“Temerior, stop it!” she pleaded. “Please! Don’t do it!”
BANG
He gasped back into reality.
Even though he didn’t know where he was, Temerior was relieved by the mattress below him and ceiling above him. When he realised that he was lying on his bed in the monastery, the terrible memories of the black alley turned into bored resignation.
“Here we go again.”
He opened the window’s straw blinds. While the light made his eyes squint, he noticed that the blizzard had stopped. Pale sunlight brightened the snowy landscape and some monks took advantage of the respite to get some fresh air.
After washing his face, Temerior caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Staring himself in the eyes, he had a vague recollection of the time when he could tolerate his own reflection.
Now the sight disgusted him.
Brother Cassidas barged unannounced into the room while he was still chewing a piece of goat cheese. They exchanged condescending good mornings.
“His excellency has sent me to accompany you to the
slosabas.”
Temerior nodded. After closing the belt of his leather pants, he put the ermine coat over a leather jacket and followed the old man. The doublet, the hose, and the codpiece were long forgotten in his baggage. The cold was biting harder every passing day, and there was nobody left to impress.
As he felt his shield of arrogance give in, he figured the accompanying attire would only make him look pathetic (if it had ever achieved anything else)…
Cassidas took him through the narrow stairway that led to the refectory. From the kitchen’s open door, the usual fragrance of onion soup invaded the room. Amidst it, he could still feel the smell of the morning’s baked bread.
Passing through a doorway, they reached the cloister. Groups of monks walked through the archways, talking with serene whispers and calm gestures.
Close to the frozen fountain that adorned the patio, a handful of younger brothers built a snowman. Temerior smiled at their distraction from serving the lord, aware that it would be short lived. Around the cloister, disproving looks already threatened to become prohibiting words.
When Cassidas pushed open the door of the
slosabas, the unmistakable smell of dust and parchment sent Temerior straight back to his university’s library.
Surrounded by cramped shelves, twelve copyist monks toiled away in small desks, their silence broken only by the scratching of their quills. After sparing an indifferent look at the newcomers, they resumed their meticulous work.
“Try not to make a mess.” murmured Cassidas. “If you take a book from the shelves and don’t remember where it was, just leave it. Someone who knows what they’re doing will take care of it.”
Temerior nodded with an obviously ironic smile.
“And don’t disturb anyone.”
A “shhh!” arose from one of the desks.
“It seems you are the one disturbing them.” said Temerior.
Cassidas left, moaning the usual complaints to himself.
“Alright, let’s see what we can find.”
Radalar had asked him for a couple of days to rest and read some journals and letters.
“You should go to the
slosabas and see what they have on the War of ’97. I wasn’t there, of course, but we should have a chapter about it. If my memory doesn’t fail me, there are at least five chronicles that mention the war. They surely have at least one of them.”
Temerior wasn’t completely ignorant about the Second Imerrian War, as they called it now, but he had to admit that he could use some reading on it.
He found the chronicles in a bookcase close to a small window. As the winter light shone on the dust specks, he started opening the tomes.
They had some of the classics from the First Palatian Empire, one or two volumes from the Great Interregnum[1] and a lot on the Second Empire. The Aspian Interregnum was in the bottom shelf.
He slid his fingers through the spines, choosing one of newer bindings.
History of the Glorious Reign of His Highness, King Enrior II of Aspia and I of Imerria. It was Emilar’s father. He was close.
Between that volume and the first tome of the
Filiorid Chronicle, he found
Triumphs, Deeds and Anecdotes of the life of the gracious first Emilar to be king of Imerria and third of that name to rule Aspia. Written by kor
Perior Delanas.
“Ah!” Temerior smiled. “Good old Delanas!”
He had read some of his work when he studied History in Liontas. Despite being an Imerrian knight with barely any education, the man was close to Emilar. As the only first-hand account of most of his reign, his dubiously written descriptions are the best source for those years.
Pushed against the back of the bookcase, there was a thin volume. Out of curiosity, Temerior reached for it.
A Description of the Most Joyous Journey of His Highness, King Emilar I to Imerria on the occasion of the swearing of his son, His Highness, Prince Filior, as Heir of that Kingdom. Written by Rudericor Beranas.
“Hmm… That’s interesting.” He picked it up.
Temerior sat on a small bench that faced an empty table, looking around to see if he wasn’t taking somebody’s place. To his right, he could see a square shape of brighter darker on the floor. It was where the desk he was using in Radalar’s room used to be.
He opened Delanas’ book and went straight to the war. He reviewed the campaigns and the battles, taking notes on old cheap parchment.
