart in mouth, trying to keep the left side of his face turned away as he was hauled to his feet. He tried to scurry away, but the spear point barred his way. ‘Wait now, boy, let me have a look at that.’

His hand shook as the guard grabbed his jaw and turned his head. Tears built up, threatening to burst. This was it. His brand, exposed. The soldier’s eyes narrowed. He tensed his legs, preparing to tear away from the soldier’s grasp, to flee. He could lose himself in the crowd. He was sure of it. It wouldn’t take long to get out of sight. Keep his head down, push into the middle, make his way as quickly as possible to the gatehouse.

The soldier’s grip tightened. Too tight. He could never break free. It was over. Back to the fifth level. Back to the dark. The pain.

He saw the soldier’s lip curl, and he whistled between his teeth. He waited for the sound of irons closing around his wrists

It never came. Instead, came the rumble of laughter as the soldier patted his other cheek merrily.

‘Well the skin’s been split like a rotten fruit, and you’re going to have a monster lump there, but you’ll be fine. Stay away from mercenaries, boy, they’re scum. Run along, now.’

He nodded, dumbfounded, and re-joined the flow of bodies moving down to the gatehouse. He lifted a hand to explore his face. It came away bloody. The mercenary’s fist had collided directly with the brand, splitting the skin and completely obscuring it. Somehow, impossibly, the mercenary might have inadvertently helped him.

Clutching a hand to his injured cheek, he was jostled along with everyone else, keeping pace with the crowd. Before him now was a trader with an empty cart – and probably a full purse – having sold all his wares in yesterday’s markets. To his right were a man and his wife, the woman with a baby in a sling across her front. Both looked worn and haggard, their clothes patched and threadbare, their shoes flimsy strips of leather tied to their soles. He imagined they were either beggars, victims of thieves, or simply a new family who had fallen behind on their taxes and were now being cast out the city, to scrounge a living in the shanty town. He might have pitied them once, but since his ordeal in the dungeons it was difficult to find pity for anyone who had not suffered as he had. Not even that little girl with her leg getting chewed to pieces by a hungry dog stirred pity in him, only anger. Only hatred. Only desperate fear.

The traffic of bodies slowed down at the gatehouse, as people clutched their silver coins tightly, for fear of pickpockets. Once paid, the guards waved them through the gates and out the city.

The gates themselves were enormous. Ten steps led down from the Eastern trench to the outer wall, but even at the top of those steps, one would have to crane their necks to see the top of the gate. Carved from thick oak planks, studded with iron, and plated on either side by irregular iron plates, they were formidable. In times of siege, massive bars of oak and metal could be slid into racks between the gates to secure them further, and large chains hung down from their entire height, to be secured to iron rings set into the ground. Even to his inexperienced eyes, it was obvious these gates were built to withstand wars he could only imagine.

Both were half open today, to give a space wide enough to let through the large ox-carts two at a time. A unit of fifty soldiers were on the trench floor alone, while there must have been fifty more surrounding the trench, and countless other staring down from the high curtain walls. This wall, built of stone blocks so enormous it held itself together with little more than its own sheer weight, towered above them, nearly forty metres high. Its outer face was even enamelled with riveted iron sheets. Twenty towers, placed at regular intervals around its circumference, added to its formidability, each housing regiments of soldiers guarding their stretch of the battlemented walls, each with a trebuchet or ballista on its highest level. The soldiers scowled at the crowd, daring them to place a foot out of line. He instinctively lowered his head, looking as meek and pathetic as he felt in the shadow of such a force.

As he waited in line, now behind a broad Southlander with a blacksmith’s apron and a little barrow full of tools, he heard the cry from behind.

‘Pickpocket! Somebody’s stolen my silver!’

Panic rippled through the crowd as people hurriedly checked their coins were safe. Lidan didn’t move. He clutched his silver ever since he stepped in line, and didn’t want to betray its location to anyone. Such was an old trick used by some gangs; one member would pretend to have lost a purse, or item of jewellery, and cry out in a large crowd about robbery, then as the surrounding people checked their possessions, the thieves would observe where said valuables were kept upon one’s person, and move to take it with their light, searching fingers. Lidan knew better, but most around him fell for the trick and began patting their tunics and trousers, or reaching into their backpacks. Many would go through the gates a few coins short, he observed quietly. It seemed, however, that some of the guards were familiar with such a con, and two of them jumped into the trench to frogmarch the traveller who’d cried out for questioning. If he was really just an innocent victim, then he’d have nothing to worry about, if he was a thief ... the dogs would not go hungry tonight.

