The Overthrow of the Steward (Part 2)
Author - Fornad
Written on - Wednesday 18th August 2010 (04:37pm)
This story is a continuation from The Khazad-dûmish Inn, where the cynical spirit, Death, discovered that Arthion, Steward of Chásor, had placed a bounty on his head worth 15’000 mithril pieces for the murder of the former King of Chásor, Eruheran Surivan (a crime which he did not commit, read from halfway down page 69 through to near the end of page 74 of The Khazad-dûmish Inn to understand fully). Death then decided to go to Chásor to sort Arthion out. Morohtar Surivan, son of Eruheran and Prince of Chásor, decided to go with him, mainly because he wanted to be crowned King in sooner than four years.
It is year 34 of the Fourth Age.
Note on Death’s speech: He speaks in unquoted caps to signify his deep, echoing tones that sound like two slabs of lead grinding together (not because he’s yelling all the time).
Part 1 can be found in my other journal entries.
Death strolled nonchalantly along a sidestreet, invisible to all but cats, rodents, and two species of monkey. Scythe in hand, he swung it casually from side to side, its deadly, razor-thin sharpness slicing the very air through which it moved.
He stopped, and looked above him. There, over a few blocks of pale-walled, terracotta-roofed houses, was the ancient palace of Mithingal. It towered over the entire city, its smooth, black ramparts, parapets and fortifications creating a startling contrast to the other, paler buildings of the city.
Death, however, was not interesting in sightseeing. He needed to find a way in.
A few minutes later, after walking through many winding and obviously unplanned avenues, roads and backstreets of Mithingal, he arrived at the outer wall of the palace. Guards patrolled along its top, clutching crossbows to their tarnished breastplates. Death noticed that their expressions were slightly pale and uneasy.
Turning away, he began to walk along the bottom of the wall, appraising its height, sheerness and smoothness. A wall obviously built for holding back a siege, and any intruders. After ten minutes, he returned back to where he had started. Apart from the huge, iron-bound gate he had seen on the opposite side, there wasn’t even a scratch in the impenetrable wall. He sighed rattlingly, then disappeared and reappeared in front of the tavern where he had left Morohtar, in the poorer quarter of the city.
He walked through its front doors, coming into a bar that was filled with dirty, raving drunks, had a dank and humid atmosphere, and absolutely stank. He spotted Morohtar on the opposite side of the bar, and checking himself for continued invisibility, walked over to him. The prince sat with his arms folded and a hood thrown over his face. A full mug of ale was on the chipped wooden table in front of him.
I’M BACK, said Death, making Morohtar jump out of his seat.
‘I wish that you wouldn’t do that!’ he hissed, prompting a man sitting nearby to give him an odd stare.
THERE WASN’T ANY WAY IN, said Death, ignoring the comment and sitting down. ONLY THE FRONT GATES.
‘Told you,’ said Morohtar gloomily. ‘Nobody’s ever broken into that palace, and no one ever will. It’s too heavily guarded.’
Suddenly, Death had an idea.
WHAT IF WE FLEW BINKY IN AT NIGHT?
Morohtar didn’t even react. ‘There are hundreds of torches lit all over the palace at night. And then the archers would shoot us.’
SO HOW, PRINCE OF CHÁSOR, DO YOU PROPOSE WE GET INTO YOUR PALACE? asked Death, slightly irked.
‘I can’t think in this stench,’ said Morohtar. ‘Going outside will clear my head.’
VERY WELL, replied Death, getting up and leading the way to the front door. After the relative darkness of the tavern, the sudden hot and bright sunlight made Death blink.
SO. IS YOUR HEAD CLEARED? he asked, turning to Morohtar.
Morohtar began to walk.
‘I’m thinking,’ he said. ‘There’s something at the back of my head... something my father once told me.’
He stopped in the street.
‘The... that’s it!’ he exclaimed. After a few moments, he laughed to himself. ‘And under Arthion’s very nose.’
WHAT?
‘There is a narrow passage that leads from a secret entrance in my father’s room to an opening some miles away from the city,’ he said. ‘It’s used if the city is invaded, and the ruler needs to get away safely.’
AND WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME THIS BEFORE?
‘My father told me this when I was young. It took some thinking to remember.’
Death nodded. NO TIME TO LOSE, THEN. I’LL GET BINKY.
He walked into the decrepit stables around the back of the tavern, finding Binky standing unhappily in one of the narrow, filthy aisles. It took him some minutes to saddle and ready the horse for his flight in the small space, and when he led him out of the stables and back towards the front of the tavern, he saw Morohtar talking to two guards. Instantly, Death flickered out of sight, then crept closer to hear what they were saying.
‘-and what ye’re doin’ is against the law,’ said one of the guards. ‘Loiterin’ outside a bar an’ that.’
‘Standing outside a tavern is illegal?’ Morohtar exclaimed. ‘Since when?’
‘Since a few days ago,’ said the other guard, smirking. ‘King Arthion commands it.’
Morohtar took a step back.
‘Let’s see yer card of naming,’ said the first. ‘Then we’ll take yer down-’
‘What’s a card of naming?’
‘Ye’ve really been away from home for a while, haven’ ye?’ said the guard. ‘Those cards were issued t’everyone on the day of the King’s coronation.’
‘Tells ye who ye are,’ said the other, grinning stupidly. ‘If ye don’ have one then ye’re definitely coming to the station wi’ us.’
There was a pause.
‘I, however, don’t think so,’ said Morohtar, drawing his scimitar. ‘Try to do that, gentlemen, and you shall soon find yourselves sliding off the end of my sword.’
Death winced as Morohtar lithely swung the blade around him, making the guards pull out their own swords. His sense for the melodramatic was becoming a little too developed. People in the street had begun to look.
