The Conqueror Read online

  In front, Eleanora had to contend with her own shadow throwing everything into the harshest possible relief and the evil sublimity of the two wriggling serpents, outlined and highlighted by the dancing glare of the torch.

  Her breathing was labored and she was fighting to control it. Her nipples were fully erect and hard as a rock.

  Her skin tingled. The temperature had dropped as quickly as her fears had mounted. Cold grit from underfoot had gotten between her toes and she was all too aware of her nakedness.

  “Oh, my.”

  The walls opened out and the top of the passage lifted and then the light was swallowed up by blackness.

  Theo’s voice startled her.

  “There are people who would pay good money to see this.”

  Eleanora laughed out loud, turning to give Theo an appraising look.

  “I mean the cave.”

  The queen laughed again, thankful that they had always had each other.

  The rose petals ended abruptly. Their instructions were clear. There appeared to be steam hanging in the air about them.

  Theodelinda looked to her left. There was a rock, rising up from a bed of gravel and stones, oddly clean for something this deep in bat heaven. It had been recently swept and washed, she thought. As per instruction, she mounted the rock and held the torch aloft.

  Eleanora took one last look and nodded firmly. She had a sneaking suspicion, going by sound and some odd reflections, that there was water up ahead, or maybe just some kind of shiny bits in the local stone. There must be walls out there somewhere. Her heart pounded in her chest, making itself known in an urgent manner.

  She had to slide a foot forward, and then the other. The eyes took a while to adjust to the dimness.

  Something glittered, and as she advanced, the guttering flame of the torch, and Theo’s loud breathing fell away. Her hands were sweaty where the snakes hung, still wriggling enthusiastically if ineffectually.

  There were sparkles in the cave walls, quartz or something and yet there was an odd rise and fall ahead of her.

  The shock of water on her toes stopped her dead in her tracks.

  She was afraid to call out for the noise it would make.

  She stood there for a moment, staring downwards into water that was probably crystal clear and yet invisible in the darkness.

  Her shadow fell in front of her, elongated and distorted, rising and falling with the level as the cave breathed all around her.

  Her mouth opened and she bit back a scream.

  She slid one foot forwards. Then the other. She went in ankle deep. The water was warm, and that could mean only one thing: the sea.

  “…huh……huh. Ah…………….ahhhhhhh. Siss. (boom) huh.”

  The cave was talking to her.

  “…ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.”

  She was knee deep. She leaned forwards, not wanting to lose her balance, and released the snakes. She had a quick glimpse of the one on the left darting off in a series of S-shaped wriggles, but where the other one got off to she had no idea. They were headed away from her and that was all that she cared. She heaved a quick breath of relief.

  “Ye, Gods. I thank you for that.” It was a whisper, albeit a sincere one…

  She walked forwards a little more boldly, now that she knew what it was. There was sand crunching beneath her rapidly loosening, soaking wet leather sandals. She went waist deep, into the surprisingly warm water, feeling it wash off the tacky white goop covering her body and leaving her whole, complete, and very clear on what she was doing.

  “…sigh…ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.”

  No wonder people were spooked the first time they came in here, she thought. The hard-packed sand beneath sloped gently downwards and she took a few more cautious steps.

  The water rose around her.

  She turned, neck deep, enjoying the sting of hot water and suddenly realizing what the place actually looked like from the other side, properly lit and with the flat plane of the water rising and falling before her. It reflected the blood-red torch and Theo, all white and nude, almost posed there up on her rock. Shrouds of mist hung and swirled back into position after Eleanora’s passage. Ducking her face, she gave it a quick wash, feeling slightly foolish for a moment.

  But this was sublime.

  “Theo!”

  The figure of her cousin, thirty yards away, flinched at the sudden shock of noise in this most intimate of places.

  “Oh, my, gods, Eleanora. You scared the shit out of me!”

  “Theo.” She spoke more carefully now. “Stand up straight. And do you hear it?”

  Theo lifted the torch, suddenly becoming a vision of something very goddess-like, nodding in a kind of elation. Eleanora wished she could see her cousin’s face a little more clearly.

  Lifting her feet, she treaded water, gently bobbing for a moment.

  She would remember this for a long time.

  There were voices muttering in the background. They never seemed to let up in this chamber, and from the sounds of little waves hitting flat stone walls, and some very black shadows, Eleanora concluded that there was more than one passage leading off somewhere behind her. The waves she was making tinkled and gurgled, coming up against hard surfaces.

  “Yes—yes, I hear it.”

  Eleanora stood there in the water for a good long while, thinking and seeing and listening to the cave breathe all around them as the water rose and fell about every half minute, going up and down her neck like the stroking hands of a lover.

  Words came to her unbidden, perhaps the first real inspiration she’d had in this affair, and so she spoke them aloud.

  “Oh, Gaia, Mother of all of the world, and Neptune, Father of all the seas, guide me in my thoughts, and in my heart, and in my actions. Guide my words and deeds just as surely as you guide the arrow of Lowren, when it flies from the bow and strikes down the common foe.”

  “Who said that?” Theodelinida wracked her brains, but the quote was an unfamiliar one.

