Farmers & Mercenaries Read online

  The creature who had been raised in a cage and never tasted a moments freedom, felt something he had never experienced before…

  Klain felt pride.

  Clytus Rillion stood on his seat screaming with the rest of the three hundred thousand spectators packed into the Grand Coliseum. In all his seasons of attending the Games, never had he witnessed such a spectacle.

  When the Kith beast first appeared from the under-tunnels, it shocked Clytus. He had heard the tales of how big these creatures grew, yet the one down on the arena floor stood nearly three paces tall. He had never met a blacksmith with shoulders as wide as the ones this creature possessed. The man who sat next to him made a jest that the beast’s chest was so large it looked like the rump of a mighty bull. Clytus sat too far away to see the creature’s face, yet he made out the full mane surrounding its head clearly enough—it was the color of creamed chocolate. Honeymilk-colored fur, covered with darker spots, glistened over the rest of its body. When the beast first emerged, it let out a roar so loud that the stadium fell silent.

  How he envied the first man to face such a creature.

  To have the glory of slaying such a ferocious beast in front of a crowd the size of which the Coliseum has not seen for generations!

  Alas, the first fight was short lived. The beast had charged the poor man, and in passing, had ripped off his arm as easily as if it was made from straw. The crowd sat stunned as Ginnius Mulma’Asion, champion of at least a dozen Games, laid writhing and screaming on the arena floor. Ginnius’ life force spurt from his shoulder like a fountain. All his triumphs ending as a red stain in the sands he had ruled this past turn of the seasons—a stain that would soon be washed away and forgotten.

  The creature had let out another roar and flung Ginnius’ severed arm into the stands. Ginnius was dead long before any Shaper could tend to his wounds.

  Not that I noticed any Shaper rushing to Ginnius’ aid with that demon of death lurking down there.

  The fights that followed took much the same course. Whether singly or in small groups, Clytus watched man after man die by the claws and fangs of the ferocious Kith creature.

  When the twin brothers, Baylain and Gaylain, took to the field, Clytus knew he would see an end to the monster. He still remembered the Games of last spring when the brothers defeated a horde of O’Arkins—a barbarous pig-faced race—outnumbered five to one. The brothers’ mastery of combat had become legendary, each having been raised from birth to fight in the Games.

  Baylain died first. When the beast bit into his throat, the crowd had gasped in unison as if rehearsed. Then the creature turned to face the brother, shoving Baylain’s body away, shredding half the boy’s neck off with the motion. Blood spurt from the gaping hole. The boy’s head dangled down between his shoulder blades like some street urchin’s floppy playdoll.

  His brother soon joined him in the aftermore. The Kith scooped up Baylain’s dropped sword and launched itself in a furious attack.

  It hacked Gaylain to pieces with his own brother’s blade.

  While watching the action, Clytus noticed that the beast possessed little skill with the weapon.

  It chopped at Gaylain like a young boy smacking a tree with a stick. Each strike sending a chunk of bloody flesh flying into the air.

  The remains were not even recognizable as Human once the creature stopped its attack.

  Now Clytus stood, caught up in the excitement of the crowd.

  Like so much the drooling idiot.

  “KITH! KITH! KITH!” His voice strained. He knew he looked like a fool as he added his calls to the rest of the cattle in the seats around him.

  Yet, my Gods, what a sight!

  The Kith beast stood over the limp bodies of Harnith, a net warrior from the coastal Isles of Komar, and poor old Salmik. A legend in his own lifetime, Salmik had seen more Games than any other in living memory. He had been much loved by the crowd.

  Live in the Games—Die in the Games, as the saying goes. The crowd will not mourn his passing long.

  Lowering its arm, the beast dropped the helm with what remained of Salmik’s face. It fell to the ground like so much trash. The Kith headed for the arches that lead to the under-tunnels below the Coliseum. The crowd still stood, screaming and wailing. Clytus pushed through the throng of bodies along his row of seats toward the exit.

