“Am I to understand, my lord, you intend to treat with the Volarians?”

Vaelin felt Dahrena stiffen at his side and gave her a placating pat on the arm. His meetings with Janus had given him ample experience with scheming old men. This one makes a show before striking his real bargain.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Darvus returned. “Darnel did and his fief remains unmolested.”

Vaelin tried to contain his shock. The Fief Lord of Renfael a traitor?

“Didn’t know that, eh?” the old lord said with another cackle, easily reading his face. “You’ve been away too long, boy. Darnel led his knights against the Realm Guard. My agents tell me he’s been given half of Asrael in return and lords it over Varinshold as we speak.”

“A traitor’s example is a poor one to follow, my lord,” Vaelin replied.

A genuine anger coloured Darvus’s wrinkled face. “My people look to me for protection and I’ve grown old providing it, swallowing every insult and humiliation heaped upon me by your kings along the way.”

“The Volarians will bring no insult or humiliation, it’s true. All they bring is death and slavery. We found one of your own villages yesterday, old people and children killed, the others taken in chains. We freed them and they joined us, all willing to fight and die to secure the freedom of this fief and this Realm. If you require an example, I suggest you look no further.”

He saw the twins exchange a uniform glance as he described the fate of the village, hands tightening on their sword hilts. Not their idea, Vaelin realised. They think the old man’s words genuine.

“My lord uncle,” the twin on the left said. “In reference to our discussion this morning . . .”

“Shut up, Maeser,” the old man snapped. “And you, Kaeser. Your dear departed mother always had wise counsel for me, but all you two ever bleat about is war and swords and horses.” He stared at the young lord until he looked away. “Their mother married a Renfaelin knight of great renown,” he explained to Vaelin. “Had a son of my own in those days so I didn’t see the harm, then the fool manages to pox himself into an early grave without issue and I’m left with these two.”

“If I might enquire, my lord,” Vaelin said. “What it is you want? I think we both know you have no intention of throwing your lot in with our enemy, and I have little time for elaborate bargaining.”

Darvus reclined in his chair, a small pink tongue appearing between his lips for a moment. Janus was an owl, Vaelin thought. Seems this one’s a snake.

“Out!” the Fief Lord barked at his nephews who both bowed and exited the tent with such synchronised precision it seemed like a rehearsed dance step. “Not you, Marven,” Darvus added as the count started for the exit. “I’d like a reliable witness to this little accommodation.”

The old lord’s gaze swung to Dahrena before he continued. “One of my agents had occasion to meet a fellow from the Reaches recently. A factor from some frost-bitten mining town, seemed to think he’d been poorly treated during a recent difficulty.”

Vaelin heard Dahrena utter a soft sigh. Idiss.

“Sadly the fellow contrived to get drunk and fall into Frostport harbour,” Darvus went on. “But not before he related an interesting story.”

“As I said, my lord,” Vaelin said. “I have little time.”

“Gold,” the old man said slowly, his gaze still fixed on Dahrena. “You have been keeping secrets, my lady.” He leaned forward, small tongue darting over his lips once more. “One of the lessons taught by a long life is that the opportunity for enrichment comes and goes like an unpredictable tide, and Nilsael is always the last to catch a wave. Not this time. This time we get our share.”

“There are sound reasons for keeping such information secret,” Dahrena said. “For your fief as well as the Reaches.”

“Not any more,” the Fief Lord returned. “Not with so many wolves at our door, and Lord Vaelin so badly in need of troops.”

“What do you want?” Vaelin asked, his patience reaching its limit.

“My dear departed daughter, keen-minded mother to idiot twins, used to say that gold was like water, it slips through one’s fingers with such ease. It’s not the man who digs the gold that gets rich, it’s the man who sells him the pick.” The bony fingers drummed on the armrests for a moment. “All gold mined in the Northern Reaches must be landed and sold in a Nilsaelin port.”

“That’s all?” Dahrena asked.

The old man smiled and inclined his head. “Quite all my lady.”

