A Hero's Throne Part 17

"No."

"Pain will save you. Pain is your future."

"Pain is not an end-or even a means. Pain may be unavoidable, but surely it is not necessary?"

The rider shook his head. "You say that, but true sacrifice is rarely voluntary-very few would ever take the pain that leads to true victory willingly."

"Certainly. But I've given so much up already . . ."

The dialogue continued, as logical as a dream, back and forth, oscillating, endless.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

Books, A Sword, A Knife * I *.

London, Westminster 23 October 1731 AD It was an hour past midnight. This was the darkest time of the night and the quietest. He had come up near the Banquet Hall, nearly all that remained of the magnificent Whitehall Palace. It had burnt, of course; withering like everything withered in the furnaces of time. All was fire around him.

Ealdstan walked down the night streets of London toward Westminster, s.h.i.+ning his silver lantern before him. His mood blackened as he looked around. Where there wasn't ridiculous poverty, there was absurd excess. Where there wasn't indifferent disdain, there was inebriation. The land was circling the gutter. No number of righteous warriors could stave English civilisation from rattling merrily and uncontrollably down the path of disaster. The whole nation in a runaway cart, with no man to steer it. His righteous warriors could not fight a lazy, loutish public spirit. Evil was not bold anymore, it was insidious.

Human and animal excrement ran through the streets, between the cobbles, along the gutters, and into the sewers. Just walking through the city was a defilement. He wondered how anyone could stand it, but then he realised that few knew anything else.

A horse-drawn carriage came along the cobblestones-a matched pair of greys pulling an elaborately styled box carriage with ornate decorations and velvet curtains shut tight. They were tied in place to avoid an accidental view of the outside world. This was how the rich coped with living in the city.

The carriage turned at the end of the street, pa.s.sing a gang of drunken revellers who shouted and jeered at the vehicle and its driver. One of the drunkards dropped drawers and waved his private parts after it, to the loud amus.e.m.e.nt of those around him. The group then fell back into line and started a bawdy chorus as they processed down the road.

They pa.s.sed close enough that Ealdstan could smell the beer on their breath and in their clothes, but due to the enchantment he wore they were never aware of his presence. As he walked away, he felt as if he were wearing the disgusting smell of old alcohol like a coat. Another layer of fetid filth, clinging to him.

Best get this over with quickly.

He made it, somehow, through the h.e.l.l of modern London and arrived at Ashburnham House. He went up the drive and stood before the door. He knocked on it with his staff, and after a lengthy amount of time, the door was opened by a very tired and very annoyed-looking butler. The butler blinked and then walked past him to look up and down the street. Not seeing anyone, he grunted and, muttering oaths under his breath, pulled the door closed-although not before Ealdstan had stepped through it.

The butler went back to his bed and Ealdstan began to explore the house. He looked into most of the rooms before he found what he was looking for on the second story: a large, square room with bookcases arranged in a circular formation. The cases stood about five feet high and each had a white bust of some aged man's head.

He raised his lantern and went from case to case, pulling the odd volume out and leafing through it. Disordered, jumbled. The fools didn't know what they had collected and accrued. There were bits and pieces of everything; poetry, sermons, legal doc.u.ments, books of the Bible in Latin and English-his English, not the corrupted, inane language they babbled now-histories, lives of the saints, letters, chronicles, psalters, and all manner of miscellany. Nothing like his own personal collection, but priceless, of course. Priceless pearls before swine.

He made a more ordered examination and found the volumes he had come for. There were only thirteen of them and he would be able to carry them easily. The rest . . .

He looked around the wooden room. It was warm in here, but there was no fire, which meant that some nearby room of the house was being heated. He concentrated and felt the source to be in the room below this one. He muttered a spell that he had mastered centuries before and the fire leapt in its hearth, kindling the mantle and racing up the walls.

He left, clutching the volumes he needed under his arm, leaving billowing grey smoke issuing from the house behind him.

* II *.

Berlin, Germany 1 February 1935 AD "A beautiful machine, is it not?" the man seated in front of him was saying, his eyes darting looks at him in the rearview mirror. He spoke in a German that was not greatly removed from the language that Ealdstan had learned all those centuries ago, but it had gained a few idiomatic quirks, run in from impure dialects, he supposed. He had brought with him an enchantment, housed in a medallion that he draped around his neck.

