Heartwood (6 page)

“I did not think they stood so close,” said Bertwald, and his lips curved in a sneer.

 

III

Procella twitched, but Valens shot her a look and she stayed where she was. Her eyes, however, were like sharp knives aimed at the Wulfengar knight. Chonrad wondered if the Wulfian knights had planned this together, but noticed the High Lord Raedwulf wore a frown. Had Bertwald taken the initiative without advice from the others?

Valens stood tall and imposing in the centre of the room, and Chonrad was reminded that the Imperator had led the Exercitus for many years, and was renowned as a skilled diplomat and mediator.

“Lord Bertwald,” Valens said clearly. “In Heartwood we do not distinguish between men and women when we choose the Militis. Our knights are chosen for their skill in battle, for their bravery and their holy manner. Not their sex.”

“Yes, yes,” said Bertwald. “As if their pretty
pawes
were of no consequence at all.”

His use of the Wulfian swearword for a woman's private parts was like a match put to the wick of a candle. Suddenly it seemed everyone moved at once.

Procella was on Bertwald before he even blinked. As she moved, Chonrad saw Leofric next to him put his hand on his sword and make as if to step down from his podium. Unsheathing his own sword with a sharp sing of steel, Chonrad covered the short distance between them in a heartbeat and flicked the blade around until the point rested on the soft hollow at the base of Leofric's throat. “Do not even think about it,” he warned.

Once he was assured that Leofric had got his message, he looked around. The scuffle was pretty much over. Valens still stood in the centre of the floor, his face as thunderous as the rainclouds gathering overhead, but around him, everyone else had moved. A startled Grimbeald looked down the sharp end of a Militis sword, care of one of the twins – Chonrad couldn't see his tattoo and therefore wasn't sure which one, although, as he remembered, it didn't really matter. The Wulfengar Lord of the Flatlands, Kyneburg, had been sandwiched between two Hanaire Council members and they had moved in swiftly to disarm him, kicking his sword across the tiles. Raedwulf was facing the other Militis twin and also the Heartwood knight Chonrad had not yet been introduced to. Though they had not gone as far as disarming him, the two longswords at his throat made it clear what would happen if he should try to draw his own.

And Bertwald lay flat on his stomach on the floor with Procella's knee in his back and her small dagger pressed just under his ear lobe, pushing so hard on his skin a red line of blood had appeared. He was clearly struggling to escape her grip, but even as he did so, she tightened her hold on the arm she had twisted behind his back and he cried out in pain and stopped resisting. She leaned close to him and spoke softly, but Chonrad still heard her words: “You think to better this
pawes
in combat? Think again,
flantor
.” A smile twitched on Chonrad's lips. Clearly the Wulfengar idiot was unable to best her in colloquial vocabulary, either.

“Enough!” Valens's voice boomed around the Curia. It coincided almost exactly with a roll of thunder, as if the very weather itself agreed with him. He flicked his hand at Procella, who pushed herself to her feet and then, burying a hand in Bertwald's mail, hauled him up by the neck.

Valens strode over to him. “People have travelled across Anguis for weeks to take part in this Congressus,” he snapped. “You will not, I repeat –
not!
– ruin it within the first five minutes!”

Bertwald put a hand to his neck and, when it came away with blood, cast a murderous glance at Procella. Before he could speak, however, Raedwulf put out his hands and, resting them on the two swords in front of him, pushed them down so he could step forward. “Bertwald does not speak for all Wulfengar lords,” he said clearly so all could hear him. “We have many problems to solve today, and making peace is going to be difficult. But not impossible. We do wish to talk about it.”

He looked at Bertwald. “I warned you of this before we came. Your position in the Flatlands has long been tenuous, but I have overlooked your regular incursions into the Plains, your repeated raids on my land, because I did not want to fight a civil war as well as a national one. But now you have gone too far.” He nodded to Procella. “You have my permission to take him and place him under arrest in the Porta. When we leave I will take him back with me, and he will be dealt with according to the law of Wulfengar.” He did not say what this would mean for Bertwald, but looking at the latter's face, Chonrad thought it unlikely that it involved riches and a castle on the coast.