The empress-mother of Efa had brought the best armies of her son to bear. Tens of thousands of pikemen and halberdiers, hordes of skirmishers on foot and horse, formidable cavalry, newly-formed harquebusier companies, hundreds of cannons… Even elephants! On the sea, they were supported by enormous galley fleets.
Emilar could barely muster twenty thousand men between his two kingdoms. In the sea, the difference was even greater.
It was speed that saved him.
The empress-mother never thought the king would be able to gather his armies and get them to Eastern Imerria so quickly. Forced to react while her forces were still assembling in Palas, she sent less than one fourth of her men against Emilar.
Temerior did his best to sketch a rough map of Imerria and the surrounding lands. Cartography wasn’t his specialty, but the drawing would help him keep track of the movements.
“The infidels still outnumbered us.” Delanas wrote. “His highness, however, wasn’t impressed by their numbers. He made our disadvantage even worse by ordering
kor Nadlas Altirada and the Holy White Habit to separate themselves from the main force and raze Efarid-held lands. The great-
imikor led his men east, freeing and recruiting aidemist slaves and peasants across the countryside. Those who had pledged their souls to the perfidiousness of Efa were given fire, death and the shackles of slavery.”
Meanwhile, Emilar met the enemy on the field.
“When the moment was right, his highness commanded all of his household knights to charge. I followed the king myself, as we cut through the infidel lines. As they fell to our righteous lances and swords, the sky itself greeted our triumph. The dark clouds parted and the field of glory was covered in golden sunlight.”
It was a victory, but Emilar needed the hundreds that he lost on that day more than the empress-mother needed the thousands that she had wasted on her first move. Her reply was a naval blockade of Firre, cutting the supply lines that came from Aspia.
Emilar replied by effectively occupying all of the Efarid territories in Imerria, letting his army live of the local’s tribute. Soon enough, however, he had a worthy reply for the empress-mother’s ships: his brother-in-law: queen Elianis’ brother, prince Serafal of Hassatriar and admiral of Lassaralia.
King Clas VI of Lassaralia didn’t allow him to muster the realm’s entire navy, but Serafal set sail with his principality’s impressive fleet, mustering privateers while he sailed around Aspia towards Imerria.
The Hassatriarians were experienced seafarers and, together with the Aspian fleets, they managed to break the blockade of Firre. Temerior took note that the count of Mamerron, Radalar’s old lord and Serafal’s vassal, died in the battle.
Delanas wrote:
“His highness was relieved with the victory but, ever prudent, he reminded his lords that the infidel fleet that fought near Firre was inexperienced. The eastern reaches of the Efarid Empire, home of villainous corsairs, could still unleash their horrors on nearer shores.”
And there was still the problem of the seventy thousand troops amassing in Palas. Soon, they’d march into Imerria.
That’s when Emilar gathered some five hundred captured Efarid soldiers and presented them to Serafal.
“Send these to your king.” Delanas quoted Emilar directly. “Tell him that the infidel empress-mother will soon annihilate my armies. When my kingdoms are ablaze, he’ll need all the leverage he can get to avoid the same fate. I send him this gift so that he can negotiate with the evil he refuses to help fight: a token of my regard for a fellow aidemist.”
The Aspian and Lassaralian diplomats began their ball. King Clas didn’t want to give in easily.
The Efarids, on the other hand, didn’t wait for their agreement to make a move. They left Palas.
As soon as Emilar heard that the enemy was on the march, he emptied every granary and retreated to his side of Imerria. Shortly after, the empress-mother crossed the border and met him in the field.
It was a disaster. If it wasn’t for a storm that delayed the pursuit after the battle, she could have ended the war with one blow.
Delanas, of course, blamed it all on Lassaralian cowardice. He gave a vivid description of Clas’shame upon receiving the news. Temerior doubted it enough to chuckle. Feeling the disproving stares of the copyist monks, he carried on with his reading.
After betrothing his daughter Mardari with Filior and securing lower tariffs for Lassaralian traders, Clas marched south with some twenty five thousand men.
The allied kings were still highly outnumbered but they held out, picking their fights and using the enormous size of the enemy’s army to their advantage. Their slow rhythm made them good targets for traps. Their thirst left them vulnerable to poisoned wells. Their hunger thickened aidemist ranks with every ransacked town.
After two years of skirmishes, ambushes and broken sieges, Emilar and Clas couldn’t avoid a clash on the open field. The empress-mother caught up to them near the village of Bederises.
Eager to break the enemy, the Efarid lines charged against walls of pikes and hails of crossbow bolts. Their cannons and harquebuses opened the way with thundering barrages, receiving only the modest salvoes of Emilar’s guns as reply.
