Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king

Outside, the sky may have been weeping a summer rain or a storm , he could not say for deep beneath the earth, the air was as crisp as it was stale.

There was a queer, heavy warmth to the dark, a heat that seemed to seep directly from the dirt. Perhaps the hell of the Five burned so brightly that its embers could be felt through the very foundation of the world.

They would never complain of the cold again, that much was certain, though the list of their other miseries grew longer with every breath.

The darkness was the worst of it, it swallowed the eyes and stifled the soul. Not a flicker of a candle, not a stray beam from a moon-slapped window,only the night, all-encompassing and absolute.

It was a darkness that invited the mind to rot, feeding the doubts that crawled through their thoughts like maggots in a wound.And if left unchecked would rot the body.

They should have fought. That was the thought that circled his mind like a vulture. When the spears had been at their throats, they should have chosen the iron and died fighting, perhaps the garrison could have overwhelmed them....of course the chance of that was small.

They had no time to prepare against the treachery that was done them.Even now they could not wrap their heads around what was true and what was false. Surely not everything had been a falsity; that was the sigil of the royal house, wasn’t it?Had he got so old that his eyes played tricks on him?

How could they have gotten his hand on it?Surely had there been a theft, the court would have announced it, the humiliation of having it stolen is shameful in comparison to the great risk that could encompass them if it fell into the wrong hands.

The amount of false orders they would give....it would be staggering.

Who knew perhaps they should have chosen to die then in a bid to kill the mastermind behind it all...

But alas, life, sour as it had become, remained a sweet thing to hold, and they had lacked the stomach to throw it away. They had walked into the black on their own feet, and now they were buried in it.

Initially, their cage had been a kinder one, but a man can only bear so much hunger before the beast wakes. When the gaoler had come with the pottage, they had smashed the man’s skull against the iron bars. They had clawed at his belt, searching for a key that was never there. A fool’s play, looking back. Why would their captor, a man who was known to measure his mercy in thimblefuls, trust a common soldier with the keys to such a cage?

For days the silence had been their only guest.

No food arrived, no water to wet their cracked lips. When the light finally returned, it was only to drag them deeper into the guts of the world, to this room where the silence was heavier still, and where they were no bed to sleep in.

Time had become a ghost. Their captor fed them at odd intervals to play games on their minds. There was no sun to mark the passage of the hours, only the hollow ache in their bellies and the increasingly frantic whispers of the weaker companion.

Indeed it was his fault. He shouldn’t have faltered when the blade was put at his throat. He should have let him do it as long as he got his dagger on Merelao’s neck.

The man beside him had fared the worse of the two. He spoke of nothing but the grave, certain that the All-Knower had already struck their names from the book of the living. He wailed that they would never see the sun again. On the first count, he was a liar; on the second, only the gods knew the truth.

There were no gaolers here now. They had been left alone in the black, a punishment for their earlier stunt and a reminder that escape was a fantasy for children and madmen.

Still, he found himself wishing for a new voice, even a cruel one. No matter how much two men spoke, eventually, they ran out of words to say, leaving only the sound of their own breathing and the heavy, humid heat of the dirt.

He had known Sir Rolan since the boy was no higher than a hound’s belt, watching him bloom into a man as tall and straight as a mountain ash. He had been a dear friend to the lad’s father, a knight of singular bravery who had carved a name for himself against the Oizenians, a campaign that had yielded glory, but also the festering belly-wound that had eventually claimed his life.

Being named the boy’s godfather, the duty of tempering the raw iron had fallen to him. He had taught Rolan that the conduct of a knight, the mercy, the vigil, the truth, was no less vital than the mastery of the flail, the spear, and the high-saddle.

Rolan had carried his shield for two years as a squire before winning his spurs. It was a bloody business; the lad had brought to justice two hedge knights accused of pillaging a temple and raping women and had slain a third in a blur with his steel.

He still recalled the boy’s smile as he knighted him and gave him the shield of his father.

Yet, it seemed the strength of the body was not always matched by the steel of the spirit.

