Oreius continued to develop more practice patterns for Relam, all the way up through thirty because he had far too many ideas to stop at twenty. The old man was an endless source of knowledge and experience. No matter how much Relam learned, Oreius always defeated him handily, confident, capable, and devastatingly skillful.
There was no trouble from the lordlings. They left Relam alone mostly, unless they happened to be walking home at the same time. Then, they would stop for a brief time and talk about training, complain of sore muscles and sympathize with each other’s shortcomings. Sebast had grown quiet and distant, and usually removed himself from these conversations, but it was an improvement over his old, argumentative self. Relam was sure the Garenes heir would come about eventually and regain some of his old confidence.
The only unsatisfactory development during this time was the lack of developments in the case of his mother’s murder. Occasionally, when Narin would eat lunch with Oreius and Relam, the former guard commander would mention that he was meeting an informant or that he thought he might finally have a lead to follow up. Each time, Relam would ask about the result the next time he saw Narin. In every case, the answer was a disappointed shake of the head. The assassin had covered his tracks well, and effectively disappeared.
One evening towards the end of the season, Relam was returning to the royal suite when he heard raised voices echoing clearly down the hall. Frowning, he hurried to the door, where the guards were on duty.
“What’s going on?” he asked worriedly.
The guard he had addressed shrugged. “Don’t know. His majesty and the chatelain seem to be going at it about something. Commander Eckle tried to go in and calm them down, but they kicked him out pretty quick.”
Relam raised an eyebrow. “That’s . . . interesting,” he said finally. “I better see what’s going on.”
“Please,” the guard said, stepping aside. Relam moved forward and laid his hand on the door knob. As he started to turn it, a fresh round of shouts burst out and he quickly opened the door and slipped into the room.
“Just take care of it,” Relam’s father was shouting. “It’s not even that far from Ardia, you’ll be down there anyways.”
“But, your majesty, we only have a few isolated reports and what he speaks of seems to indicate a pattern of numerous raids. This just can’t be true or we would be receiving messages from all over the kingdom!”
“We got one from Ishkabur too, didn’t we?” the king shouted. “And you told me yourself that you were concerned about these raids weeks ago, even if the Assembly was ignoring them. And now that we know there is vertaga involvement our worst fears seem to be confirmed. I will not-”
He stopped abruptly, noticing Relam for the first time.
Clemon looked around too, surprised by the sudden break in the tirade. “Ah, your highness,” he said, glancing at Relam’s father. “Back from training I see.”
“Yes,” Relam replied looking between his father and the king’s chatelain. “What’s going on?”
“It’s nothing,” the Clemon replied immediately. “Just a . . . minor dispute.”
“That’s not what it sounded like,” Relam said, looking at his father.
“We can tell him,” the king decided. “He’ll be a crown prince in just a few months, when he turns twenty. He can be trusted with this.”
“Seeing as it is an irrelevant matter being brought up by an alarmist I couldn’t agree more,” Clemon sniffed haughtily.
“That’s not-”
“Maybe you should fill me in,” Relam interrupted. “Then you can go back to arguing.”
“Excellent idea,” his father agreed. “We’ve been receiving reports from Ishkabur and the West Bank. Apparently, there have been a few vertaga sightings.”
Relam frowned. “Vertaga? Didn’t we fight a war with them ten years ago or so?”
“A little longer than that, but yes,” the king agreed. “You would have been pretty young then. You probably don’t remember much of what went on. I led the army south in time to turn them back, but much of the Renlor Basin was lost to the monsters before they were stopped.”
“Monsters?” Relam asked, rolling his eyes.
“It’s true,” his father assured him. “These beasts, they’re not human. Heavily muscled, over two meters tall with great horns growing out of their skulls.”
“I never saw one myself,” Clemon put in. “I was involved in a dispute out at Gobel-Tek at the time.”
“Yes,” the king muttered. “I’d forgotten about that. Something about grazing rights?”
“Maybe,” Clemon agreed. “Seems like the sort of dimwitted thing that would become a major problem with those plainsmen. Honestly, I don’t know why we bothered to do anything in response to-”
“Can we stay focused?” Relam interrupted.
“Oh, right,” his father said, clearing his throat. “Anyway, a young soldier called Janis Kurkan turned the tide, mustering what was left of our forces in the south at Ganned’s Gorge. He held the vertaga off there until a huge storm blew up out of nowhere, dropping buckets of rain over the surrounding lands. The gorge filled up in no time at all, drowning many of the monsters. Janis’ forces were safe until the water receded. By the time the remaining vertaga were preparing to move on, the rest of our forces had arrived and we chased them back into the Fells, scattering them and driving them before us.”
“How did the war start?” Relam asked. “And where did they come from?”
“We still don’t know,” his father admitted. “They came out of the Fells with no warning and began raiding, pillaging, and destroying in the Renlor Basin. Apparently, that’s what is happening again now. Or at least over the last several weeks.”
“Now, hold on just a moment,” Lord Clemon protested. “We have just a few isolated incidents.