  The day wears on and I have much to prepare.

  As he headed out, he heard the Game’s Master Julitan’s voice echo out of the center box. “Now that folks is something you will tell your grandchildren of! Alas, WAIT! This day is yet half-done! If you will fix your eyes now upon the southron tunnel, you will see one of the O’Arkin beasts from the Morlis Mountains just emerging.

  “You witness the return of Orm, King of the O’Arkin horde! Followed closely by his elite guards. This day, they have challenged our very own Tomathya, Captain of the Mocley Royal Patrol and his Black Outriders!”

  The roar of the crowd faded behind Clytus as he ducked through a side tunnel that led down to the main streets surrounding the Coliseum. The booming drums heralding the Black Outrider troop rumbled deep in his ears.

  Clytus chuckled.

  Ha! Another band of O’Arkins, lured to the Games by the promise of riches, for Tomathya to slaughter.

  Exiting the Coliseum by a small side archway, he stepped onto the wide cobblestone street. Mingling with the people wandering by, he let the throng sweep him deeper into the city.

  The wagons rolled to a stop near the field they would work this day. Standing and hopping off the back of the last wagon, Arderi Cor fell in with the rest of the forty or so fielders heading for the supply shed. The half score of guarders in escort trotted off toward a copse of trees to make their rounds, scouting the area for safety.

  The morning chill had dissipated under the clear blue sky spreading out across the horizon. Arderi smiled at a squirrel chattering in defiance at the guarders who penetrated its domain.

  I love springtime! Even though it means the plow and seeding, and a day spent bent over the hoe.

  This field, like every planted section surrounding the Hild’alan stead, spread out and away from the protective wall like some giant spider’s web. This one consisted of a large, flat dirt area, squarish in form. On the far side from where he stood, the ground rose to create a small, steep hilly area where the land had been allowed to grow as it willed—hardwood trees and undergrowth, for the most part.

  Arderi’s group had spent the entire tenday so far working this one section planting wheat. This particular field had lain fallow for several turns of the seasons, and the number of small stones that had collected here during that period amazed him.

  Where do all the stones come from? This field has been planted over and again for hundreds of turns of the seasons! Surely, some fielder before me should have removed them.

  He was glad they had finished more than half the field already. They should have no problems completing the rest by Holiday.

  When they reached the tool shed, Tinim Wilk, a rotund man who served as equipment keeper, handed Arderi a hoe. Continuing across the field to where they had left off the prior day, Arderi bent to his labors, letting his mind drift off to Alant’s Crystal that waited at home. Near two winters had passed since the last communication from his brother.

  In the first Memory Crystal, Alant was newly arrived in Mocley. He had not seen much of the city, yet the sights and sounds he had imbued for his family to experience were wonderful. It had been Arderi’s first experience with a Memory Crystal—they were expensive and not for simple folk like fielders. Alant had explained that all new Initiates of the Academy were allowed the use of one Crystal when they arrived at the school. The Crystal had allowed Arderi and his family to see and hear Alant. However, the most wondrous part was that it allowed them to experience the city as if they had actually been there themselves.
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br />   What a fantastic device! Yet, Alant has been in Mocley long enough to know the city much better. I wonder what he will show us with this one.

  Alant had imbued the memory of his approach to Mocley on that first Crystal. He sat on the front bench of a wagon, Grand Master Grintan sitting proudly by his side, in the caravan that had taken him to the city. The Memory Crystal made the user drawing from it feel as though they were the one on the bench, sitting next to the old Sier. Arderi remembered feeling the strong breeze they rode into—how it felt as it blew across his exposed arms and tussled his long hair about. It carried the smell of salt in it, something Arderi had never smelled before. While the caravan drove down the road, Arderi was amazed to see houses and barns and planted fields sitting out in the open, exposed, with no protective walls. When he commented on them—in his brother, Alant’s voice, and not his own—the driver said they were called farms, each housing a single family who tended their own set of fields. Arderi could not imagine the feeling of sleeping so open and vulnerable. There was much on this Plane that could end the life of a fielder tending his crops.

