“Well then, as you know, us clansman are not kingdom men. We only ventured down from the mountains a few times a year. Two of my sons, Harrap and Condlin, made one such journey in the fall. They went to the city of High Crossing to purchase animals and other provisions like they do every year before winter sets in. Only this year the town was nearly empty.”
This grabbed Lord Gregory’s attention.
“Harrap and Condlin continued south to the city of Castlemont. I guess I should say where the city of Castlemont used to be.” The old man leaned forward on his stool, took up a poker and began prodding the fire back to life.
“Used to be?” Lord Gregory asked.
“What few folk they came across told them that the city was sacked by your new king and then was destroyed by his wizard. The ones that didn’t hide well enough were rounded up and herded to that slaver city by the sea.”
“O’Dakahn,” Lord Gregory said. “But…but that’s impossible.”
“Oh there’s much more to tell,” the Eldest said. “While your Westland king was herding the people of Wildermont to the south, and his army was making passage through the Wilder Mountains to attack the Red City, a dragon rider led an army out of the swamps and took Westland for herself.”
“But-”
The Eldest cut Lord Gregory’s protest off with a wave of his hand and a healthy harrumph. “Walking lizards from the marshes, the zard, Harrap called them. Huge man-like beasts that aren’t true giants, but wild half-breeds from beyond the Giant Mountains hold Westland under the Dragon Queen’s rule. They destroyed the bridge at Castlemont. That alone amazes me. I’ve seen that bridge with my own eyes and it would take powerful forces to tear it down. I wouldn’t believe these things had my own two sons not told me of them. They are good fathers, and good men. They have no reason to lie.”
Lord Gregory had crossed the magnificent bridge that led from Wildermont over the Leif Greyn River into Westland at least half a hundred times in his day. A spectacle of archways wide enough for five, maybe six, wagons to cross abreast, it was the only land passage from the eastern kingdoms into Westland. If this Dragon Queen really existed, then she wasn’t planning on giving Westland up anytime soon. The fact that she had destroyed the only land access into Westland showed that she meant to isolate and defend the territory. He could only hope that his lady wife was alive and well. Surely his friend Lord Ellrich, or another of his peers, had seen to her safety.
“What of your kinsman Hyden, and my countryman Mikahl?” Lord Gregory asked. Inside him the desire to get his legs working again so that he could go see if these things were true, was growing from a spark into a fire.
Mikahl was the true king of Westland, though the boy didn’t know it yet. I may have told him, Lord Gregory said to himself, but he wasn’t sure. Mikahl had been raised a bastard, but King Balton brought him up well. Mikahl was Lord Gregory’s squire in his adolescent years, and the king’s squire up until King Balton was murdered. Mikahl was smart, well trained, and capable. Lord Gregory hoped he was still alive, and still had possession of his father’s sword, Ironspike.
“Borg, the Southern Guardian, a true and noble giant, came out of the deep mountains in the early fall,” the eldest said. The reverence he held for the giant was clear. “He brought with him three horses and a tale as wild as the news of the Dragon Queen. Hyden, Mikahl, and the elf, met with King Aldar. What transpired at the meeting, I do not know.” Halden stirred the fire again and adjusted his old body on the stool. “The Seawardsman who was with them was killed in the Giant Mountains by the same beast that got you. Borg spoke of Mikahl’s bravery in the battle, and for Borg to make such compliments is no light matter. King Aldar sent them through the Evermore Forest to the kingdom of Highwander. Borg was very vague about why, but my grandson Hyden and his hawkling, and that… that elf went with him. They rode on the backs of King Aldar’s great wolves no less. Can you imagine crossing through the Evermore Forest on the back of a great wolf?”
Lord Gregory couldn’t even imagine Mikahl fighting the hellcat, much less anything else. He knew that King Balton had sent Mikahl to the Giant King. It was the only place he knew that Prince Glendar and his wizard Pael might not hunt them down. It was why Lord Gregory had been with them in the mountains in the first place. He’d sworn to help Mikahl get to the Giant King. He was relieved to know that he would not live on as an oath-breaker; almost as much as he was relieved to know that Mikahl was probably alive. He wondered why King Aldar had sent them to Highwander. The Witch Queen’s Blacksword warriors were the ones who started the bloodshed at the Summer’s Day Festival. At least that’s the way Lord Gregory remembered it.