Every ounce of gold sold within his own borders, Vaelin thought. Any merchant seeking to buy it will have to come here, along with all their clerks and ships, no doubt laden with goods to trade in kind. The snake will make his fief the richest in the Realm within a generation. Janus would have been impressed.

“Your terms are acceptable, my lord,” he told Darvus. “Subject to ratification by the Crown.”

“Crown, is it?” The old man gave another cackle, raising a skeletal hand to point a finger at Vaelin with no sign of any tremble. “There’s only one head left fit to wear it and it stands before me right now.”

CHAPTER TWO

Lyrna

Captain Belorath was a fine Keschet player, demonstrating a fundamental understanding of the game’s many nuances whilst employing the more subtle strategies that set the skilled opponent apart. Lyrna beat him in twenty moves. It would have been fifteen but she thought it best to allow him some dignity in front of his crew.

He glowered at her from across the board, hands moving in a blur as he removed the remaining pieces. “We go again.”

“As you wish,” Lyrna said, removing her own pieces. For all his skill the captain laboured against a basic misunderstanding of the most important element of Keschet: the placement of the pieces. Every move flowed from this seeming formality. She had already won when he failed to place sufficient spearmen on the left side of the board to counter the lancers she would launch six moves in. The game starts when you place your first piece, her father had instructed all those years ago when he first taught a five-year-old a game that baffled most adults. Within a year she had beaten him in an epic battle of one hundred and twenty-three moves that would have made a salient entry in the history of the game, if anyone else had been there to bear witness. They never played again and the board and pieces disappeared from her room soon after.

The captain slammed his emperor onto the third square from the left in the first row, a standard placement if one intended an aggressive strategy, or sought to conceal defence with offence. She responded by placing one of her archers in the middle of the second row, continuing to build a standard formation in response to his seemingly complex arrangement. The Emperor’s Gambit, she thought with an inward sigh as crewmen and Realm folk wagered around them. The odds seemed to be in her favour. Thirteen moves this time.

In the event she managed to string it out to seventeen, any more generosity would have been obvious.

“The Dark,” one of the crew whispered as she plucked the captain’s emperor from the board.

“Dark or not,” Harvin replied with a laugh. “You owe me two cups of rum, my friend.”

Lyrna cast her gaze at the placid sea as the increasingly red-faced captain set about removing his pieces once more. Three days and not a whisper of wind, she thought, straightening as a familiar sight came into view, the huge fin leaving an impressive wake in the becalmed waters before slipping under.

The captain had ordered the crew to the oars when the wind died, but the heat of these climes forced frequent halts lest the crew collapse from exhaustion. The Realm folk had taken their turn at the oars, Lyrna included, though their inexpert lack of rhythm often proved more of a hindrance. It was during the latest break from rowing that the captain had produced a Keschet board and commanded his first mate to play, beating him in only forty moves, apparently something of a record on the ship.

“Our lady can beat that,” Benten had said, his tone one of complete confidence.

“Is that the case?” The captain’s bushy brows knitted together as his gaze found her, rubbing her aching arms as she rested on her oar.

Lyrna gave the young fisherman a hard look. She hadn’t shared a single word with him about the game yet instinct seemed to tell him a great deal.

“I can play,” she replied with a shrug.

His third try was more impressive, abandoning long-established set attacks for a complex series of feints on the left, seemingly careless of losses, but masking the gradual approach of all three thieves towards the centre.

“Congratulations, Captain,” she said with a bow some thirty moves later.

“For what?” he growled, staring at the emperor in her hand.

“For providing me with a unique game.” She raised her head as a gentle breeze tickled the still-sensitive burns on her upper cheek. Strange to feel the wind and not have it tousle one’s hair, she mused. “I believe we’re about to resume our voyage.”

? ? ?

The breeze built into a strong westerly wind, known to the Meldeneans as the Fruitful Vine as well-laden merchantmen were often to be found following its course. Now though the ocean seemed empty.