The Book of the Broken

Raymond House

“My dear, you are beautiful,” Stephen King of Essail took a strand of his queen’s hair and said, “Please promise you will come to me tonight. Before we leave for Sunderland.”

“You know I haven’t been feeling well,” Morgellyn reproached her husband, lifting his hand from her hair.

“Perhaps you’re pregnant again.”

She restrained the urge to spit and smiled instead.

“That could very well be true,” Morgellyn said.

“After all, you are scarcely thirty.”

Morgellyn was about to return that she was not yet thirty, but sweetness counted. She said, “It is true, and there is life in me yet.”

She even laughed.

“Maybe another boy!”

“Yes!” she laughed. “A whole tribe. Now drink your mulled wine. I had it specially brewed for you. I think I will lay down a while.”

Stephen nodded, and lifted the cup to his lips. Only then was she satisfied. She had given him three sons already and he wanted another? Why didn’t he try carrying a bowl stone in his belly for the larger part of the year, risking health and gaining weight, sore breasts, the morning sickness, the loss of a tight body, the danger of the childbed? She had been pregnant at fifteen, and did he not know by now she would never have a child again? Direweed had taken care of things since William was born, and the two times it had not, there were other herbs to casts a growing child out. The first time she had done so she had surprised herself, but watching Stephen finish his wine and wipe his lips, she remembered the second time, as she had boiled the parsley and the barley along with a double dose of direweed, she had rid herself of the second pregnancy with no moral trouble at all.

As Stephen was preparing to leave, Eva entered the room.

“Your Graces,” she said, surprised to see the King, curtseying to him and then to the Queen. “We have a guest.”

“Damnation!” Morgellyn swore, standing up and lifting her skirts to head out of her chambers ahead of the King. They came down the corridors and through the dining hall to the ante hall where she stopped, wanting to curse again.

Stephen only saw the red cloak and the golden dragon. He did not know Anthony Pembroke, but Morgellyn was in no mood for him.

“Anthony,” she put out her hand.

Courteous as ever, Lord Pembroke genuflected, doffed his cap and kissed her hand. The boy beside him did the same.

“Who art thou?” she said to him.

“Teryn Wesley, your Grace.”

“Thou art fair,” said the Queen, and Teryn bobbed his head again and stood behind Anthony.

“Hast thou come on leisure or business?” Queen Morgellyn asked Anthony.

“I come on the business of your brother, his Highness the King of Westrial.”

“Oh, joy!” Stephen clapped his hand together. “Will he be coming?”

Morgellyn schooled her face to remain expressionless, and Anthony continued:

“I’m afeared not, m’Lord, but I come on his behalf. For I have heard King Raoul is still here with his family, and I come to pay court to his daughter, the Princess Isobel.”

“My brother seeks a wife?” Morgellyn said with what Anthony thought was a sly smile..

But before he could reply, King Stephen, pulling Anthony by the hand, also grasped Teryn’s shoulder.

“Come in! Come in! We will refresh ourselves and talk of marriage this very night. Raoul will be so pleased.”

As the men went into the house, leaving the Queen on the steps with Eva, she looked after them, took a breath, and then came back into the ante hall, making a bee line for her chambers and for her solitude.

The Westrial Border:

Ollagoth

One morning Connleth saw a ring of grey stones like giant’s teeth. From then on, now and again he saw things like these, stones as all a man, many collapsed but which still made spirals. There were tall pillars which were the remanants of what had once been a wheel or seeming doorways with their great lentils knocked down. They were, for a time, separated from Sara, Nialla and Obala. Now they did not always find a village to stay in, but Wolf and Anson taught the others how to set up a tent. In the early morning, Myrne saw these ancient stones, veins strong, lichen covered surfaces rough, some leaned over as if spying, dark grey in the early mist.

“Are those from Atle as well?” she asked. “Are they from the Second Creation?”

“Atle and Calde are not the only things from the past,” Ohean said. “These stones are old, very old, were here even before the Royan were here. Only the descendents of the Tribes can speak of them, and often what they can say is not much. But their power is deep, and their power is true. This much I know.”

