Darkling Fields of Arvon Read online

  DARKLING FIELDS OF ARVON

  Legacy of the Stone Harp: Book Two

  James G. Anderson & Mark Sebanc

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2010 by James G. Anderson & Mark Sebanc

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A Baen Books Original

  Baen Publishing Enterprises

  P.O. Box 1188

  Wake Forest, NC 27588

  www.baen.com

  ISBN-13: 978-1439132999

  Cover art by Todd Lockwood

  Maps by James G. Anderson

  First printing, May 2010

  Distributed by Simon & Schuster

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Anderson, James G. (James Gideon), 1967–

  Darkling fields of Arvon / James G. Anderson & Mark Sebanc.

  p. cm.—(Legacy of the stone harp ; bk. 2)

  ISBN 978-1-4391-3353-8 (trade pb : alk. paper)

  I. Sebanc, Mark, 1953– II. Title.

  PR9199.4.A524D37 2010

  813'.6—dc22

  2010005099

  Pages by Joy Freeman (www.pagesbyjoy.com)

  Printed in the United States of America

  To Jeremy and Monique Rivett-Carnac,

  in grateful tribute to a bond of friendship

  tested in the wind and wave of deepest storm.

  Without you this work would not have come to be—MS

  With love and gratitude, to Fr. Jim Duffy,

  mentor and friend, for patiently guiding

  me along the songlines of my life—JA

  Baen Books by

  James G. Anderson & Mark Sebanc

  Legacy of the Stone Harp

  The Stoneholding

  Darkling Fields of Arvon

  The Hidden Kingdom (forthcoming)

  Ocean Isles of the West (forthcoming)

  Maps

  One

  The clash of sword on shield rang from the grey stone walls. The noise filled the chamber, each clang punctuated by a grunt of exertion as the combatants threw their blows. A flash of steel arced overhead. The swingeing stroke met the face of a raised shield obliquely. The blade sparked and clattered across the banded surface of the oaken buckler, deflected to the side. A counterstroke etched the air like a sliver of lightning. The opposing shield wheeled up, then shivered beneath the brunt. The fighters closed, grappling. Sword blades crossed, parted, and crossed again. For the briefest moment, steel remained pressed against steel, strength met by strength. Then each blade slid down the other until the crossguards locked. The swordsmen's faces met in a narrow space of mingled breath and the stench of sweat and battle.

  In silence, the warriors held each other with a stern gaze—calculating, assessing, each taking the measure of his foe. It was the hammerson whose grim stare broke first, a sneer spreading across his bearded face. The look of derision sorted unnaturally with his clear slate-blue eyes. A strand of flaxen hair, free of the leather thong that had bound it, now stuck to the small man's sweat-soaked brow. With a throaty chuckle, he pushed the taller man away and took a step back. The two stood aloof, each in a crouched stance, each eyeing the other warily.

  A sword point dipped, breaking the spell.

  Kalaquinn leapt forward to meet the renewed attack. The lean, raven-haired Holdsman swept his shield left to parry the blow to his waist. In the same moment, he feinted a high cutting stroke but pulled the blade in midswing towards the other's knees in a low countercut. His opponent read the move unerringly. Following Kal's feint, he slid his shield down to block the blow even as he brought his own sword into play again, aiming for Kal's shoulder. Kal twisted his body up to meet the challenge, just managing to deflect the sword with a shield edge. He launched into a return blow without pause, but, catlike, the hammerson sprang out of reach and replied with a stroke so quick that Kal had barely time to pull his sword arm out of harm's way. In the breadth of a heart's beat, Kal lunged again to the attack, forcing the small man back.

  Lissome and quick, the slight figure evaded Kal, parrying with his shield, probing now and again with a sword feint as the Holdsman pressed. Suddenly, the hammerson heaved his body forward against Kal's assault, boldly stepping ahead, his shield held before him to deflect the oncoming stroke. In a blur, he ducked beneath Kal's outstretched sword arm and pivoted full around to deliver a vicious backhand blow to Kal's unguarded belly. The hammerson's sword sliced the air in a harmless arc, for Kal, just as light on his feet and anticipating the move, had spun around, whirling away from a stroke that would have surely ended the contest.

