The Conqueror Read online

  “I make it forty-three prisoners in all.”

  “That’s right, sir, forty-three. Yes, sir.”

  Nyron accepted a bill of lading listing names and descriptions, running a quick eye over it.

  He’d been a slave for five or six years himself, before buying his freedom from an indulgent master who needed money. The master wanted to pick up a few extra acres for his youngest son’s death-portion. It was a common occurrence, when the better class of owner began feeling their age and sensing the cold hand of mortality. Fairly well read, Nyron considered himself a bit of a philosopher. He was also luckier than most. The Army had been the making of him, and now he wouldn’t trade it for anything.

  It was better not to take things too personally sometimes.

  He wondered if the man would risk a fight.

  The big prisoner stood at ground level. After his long confinement, he gratefully stretched his spine, seemingly growing in front of their eyes, and they could almost hear it crack at hip-level. It was more a thing of the imagination. The cage wasn’t very big, only about four and half feet wide and about ten feet long. Nyron doubted if it was a full six feet high inside. With nine or ten people in there for several days, plus the honey-bucket, sleeping accommodations left much to be desired. It was a very good reason to stay out of trouble. It was better than slogging along on foot, chained to a dozen other people, all of them of different size and gait. That’s how Nyron had always thought of it. You never really forgot. Nyron nodded at the driver, his boy standing patiently beside the team. The kid hit the nearest horse on the flank with a willow switch. The tall wagon trundled and lurched forwards in anticipation of being turned around and left outside the second gate where the big draft animals could graze and rest if they didn’t need other attention. There simply wasn’t enough space in the inner yard for all the big wagons.

  “Holy.” The prisoner dwarfed his handlers, who were often not the most prepossessing of men. “Mother of Nutshepshat.”

  Each according to his needs, each according to his abilities, thought Nyron. What irony—a man who should have been a general, being dragged around by the likes of them.

  “Yes. Lowren, ah, that’s his name, is the really, really big one that didn’t quite get away. Our prize, and one that shall bring my master much profit.”

  Nyron examined the lean, strong features and formidable physique of the prisoner. He’d had to bend double to get out of the cage. Loaded with chains and shackles, whose weight he seemed to ignore, head held high as he stretched his legs in unconscious yet urgent manner, the prisoner looked around at his new, albeit temporary home.

  “Oh, he’s one of yours? How much, if I might so inquire?”

  “Ah, a connoisseur. Good fellow. Well. I reckon we’ll start the bidding at---” As if not already familiar with Lowren’s statistics, he took another appreciative look. “A hundred gold pieces…”

  “A hundred!”

  “Yeah. Don’t forget I have to answer to the Count. Some sort of northern prince-ling, if his story is to be believed.” The barbarian’s head came around, and his eyes hardened and the gaoler’s look sobered. “He wasn’t too happy to be taken, I can tell you that much. His manners are good and they say he can read and such like that. He’s not like the others. His spirit hasn’t been broken, not yet anyways, and in my opinion his next owner had better take that into account.”

  Lowren was an exceedingly healthy looking specimen, Nyron thought. He might not understand a word of it, but he knows what a gaoler is. He met the eyes for a moment, strangely uncomfortable with it. He doesn’t like me very much, does he?

  “Yes, but a hundred pieces?” That was outrageous, the average farm hand not worth a tenth of that.

  Not even a twentieth.

  Barbarians, tall and strong as they might be, weren’t good for much else. They had no trades, no skills to speak of except war and plunder—they were pretty good at drinking and fighting and carousing in general of course, and once that was taken care of, that really only left subsistence farming and grazing the herds.

  “Really. He is a king, you know. That’s the last of them.”

  The second wagon had finally moved off and the slavers were pulling their people into line with the occasional kicks, slaps for the younger or weaker ones, and a good measure of cursing as well.

  “A bloody king. Hah.” Well, serve him right then!

  Looks good on you.

  Nyron nodded sourly. Too rich for his blood, and it probably wouldn’t be worth it anyways.

  Keeping a certain type of man or woman docile and subservient was extremely difficult. They were expensive to feed, clothe and house. He’d heard some real horror stories, not the least of which was how they would sicken and die for no real reason sometimes, and just when the owners were growing quite fond of them.

  A thought struck him.

  “How, in the names of the gods, did you ever take him?” There had to be a good story here.

  Barbarian kings didn’t travel or camp without followers and hordes of armed men with naked swords and those horrid little re-curved bows. Bags and bags of arrows, as it was said, and the women were almost worse. In a defeat, barbarians had been turned back upon the enemy by their own wives and mothers more than once.

  It was no legend—it was truth.

  “Ah. Trade secret—I wasn’t actually there, you understand. But there may have been a female companion involved—and maybe a little ale as well.” Garvin cracked a grin, grabbing Nyron’s upper arm in familiarity. “It’s possible she, ah, might have slipped him the old knock-out drops, eh? Heh-heh-heh.”

  He let go, and turned to look again.

  The prisoner’s startling blue eyes impaled Garvin and the smile disappeared. Garvin, cold in the face now, made an overhand motion with his free hand. The prisoner looked away, feigning indifference. Apparently the prisoner had been bonked on the head when he was in his cups…those eyes were definitely forbidding, thought Nyron as his own grin faded.