He also remembered thinking that he was dead after sending his page Wyndall to take a message to Lady Trella. If Wyndall made it, Lady Trella would have been warned of the coming trouble. Hopefully big Lord Ellrich or Wyndall or someone else had helped her to survive. In a rush of angry passion, Lord Gregory tried to rise up from the bed only to end up howling as his soft, un-worked muscles gave fiery protest.
At once, the old clansman was at the door yelling for young Tylen. The boy came and went, then returned with another cup of the horrible concoction they had been feeding him. The Eldest helped him drink it down and waited patiently until Lord Gregory slipped back into his deep dreaming slumber.
Lord Gregory dreamt a memory of the big half-breed beasts he’d fought in Coldfrost. He, King Balton, and Lord Brach had led the men bravely against the huge brutal creatures. Then King Balton used the power of his sword, Ironspike, to create a magical boundary that the creatures couldn’t pass. Borg had spoken for King Aldar there in that frigid bloody place. The true giants wanted no part of the breed beasts, and in fact were pleased with the way King Balton had imprisoned them on the glacial island.
In his dream, the true giant, Borg, fought alongside him, young Glendar, and King Balton against the creatures. They battled to free the Lady Trella from a prison of ice where huge hairy half-men were trying to tear apart her body.
Lord Gregory woke in a cold sweat. His legs ached from the movements Tylen had put them through, but he wanted more of it. From that day forward his whole existence was about getting his legs back under him. It took half a month for him to be able to sit up on his own. He had Karna and Tylen place his food across the room. He crawled, slithered, crumpled and cried, but he didn’t give up, even though he went hungry many a mealtime. In the evenings, he worked his legs while lying in the bed, bringing his knees up as close to his chin as he could, one after the other, over and over again. He used a rock the size of his fist for a weight to exercise his arms, but gradually worked up to a head-sized chunk of granite. His arms regained muscle much faster than his legs, but he didn’t get discouraged.
He talked to Harrap and Condlin about their journey into the ruined cities of Wildermont for many hours. He questioned them in great detail and learned that the half-breed giants had been released from Coldfrost and had helped tear down the great bridge between Westland and Wildermont before taking over rule of the Westland trade city called Locar. They were building great wooden watchtowers all along the Westland bank of the Leif Greyn River when the two clansmen had been in Castlemont. Some said King Jarrek had fled his kingdom. Others said that he had died by the hand of the wizard Pael.
As hard as he tried, Lord Gregory couldn’t learn much more than that from the two men. They weren’t kingdom men. They’d been born and raised and lived here in the mountains their whole life. Kingdom men seldom dared to venture here, and the things a kingdom man might notice about a place were lost to them.
Harrap helped his nephew Tylen support Lord Gregory the first few times he tried to stand and walk. It was hard and painful and even comical at times, but finally, near midwinter, Lord Gregory took some steps on his own.
“This lion might not yet be able to roar,” he told them. “But at least I can still growl.”
He began using a cane that the Elder had carved for him out of a witch-wood bough. The handle was the head of a snarling lion and the base a wide lion’s paw. It was crude work, but heartfelt. Lord Gregory cherished it dearly.
By the time spring was upon them, Lord Gregory was hobbling along fairly well. When he left his room the first time, he found that he had been living underground all winter. The clan folk all lived in stone rooms built right into the sloping walls of their little valley. Narrow passages that reminded Lord Gregory of mine tunnels led from the open valley into the homes. Giants and dwarves, Halden told him, had supposedly built the burrows long centuries ago.
The clansmen didn’t own or ride horses, but on several occasions Lord Gregory rode on the dead Seawardsman’s mount. It wasn’t long after that he was feeling well enough to leave the Skyler Clan and their hospitality behind him. The desire to find his wife was gnawing at him like a starving dog at a bone.