  Again, the two combatants broke from the fight, staying outside range of one another to catch their breath. Sweat stung Kal's eyes. He quickly drew the sleeve of his sword arm across his face. Kal smiled. Loosening his wrist, he spun the sword blade around in a close circle by his side. Rhodangalas felt good in his grip, supple, like an extension of his arm, now strong from practice and from rest. His whole body felt strong, muscled and taut with the lithe and potent strength of a highland war bow at full draw.

  Kal resumed a high guard stance with slow deliberation, shield held forward off-centre to his opponent, a gap left open between his shield and his body. Fast as a viper's tongue, the hammerson rushed to attack. What Kal's adversary lacked in size, he made up for in speed, but the hammerson did not drive his sword for the opening that beckoned between shield and body. Instead he made a quick feint toward the gap, then slashed low at the Holdsman's knees. Kal blocked with his shield, and, even as he did so, the hammerson's sword whistled around to his attacker's downthrust arm. With fluid speed, Kal lifted his shield to parry, but he was not quite fast enough to take the blow flat on its surface. The sword blade skittered across the side of the shield and grazed the Holdsman's unclad forearm, drawing blood.

  "Kalaquinn!" Alcesidas dropped his sword point, lowering his guard, his face ashen. "I-I did not expect you to miss the block. You are harmed? Let me see."

  "No, no. Stay yourself, Alcesidas, and your concern. I shall be fine," Kal responded with quick ease, speaking in the ancient tongue still used in this subterranean realm as he drew back from the crown prince of Nua Cearta and shrugged. He quickly examined the fresh wound, then wiped the blood from his forearm onto his tunic, still holding his sword and buckler. " 'Tis no more than a scratch. You have added but a trifle to my growing collection of combat trophies."

  Kal glanced from his opponent to those standing along the walls observing the contest. Though none moved, each wore an expression of worry, save for Lencaymon. The thickly built swordmaster, clad wholly in black leather, grinned as he looked on his two students. Clearly he was enjoying the bout.

  "We should have used blunts!" Alcesidas stepped closer to Kal. "This . . . this was ill-conceived foolishness! Galligaskin," the crown prince called, slipping uncomfortably into the common tongue of the Holdsfolk. "The healing pouch of the Hordanu, please. Bring it. In it he will have surely some proper physic to stop the flow of blood, to heal the wound."

  "Galli! Mind him not! Spare yourself the errand. Look, it is in truth but a scratch, and no longer bleeds. Stay and watch the play of sword and shield. Come, Alcesidas!" Kal slipped easily again into Old Arvonian as he grinned at his adversary. "Is your liver more mottled than those of our ignoble lowland cousins that you quake so at the sight of a mere drop of blood?" The prince's eyes widened. "Suppose you that I would slight the gift made to m
e of Rhodangalas?" Kal lifted the sword in his hand. "We have not yet finished our business. Come! 'Twas three touchings of the body we agreed upon, and that was but two. Now, to arms!"

  Kal sprang forward and struck Alcesidas's limply held sword, which the hammerson jerked away, regaining his hold on the weapon as it was nearly knocked from his grip.

  "Ah, so, you think to best a son of Magan Hammermaster?" The prince smiled and raised his blade. "You reckon not a Forgeman's mettle, young anuas! Come, then, my lord Myghternos Hordanu! Come!" Alcesidas straightened and inclined his head toward Kal in an exaggerated play of obeisance, then beckoned him with his bucklered arm. "Come, come. 'Twas three touchings, indeed, and I have but paid you two. Come, I owe you yet one more, and 'tis a debt I will soon pay." The prince straightened himself and narrowed his eyes. "Ah, do you so fear your paymaster that you sidle sidewise away from him? Stand, and I shall quickly get to the heart of the matter!" Alcesidas rapped his chest twice with the fist of his shield arm and chuckled grimly. "Come, one touch do I owe you? One touch shall I pay! Or do you, my lord Hordanu, wax overtired?"

  "Methinks you wax overmuch in your speech, my lord prince. Would that you bandy blades as well as you bandy words!" A smile creased Kal's face as he held the king's gift before him, languidly tracing the air with the silver blade.