"It is powerful, efficient, and all running in proper order. Just like the Grodeutsches Reich will soon be. You hear that sound she makes? An efficient and well-ordered engine makes very little noise, just as the Deutsch nation shall make very little noise as we reorder ourselves and eliminate all the rough elements that prevent the engine from working properly. That will be the Gleichschaltung, and it will bring in a glorious new dawn of peace. A unified Europe for Europe's true children."

The dark, winter streets were a blur around them as the car sped through the city. When did these cities become so big? "What if the machine breaks and fails to operate?" Ealdstan asked. He was using his broken and incomplete German that his sigil fixed, to prevent him from misspeaking as well as mishearing. He could have spoken English, but there was more to a language than just communication-the thoughts, ideas, and hopes of a people were tied into their lexicons. Ealdstan wished to understand the German mind, and not just their words.

"Brechung?" The driver actually turned around in his seat to look at Ealdstan's face. "Break? The Reich will never break. The people are strong in will! The people-"

"No, no, the machine, the machine. This!" Ealdstan rattled his stick and thumped the roof. "What if this breaks? Do you have the ability to fix it? It seems inordinately complex."

The driver laughed. "I have some ability, yes, although I am no mechanic. Do not worry, it is a good engine!"

Ealdstan glowered out the window. When had he last visited the surface? A hundred years ago? Perhaps less? There were technical wonders then, but they were kept by the rich and influential. Now it was as if the sky had broken open and rained mechanical marvels down on all the people. In his brief trip from the tunnel exit in Sudmer Mountain, he had seen radios, telephones, automobiles, and here in Berlin, the elephantine omnibuses. Men wore clocks on their wrists. Ealdstan remembered when exact time was only known from church towers. Now anyone could strap it to their arm. And here, just the start of the evening, and electric light was already beaming from lanterns just as small, yet brighter than his own enchanted lamps. And then there were the weapons. So many weapons.

The car slowed slightly-out of reverence?-as the Reichstag came into view. Electric lights were strategically arranged to highlight its grand, sprawling design. It was obviously built to impress, but Ealdstan only sniffed and looked out the other window, then down at the sleeves of the large overcoat he had been given to wear over his robe.

The car slowed and stopped before the door of the great state building. Ealdstan allowed the driver to circle the car and open his door for him. Already a group was forming in the doorway to meet him. He involuntarily bristled at the sight and then masked his rude gesture by shrugging deeper into the large coat.

"Welcome!" A slight man in a dark suit emerged from the pack. He was clean shaven and his hair was completely slicked back. He wore a wide smile and opened his arms as if Ealdstan were a dear friend he hadn't seen in years. He walked with an awkward, heavy limp, which he tried very hard to hide. "Welcome, my friend. Please, come inside. How was your journey? I trust everything was smooth."

Ealdstan mounted the steps and crossed the threshold of the building. There was a great bustle, even this late in the night, as people moved folders, furniture, and themselves through the halls and corridors. "You'll forgive the disorder. We only received offices yesterday, and much as we would like, reorganization does not happen instantly. A large animal cannot turn immediately. Du!" he called suddenly. "Du! Warte mal! You will excuse me," the industrious man said and walked off to bark orders at some workmen who were hefting a very large desk across the hallway.

Feeling uncomfortable under the harsh indoor lights, Ealdstan stood alone, watching the people in the building dart to and fro.

"I am so sorry, sir," the man said, returning. "Please, come this way." He ushered Ealdstan into a large room off the main corridor that was oddly devoid of people. Then he shouted across the hall to a couple of men in brown s.h.i.+rts and trousers to stand outside the door and make sure that they were not disturbed.

"As I say, everything is disordered. I myself do not even have an official position yet-I just pitch in with whatever needs to be done, for the moment, and that seems to be everything. This will pa.s.s, this will pa.s.s. All that you see here-it is not confusion, it is reordering-a right ordering!" He crossed the room and closed the windows as Ealdstan stood just a few paces from the door.

"It is both exhilarating and exhausting at the same time." The unofficial official lowered himself into a plush, ornately constructed chair. "Please, take a seat."

"I will stand," Ealdstan declared.