  “I did.” Eleanora waded firmly up out the water and took the torch from Theo’s unresisting hand as the echoes slowly subsided and the pair turned to go.

  Chapter Seven

  Lowren strode into the great hall with a few of the boys clumping along behind, still laden with personal weapons and assorted baggage.

  “Mother.” The place appeared empty at first glance. “Mother?”

  A man looked up and shrugged.

  There were one or two loungers, local men, sitting at a table in the furthest corner. They were probably wondering when lunch was served. He nodded pleasantly in their direction. Their business couldn’t be too pressing, and perhaps they were content enough with an ale or two.

  Otherwise they would have been right on him.

  He looked around. There was a lass right there.

  “Ah.”

  “Sire.”

  He smiled, and the young serving girl, busy sweeping up the old rushes from the hard-beaten dirt floor, blushed and curtsied, eyes averted and head held low.

  “Would you please bring the gentlemen some ale, and perhaps some cold meat, young lady?”

  “Bread, and cheese, and bacon and whatevers.” Bibbs was being his usual irrepressible self. “Potatoes, and gravy, and cakes and pies and tarts would be well, my dear girl.”

  Her eyes darted back and forth, and nodding profusely, the unfamiliar servant turned and bolted for the kitchen, taking the rake with her. Lowren looked down dubiously at the pile of soiled rushes, but no doubt someone would get back to it soon enough.

  “You’ve frightened her off, you good-for-nothing individual.”

  Bibbs stood right there, eyebrows climbing in speculative manner.

  “Wot damme. Forgive me sire, but that was one sweet young thing.”

  “Well, don’t get your hopes up too high, Bibbs” Lowren’s tone was pleasant, even humorous.

  People brought into the household very often married out of it—when they were of age, and if
they were of a mind to, and if there was no moral, social or legal encumbrance to say otherwise.

  “She seems a bit young yet, my fine fellow.” Garvin slapped Bibbs hard on the back in sympathy.

  Kann, Thoma and Garvin had headed straight for the rear wall and their habitual long table where they were close to the fire and could see everything coming and going. It was a good habit for desperate men, as one might say.

  “Ale, the man said. What about wine? Or even strong liquor.” Thoma shook his head in disgust.

  Bibbs followed along at a relaxed pace.

  “Ye shall have all you can hold, trooper, or I perhaps have failed to understand our master’s temperament after all.” Garvin was looking around, and his eye fell on a pale oblong box made of some soft, light wood, perhaps poplar.

  It was always there, on the shelf over the hearth.

  There was a catch on the side and it opened up to the game with its dark and light triangles, a word he would have cheerfully acknowledged that he couldn’t even spell. He got up and ambled lazily over.

  “’Gammon, anyone?”

  Kann pulled an adjacent bench closer, on the opposite side, and having put his back to the table, lifted his aching feet to the seat.

  “Oh, damn.” He sighed, putting his elbows up and crossing his hands across his stomach. “Home at last.”

  It was the morning of the third day, just as the skipper had foretold, and none too soon for one such as Kann. Holy, Mother of Aphrodite—he hadn’t been seasick or anything, but three days and three nights on a ship were almost worse than three days and three nights on horseback. As for three days and three nights on foot, that was another thing entirely.

  Which, to be fair, he had never actually done. It wasn’t a fair comparison, but you had to have something.

  There was always something, wasn’t there?

  “Mother must be about here somewhere. It’s awful early in the day for her to retire.” Lowren turned his back and strode off.

  Just outside the main arch lay the stairs to the upper chambers.

  The wooden keep was typical, a stout outer wall, and a tower with a small footprint but built to a commanding height for strength and security. One or two more men wandered in, with the party’s horses all cleaned and combed and pastured. One would think they had the tack sorted out and hung up.

  Kann pursed his lips and grimaced. Some of the younger ones were so eager to avoid him, they’d be going around to the back door of the kitchen. But he’d been away for a few days and they tended to slack off when the Serjeant at Arms wasn’t around. He’d been a bit shocked, upon arrival, by the state of one or two things. His mind reeled with exhaustion sometimes.

  Not for the first time, he wondered aloud if he was getting older.

  There were grins and nods as the other men sagged at their seats.

  They listened to Lowren’s footsteps going up the old oaken treads and then it went quiet again when he came to the first upper floor level.

  “Mother? Mother?”

  They heard him moving around up above.

  “You have to admire that, eh, gentlemen. Lowren’s never been afraid to be seen hugging his mother.” Garvin bit his lip. “I suppose we could have found worse.”

  Thoma’s eyes were drooping. He’d had the night shift as watchman on the forepeak of the ship. With land looming off somewhere in the darkness ahead, he’d been tense with the expectation of running aground. There was no way in Hades that he could have ever fallen asleep. Far better to stay awake and suffer, knowing there was a reward ultimately in sight. As it happened, he’d spotted land in plenty of time and the helm had steered for port with little or no fanfare. They’d only been a few degrees off.

  His lean and lugubrious face broke into an uncontrollable yawn just as the pair of swinging doors from the kitchen to the great room opened and a small procession emerged. It was strange to have to fight your own face like that, or so thought Thoma.