Before long it was his turn to pay, and he deposited his silver into the mailed fist of a disinterested guard, his bristly beard damp with sweat, or maybe ale from the blurred look in his eyes. Head bowed, he hurried along, and was finally through the gates, beneath the great outer wall. It was so thick, the road through was almost a tunnel in itself, the black granite smooth underfoot by the passing of countless feet. Cold, too, the shadowed passage untouched by sunlight. Above him were the gaping mouths of murder-holes, waiting to vomit boiling tar or quicklime on attackers. He shuddered. Woe betides any fool who dared mount an assault on this fortress.

Finally, he was out. Out of the dungeons, the tower, the city, the despair. Freedom beckoned like an old friend. He smiled as the moonlight hit his face, and stepped into a new beginning.

2

The moon’s promise of freedom was a lie. Now he was locked behind the dangers of the vast, sprawling shanty town, and his poverty. In the sense of being able to walk around unguarded, he was indeed free in this filthy, dry, desolate slum, but free to do what? To die? He had no supplies, no water, and no means of leaving the shanty town to brave the black desert. Two days after walking through the outer walls of Crastalan, he was as trapped as he had ever been, as he realised the city’s strongest defence was the land itself.

So far, he had lived from day to day, scrounging for scraps of food in discarded waste heaps, or sitting on the hard sun-baked ground, hoping that someone would drop a coin into his lap. Nobody ever did, there were so many beggars here that no-one spared him a second glance.

As he wandered the streets the second night, walking aimlessly, going wherever the crowd took him, his stomach tightened as the aroma of frying potatoes hit his nostrils. Around the corner was the source; a food stall run by a couple of Southlanders, with a little fire heating several steaming frying pans. Two soldiers flanked the stall, scowling. They were selling cheap food for a cheap price. The only thing on the menu was the fried potatoes, cut into large chunks and set in the pans in a bath of grease, to cook until crisp and golden. Lidan’s mouth watered, but he walked past, his gut growling longingly at the missed meal. His last proper meal had been those nuts back in the city, and since then it was only a few stale crusts of hard bread and apple cores that sustained him. He was fortunate, of course, that there were several wells in the town, though he’d have to queue up for hours to reach them, and had nothing to store water in, so made do with gulping down as much water as he could from the bucket each time. The key was not to drink so much to make you vomit, as he did on his first attempt. No, drink slowly, only as much as the stomach can take.

But water alone was not enough. Drinking so much and eating so little made his stomach twist. But the heat was too much to abstain. Bent double, he guzzled bucket after greedy bucket, keeping the heat at bay with his pain.

As the sun began to rise, he ducked away from the crowd and stumbled into the shadows of the ramshackle buildings. They were all made of an assortment of materials, some from wood, others from sun-hardened mud, one or two from thin metal sheets. He passed a building that had clearly once been an ox-cart, the wood splintered and dusty, with the wheels nailed together and covered in the hide of an animal to make a roof. Another seemed as though it had started out as a jolly little coracle, but its owners had built up around it with mud to form a crude hut, sensing that the boat would never see water again.

He walked and walked, looking for an ideal place to sleep. It was not enough to get a spot that was in the shade at that moment; he needed to find a spot that would stay in the shade all day, as well as sheltering him from the strong gales that sometimes swept across the desert, blowing grit into one’s eyes, mouth, and ears. He found a likely shelter. A sad little hovel between two huts. But as soon as he crawled into the shade, something growled malevolently in the darkness. He beat a hasty retreat. It was probably just some stray dog, but he was in no mood to fight a hungry animal for a place to rest. Besides, the dog would win.

Eventually he found another little grotto of sorts, walled on three sides by huts, with the roof of one hut overreaching its wall to provide shelter. There was another beggar, an ancient satorr with greasy grey hair, thin enough to be a living skeleton. He glanced wearily at Lidan as he approached, and rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

‘Can I join?’ asked Lidan, standing above him.

The satorr didn’t answer, but shifted to one side to make room in the shade. He collapsed gratefully, curling up in a corner.

*         

He woke up around midday, the sun at its zenith. Sweat trickled down his back and beneath his arms. He groaned and stretched, the old satorr was gone. He coughed lightly to clear his throat of the dust that had caught there while he slept, and winced in pain. His throat was parchment-dry, as if it were scoured with a fistful of coarse gravel. Licking his lips with a dry tongue, he considered leaving his shelter to go to a well, but the day was too hot. Considering the sweltering heat he was suffering here in the shade, he shuddered to consider the heat in the open.

He lay back down. The ground was dampened with his sweat, but he attempted sleep. Unsuccessfully. He lay still, drawing ragged breaths, too weak even to pray.

