The Frontier Lord: Previously published as The Marcher Lord Read online

  The Frontier Lord

  Previously published as The Marcher Lord

  Duncan M Hamilton

  Contents

  Also by Duncan M. Hamilton

  1. The Journey

  2. Mirabay, Jewel of the West

  3. The Court of Mirabaya

  4. The Audience

  5. The Altercation

  6. The Palace Garden

  7. The Second Day

  8. The Surprise

  9. The Dirty Blade

  10. The Garden of the White Lilies

  11. The Dragon Fang Inn

  12. The Insult

  13. The Cloister of Sint Gerol

  14. The Note

  15. The Audience

  16. Homeward Bound

  Untitled

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Also by Duncan M. Hamilton

  The Society of the Sword Trilogy

  The Tattered Banner

  The Huntsman’s Amulet

  The Telastrian Song

  The First Blade of Ostia

  The Swordsman of Tanosa

  1

  The Journey

  ‘Andalon looked along the arrow and carefully tracked the beast across the sky before loosing. There was only one spot where something so small as an arrow could harm it, and Andalon had only one left. He held his breath and released his fingers. The bow jumped in his hand with a loud thrum, and the arrow whistled away into the sky.’ Borodin paused with his tale for a moment to guide his horse around a large rock that had rolled out onto the road.

  ‘He shielded his eyes with his hand and watched the arrow’s flight, until it was blotted out by the great hulking mass of the dragon. So fixed was it on destroying the village with its fiery breath that it didn’t notice a speck as small as Andalon, or the even smaller speck of his arrow.

  ‘The first the beast knew of Andalon, or his arrow, was when it struck the soft fleshy part where the dragon’s wing met its shoulder. It screeched in pain and anger as its wing failed and its lazy flight of devastation ended. In the blink of an eye, it was tumbling to the ground, and Andalon was galloping toward where it would fall as quickly as his horse would carry him.’

  ‘You’ve told me this one before, Father,’ Rolf said in his broad Marchland’s brogue.

  ‘I know,’ Borodin said.

  ‘Hundred times, at least.’

  ‘I know. You’ve never complained before though.’

  ‘Not complaining now,’ Rolf said. He had been barely old enough to walk the first time his mother told him a story of the Chevaliers of the Silver Circle. Nineteen years on, the stories still brought a smile to his face when his father launched into one. There was comfort to be found in them, a reminder of a safe place and a warm fire. He had heard them all, many times over, but would never tire of them.

  ‘Just wondering if you’ve any other ones? Any I haven’t heard before?’

  Borodin shrugged, and gently discouraged his horse from nibbling at the hedges lining the narrow track they rode along. ‘You’ve heard all of the tales I have to tell,’ he said. ‘A hundred times at least, as you say. I learned all the ones I know from your mother.’

  ‘Why aren’t there any new ones?’ Rolf said. ‘The Silver Circle still exist, don’t they?’ There was a hint of anxiety in Rolf’s voice.

  ‘Yes. At least they did the last time I was at court.’

  Rolf relaxed. He had idolised them for so long, to think they were gone when he was finally going to Mirabay—capital of Mirabaya, home of the King and the Chevaliers of the Silver Circle—would have been too great a disappointment to bear. ‘And they’ll be in the city when we get there, won’t they?’

  ‘I don’t see why not.’

  Rolf smiled. He very much wanted to meet one.

  They continued on in silence for a time. On such a long journey, it was both exhausting and impossible to keep conversation going the whole time.

  ‘If they still exist, I wonder why there aren’t any new stories,’ Rolf said.

  Borodin shrugged. ‘The land’s been at peace for a very long time. Difficult to do heroic things when there’s no warring to be made.’

  ‘We’re at war on the Marches near on every month,’ Rolf said.

  ‘What we’re at isn’t what those great chevaliers would consider war. The King requires me to keep his borders safe, which means fighting with the raiders and reavers and whatever else the Szavarians choose to throw at us, but that doesn’t make what we do war.’

  ‘Seems like war to me,’ Rolf said.

  ‘When you’ve seen sixty thousand men face each other across a muddy field, a few hundred angry Szavarians don’t seem quite so big a thing. “Skirmishing” might be the word.’

  ‘Making war wasn’t the only thing the Chevaliers did, though,’ Rolf said.

  ‘No, it wasn’t, but the world isn’t as wild a place as it was when the Circle first came to be. All the dragons and demons and great, fearsome beasts have been vanquished or driven off to places so far away they might as well no longer exist.’

  Rolf nodded, but said nothing, instead allowing his mind to drift back to tales of the Silver Circle, and the names of the great heroes who had made up their ranks. Andalon, who had defeated the dragon in his father’s story. He was as skilled with a lyre as he was with a sword. Valdamar, the Blade of the Morning Mist. He fought with two swords, and came from a distant province, like Rolf did. Rolf had never heard how he came by his sobriquet. It didn’t seem to have warranted a story of its own, which had always struck him as odd. Nonetheless, he was the favourite of most of the young men at home. Tall, dark, and mysterious, he was the favourite of most of the girls as well.