As the infantry slaughter bloodied the centre of the field, the cavalry forces traded blows in the flanks. Better-fed and bigger, the steeds of the aidemist nobility gave their riders an advantage. Fighting together, the kings’ guards, the nobles’ retinues and the knights of the Holy White Habit scattered the enemy horsemen. In a frenzied charge, they trampled the exposed flanks of the pike formations.
Delanas gave his grandiose metaphors free reign when describing those moments. Emilar, of course, was a lion. He fought in the front with his men, clawing relentlessly at the infidel lines.
Kor Nadlas was a bull, charging furiously through the field. Serafal of Hassatriar was a stork, proving himself as gallant and fierce in land as he was in the water. Clas was a fox, useful enough, but lingering far from the action.
The chronicle then said that, while the empress-mother committed her reserves, the clouds parted and divine light poured through, just like in the first of Emilar’s victories. Encouraged by the sight of Emilar’s sword shining in the sun as it was brought down on the enemy, his men pushed forward and broke the empress-mother’s army.
The description ended with “his highness won Imerria on that day.”
As the Efarids retreated in disarray, Emilar occupied the Imerrian lands that his father had left unconquered. After signing a ten year truce, he crowned himself lord of the whole kingdom.
“All of his subjects and brothers in faith rejoiced and gave thanks to god. There was nothing but relief and joy among aidemist souls.” Knowing the Aspian envy towards Emilar’s attention to Imerria and the Lassalarian claims to the region, Temerior doubted it a lot.
***
He read some more pages of Delanas’ book, taking notes on Emilar’s stay in Imerria after the war. Temerior figured that Radalar would have his own ideas on how that stay was viewed back in Aspia.
Speaking of the old man’s own ideas, Temerior turned to Berana’s telling of the voyage in which Filior was sworn as the heir to Imerria.
He skimmed through it, stopping when he read the title: “Chapter VIII: His highness halts at Lilanor to attend the wedding of the count’s son.”
Now he’d see if the old badger was speaking the truth.
He hated to admit to himself that he was starting to doubt Radalar’s word less and less…
Did he really hate to admit that? Did he ever really doubt the old man? Well, he did seem like a senile poser at times… But having all that imagination at that age…
What would require a better memory? Remembering a long made-up story without contradictions? Or remembering all those details from several decades ago?
The answer wasn’t here. There was no mention of Filior’s incident in the river. Neither did Beranas account for the appointment of a new companion to the prince.
To be fair… Why would he do it? The whole thing wasn’t a very flattering anecdote…
However, where else would he be able to find Radalar?
The swearing ceremony, of course! Beranas would surely mention the boys carrying Filior’s mantle.
Turning the pages quickly, Temerior saw names of Imerrian villages, castles and cities passing before his eyes. After reading so many of them when learning about the war, he couldn’t help but shudder. Many were devastated by the empress mother a few years after Emilar’s visit.
“Chapter LIV: Prince Filior of Astalis is sworn as the heir to the kingdom of Imerria.”
After accounting for the illustrious audience and the tapestries that were hung on the walls, Beranas went on to describe the prince’s attire:
“His highness had his black hair uncovered and was clad in a steel chest piece engraved with the two castles of Imerria. Over it, his highness wore a black and gold velvet mantle that was carried by three boys of his age.”
There were no names or physical descriptions. “Damn!”
He closed the book. Maybe Delanas made mention of it.
Temerior grabbed his chronicle again and looked for the swearing ceremony. He didn’t even mention the mantle and its carriers.
He had now decided that the old man was definitely lying. It all sounded like tavern talk anyways. Saving a prince, threatening another and getting away with it… Soon, it seemed, having a pretty nun forget her vows! The man had a big imagination and a bigger bottle.
Then again, it was undeniable that he had been chancellor. Temerior had seen his name in a few texts and everyone did call him “excellency.” Was it all really the exaggeration of a boring career?
It all came down to whether
bedarikor Lomasas was wasting his time or not. It bugged him. Could his old master be mocking him?
Mocking was a mercy, really. Lomasas could very well be getting rid of him for good. Not that he didn’t deserve it. Temerior would get rid of himself for good if he had the courage.
Perhaps he should find that courage.
Distracted, he started turning back the pages. He was looking for Delanas’ account of the marriage in Lilanor, if it existed.
Almost unconsciously he was giving Radalar (and himself) one last chance.
There was the wedding.
“During the festivities, his highness picked a boy from the Lassaralian entourage and made him prince Filior’s companion. His name was Radalar Voladas.”
Temerior closed the book and sat still, staring at the dusty shelves.
[1] A period of chaotic political fragmentation between the First and Second Palatian Empires.