Sometime later, as he still wrestled with sleep, someone walked into the shelter. It was a tall figure, clothed in long robes, and with a long scarf wound around its head. He watched warily as the figure sat down beside him and unwound the scarf. His sticky eyes widened. The old satorr, returned again. He attempted a smile to greet his company. It was returned with a disapproving frown.

Had he the energy, he would have withered from the look. Instead, he simply closed his eyes. Something pressed against his chest. He opened his eyes. A water-skin. Mustering the energy, he sat up and gulped a mouthful. It was warm, gritty, and had a slightly metallic taste to it from the copper lid of the skin. No doubt it held all manner of scum and muck from the satorr’s rotten mouth. How wonderful it felt on his lips, tongue, running down his cracked throat.

He returned the skin to the satorr, wiping his mouth with the hem of his tunic.

‘Thank you,’ he croaked. ‘I was dying of thirst.’

‘I know,’ replied the satorr, shaking his head. ‘Why didn’t you have a drink before?’

‘It is too hot for me to go out, so I tried to wait until sunset before going to a well.’

‘Why didn’t you fill up your water-skin last night? Save yourself something for the day?’

‘I have no water-skin. I’ve been relying on drinking as much as I can in the night, and sleeping through the day.’

‘Foolish. You need a skin. If I had one to spare I’d give it to you, but this is my only one. You’ll need to get yourself one if you want to survive the week.’

Lidan agreed, he would never survive this shanty town. But then, that was the point, wasn’t it? He didn’t want to have to survive the town, he wanted to be free of it, to feel grass under his toes, water on his skin, rain on his head. He said so much to the other beggar, who shrugged.

‘So you don’t want to live here, that’s fine. You’ll still need a skin to get across the desert.’

He nodded. ‘Where will I get one? I have no money, and nothing to trade for one.’

‘Then you’ll have to steal it. It’s that or death. You should get better clothes. Those rags are letting in too much sun, you’ll burn to a crisp if you’re not careful. See this long bit of cloth? I wrap it around my head like this. Keeps the sun off me, but doesn’t bake my old head,’ he held up the scarf. ‘Again, I’d give you one if I had a spare, but I don’t. You have food?’

‘No, do you?’ asked Lidan, hopefully.

‘A shame. I don’t either. I would tell you to steal some, but most of the food stalls are guarded, it’d be death if you tried to steal some. Then again,’ he added, thoughtfully, ‘I suppose it’d be death if you don’t try, so you don’t really have anything to lose, do you?’

Lidan looked about him, and sighed. ‘Why do people even come here? What’s the point? They’d be better off back in their little villages, not here. Empty desert, no food, no money…’

‘Speaking from your own perspective. The majority who come have enough money to settle in the town, build themselves a nice home, and sell their wares or skills to make a living. For most people it’s decent enough. The soldiers even protect them from thieves and outlaws. I agree, from our perspective, as lowly beggars, life is cruel. But that’s because we squandered our money, reached too far, or came here without thinking it through, eh?’

‘Maybe,’ muttered Lidan, sullenly. ‘What’s your name, anyway? I’m Lidan.’

‘Alright. I’m Winten.’

‘Thank you for the water, Winten, and for your help and advice.’

‘Beggars must look out for each other, nobody else will.’

They said no more after that, and turned their backs to one another. Not that it mattered. ‘Beggars must look out for each other.’ He smiled at the sentence, repeating it a hundred times over. How true. He knew it well enough from before the prison. Admittedly, there were grander alcoves and alleys in the city proper than out here, but the filth and waste of others was the same wherever he slept. But being with someone to look out for you, to watch your back, was a rarity. He thought he was alone, would always be alone. But now Winten was here, perhaps it would not be so. With a smile, he slept, safe in the company of a fellow beggar.

*         

The street was dark, crowded, with jeering civilians pressed on all sides. The guards held Zile in their vice-like grips. The sentence was called out. The blade gleamed in the torchlight. A whistle. A thud. A scream. Dark blood on darker stone. He wailed. There was nothing he could have done. Nothing.

*         

He woke with a gasp. It was night, and still warm, as always. What little water his body had to spare was swiftly evaporating from his skin as a foul-smelling sweat. Even in his filthy state, the odour stung his nostrils. Shaking from the painful dream, he sat up. Alone.

‘Winten?’

No. Gone. Of course he was gone. An overwhelming surge of grief swept over him. Whether it was from the dream or this new abandonment, he couldn’t tell. Not that it mattered. It was the same as before, him against the world, with nobody to watch him as he suffered. He might have cried, but his eyes were too dry and gummy.

Shaking his head, desperate for a clear mind, he left the hovel.