”Hey, ser... do you think we will die in this hole?” the young knight asked. His voice was a thin, reedy thing that trembled in the dark. It was the third time he had asked. Or was it the fourth? In the Great Dark, a man’s only clock was his stomach, and by that reckoning, they had seen three cold meals pass.

He felt a pang of grief for his godson, but he had no bread to give him, only the dry husks of comfort.

”Peace, Rolan,” he rumbled, his voice grating like stone on stone. ”This trial is but a fleeting thing. Soon enough, the Prince will march with the full power of the South. He will come with fire and iron to punish the treacherous bastards who put us here. The gates will be smashed, and we shall walk out into the sun.”

He felt the young man nod beside him even in the dark. ”Yes... yes, you speak true, ser. The Prince is coming. We shall be saved. Indeed he is”

He reached out through the blackness, his calloused hand finding Rolan’s shoulder. He squeezed it hard enough to bruise, needing the boy to feel something other than fear. ”We are doing our duty, lad. Never forget that. A knight’s path is often trod in the dark.But the gods shall light they way against the darkness”

”Duty,” Rolan muttered, the word sounding like a prayer. ”Yes, we are dutiful. And we will be saved. That is our reward... our duty.Duty is a reward.”

’’Yes lad...Good. Duty is his own reward..’’

As the boy lapsed into a rhythmic, haunting chanting of the word, a black thought flickered in the older man’s mind.

He looked at the heavy masonry of the wall he could not see. Would it be a mercy? he wondered. One swift, violent crack of that young skull against the granite would end the shivering, the whimpering, and the slow rot of the soul. It would be a final act of a godfather, sparing the boy from the lingering death of a forgotten cage.

He had seen what prison for years could do to a man...no this rebellion would not last a month, much less years. Merelao was a soon-to-be dead man.

He had to believe salvation was coming.

But the thought passed as quickly as a shadow. His hand loosened on Rolan’s shoulder just as a new sound cut through the heavy air.

Clack. Tap. Clack.

The rhythm of boots echoed down the stone corridor, growing louder with every heartbeat.

”Hush now, boy,” he whispered. ”It is time to eat.”

He expected only silence, as it always had been when food was delivered them, pushed only to the cell with a stick.

It was only when a voice echoed in the dark, the only voice they must have heard in days or weeks, that he realized the error of the thought.

”Mother, Mother, worry not.

Your boy will not come back on oak.

Mother, Mother, worry not.

Your boy from war will make himself be known.”

A beautiful voice that could have belonged to the fairest of angels echoed through the damp wall of the dungeon.

It was a soothing voice with an equally soothing melody, but it made their heart go ice all the same.

”Give me your hug, Mother. Share with me your love.

For that should be a son’s lot.

Worry not for the wars to come.

For your boy, by the Five’s hope there will be no harm.”

A flicker of light appeared, a tiny, dancing spark that grew into a warm, amber glow. It cast a great, distorted shadow against the corridor wall, a shadow that seemed to dance in time with the song. Even Sir Rolan, whose mind had been wandering in the grey wastes of despair, shrank back into the corner, his eyes wide and fearful as they bathed the light the encroaching flame.

”Father, Father, give me your sword.

For war and glory, your son shall work.

Father, Father, give me your steel.

Unless you want your son’s skin to be dimmed.

Father, Father, give me your respect.

For a name is the only shield I have kept.

Father, Father, give me your hand.

For a handshake is all your son has wept.

Father, Father, why so cold?

Don’t you know your son home won’t go?

Father, Father, look at the sky.

’Tis a weary thing for a boy to die.”

The song trailed off into a soft, melodic hum as the heavy iron bolts shrieked in their sockets. And then there he was.

Standing there, framed in the golden halo of a handheld torch.

A faint, knowing smile that knew all the answer and truth of the world, played upon his pink lips.

”Sir Rolan,” he murmured with a nod casting the light to reveal the face of a broken man.

Then he turned the light upon the other one, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a way that felt more like a threat than a greeting.

”And Sir Aldon, always a pleasure to see you once again. Were my father here...I’d say he would extend his regards...’’