  It could happen to anyone.

  Nyron chewed on a lip as the group moved indoors for registration and cell assignment. There were times when you could just sense trouble.

  Better if this one goes to some big farm, a long ways from town where they can quickly work him to death in the traces. You can end your days pulling a plough around all day and sleeping on the ground in an animal shed at night, and hopefully, with a little luck, you can stay the hell away from my town.

  “Well. Good luck to you, and especially with that one.”

  The Officer of the Day took the gaoler back into the office. They went over the documents and determined the number of private and public prisoners. With only minor haggling, they settled on a price for food, water, straw and blankets. For the record, this would be under the manor’s roof as custom called-for, as well as provision at stipulated rates for water, oats and fodder for the animals.

  Nyron, with six years under his belt in this position, had never met Garvin before, a fact easily explained by Garvin being new to the job. His best wife was a second cousin to the Reeve up Boethmoor way. Otherwise he’d still be running a few scraggly sheep out on the common, as he explained.

  Nyron’s piles were killing him. A thick, embroidered silk cushion did nothing to alleviate that. It was a known occupational hazard of scribes everywhere. Garvin nodded in sympathy, saddle weary as he was. His own bench was quite hard, although worn smooth with beaten-in terrain features attesting to a thousand sets of buttocks before him. With a bit of a sigh, Nyron inked his quill and in the appropriate book took down all relevant details as to prisoners, and properties, the names of the owners, person-or-official-having-charge, origin and destination. He verified that all tax and postal seals were proper and in place on the documents supplied by the County’s gaoler.

  “Very good.” Garvin read the manifest and bill of exchange and carefully made his seal, the hot wax always stinging a knuckle on your ring finger if you touched it accidentally, and t
hen he looked up at Nyron.

  Each and every form required a fee, of course. He paid over the money cheerfully enough.

  “Time for a drink, my good sir, and a meal, and possibly a buxom wench or two besides—although I have been bidden not to trifle with the merchandise.” There were one or two fairly attractive females in the shipment, although Nyron’s taste was for something a little more nubile.

  So far, he hadn’t noticed any really beautiful boys or anything like that. A bit of a wash might help, he thought.

  “I couldn’t agree more—about the drink, anyways.”

  They had been bound over and only a fool messed with those in the care and custody of the Crown.

  “And of course you’re welcome to have your own men check in, even guard them, and use our, ah, guardroom facilities. Just behave yourselves and stay out of prohibited areas.” Basically, anything that was locked, guarded or behind closed doors in private or state quarters, was out of bounds to visitors.

  “Ah, yes, sir.”

  “Off you go then, there’s a good pub just around the corner. The Dead Boar. A bit of a pun, really, ah…it’s not that bad. Half of your men are probably there already. On behalf of Queen Eleanora and all of our assorted merchant guilds, we bid you welcome, and, we sure hope that enjoy your stay in this, our fair city.”

  They shook hands and then Garvin was cut loose to make what he could of the rest of the day.

  Chapter Two

  Kann had gone off to see to the men, most of whom were already straggling along on foot, back towards the town below, and he wouldn’t mind finding his own quarters before too long. In the county uniform of grey kilt and blue jerkin, they blended right in and no one took any real notice of them.

  Garvin headed for the stables. One of the personal string of animals had lost a shoe and it was his first thought. Their animals were distinguished by not having the royal crown branded on the left flank, but private animals changed hands fairly often and it was more a matter of having a good description and a bill of sale. This one in particular he would be sad to part with, a nice piebald gelding, black and white with all the vigor of a young stallion and none of the bad temper.

  Nyron was just going off shift. As was his habit, after signing the book below the day’s entries he turned it over to his relief. Serjeant Torak had the night shift. Captain Nyron headed for the kitchen complex. This lay at the rear of what had been renovated into a proper palace, built on the foundations of the original keep or so it was said. It was said the dungeons were the only remaining vestiges of the old place. With the renovations had come new buildings at ground level, backing up the inner curtain wall to some extent with the holding cells. Actual Court was held in smaller rooms off the Great Hall.

  The smell of bread, and ale, and cheese, and fish, and more than anything what smelled like chicken pies was overpowering to a hungry soldier after twelve hours on duty. Much of that had been spent on his feet. The rest had been spent on his butt. As to which was worse, that was sometimes difficult to say.

  The chamberlain, Taez was there, talking to Margg, and Nyron had a thought. While the reward might be interesting, it wouldn’t be much in monetary terms. There would inevitably be too many middle-men, and one was often enough to seriously complicate matters. His personal status was simply too low to pull it off. Then there was the question of the price. The barbarian had a certain rugged sex appeal, to the extent that Nyron, not the most ambivalent or ambidextrous of men, had even noted it himself. He grinned slightly at his internal word-play.

  Queen Eleanora had a certain reputation, not that he cared one way or the other.

  The question was how to bring the subject up, in a socially-palatable form. Margg was getting a quiet and extremely polite dressing-down, but it was a dressing-down nevertheless. All the signs were there. She looked extremely upset. Nyron had appeared during a brief lull in the conversation and she looked at him in something akin to gratitude.