Winten may have left him, but his advice remained. He went to the nearest well and had a drink. The queue was shorter tonight, as the sun had only recently set, so he didn’t have to wait for too long before it was his turn with the bucket. His stomach churned as the water filled it, but he ignored the pain. Just enough for the night.

His plan was to head to one of the unofficial market squares, where folk who were either too poor or too lazy to take their wares into the city itself gathered. He was surprised to see how many there were. At least twenty stalls crammed into an area not thirty metres square, completely packed, with crowds gathered around each stall, haggling and exchanging coins for weapons, food, equipment, for fixing saddles and scabbards, buying new clothes. There was even a little anvil, where a stocky youth offered his hand at fixing horseshoes. The smith had a long queue of men before his stall; soldiers, mostly, the outriders and scouts of the king.

Why fix their horseshoes at this run-down place in the slums instead of the stables and blacksmiths of the city proper?  Maybe it was cheaper here, away from the eyes of their stern commanders. Maybe they liked to watch the fools like him scratch out a life in the mud.

He lingered by one of the horses, a plan forming in his mind, but he must have been staring too intently. One of the outriders, a thin fonex with light brown skin, squared up to him and demanded what he was doing. Lidan muttered an apology and scampered off, the chuckles of the soldiers ringing behind.

All the stalls in this market square were too closely guarded for him to try his hand at thievery, so he squeezed himself away and wandered the slums to the next one. This square was smaller, with fewer stalls, though no less cramped. Worse, a guard tower was erected in the middle of the square, housing four soldiers with crossbows, staring vigilantly at the swarming crowds below. This was not the one.

It was not the third, nor the fourth, but the fifth square he arrived at that he deemed safe enough – or dangerous enough, depending on how you looked at it – to steal from one of the stalls. By now it was around two in the morning, and the sky was as dark, with only a crescent moon to illuminate it. This square was badly lit, and the soldiers had mostly gathered around one large food kiosk. It was obvious from its size that this was a permanent feature of this particular square, and the owner probably slept in the back. The owner had also had enough time to build it into a sturdy building, dominating the square. The guards’ orientation to this kiosk meant that the other stalls, of which there were many, relied on their personal bodyguards to protect them, of whom there were few.

Lidan looked around. It was not as full as the others had been, possibly because the early market rush had ended some time ago, with most of the stores’ wares sold, but there were still enough people around to be able to melt away into the crowd. Aside from the food kiosk there were a couple of little carts selling planks of wood, presumably for building more of the scrap huts, a man selling jewels from an oaken chest, three stalls selling fabric for making clothes, a satorr with the tools of a cobbler, and another blacksmith farrier. He saw several stalls selling useless odds and ends, from parchment and quills, to bars of iron and bronze, a large group of Islanders selling various tinctures and potions, as was typical of their people and their tropical medicines, and finally a man selling weapons from his large ox-cart.

It was this last cart that caught his eye. Though nobody was selling any water-skins, a weapon would not go amiss. Indeed, it could well aid him in threatening someone and perhaps stealing their skin, as opposed to pinching one from an actual stall. Walking over, he heard the smith’s assistant, advertising his master’s wares with powerful shouts. Strange tattoos covered his face and neck. The marks of a former pit fighter.

‘Finest-quality weapons you’ve ever seen! Not a soul in Nefarwy has ever wielded weapons as fine as these. Even the king envies our goods! How about you, marm, care for a dagger to protect you from hungry men? You, sir, a cudgel to cave in the heads of muggers and burglars! You, priest, we have quarterstaves you might like, blessed by the northern winds themselves!’

He raised his eyebrows in surprise; he hadn’t expected to find a priest in the slums. But there he was, an old man in the brown habit, tied around the waist with a white girdle, wandering about the square. As he passed, Lidan bowed to the priest in respect. Judging from the medallion around his neck, a tilted semicircle with four spikes, he was a simple brother worshiping one of the four winds, probably the north. Most people in Nefarwy worshipped the northern winds, for their power and wonder. He wasn’t entirely sure why it was the north wind they deemed the holiest and strongest, but that’s how it was. In his current situation, he wasn’t going to question it.

Shaking his head, he approached the weapon cart, five paces away from the young guard, still busy shouting out praise for his master’s products. Men with such tattoos made him nervous; they were all too similar to the Hobb, the fierce nomads of Dailas. Over time, the traditions of these nomads seeped into some of the other villages in the forest, even to Crastalan’s fighting pits. Any man marked with such tattoos signified their martial prowess. Renowned brawlers, distinguished in blood, it would not end well for him if he got caught.