‘Put that sword away,’ said the second guard. ‘Don’t try anything stupid.’
‘Stupid like this?’ laughed Morohtar, leaping forward and darting his blade at the first guard’s unprotected chest. The man managed to drive the scimitar away at the last second with his own sword, but after a few quick spars Morohtar sliced an open gash in the guardsman's arm open. The man fell to the ground with an agonised wail, provoking a shocked gasp from the gathering crowd. The prince turned to the other guard.
‘Want to try me?’ he asked, his eyes glinting.
The guard’s mouth hung open in shocked recognition.
‘Ye- ye’re the prince!’ he said. ‘Murderer!’
Morohtar looked around him, seeing the crowd for the first time. He looked at the fallen guard lying at his feet, a puddle of blood already spreading. The other man dropped his sword and ran.
‘I- I...’ he said, the words sticking in his throat. Death moved forward, leaping up onto Binky and pulling Morohtar on too. The crowd’s eyes widened, as it had seemed to them that the prince had simply flown backwards to the saddle.
LET’S LEAVE, said Death, kicking Binky up into the air. They soared away from the crowd and the terrible scene swiftly, passing over the city walls in less than a minute.
Death turned to Morohtar in mid-flight.
WHAT WERE YOU THINKING? he said in anger. IF YOU WANT TO GET THE PEOPLE OF CHÁSOR ON YOUR SIDE, SLASHING AT THEM WITH YOUR SWORD IS NOT THE WAY TO GO ABOUT IT.
‘I couldn’t hold myself back,’ said Morohtar in shock, staring at the hand that still held the bloodied scimitar. ‘What am I becoming?’
THE SAME BLOODY RECKLESSNESS THAT KILLED YOUR FATHER LIVES IN HIS SON TOO, said Death. YOU ENJOY THE THRILL OF VIOLENCE, IT SEEMS.
‘But I don’t! I-’ Morohtar paused. He remembered fighting with the boys of the court when he was young, sparring and defeating his father’s guards as he grew older, killing wargs and orcs in the northern forests when he was a man. The fire and exhilaration of battle had always been too easily kindled within his heart.
AND SO YOU REALISE.
‘I do,’ replied Morohtar, hanging he head.
HOLD YOURSELF BACK. SAVE YOUR ANGER FOR THE ONE WHO TRULY DESERVES IT.
‘Arthion,’ said Morohtar, the name almost becoming a curse in his mouth.
INDEED. Death paused. THE ENTRANCE YOU MENTIONED. WHERE DOES IT LIE?
‘Somewhere to the west of here. There’s a copse of trees planted to cover it.’
Death scanned the landscape below with his sharp vision, but could see only sun-baked fields, hedgerows and paths. After a while, he spotted a small group of young birches quite a way off from the main road.
COULD THAT BE IT?
‘I think so. The underground passage’s only-’
Morohtar was cut off by a sudden drop into howling wind, and a few, gut-wrenching seconds later they had landed. Death swung off Binky and led him to a patch of grass, while Morohtar remained in the saddle, slightly shell-shocked.
‘I thought that I told you-’
YOU DID. I IGNORED IT.
‘Right.’
There was a time when Morohtar would have struck a man to the floor for treating him so insolently, but now there was a gaping hole inside him, torn out when he had seen the guardsman fall to the cobblestones. He dismounted and walked to the edge of the copse without saying a word.
Death turned away from Binky and strode past the prince, into the light shade of the birches. He laid one skeletal hand upon a silver trunk and looked through the trees. The copse was small and sparse enough that daylight broke through everywhere, and that he could see all the way to the other side. He examined the leaf-strewn ground. No entrance was to be seen.
ANY THOUGHTS?
‘I don’t know. My father told me about this passage a long time ago,’ said Morohtar, walking through the trees and looking at the ground everywhere. ‘It’s possible that it could have fallen in or something.’
Morohtar stepped forward. There was a click, a loud twang, and barely a second later, a sort of dull thunk.
DID YOUR FATHER TELL YOU ABOUT ANY KIND OF TRAPS? queried Death in an relaxed tone.
Morohtar turned around slowly. There, hovering not an inch from his suddenly fragile-seeming head, was a crossbow bolt. Green light that was filtering through the trees gave a menacing gleam to its sharpened point.
‘I don’t think so,’ he said, trying to keep his voice steady.
GOOD, said Death briskly, going over to where Morohtar was still standing, stock still. The bolt fell to the ground. NOW, WE CAN SEE THAT SINCE THE CROSSBOW WENT OFF WHEN YOU STOOD THERE, THE ENTRANCE WILL BE UNDER YOUR FEET.
Morohtar stepped to the side, and immediately a buried trapdoor opened, pieces of earth and roots falling into a dark hole beneath.
INTRESTING ENGINEERING, said Death, crouching down and peering at the complex array of springs, levers and hinges at the trapdoor’s edge. He remained there for a few moments, and then straightened up, leaning on his scythe. NO TIME TO WASTE. LET’S GO.
‘Hold on,’ said Morohtar, watching Death clamber into the hole. ‘Aren’t we going to...I don’t know – create a plan or something?’
Death stopped and looked up at him.
WE CAN DO THAT ON THE WAY. IT IS QUITE A FEW MILES TO THE CITY.
Morohtar nodded.
‘Of course.’ He took a last look around at the small forest, and beyond, the fields of Chásor, his home and realm. The next time he looked at it, he would be king. If he would ever look at it again.
Morohtar gripped the handle of his scimitar, and pulled it out of the scabbard. He wiped it clean of the last traces of blood, then held the blade close to his face.
‘The next blood you shall taste will be that of the traitor,’ he whispered. ‘I swear it.’
To be continued...