  “Taez.”

  That shaven head gleamed in the overhead light falling from a hundred tallow candles. Tattoos wreathed the shiny hairless forearms, arms like a stevedore Taez had. Each and every one of them seemed to have a past. The kitchen was very hot, and a kind of unofficial sanctuary for the more junior officers. This was true on summer nights and most especially in winter. Taez turned to regard his colleague. They served civilian and military functions respectively, their duties didn’t overlap and Nyron had always deferred to Taez in household matters. For that and other reasons, they had a pretty good relationship.

  They might even be friends, insofar as it was possible to do so, thought Nyron.

  “Oh, hello, Nyron. How was the day?”

  “It was all right. The usual, as usual. Perhaps even a little boring. This is usually a pretty good thing, at least to my way of thinking.”

  Taez nodded, half-grinning, and his eyes naturally gravitated back to the head cook, a stout woman and a bit of a terror in her own right. She stood wringing her hands and looking unhappy.

  “We’ll talk of this later.”

  “Yes, Master Taez.”

  She nodded, bobbed her head, and bolted.

  “What’s up with Margg?”

  Taez shook his head.

  Then he grinned again, as Nyron helped himself to a poultry-pie and a tall mug of milk.

  “Nothing, really. She just takes everything a little too personally.”

  Margg’s greatest fear was that she would be replaced, thought Nyron. There must have been something wrong with the fish, or the mutton, or the pudding was a bit cold last night, and she was desperately trying to lay the blame squarely where it belonged…somewhere else, no doubt.

  He nodded pleasantly. The pie steamed and the smell was wondrous. He put it down quickly and beckoned at a boy, who came over and gave him a thick pair of potholders.

  “Spoon.”

  “Yes, sir.” The lad scuttled off to get him one.

  The kitchen boys would catch it today, if he knew Margg. The pair moved to Taez’s cubicle where he kept the books and there were locking cupboards for anything expensive that might walk away.

  The kid was back again.

  Nyron nodded and the boy stuck it in the pie.

  “Off you go, then.” Nyron looked around at the bustling activity.

  The noise, as usual, was bedlam.

  They fed hundreds of hungry mouths on a daily basis and they had the staff to prove it, with people cooking, stirring, brewing, cheese-making, setting out platters, carving, and washing up the inevitable pots and pans. The main kitchen area was a hundred feet long and then there was a series of storerooms along the back wall. The hearth was a marvel, fully twelve feet tall and with multiple iron doors, ranges, and warming surfaces in addition to a pair of open fires with spits big enough to roast an ox.

  Theft and pilfering would always be a problem with stores and beverages littering the place at all times.

  Things walked away from the kitchen with depressing frequency around there. Nyron seated himself on the bench just inside the door. How many kitchen boys had sweated it out on that bench, waiting for Taez to dispense justice in his own inimitable fashion over the years? All of them, probably.

  “So. Taez.” Nyron took a long breath and just spat it out. “We have a very special prisoner today. Came in just now, along with the usual lot of sorry slobs.”

  “Oh, really?” Taez, busy with the accounts and the constant re-provisioning of a household that numbered anything up to three hundred warm bodies on any given day, and that was when there was nothing really special going on.

  Taez enjoyed Nyron’s company well enough.

  Nyron wasn’t one to hang about all day, and that was better than some would-be acquaintances.

  The Army had their own mess, their own quarter-master and their own kitchen. Taez imagined things weren’t much better over there. It was just another side of the fence. Nyron was welcome enough to the pie, if it came right down to it.

 
; Taez was also a busy man, subject to supervision and the occasional audit from above, just like anybody else.

  “They say he’s the king of some barbaric northern tribe.” Nyron held his hand up, palm down, indicating that the height of the prisoner was a good eight or ten inches greater than his own. “I mean, this one is really something.”

  “Hmn.”

  “Uh, huh. They say they’re asking a hundred gold pieces for him.”

  Taez’s head lifted from his account books. His door was always open, and his crowded little cubby was in the noisy kitchen area with its hordes of bodies, all hands all keeping busy just to keep up with the demand. Nyron got up with a little grunt and thoughtfully shut the heavy oaken door, not latching it but leaving a crack open to indicate that people could enter on actual business.

  They could hear each other a little better now.

  ***

  After taking a good look at Lowren the night before, on Nyron’s suggestion he was in attendance at the auction first thing next morning.

  Taez didn’t think much of it at first. The place was certainly crowded this morning, a wooden bull-ring with high rafters holding up an octagonal dome roof, also in wood. There were tiers of seats, with a raised platform for distinguished guests such as himself. There were barricades in front of the wall, a walkway around behind the short barriers, and stalls in under the galleried seating for animals penned and waiting for sale.

  Looking around, he saw one or two people he knew. The noise was horrendous, even compared to the kitchen. He watched a few desultory sales, and bought one or two lots, but Taez wasn’t here for beef or mutton today. He wasn’t even sure he was going to do it. It was just curiosity more than anything. At least that’s what he told himself.