  Assuming a middle guard stance, he saw the keen gleam in the hammerson's eye. The small man's ardour, his passionate demeanour, left Kal in no doubt—swordplay was a serious business in this kingdom deep beneath the Radolan Mountains, no less serious than was archery in the Stoneholding.

  It was time for the third touching.

  Kal and Alcesidas circled each other in a grisly parody of dance, each lifting a foot and placing it lightly behind the next to shift balance and take a shuffling step in time with the mirror image across from himself. Teeth were bared and eyes blazed. This time Alcesidas sprang to the attack, slashing high to Kal's neck. Balanced on the ball of one foot, Kal brought his right leg back a step, then leaned forward into the blow, meeting it with his shield. Then, rather than countering with a forehand blow, as his opponent might expect, in one fluid motion the Holdsman swung his sword over and around above his head, left to right, sweeping it backhand to the hammerson's body. Alcesidas read the maneuver unerringly, sliding his shield sideways to parry the blow while he brought his blade into play. Even as Kal regained his guard, the point of the prince's sword had come to rest in the hollow of the Holdsman's neck above the breastbone.

  Kalaquinn's startled silence gave way to a laugh. "I yield, my friend, to your mastery of the sword. Yours is the third touching." The Holdsman bowed his head in submission and let his sword point fall to touch the flagstones, his face dripping with sweat.

  Alcesidas withdrew his sword, nodding in turn to his defeated opponent.

  "Well done, my lord Hordanu! Never have I seen the eldest of Magan Hammermaster so tested in a challenge of three touchings."

  Kal glanced up at the swordmaster, who stood beside Galli and a handful of other applauding spectators. "You would congratulate me? I scored not one touch, not one. And 'twas merely the luck of a beginner, Lencaymon, and your peerless instruction in the arts of the sword, that saved me from an even worse bloodying." He glanced at his forearm. The fresh wound glistened, but the blood no longer ran freely.

  "Nay, Kalaquinn. False modesty ill becomes you. 'Twas neither luck nor Lencaymon's able tutelage. You have an unnatural aptitude for the sword," Alcesidas said as he slumped to a bench along the wall and wiped his face with a cloth. "That I should have wounded you . . ."

  "Indeed, that you should have, my lord," Lencaymon said, a tutor's reproach colouring his tone. " 'Tis a testament to the sword skill you have so recently acquired, Kalaquinn, that you should have fought Prince Alcesidas such a bout and with such skill. And that you would so unnerve him in his sword handling that he would lose control of his weapon and inflict even the slightest damage on you."

  "Come, with a weapon like Rhodangalas even Gammer Clout could defend herself from the mightiest of foes," Kal said, holding the sword before him so that it glinted fair in the light of the avalynnia set in niches about the small hall.

  "Surely you jest, Kal. Why, Prince Alcesidas would shortly make a sieve of most any foe he might face, regardless of the blade the man bear," Galli said. Kal's companion had quickly remembered his schoolboy lessons in the old language by force of use over the past weeks in Nua Cearta.

  Galli looked at the weapon in Kal's unclenched hand. His frank, open face, framed by the twining tattoo of his browmark, held an expression of wonder and enchantment as he once again had a chance to study the sword.

  The weapon did indeed prove warrant to the worth of Nua Cearta's forgecraft. The bronze hilt was worked into the semblance of a hawk—both quillions of the crossguard thrust slightly forward, knuckled, then swept outward, splayed at the ends and along the rearward edges. The flat surface of each was tooled by delicate stroke to devise the shaft and vane of wing feathers. Elegantly rounding from the crossguard wings, the quillion block, which housed the shoulders of the blade, formed the head and beak of a bird of prey. The pommel, having the chamfer of a broad fan, was similarly engraved with the fine detail of broad tail feathers. Between pommel and crossguard, braided wires of steel and bronze were cross-wound over burnished leather to form the grip. Inset into the bird's head beneath a lowering brow, two small rubies, the only rich adornment of the sword, twinkled, giving the metal creature a cast of savage ferocity.