  I suppose not everyone can afford the protection of a stead.

  When the wagon crested the last hill, the city of Mocley spread out before them like a wondrous blanket. He could not believe how large it was. The outer walls of the city snaked off into the horizon, and he saw no end to them. A vast, blue-green ocean rolled off the left side of the city. The sheer size of what he beheld terrified him.

  Alant said the city itself held over a thousand thousand people, yet I never dreamed…

  Rows of houses and shops, tens of buildings deep, clung to the front of the massive city wall like moss on the side of a tree. There were more buildings and people, wagons and animals, on the outside of this place than were contained within all of Hild’alan! The walls rose high—three or four times the height of his own stead’s walls—and Arderi marveled at how they could even stand at all. Over the tops of those walls, great buildings climbed even higher—reaching for the heavens themselves—as if each tried to outgrow the other.

  The caravan approached the main gates to the city of Mocley by winding its way through the town outside—the wagon driver named it Gatetown. The sights and sounds overwhelmed Arderi. He found himself dizzy with the commotion. They came to a stop in a large cobblestone-paved area in front of the entrance to the city proper. The gate looked wide enough to accommodate four or five wagons abreast with ease, and tall enough to admit a giant.

  He gaped with awe at all the guarders, both afoot and ahorse, who milled about the area. Their tailored uniforms—yellow and blue tabards adorned with a talon clutching a wheat stalk, worn over a mail hauberk—glistened with bits of plate at strategic points around their bodies. All of them wore long swords and dirks about their waists. Some even carried long poleaxes—these being decorated with yellow and blue streamers to match their tabards. Their splendor put the guarders of his home—with their bland brown leather armor and plain shortswords—to shame. After a few moments pause, while those in charge of the caravan spoke with the guarders of the gate, they continued into the gaping jaws of the city of Mocley. So thick were the walls they passed through, everything around them plunged into darkness. Torches burning along the interior created the only light in the passage. In the middle of the tunnel, they rode under two huge iron portcullises.

  Like the teeth of the Great Beast, swallowing us whole, wagons and all.

  He could not fathom the power it would take to lift such an immense gate. The crossbars alone measured several paces deep and at least one pace thick. Each of the upright bars looked as broad around as any tree. Archer slits lined the entire passageway at two levels, halfway up the arch—some three heights of a man off the ground—and again near the apex. As he passed these death-dealing nooks, he felt the horrifying effect they would have on an enemy who tried to enter uninvited. Holding his breath, he did not release it until the tunnel spit them out into the light of day, thrusting them into the bowels of the city. Sighing with relief, he blinked at the glare of the sun after the darkness of the entry tunnel.

  That was the only memory view of the city Alant had imbued on the Memory Crystal. He claimed that upon reaching the Chandril’elian, his instructors immediately pressed him into his studies, never allowing him to leave the school grounds.

  Alant called the school the Chandril’elian, as it is named in the Old tongue, yet I had never heard it referred to as anything other than the Academy.

  He did describe the city for his family, however. “The city of Mocley, founded by Artimus Mocley, is well over two thousand winters old,” Alant spoke in an intonation like that of a schoolmaster’s. He faced the person who drew upon the Crystal as though standing right in front of them in the same room. “Artimus was a lesser Prince of the Elmorr’Antien people from the Isle of Hath’oolan. The original town makes up the center of the city we find now, encompassing the harbor and dock areas. The common folk refer to it as the Warehouse District, yet shops and homes, hotels and brothels, gambling dens and fish markets all litter the area, as well as the warehouses. It is this place that keeps the Mocley Royal Patrol most occupied.”

  Arderi continued to till the dirt of the field, smiling as he recalled how much Alant had sounded like a local, not one describing a city he had arrived in a mere tenday before.

  “The Warehouse District also contains the great Millitinia, which houses the might of the Mocley naval strength. The original wall still surrounds this district, as it did when the city called it the outer wall.”

