a lesser man than I want to be. My word needs to be trustworthy always. If it is not, then I can never be trusted.
“That said, Princess, I ask that you come with me on my terms. Or, if you like, you may stay where you are, and the deal I have negotiated with your father will be forfeit.”
Kan-hazur crouched in the corner, pondering his words. Daylan had never expected to have to try to convince her to leave. But the wyrm that fed upon her soul was a contrary thing. It shunned reason, trust, and compassion.
He suddenly realized that perhaps he needed to manipulate her in ways that she understood-fear, greed, shame. But to do so would violate every principle of the order that he lived by. Gentleness, loving kindness, gentle persuasion-those were the means that he was allowed to use in such circumstances.
He chose gentle persuasion. “I have a question, princess. You say that the purpose of life is to master humility. But once that is done, what have you gained?”
She glared at him. “Once you realize that the universe is a cold, uncaring bitch, it means that you have only one choice in life-to fight for what you want. It forces you to live by self-determination, and that is the mother of all virtues.”
Daylan nodded. “I, too, value self-determination, and see it as a fertile ground from which virtues may grow. So, I have to wonder: If you are resolved to lead a self-determined life, how is that to be done here in this cell? Are you going to sit here and die where King Urstone’s men have placed you? That doesn’t sound like self-determination to me. It sounds as if you are their pawn. Or would you choose instead to go back and claim your empire, even if it means that you must fight your own father for it?”
She glared at him. At last she climbed to her feet. Daylan offered her his hand, but she rejected it.
“I will not take my empire because you give it to me,” she growled. “I will take it because I can. You have arranged my release for your own reasons, and I will owe you nothing.”
Daylan shrugged. “It doesn’t matter to me which evil wyrmling rules the earth. You’re all much the same.”
Still, she followed him out of the cell.
In the torture chamber, Daylan found a ragged tunic beside a rack. Someone had torn it off a prisoner before flogging him. The tunic was overlarge, but it would have to do.
They climbed the stairs stealthily and found a single guard on duty. He was sitting at a table, snoring loudly. In one hand he clutched a finely gilded wine bottle as if it were a lover. Obviously, the bottle was a gift from the king.
Daylan Hammer and Princess Kan-hazur unlocked the prison door, and were unleashed upon the world.
THE HARVEST
A hero is not always brave and strong. More often, he is but a common man who finds the courage and strength to do what he must, while others do not.
They’re going to kill you, Alun thought as he ran in the dawn light. Watch your back in this battle.
Alun raced along the uneven highway to Cantular, hulking warriors both ahead and behind. The road had become a ruin since the change. The once-smooth highway, paved with stones four feet thick, was now broken and uneven. The roots of great oaks had thrust up through the stone, and old streambeds cut through it.
So Alun watched his feet as he jogged. There was little else to see. A summer’s fog left the vale gauzed in white. Trees came out of the mist as he passed.
There was only the heavy pad of the warrior’s feet, the clink of bone armor, and the wheezing of breath.
Alun’s legs still ached from yesterday’s run. But he covered the uneven ground well enough. Only so often would someone shove him from behind, shouting, “Move along, maggot!” or some other such insult.
He could not hear well with his helm. It was made for a bigger man, and fit him ill. As a child, Alun had played soldier and worn wooden buckets on his head that fit him better. The armorer had passed the bone mail and weapons out at dawn. The armor had been brought here ahead of the war party, secreted in a cave. The bone armor that Alun wore was carved from a world wyrm. The older it got, the lighter it became, but it was supposed to be tougher than a bear’s hide.
Alun bore an ax into battle. Once again, it was too large to feel right in his hand. But it had a big spike on one side, and another at the end, and he imagined that he could pound a spike into a wyrmling’s knee if he had to.
Alun peered ahead and behind, searching for Connor or Drewish. They were the ones who would most likely put a spear in his back. But he caught no sight of them.
So he ran, grateful that he only had to run. The troops had been cut into two divisions. Three hundred men had set out upriver at the crack of dawn to swim across the flood. They would take the fortress on the far side.
Six hundred ran with him now, hearts pumping, each of the warriors seemingly lost in private thoughts.
“Don’t look so down,” a soldier said at Alun’s left.
He glanced over, saw a large soldier, an older man, perhaps in his forties. Alun recognized him. He’d come to the kennels at times to bring the dogs in after a hunt. Alun couldn’t recall his name.
“First battle?” the soldier asked.
“Yeah,” Alun said. He’d wanted to nod, but he didn’t want to look all out of breath.
“Just remember, they’re more afraid of you than you are of them.”
“Really?” Alun said. He couldn’t imagine it.
“Nah,” another soldier behind them laughed. “He’s having you on. They’re wyrmlings, damn it, and you’re just the scrapings on their boots.”
Greeves-that was the man’s name. Greeves laughed too, and Alun found himself laughing just a bit. It felt good to laugh, knowing that you might die.
“Just remember, keep yourself hunched low,” Greeves said. “Don’t come at the enemy head-on. Veer to the right or the left. And when you lunge in for a stab, don’t aim high. Pick a low target-a kidney or their knees. Then leap back. Got it?”
There was sudden shouting up ahead, troops jostling. Alun was in the rearmost third of the division. Suddenly he saw the High King and a dozen warlords off to the side of the road, peering ahead. Connor and Drewish stood at the king’s back, and Alun peered at them fearfully, afraid that they would follow him, that they would slide a blade between his ribs in the heat of the battle.
He stumbled, tripping on the heel of one of the soldiers in front, and then he realized that a gray shadow loomed above them all. They had reached the fortress. They had seemingly reached it in an instant.
The ring of metal the cries of dying men suddenly came loud, echoing down from the stone walls. Alun was startled to find the battlefront so close ahead. He pounded along the road, and the soldiers beside him broke into song:
What shall they say when the day is done
Of battles fought and glory won?
I was first into battle,
I struck fear in my foe,
I was first to land a bloody blow!
Suddenly they were in a seeming canyon, walls rearing high above them on either side-the fortress. A heavy war dart came hurtling from the tower above, clanked against a man’s helmet, and bounced away. Alun glanced up at the crenellated tower, tried to see the wyrmling that had thrown it, but archers along the street sent up a rain of arrows and the wyrmling dove for cover.
And then he saw his first bodies, human bodies, men of the warrior clan littering the roadside-spears and arrows in them. And then he was rushing beneath an arch, and there were huge doors that had been battered down, and Alun raced into a courtyard.