  From beneath the bronze hawk's head stretched the sword blade, edges scarcely tapering down its length until rounding to meet in a point. Its mirrored surface was hollowed, a wide fuller extending from a hand's span before the hilt almost to the sword point. Here the fuller narrowed abruptly, rose to the blade's surface, and resolved into the etched heart shape of an avalynn leaf, itself a filigree of webbed veins and serrated edges. The sword's beauty, however, belied its purpose—Kal had just proven that. Clearly, despite its intricate art and workmanship, the weapon was made for war.

  Seeing the expression on Galli's face, Kal lifted the blade sideways and read aloud the line in Old Arvonian that was gracefully chased within the fuller: "I am Rhodangalas, truest offspring of the craft of New Forge . . ." He flipped the sword over. Its reverse side was crafted in exact replicated detail—hawk's feather-graven tail and pinions, its ruby eyes, the inscribed fuller and avalynn leaf. He continued reading. " Who would wield me must be swift of limb and keen of eye and true of heart."

  "Well," said Galli, tearing his eyes from the sword, "do those lines make a demand, or are they prophetic?"

  Kal chuckled. "I know not. Perhaps both. All the same, it must be said that Rhodangalas is a matchless gift."

  "True, and a fitting one for Magan Hammermaster to bestow upon you that are now Hordanu," Galli said. "Volodan tells me it is the finest sword that has ever been forged in Nua Cearta."

  Alcesidas nodded his assent. "Here, Kalaquinn, you have earned your refreshment." He rose from his bench seat, handing Kal a tankard of ale, which he had poured from a pitcher that had been set in a broad shallow stone dish of ice-cold water recessed into the wall at waist height. The gently burbling waters appeared from a black slit just above the pool's surface, overflowing through a similar opening to disappear behind the walls of the chamber.

  "I have come to look forward to these sessions, Alcesidas," Kal said as he gently wiped his blade on a cloth and lay Rhodangalas aside. Kal accepted the proffered cup, then nodded his thanks and took a long draught of the ale, savouring its cool, slaking bite.

  "As have I," said the prince. "Yet I think me now, however, that it tests excessively the boundaries of good sense to fight with naked and unguarded steel. Only now do I learn how keenly you have taken to your lessons from Lencaymon. Else I would not have insisted that together we make trial of Rhodangalas sword on sword, edges honed."

  Kal grunted his agreement. "I have no wish to meet an early end."
<
br />   Alcesidas laughed and, tilting back his head, emptied his tankard. He sighed, then said, "Re'm ena, the next time we use blunts. Too dangerous, this."

  "Dangerous? Better to call it madness. Utter madness. Such a display!" Lencaymon pursed his lips in mock disapproval beneath merry eyes as he took Rhodangalas from alongside Kal, caressed its blade, and tried its edges cautiously with a thumbnail. "Why, if Magan Hammermaster were to learn that I allowed this contest of unblunted weapons, he would feed me piecemeal to the tunnel wolves—"

  "Who would surely spurn such bone and gristle, when they have gorged on Shadahr's men for better than a fortnight and a half," Alcesidas said.

  "They have well-nigh scoured clean the outskirts of your kingdom, have they not—the tunnel wolves, I mean?" Galli said.

  "Yes, that they have. In as short a time as it has taken Kalaquinn to become a master of the sword's art," Alcesidas said and shook his head. "The three touchings, mine, but not willingly surrendered to me, nor easily won."

  Lencaymon drifted to the far end of the Hall of Arms to replace the swords in their scabbards to racks along the wall with a clatter. The gathered hammerson spectators soon began to file out of the room, each offering words of sincere consolation to the young Hordanu and less-than-sincere congratulation to their friend, brother, and prince. Even as the last echoes of laughter faded in the hall, Alcesidas sought out his bench seat again and returned to the thread of the conversation.

  "It was a fortune-favoured moment for us, though doomful for Shadahr, when the wolves were loosed from their cages by his own man to raven on his forces. Now those of his men that remain fill our prison chambers to overflowing, preferring to surrender to us rather than fall prey to the horror that is the wolves. Even the mighty Shadahr has thrown himself upon the mercy of Magan Hammermaster. And in all this, no little praise is due to you, Galligaskin, for employing your native tracker's art to help us find the defects and frailties in our defences, that we might stop them up."