A fine fighter he may be, but as a salesman, he clearly had a long way to go. There were only three others around the cart, as the young guard’s shouting seemed more effective at driving people away than it did at summoning them. His master was currently talking to a hanex, haggling over the price of a sword.

‘Five silvers!’

‘Outrageous! That’s more than I made in three months as a soldier! I’ll give you two silvers.’

‘Five. The sword is made from good steel, from my forge back in Dailas, and do you see the pommel? The mark of the northern winds. It’ll bring you protection. Five silvers is a good price for such a weapon.’

The hanex spat in contempt, ‘It’ll be my skill that brings me protection, not the wind. Don’t try to push your holy nonsense on me, the sword is not worth five silvers. Looks more like iron than steel to me, anyway.’

The smith bristled, his pale skin flushing. ‘Doubting my work? The price has gone up to six silvers, then, for your insult! It’s made of the finest steel, heat treated and tempered the right way, and folded just enough times for optimal resistance and hardness. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a better weapon. Could an iron blade do this?’ He took up the sword, held the blade securely at the foible, and flexed it. It bent into a neat half-circle, only to spring back to its original form when he released the pressure. ‘See that? No warping, no shattering, as strong as ever.’

The hanex paused. ‘Alright so it’s good steel. I’ll give you three silvers for it. And you’ll pay to get it sharpened. It’s all I can afford as a bodyguard.’

‘Then I suggest you find a better-paid job. The price is six silvers, and you’re lucky I’m still willing to sell it to you.’

‘You greedy rat. Fine. I’ll give you four silvers, and twenty coppers, it’s all I have on me. But throw in the scabbard as well.’

The smith paused, thinking, then picked up the wooden scabbard, sheathed the sword and offered it to the hanex, who tossed him a purse of money and walked away, grumbling. The smith grinned smugly as he tied the purse to his belt, not bothering to inspect its contents, and moved on to the next customer. Lidan waited as the man before him bought a cudgel, slowly playing with the empty money-purse at his belt. He chewed his lip thoughtfully, and gently kicked at a couple of flat stones by his foot. It would be risky, especially with the guard, but he had no other option.

Finally, the smith looked at him.

‘So, young man, what can I get you? A sword? A dagger? How about an axe? An axe will give you some extra muscle in a fight, by the four winds I can tell you need it.’

He smiled thinly. ‘What daggers do you have?’

The smith stepped back and rooted about his cart, taking up short blades and cradling them in his arms, and brought them all to the front to show him. There were all manner of daggers, knives, and dirks, some curved, some with serrated blades, some single edged, some barbed, others plain, one even had a gilded hilt and delicate silver inlays all over the blade. The smith picked up the gold-hilted dagger and winked.

‘Fancy little treasure, this one, much too expensive for you, methinks,’ he tossed it to the back of the cart. ‘What kind of dagger are you looking for? Nothing too expensive, I’d wager, from looking at your clothes, no offense meant, of course.’

He shrugged. ‘None taken, just a simple dagger, if you would. Not iron, mind, steel. I don’t want it rusting.’

‘Steel still rusts if you don’t take care of it,’ he warned, as he picked up a couple more daggers and threw them to the back of the cart. ‘Alright, so straight bladed or curved, single or double edged?’

He paused to think. ‘Double edged, and straight, please. Remember; nothing too expensive.’

The stall-owner nodded, and sorted through more knives, throwing more and more back into the cart, until he had two left, both double-edged straight blades. There was a white knife, about a foot long from pommel to point, and a more expensive-looking rondel dagger with a carved wooden hilt.

‘Single-edged, but beautiful, no?’ the trader gestured to the rondel.

He considered both, and pointed to the knife. ‘Could I have a hold of that one? To get its feel?’

The smith nodded and handed him the weapon. He fumbled and dropped it. As he bent down to pick it up, he grabbed a couple of the flat stones from the ground, and concealed them in his palm. He held the knife in his hand, testing its weight, as his other hand opened the drawstring of his purse and dropped the stones inside. He nodded.

‘This one is good. How much for it?’

‘I’d say... two copper ingots?’

Lidan frowned. ‘That would be difficult,’ he grimaced, ‘I only have three copper coins and a silver in my purse.’

The trader’s eyes brightened. ‘For that much I’ll give you both, and a free leather sheath for one of them!’

He shook his head. ‘I’ll want a sheath for each, and wooden ones, not leather.’

Now the smith shook his head. ‘I don’t have a wooden scabbard for the knife, only the rondel.’

‘Fine. A silver and three coppers for the two knives, a wooden scabbard, and a leather sheath, and throw in a sword-belt as well, to sweeten the deal.’

The smith narrowed his eyes. Perhaps he’d