Though he knew it was wide, Derek had no true idea of how broad the river was until they forded that next day. In place of a bridge there was a long, broad walkway, like a pier of earth and rock that extended for sometime, and for sometime was above the level of the water. It was broad enough for several wagons to cross, and several did, until at last that path was lost in mud and slime and became one with the many rises and falls of marshy land and stony isles. At some places there was so much dry land houses on stilts had been set up, and there were great flets for boats to be pulled across by ferrymen, but always there was the water. They breakfasted amongst the high grasses and spring flies, and Call laughed to see that there was a tavern on stilts set up, but at last they found themselves walking another pier and crossing into the other side of Langenford.

That other side was richer with buildings of stone and more Royans, golden brown skinned and red brown skinned. Just like that they were very clearly in the Far West. They rested their ponies and then trotted a steady pace on an old stone road toward Ollagoth.

It was early in the evening Connleth heard them whistling and calling and Myrne slowed her horse, reminding herself these were friendly calls.

“I though the same myself,” Imogen murmured from beneath her veil.

But now the Blues were dismounting, and Derek was embracing Conn and swinging him around.

“Well met,” Ohean said and Anson went about embracing each of the Blues, followed by Pol and Austin.

“My Buwa, Mr. Kurusagen, you do look a little less stylish these days,” Calon noted and Pol said.

“We didn’t have the luxury of stopping at hotels.”

“Should we wait for the others?” Imogen wondered and Thano and Myrne looked at her.

“My fear says no,” Imogen said. “But my good senses say to hell with fears.”

“We will all be together soon enough in Ollagoth,” Wolf said, and Ohean said, “that much is truth. Ollagoth or sooner.”

And now they rode into the hills and into the great black pines, and Ohean said this was the southern lip of the Great Forest. Here the land seemed to plateau, which was good because the trees were dense.

“The land spreads out,” Ohean said, “and there are villages to rest in, We shall stay in Ollagoth tonight. No tents, so cheer up. And in the morning we shall reach our destination. Or rather,” Ohean corrected himself, “a destination.”

The great trees cleared to reveal a village of white stone houses with high yellow limestone tiles. It was only coming close that you could see how large the houses were, for under the trees the homes looked like the play things of children. A great road stretched west from Ollagoth toward Chyr and the men here were dark as Ohean or darker.

“This part of Westrial is nearly all Royan, and here a priest might wear your Blue Robe and command respect.

In the tavern, quieter and better kept than most he had seen outside of Kingsboro, women as well as men drank and they discussed the end of the war and the matters in the surrounding land.

They say that Michael Flynn is coming back, but what is he coming back to since King Cedd disinherited him.”

“There was no fairness in that,” another said.

“Cedd wanted to gift one of his favorites and, in truth, the old Lord Flynn was behind in taxes—”

“But mercy!”

“Cedd Athelyn has never known mercy, and now he’s full of jealousy every since Prince Anson covered himself in glory.”

Anson, who had not worn his hood over his bronze hair for some time, put a finger to his lips, and they continued eating.

The only concession Ohean gave to hearing this was a small grin, but the men went on, “Anson is one of us. He has the old blood. This Cedd is a Sendic with a Hale mother.”

Imogen looked at Myrne and both white women seemed to shrink into their seats, “and now he sends in a white man, one of the Ayl to take Loxley Holding, well, you think there won’t be trouble?”

“The Walters will see to that.”

“And true…” the conversation drifted on.

Wolf had blenched at this, but Ohean said, “Never fear, those of the Far West do not mind white men. They simply mind being being ruled by them.”

“And besides,” Connleth pointed out, “You all are the Lord Ohean’s companions, so they’ll probably feel even better about you.”

“True enough,” Wolf said. “You should see the looks I’ve gotten in Chyr.”

“You have been to the Old Kingdom?”

“Only a few times,” the red head said.

Connleth did not want to lose his train of thought and he said, “The whole business about Loxley and whatever… is that why we are here?”

Derek had wondered the same. Conn didn’t exactly know the route to the White Tower, but he was sure there were quicker ways than the one they were traveling.

“It is a reason,” Ohean conceded.

“Oh, you have to understand about the master,” Wolf said with an indulgent smile, “He never has just one reason for doing anything.”

“That,” Anson pronounced, “has always been the truth.”