Procella looked at Valens, who nodded. She grabbed Bertwald's arm ready to march him to the doors. He spun on her and declared angrily, “Don't touch me,
pawes
!”

Wincing, Valens brought his hand up to massage his forehead and Chonrad rolled his eyes as Procella's arm drew back and her fist met Bertwald's chin with a resounding clunk. The Wulfengar outcast fell heavily to the floor and lay there unmoving.

Shaking her hand, the knuckles now bright red, Procella beckoned to the two Custodes who were standing guard at the doorway. They came over and picked up the limp body, carrying him out of the Curia.

Procella's eye caught Chonrad's as she made her way back to her podium. He didn't dare smile, but he saw her lips twitch briefly, and knew she had recognised his admiration.

Everyone went back to their own podiums. Valens, his hands behind his back, his face serious, waited for the voices to die down. Then he began again.

“Where was I…?” he said wryly. “Oh, yes. As I was saying… Welcome to you all. We have asked you to come to Heartwood today to take part in a discussion about resources, and the movement of those resources throughout the lands.

“As you all know, there has been a steady decline over the past few years in the quality of the harvests, due to several unfortunate, unforeseeable issues – mainly bad weather, with too much rain in The Shining, and The Sleep hit exceptionally hard. This has combined with a widespread crop disease that has eradicated almost half of Laxonian wheat yields. There has also been a deadly cow sickness, which has taken a good quarter of our cows in all corners of the lands. Food, my friends, is in short supply, and we can only envisage it growing rarer.”

One of the Hanaire Council members spoke up. “We need better lines of communication,” he stated. “If we do not know this is happening, we cannot address the problem.”

“That is not the main issue here,” said Raedwulf. “The issue is there is just not enough food to go round. There is little we can do about that.”

The High King of Laxony, Hariman, frowned and said: “There is always something we can do. There are always those who have more and others who have less. It is a Question of evening out the provisions so they are more equally distributed.”

Before Raedwulf could give an angry retort, Valens stated, “Part of the problem is the continuing aggression between the Twelve Lands. While there is war, trade and travel can only occur at a minimum, which means the grain from Laxony and the meat from Wulfengar are not exchanging hands. That is why we have to talk peace.”

“We are not at war,” said Raedwulf.

“Are we not?” Hariman's gaze was challenging.

Raedwulf stared at him, then looked back at Valens. “We are not at war,” he repeated, “but I can see how it might look that way. The repeated taking of our trade vessels in Laxonian waters…”

“…by pirate vessels,” Hariman stated.

“So you say,” snapped Raedwulf. “But what proof do we have you are not keeping the spoils?”

“What proof do you have that we are?”

Raedwulf glowered. “If piracy is rife off the Laxonian coast, why have you done nothing about it?”

“We have! We have increased the manning in our shore forts, and we have doubled the Coastal Watch, but we have a very long coastline and cannot cover every inch of every beach in Laxony all the time.” Hariman was clearly exasperated. “We have spies operating in the coastal towns, trying to find out where the smugglers are working from, but so far the people are keeping quiet. And our navy is not strong like yours; we do not have your ship-building skills.”

“That is because you can but stretch your legs and walk from Laxony to the mainland,” said Raedwulf enviously, clearly not believing the Laxonian High Lord.

Hariman threw his hands up in defeat and looked to Valens, his face expressing his frustration.

Valens held up a hand. “Perhaps we could talk later about measures that can be adopted by both countries to solve this problem. But for now I would like to continue to address the problem of the poor.”

Raedwulf gripped the sides of his podium with both hands. Chonrad frowned. The Wulfengar leader looked grim, as if he were about to tell Valens that someone close to him had died.

 

IV

“We have no more food to go around, Valens. Our stores are depleted – our stock is virtually nil! We have nothing left to share. And therefore…” he paused slightly, whether for effect or whether because he genuinely didn't want to continue, Chonrad didn't know. “We are going to have to cease the Charitas.”

There was a collective gasp from around the Curia. Valens went rigid. Chonrad's heart sank.