  He’d fought everything else over the years.

  “Ah.”

  There were two young girls in the lead, bearing flat trays with mugs and larger steins for those that would use them. The next girl carried two carafes, presumably with ale aplenty inside of them. Behind that came the cook, rather unusually for her. Perhaps she was bored and wanted the news, thought Thoma.

  He grinned as the first girl, Senia or whatever, (he thought that was right) made a beeline right for him.

  “You know me too well, my dear.” She shyly plonked a stein down in front of him, and handed over a small piece of linen from a stack held under her left arm, hand-embroidered in the arms of Lowren and all of those Lemnian kings before him.

  “Enjoy, sir.” She curtsied and side-stepped, seeking out Garvin, who sure looked like he could use a drink about now.

  Kannn had somehow contrived to be served first and he sipped appreciatively.

  “Well. That helps.”

  The next maiden was a bit more buxom. Thoma had always appreciated the view of a nice cleavage. This one was worth keeping an eye on. She leaned over, pouring out the cool, foamy amber fluid. She may have been aware of his scrutiny, and he studied the reaction closely. While it was her everyday costume, she seemed to present with a certain flair when he was around.

  A man could always dream, after all.

  “Enjoy, Thoma.” Her eyes were downcast, demure, and yet there was something in her voice.

  He raised the cool mug.

  Not a superstitious man, still, there were times.

  “To Neptune, and thanks for the fair weather.”

  Her eyes came up and she smiled.

  The head of foam rolled down the sides. In a moment, his beard and mustache would smell like that. It was the sort of smell you could go to bed with, as he had always said.

  “Thank you, thank you kindly.”

  The other girls and boys put the platters down along with some knives, some salt. There was a loaf of the sweet, dark Lemnian bread, some butter and some cheese, and this and that and the other thing.

  ***

  “Hello, Mother.”

  “Lowren.” She had been standing in front of the hall mirror, just at the top of the stairs and a prized household possession.

  “Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest of them all.” He stood there grinning.

  Her eyes lit up and she turned her face. Lowren bent in close and gave her a kiss on each cheek. She pushed him back and took a long look. He could call upon ten thousand warriors and yet he would always be her little boy. There was just no shaking her.

  He was surprised by how thin she was becoming. They’d been gone a little over two weeks and perhaps that was the difference. She was all new to him, after the jumbled impressions of the sea, and lands far and wide. He hadn’t seen her this clearly in a while.

  “So. Is it true that Vaeomon will come in with us?” Vaeomon was King of the Sicurri, who roamed the far distant steppes to the north and the east of the great sea.

  The Sicurri consisted of fifty thousand households, according to their King.

  “Yes, that’s what he said, Mother.” Lowren had conducted several secret embassies, leading them in person in order to demonstrate the seriousness of his intentions.

  It would also speed up negotiations, which were always necessarily slow, with important documents going back and forth by dispatch for scrutiny and counter-suggestions.

  With his fellow barbarians becoming rather wary of written treaties signed by people who seemed to be remarkably well-equipped with the forked tongues of serpents, a face-to-face meeting was always better. They had cut their thumbs and mingled their blood, and performed other ceremonies of a rather unsettling nature.

  “Speaking of which, where’s the mail?”

  “I put it in your chamber, on the desk.” Sylphie looked at her very tall son, the eldest.

  Her second-born had died courageously, as she had always expected he would, at the battle of Salamandria. In order to win his spurs a
nd to set himself off from his older and more illustrious brother, Normanric had taken a band of men at arms, The Company as he called it, and gone off to serve the King of the Jungthurgi, a kin-tribe related to their own. Normanric was swept away by plague on distant campaign against one of the Great Khan’s possessions to the distant east. It was the beginning of the end, and after Salamandria, the Jungthurgi had ceased to exist as an independent nation. Her second son had died trying to prevent that. It was something she told herself often, and now the future looked grim indeed. And yet Lowren—Lowren was different.

  Lowren was special, in that men loved him and looked up to him, and yet he seemed so unaware of his great gift.

  A mother couldn’t say such things to her children. They might learn it on their own, or perhaps never. But you could never really tell them.

  Grief always came with such thoughts. For the sake of others she always hid it as best she could.

  “Thank you. Was there anything that looked particularly important?”

  “Just the usual posts, dear.”

  He grinned on hearing it. She was the only one in the kingdom who could get away with calling him that. He had never thought to try to get her to call him anything else, although sire or King would be nice once in a while. The truth was that he always called her Mother and wouldn’t think of calling her Sylphie in that informal and very sophisticated way that he had heard some people’s children had.

  Lowren, his own belly rumbling somewhat, as thirsty as any other man, went off to grab the letters and see if there was anything particularly urgent.

  A day or two of rest, and then they must be off again.

  Time was short and there was much to do.

  Chapter Eight

  The safest place for the more confidential dispatches was right at his side. Lowren had a man detailed to carry his official pouch, which he took pretty much everywhere on business. The hunt, taking place on a weekend, was state business of a kind, mostly because he was a king.