  Rolf’s favourite was Ixten, however. He was big, strong, and indomitable; the type of man who was more use on the battlefield than in a city duel. Rolf was the only one who favoured Ixten. There was nothing about him to inspire much fame, but he was honest and good and always tried his hardest. In every one of their adventures, he was the heart and soul of their fellowship, the great rock upon which their great deeds were constructed.

  Rolf was not big, but he was fast. Considering the others, it was odd that he had chosen as his favourite the one he was least able to emulate. Andalon might have been a better choice for him, although Rolf could not play the lyre. He had often considered trying to learn—the girls always seemed to favour the lads who could strum a chord or hold a note—but the demands on a marcher lord were many, and there was never the time.

  When Borodin said he had to travel to court, Rolf had decided there was no way he would be left behind. The last time his father had gone, Rolf had been far too young. Now he would not let the chance pass to see where the great swordsmen of the Silver Circle had laughed, and eaten, and drank, and prepared for their acts of valour, and where the current men of their ranks still did the same. They epitomised all that was good and fine in the world. Rolf was determined to see them with his own eyes, and would not hear anything to the contrary.

  When his father had finally relented, the other young men around the castle had been jealous of him. His mother had given them all lessons when they were boys, had thrilled them with tales of the Silver Circle. They had all loved the stories, and it was a love that never left them. When they grew from boys into men, they had even entertained notions of having their own Silver Circle out there on the March.

  They could never agree on a name. It had led to more than one fight, but the memory of those arguments brought a smile to Rolf’s face. ‘Silver’ sounded too grand for a bunch of young cavaliers out on
the marches. ‘Gold’ was even farther beyond them, with their many-times-repaired armour and old weapons. ‘Steel’ or ‘iron’ seemed to be setting their ambitions too low. The name was only the first problem, however. As with the lyre, there was never the time for anything more than a few stolen moments of idealistic daydreams.

  When he returned to the March, he would know the names of all the current members of the Silver Circle, and he would have a dozen tales of their bravery that none of them had ever heard before. What was more, he would have met those brave men in person. It was a silly, childish notion—he was a man full grown now—but he loved it all the same.

  ‘Gonna finish the story?’ Rolf said.

  ‘I thought you’d heard it before?’

  Rolf shrugged.

  ‘I’m only sorry I don’t tell them as well as your mother,’ Borodin said.

  ‘No one tells them as well as Mum did.’

  ‘It was her bard’s blood. It runs strong through the generations.’ They rode in silence for a few moments. Borodin cleared his throat. ‘When Andalon reached the fallen dragon, it was far from dead…’

  2

  Mirabay, Jewel of the West

  Rolf had been told many times how beautiful Mirabay was, but that did not prepare him for his first glimpse of the Jewel of the West. It was a city of glowing white, capped with slates of blue-grey. Tall, turreted walls enclosed a mass of spires, towers, palaces, bell towers, and the homes of thousands upon thousands of Mirabayans. It was also home to the Silver Circle.

  Borodin stopped his horse when they crested the hill that gave Rolf his first view of the capital, and waited silently as his son drank it all in, his mouth agape.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ Rolf said.

  ‘Aye, it is,’ Borodin said.

  Rolf raised an eyebrow. It was rare his father’s polished accent let in a hint of the Marches. Borodin had been a page at court, then a student at the Academy. He was very much the city man when he returned to the March to inherit from his father, Rolf’s grandfather, and his accent had never given in to the Marcher brogue, unlike Rolf’s. His mother had always said Rolf’s accent was as thick as March mud, but then again, he had not the benefit of an Academy education.

  ‘From here at least,’ Borodin added.

  ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘Nothing at all.’ His father smiled and gave him a knowing look.

  They continued on their way, both eager for their long journey to be at its end. The March of the Western Reach was a long way from Mirabay. The thought of a warm bed, a roof over his head, and a hot meal had Rolf licking his lips by the time they reached the city gates.

  Guards in shining silver breastplates stood by the open gate, a gaping, shadowy maw in the white stone walls. At first Rolf thought they might be men of the Silver Circle, but felt foolish as soon as the idea entered his head. This duty would be far too lowly for men of such great renown.

  They rode through the cavernous opening in the wall, and into a city bursting with life. People, animals, noise. Rolf had never seen so many in one place before. His horse’s hooves clattered on the cobbled street. The only place in the March that was cobbled was the courtyard outside of their old, rambling castle.

  Nobody paid them much attention, other than to get out of the way of their horses. They all seemed so busy, as though they had many more important things to be doing. It was a stark contrast to the approach taken in the March, where life danced to a slower beat.

  ‘So many, Father,’ Rolf said.

  ‘And there are plenty more. Tens of thousands here. Too many if you ask me. Always feels so cramped after the Marches.’

  Rolf realised that it did. The buildings lining the streets were tall and blocked out most of the sky. He could only see as far as the next turn on the street. At home he could see to where the land met the sky in every direction. Now that it was brought to his attention, it felt confining.

  They continued on; his father knew the way. In the March, everyone Rolf passed would doff their hat or bid him good day. Here, it was as though he was no more than an obstacle to avoid. No one looked him in the eye. No one even cast him a curious glance. It seemed that he was nothing more than one more stranger in a city of strangers.