Everyone throughout the Twelve Lands and Hanaire who owned land was instructed to give a tenth of what they made to Heartwood and its temples throughout Anguis. This was the law, but it was also more than that; it was recognition by all to the service that the Militis carried out for them with the Arbor. Heartwood itself had no land outside its walls; it owned some milk cows and goats, pigs and chickens, but not enough to feed the whole of the Militis, and there was nowhere inside the Baillium to grow grain. Luckily the majority of their wheat came from Laxony, but Chonrad knew they would sorely miss the sacks of oats and barley, and the barrels of fish Wulfengar wagons brought to them with each new Moon.

Hariman's face was aghast. “You cannot do that. It is the law.”

Raedwulf had grown pale, but his mouth was firm as he said: “This decision has not been taken lightly. And it need not be a permanent one. But we must look to our own first.”

Valens began arguing with him, the two of them coming down from their podiums to face each other across the floor as the first drops of rain began to fall on the cloth roof. Most people's attention was fixed on them, everyone realising this decision by Raedwulf marked a new low in the relationships between Laxony, Wulfengar and Heartwood.

However, Chonrad's attention was suddenly distracted by Procella. She wasn't watching the rapidly escalating argument that was ensuing. She was watching the ring of water around the edge of the floor and frowning. What was she staring at during this crucial moment? Chonrad's eyes flicked back to Valens impatiently, but he couldn't help looking back at where she stood transfixed at her podium.

Suddenly she looked up, and to his surprise she stared straight at him. “The water,” she mouthed, pointing at the ring.

He looked behind him into the channel.

The water, which usually moved slowly, its surface with barely a ripple, was bubbling.

Looking closer, he could see shadowy shapes under the surface, the same as he had seen earlier, only this time there were more, crowded together. Was it just the reflection of the people in the Curia? But immediately he knew that wasn't the case. Apprehension rose inside him.

Turning, he saw Procella leaving her podium and, one eye on the channel, moving down towards Valens. So far the Imperator hadn't seen her; he was almost shouting at Raedwulf now, the two of them standing so close you couldn't walk between them.

“Valens,” she said cautiously, backing towards him. He ignored her, continuing to shout at the Wulfengar High Lord.

“Valens,” she said more urgently. Around the Curia, other people had started to notice the movement in the water and voices began to rise.

“Valens!” she yelled. With one fluid movement, she drew her longsword. Chonrad sucked the breath in between his teeth – it was not a good move in a place where tempers were escalating and the Wulfengar lords flinched as she drew her weapon, sensing they had been betrayed.

But even as he wondered at her action, he saw what she had seen, and his hand quickly went to his own sword. He slid the steel blade out of the scabbard, yelling, “Raid! Raid!”

If he had not seen it with his own eyes, he would not have believed it. Out of the water, figures were rising, huge figures, taller and broader than any he had seen in his life, and Chonrad was not small for a Laxonian. Yells echoed around the Curia as everyone finally realised what had caught Procella's eye in the first place, and he heard rather than saw the singing of steel as all weapons were drawn.

He stared at the warrior in front of him as he stepped out of the water onto the floor of the Curia. Towering over him, the warrior's skin was green as grass in sunlight, although his hair was darker, the colour of a forest river, where it curled beneath the bottom of his helmet. This looked as if it were made of gold, although that metal was too soft for such a piece of armour.

His arms were bare, but his chest was covered with a huge breastplate made from, it seemed, tiny shells interlinked with thread, and underneath he wore a short tunic made from some sort of thick cloth. His legs and feet were bare, but the size of his thigh and calf muscles made Chonrad blink.

The warrior came forward quickly, and Chonrad had no time to think. On the defensive immediately, he raised his sword to counter the other's slicing cut across his body, the steel blades meeting with an ear-piercing ring. Up close, the warrior's eyes shone through the visor like two glowing green jewels. Through the helmet he heard the warrior say something angrily, but he couldn't understand the words and he grunted in reply, using all his weight to throw the warrior back. With his left hand he quickly reached up and pulled his mail hood over his head. He was immediately glad he had done so; the warrior's next parry glanced off his own upraised sword and struck the top of his left shoulder, jarring the bone, but failing to break through.