  “Several hundred turns of the seasons later, as the city grew, a second outer wall was added. At first, this newly enclosed area consisted of a mishmash of more shops and houses. Over the turns of the seasons, however, the wealthier townsfolk—merchants, clergymen, officials and the like—purchased the properties. Most of this area now contains large mansions and villas. It is referred to as Old Town, which is odd as it is hundreds of winters younger than the Warehouse District.”

  “As the winters passed, Mocley became a center for trade. With the added income, the magistrates commissioned some truly magnificent buildings. During this period, the Grand Coliseum, the Great Palintium, and even this Chandril’elian were all constructed. The wide paved roads, the large fountains, and the interconnected sewer system were all added or upgraded as well. A new third outer wall was erected to encompass this new construction and is referred to as New Town, though much of it, such as the Grand Coliseum, is well over a thousand winters old.”

  “The final outer wall we have currently was added a few hundred winters ago. This newest addition to the city was designed to promote trade and commerce. It contains the Bazaar, the large area set aside for the buying and selling of products and produce brought in from the surrounding farms and steads. The Gem District is where everything dug up in the mines of the Morlis Mountains ends up. The Crafters District houses most of the blacksmiths, carpenters, dyers and clothiers, cordwainers and coopers. This is also the area that holds the prominent Merchantillian, which contains the most prosperous merchant shops in the entire Plane.”

  “Over the last few hundred winters, the city has continued to grow outside the boundaries of the outer walls. Gatetown, a group of a hundred or so buildings, surrounds the main gates to the city. On the bay side, you will find Fishtown and Gullstown. The poor, as always, build their hovels and shacks against the walls wherever they find room. At the council meeting this morn I recommended that a new fifth wall be considered for—”

  Alant abruptly stopped talking. “Well, I did say I do little outside of my studies.” A sheepish tone crept into his voice, and a thick, leather-bound book came into view. “I am reading from one of my lesson books, Mocley – A History, by Minroehe Granger. Sier Granger was a teacher here until not long ago.”

  Standing in the middle of the dirt field, hoe in hand, Arderi’s thoughts shattered when a man yelled, cal
ling an alarm. Someone grabbed his arm and he almost lost his footing.

  “Pay attention, son!” Arderi looked into the worried gaze of his father. Releasing the boy’s arm, Tanin jogged off toward the wagons on the far side of the field.

  Glancing around, Arderi realized that most of the men from the work crew had already made it to the safety of the wagons. He jumped when a scream of pain sounded from his right. Spinning around, he looked at the tree line some twenty paces distant. Horses bayed and men shouted within the dense foliage. The sharp snap of breaking branches emanated over the field, and Arderi caught a glimpse of movement through the foliage.

  “Come on, boy!” Even though Tanin was yelling for him, Arderi paused.

  Stealing a glance over his shoulder, Arderi saw his father sprinting away. Turning his attention back to the trees, he stood rooted. A crash made him leap back and raise his hoe for protection. Smashing through the underbrush, a horse and rider tumbled sideways, then danced backwards down the small rise that separated the copse of trees from the plowed field. The steed reared up and slipped on the mud of the steep slope. The guarder in the saddle grasped a large fur bundle tightly to his chest. Letting out a cry of pain, the man toppled over the horse’s rump. Horse, rider, and furry bundle all smashed to the ground. The man’s shriek ripped across the field as they went down. The horse landed on top of him, cutting his scream short. The horse thrashed about trying to regain its footing. Fear evident in its wide, rolling eyes.

  That is when Arderi saw it. The furry bundle extracted itself from the tangle of man and horse. It looked like a cat—a huge, bushy thing with large gray spots across its brown fur. It must have been two paces long in the body, easily half the height of a man at its shoulders. Two large fangs jutted down from either side of a blood covered muzzle. Crouching down, it arched its back. It seemed to look for an opening to pounce on the fallen horse and rider.