  A fleeting glance down a side street showed Rolf a man being beaten by three others. No one intervened to stop it, no one tried to help the unfortunate victim. Rolf looked to his father. No chevalier of the Silver Circle would stand by and allow such an affront to justice to go unpunished, but in their absence, the duty fell to good men. Borodin saw the direction of his gaze and shook his head.

  ‘Men are best advised to mind their business in the city. Never does any good to meddle in the problems of others.’

  Rolf looked at him wide-eyed, but obeyed his instruction. He could not quite believe what his father had said. It ran contrary to everything he had taught Rolf over the years. Perhaps it was an isolated instance. Perhaps he had merely borne witness to a rare occurrence.

  There were so many new and interesting things to see in the city that he was quickly distracted from the unpleasantness. They passed a colourful market where fruits that were a rare treat in the March were stocked in such abundance they seemed limitless. If anything, the market was busier and noisier than the rest of the town. It was exciting merely to pass through a hub of such vibrant energy. He made a note to return there for a proper look around if the time permitted.

  Their tour of the city ended beneath a sign that read ‘The Dragon Fang Inn.’ It seemed suitable that they would stay there. The Dragon Fang was a mountain peak visible from the March. It was deep inside Szavaria, but on a clear day its snow-capped peak did not seem so far away. In the days when the Silver Circle first ventured forth, the Fang was still home to dragons. The thought made him long for the great open spaces, the grasslands that stretched to the horizon in all directions but west, where the Fang and great forests proclaimed the wild, brutal mysteries of Szavaria.

  They dismounted, happily handing their horses over to a stable boy, gladdened by the conclusion of their outward journey. On the morrow, they would visit court, and Rolf might finally realise his lifelong dream of meeting a chevalier of the Silver Circle in the flesh.

  3

  The Court of Mirabaya

  The King’s palace was the stuff of children’s stories and dreams. Built of white stone, it was perched on top of a steep, forested hill at the edge of the city. Standing out against the green that surrounded it, it looked like a diamond topping a bowl of emeralds. There were high gables and half a dozen slender towers topped with conical roofs, all of the blue-grey slate that capped the rest of the city. Rolf felt every inch the ignorant bumpkin as he looked on its magnificence, fanciful ideas of beautiful princesses and brave knights racing through his mind. This place represented what they defended on the March, and it made Rolf feel enormously proud.

  A steep pathway led up to the palace gates, although Rolf spotted a wooden elevator that projected out from the palace wall, reserved, he presumed, for the King’s convenience. Despite both being men of action, Rolf and his father were out of breath by the time they reached the top of the pathway. The week spent in the saddle had taken its toll on their legs.

  ‘Who approaches the palace of the King?’ said one of the silver-plated guards by the great double doors.

  Chevaliers of the Circle? Rolf wondered. This close to the King, it was possible. More likely than the guards at the city gate, but still not very. The Circle were his last line of defence. His very finest; the men who faced danger no one else could.

  ‘Borodin dal Oudin, Lord of the Western March, and his son, Rolf,’ his father said.

  He had said it in what Rolf called his command voice. Rolf had been practising his own ever since his voice had turned. It was far from perfect, certainly not as impressive as his father’s, but it had served him well enough.

  ‘Pass, Borodin dal Oudin, Lord of the Western March.’

  They opened the
doors, giving Rolf his first glimpse inside the King’s palace. A long, barrel-vaulted hall stretched deep into the palace. The floor was a pattern of marble tiles polished to a high sheen, the ceiling frescoed with scenes that Rolf was certain must have come from the tales of the Circle. Here a man standing triumphant over a slain dragon, there a man standing on a bridge, bravely facing down an army that desired to cross. So it continued, a new scene every few paces, such that Rolf had an ache in his neck by the time they reached the next set of doors at the hall’s end.

  The next room had a ceiling of dizzying height, and two great staircases of white marble on its flanks. There were more people there: servants in liveried uniforms, nobles in the finest silks, guards in shining breastplates. The Circle? Probably not. Servants busily went about their tasks and finely dressed people passed in and out of another set of doors at the far end. Rolf knew immediately that they led to the King’s audience hall. That was where he would see a chevalier of the Circle. Even seeing the King felt secondary by comparison.

  Rolf felt his heart race as they crossed the hall and approached the doors.

  ‘Remember to mind your manners,’ Borodin said. ‘All those things your mother taught you? They’re important now. More important than anything else. Do you understand?’

  ‘I’m not a child, Father. I know how to behave.’

  ‘Court can be an overwhelming place. Just reminding you to be careful.’

  4

  The Audience

  Borodin bade Rolf wait near the door when they went into the audience hall. He went to talk to an official, leaving Rolf to take in the spectacle before him.

  The hall was a heaving mass of people dressed in an array of colours so vibrant and varied that it was almost overwhelming to the eyes. He was drab and shabby by comparison, despite being dressed in the very best clothes he owned. No one took any notice of him, or his attire, but it was little consolation. When he met a chevalier, his appearance would shame him.