"Then I will stand also," the other said and rose to his feet again. "And I will come directly to business. When we found we had opportunity to contact you, as you well know, we wasted not a moment. Until our man met you, we had no idea that the legends were true; we are simply beside ourselves with excitement over this most historic moment. Our leader himself will be here shortly to pay due honour to your person, but he has instructed me to act and speak on his behalf until that time. I was also instructed to present you with this."

He went back over to the chair and picked up a long box that lay on a side table. He came back and held it out to Ealdstan.

"It is a sword manufactured in this land, made by Eickhorn, in Solingen, the best weapon-smith in the world. I would like to present it to you, on behalf of the German people, as a symbol of our shared goals and ambitions."

Ealdstan reached out for it with both hands, tilting his staff against his shoulder. He opened the box to reveal a sword with a slightly curved blade, sheathed, with a hilt that was modelled with a gilt lion's head pommel, the mouth of which bit the handguard that bent around to meet it.

"Those are rubies in the eyes, not gla.s.s. And the crossguard has been altered to include the swastika. That is our emblem. It has been selected and designed by our leader himself, as the symbol of our movement that will sweep Europe and, one day, the rest of the world."

Ealdstan pulled back his great coat and tucked the sword into his belt, putting the box on the chair next to him.

"But that's not why you are here. You are here because of what we can do for each other."

"I do not know what I can give you."

"We do not want anything from you. That is not what I am asking. Men are not a concern. We have men. In time, we will give you men. All we ask of you, for now, is for you to consult for us."

"Consult?" Ealdstan tightened his grip around his staff.

"We are building an empire. We have never done this before. You have been doing it, in secret, for centuries. We want you to help us. We know of your work. Our leader is a great student of legend and ancient history-of the forgotten times that are remembered only in stories. A time of dignity, when men not only lived with purity and honour but also fought for it. When the righteous stood tall, and the corruption of dishonourable men did not touch them. That is the golden age that the legends speak of. Those times that you have seen leave-as the faithful left, one by one, only to be replaced by the faithless. Did you think those times would never return?"

Ealdstan wrung his hands around his staff.

"Those days will come again, my friend," said the man, smiling, knowing he was drawing Ealdstan in. "You have the knowledge, and the people of Germany have the will. With your help, who could stand against us?"

Ealdstan nodded and stroked his beard. "I would dearly love, more than anything else, to see that world come," he said. "I would very much enjoy further discussion."

There was a knock at the door, and it was opened by one of the brown-s.h.i.+rted youths. A man stepped through who did not wait to be announced, nor for permission to enter.

"Ah, here is our leader now!" The slight man's face beamed. "Archchancellor! You have made very good time."

"For this, I make time. So, you are the wise Ealdstan, I presume. It is good to meet you. This is a meeting that will be recorded in the legends of the future. I hope Herr Goebbels has been showing you every hospitality."

* III *.

Niergeard 13 February 1948 AD Frithfroth knocked on the door of Ealdstan's study. He waited a moment and got no reply, as expected. He put a hand on the metal door loop and pushed it open a few inches.

"My lord?"

Ealdstan was at his desk, writing in a small book.

"My lord, the lifiendes are ready to depart."

"In a moment," Ealdstan said and dipped his pen in the ink bottle.

"Wysfaeder, if you will permit me . . . Is it right?"

All that Frithfroth received as an answer was the scratch of pen on vellum.

"I don't mean is it right that they aid you in this-aid us in this way, but is it right that we make the task so much more difficult? The heart could be brought here, with no difficulty, and any one of them could perform the task."

More scratching.

"It's only . . . that this is the third group of lifiendes that have managed to find their way here-no easy task in itself. I am told that on the way they ran afoul of the usual perils. Surely that is test enough?"

Scratching, more scratching.

Frithfroth resigned himself to getting no response from the ruler of Niergeard. He was leaving the room backward, intending to pull the door behind him, when Ealdstan pushed the book away from him, leaving it open on the top of the desk and wiping his pen on a piece of cloth.

"There are mechanisms and circles in movement of which none in this world but I have any knowledge," Ealdstan said. "To fall down a hole in a cave is hardly proof enough for what will be demanded of them in the future."

Frithfroth deferentially accepted this statement and made to leave again. "But, wise Ealdstan," he said, changing his mind, "must the cost for them be so high? When the bodies of the last two were discovered, it fair broke the hearts of those that found them. Many of them left here and renounced their immortality at that very instant. Others, sometime later."

Frithfroth chewed his lip. He had said this much, why not say all? "These latest trials are not just trials for the lifiendes, but also trials for Niergeard. I have never seen spirit so low."

"I am not oblivious to the moods of the city that I created. Threat with no real danger is no test at all. In the perspective of all the centuries, the pa.s.sing of a few young lights is of little matter. All pa.s.s-one day you and I shall. The dead are happier dead. Mourn not for them. The sacrifice they are making is as the first few drops of a torrential downpour."

Frithfroth nodded. "Just so. As I said, the lifiendes are now ready to depart." With that, he closed the door completely and made his way back down to the courtyard under the Great Carnyx. G.o.dmund and Modwyn were there, along with the four lifiendes and their escort.

"Ealdstan will join us shortly," Frithfroth reported.

"I should jolly well expect him to," said the youngest girl, who stood in her new, dyed leather riding dress. She awkwardly held an ash wood spear in her hand. "It's our ruddy necks that we're risking to save his!"

"Language, Sarah!" chastened Molly, her sister and one of the younger two of the four Trevellian cousins.

Sarah gave her head a flick to keep her long hair in check-a habit that Frithfroth had become accustomed to seeing. He had spent the last couple weeks with the children, showing them around the city and the tower. He had bonded with them; the others were either jaded at the long line of failures, or else too afraid to become close to the sacrificial lambs.

"He will take his own time about his own business. I am sure he knows better than we what lies ahead of us." Molly was mousy and apologetic, the opposite of her loud and strong-willed sister. She was the peacemaker of the group, sensitive and always appeasing.

"That is true, young lifiend," said aeelwulf, the knight they had awoken and who was to accompany them on their quest. "More than you could know."

Frithfroth shot him a ferocious look. Don't say too much, the look said.

"Mister Frithfroth, sir." The youngest of all the cousins, Theodore-or "Teddy" as he was called by the others-meekly approached. He wore a dagger and a mail s.h.i.+rt that had been altered for his small stature. He looked absurd, and Frithfroth's heart nearly broke for him. He was almost too young to have a real personality of his own, except that he was intensely sensitive and caring, with no hardened areas of his character.

"Mister Frithfroth-what does that mean?" He pointed to the Carnyx. "'Blow this horn and summon the next army'? What is the next army?"

"Why, it refers to all the knights who sleep beneath Britain's soil."

"No, that's the old army. Who is the next army?"

Frithfroth looked up quizzically and caught G.o.dmund's eye. The grizzled warrior just shrugged.

"But they are not an army yet. They are just separate warriors, all taken from different points in this nation's history. They are not yet an army, but when they arise, they will be."

Teddy frowned and walked back to join the others.

He is eight years old, Frithfroth thought. He tried to think back to the time when eight years was all the time that he knew on this earth. Now, eight years was no more time to him than a fortnight had once been.

A clap of thunder s.h.i.+vered the silence and a wisp of smoke twisted from the ground, dispersing into the stale air to reveal Ealdstan. The children were awed, which was naturally the only reason for the act. They leaned in toward each other, all of them trying to put on a brave face.

The aging wizard brought his staff down on the ground three times, pounding the rock beneath his feet violently.

May the Hand that Makes guide your hearts, May the Light that Illumines s.h.i.+ne on your path, And the One that Goes Between aid your steps.

"Paul Trevellian, approach," the wizard said.

Swallowing hard and shaking visibly-but nonetheless endeavouring to hold his head up high with strong, British reserve-Paul left the small pack. He was not the oldest of the group-Sarah was-but he a.s.sumed the most responsibility. He was rather bright, but this characteristic was often hampered by his sense of duty-he tended to do what was expected of him, even if that was at odds with his own or his companion's best interests.

Ealdstan towered over him, his face dark. Has he used an altering enchantment? Frithfroth wondered. Is he trying to terrify the lad? Has he no heart?

Reaching into the folds of his red robe, Ealdstan pulled out a knife in a leather sheath.

"This blade has many enchantments on it-it is made of stone and is the only weapon that should be used to destroy Gad's heart. If you are to free this land from his poisonous clutches and wish to return to your home, strike well and strike true. And remember, when in doubt, follow the water."