The Serpentwar Saga: The Complete 4-Book Collection

As more soldiers rode past, Stefan shouted, ‘I warn you now, brother: when I ascend to the Baron’s office, I’ll be nowhere near as tolerant as our father. If I catch a glimpse of you or your mother at any public function, I’ll have you arrested so quickly your shadow will have to search to find you.’ Without waiting for a reply, he viciously dug his spurs into his horse’s flank, causing the high-spirited gelding to leap forward into a fast canter, then a gallop, so he could overtake his younger brother.

Then the main detachment of soldiers approached, followed by the Baron’s carriage. As they passed, the riders moved at a steady canter, but the carriage slowed. When it was almost upon Erik, the curtain of the carriage closest to him was pulled back, and he could glimpse a white face peering through the gloom at him. For a moment, father and son locked gazes, and Erik felt a sudden rush of confused feelings. Then all too suddenly the instant passed, and the carriage rolled away, the driver using the reins to urge his team of four ahead, to overtake the escort.

Erik stood puzzled and angered as the following troop of soldiers approached. He had expected to speak at last to his father, not merely share a momentary glimpse.

As he turned to leave, the last rider reined in and said, ‘Erik!’

He turned to see Owen Greylock dismounting. Forgetting courtesy, Erik vented his anger. ‘I thought we were friends, Master Greylock, at least as much as rank permitted. But you had me traipse through the town to this place so that Stefan could insult and threaten me, and my father peek out from his warm carriage at me!’

Greylock said, ‘Erik, it was your father’s request.’

Erik put hands on hips and took a deep breath. ‘So it was his idea to have Stefan as much as tell me to leave the barony?’

Greylock led his treasured mare to where Erik stood, and put his hand on the younger man’s arm. ‘No, that was Stefan’s impromptu performance. Your father wished to see you one last time. He’s dying.’

Erik felt unexpected emotions break to the surface, panic and regret, all viewed somehow at a distance, as if the warring emotions were taking place within someone else’s breast. ‘Dying?’

‘His chirurgeon warned against this, but with the Prince’s death, he felt the need to attempt the journey. Borric has named his youngest brother, Nicholas, to succeed his father, until his own son, Patrick, is of an age to rule the Western Realm. Nicholas is an unknown; everyone expected Erland to take the post. It could be a fair political bloodbath in Krondor this week.’

Erik knew the names: Borric, the King, and Erland, his younger twin brother. Patrick was the King’s eldest son, and by tradition one of the two should have taken the office of Prince of Krondor, but the intrigues of the court meant little to Erik.

‘He asked me here so he could catch a glimpse of me as his carriage sped by?’

Greylock squeezed Erik’s arm for emphasis. ‘His last glimpse of you.’ He removed something from his tunic. ‘And to give you this.’

Erik beheld a folded parchment being handed him by Greylock. He took it and noticed it was free of any stamp or seal. He unfolded it and began to read. ‘“My son –”’

Greylock interrupted. ‘No one is to know the contents but you, and once you are done, I am to burn this. I will stand away while you read this to yourself.’

He led the horse away, while Erik read:

My son, If I am not yet dead when you read this, I soon shall be. I know you have many questions, and no doubt your mother has answered some. I am sorry to say that I can give you little more than that, and less satisfaction.

When we are young, we feel passions that are but faint memories when we are not very many years older. I think I did love your mother, when I was very young. But if so, then that love, like memories, faded.

If I have any regrets, it is that I could not know you. You were innocent of your mother’s and my indulgences, but I have responsibilities that cannot be set aside because of my regret over a youthful indiscretion. I hope you understand and realize that whatever life we might have imagined as father and son was an impossible illusion. I hope you are a good man, for I am proud of the blood that flows in both our veins, and would hope you honor it as well. I have never publicly denied your mother, because at least I can allow you a name. But beyond this I can do little else.

Your brother Stefan will be set against you in every way. My wife fears any threat to her son’s patrimony, and if it is any comfort to you, I have paid a price for remaining silent before your mother’s accusations. I have shielded you and your mother more than you might know, but once I am gone, that protection will vanish. I urge you to take your mother from the barony. There is a growing frontier along the Far Coast and in the Sunset Islands, and opportunities for a young man of ability. You could make something of yourself there.

Leave Ravensburg and Darkmoor, and make yourself known to one Sebastian Lender, a solicitor and litigator with an office at Barret’s Coffee House, on Regal Street in Krondor. He will have something there for you.

I can do no more. Life is often unfair, and while we might wish for justice, it is usually an illusion. For what it is worth, you have my blessing and my wish for a happy life.

Your Father

Erik held it in his hands a few moments after he had finished, and at last he held it out to Greylock. Owen took the parchment and produced one of the elegant flint and spring-loaded igniters that were all the rage among those who smoked tabac. He struck a series of sparks until one lodged in the parchment, and blew it to a flame. Holding the parchment by the edge, he let the flame grow until it engulfed the document. Just before his fingers would be burned, he let the parchment float away, rising on its own heat as it was consumed.

Erik felt empty. He now realized that whatever he had expected when summoned to this lonely spot, it had been something more than this. His attention returned to Greylock as the Baron’s Swordmaster mounted. ‘Was there anything else?’

Owen said, ‘Only this: he urged you to count the threat as dire and take the warning with the most gravity.’

‘Do you know what that means?’

‘Not by his words, Erik, but I’d be a fool not to guess. It might be considered a wise thing if you were on your way to a new home when we return from Krondor. Stefan has a temper that blinds him and a dangerous nature.’

‘Owen?’ Erik said as Greylock made ready to ride on.

‘What?’

‘Do you think he ever really loved my mother?’

Greylock looked startled by the question. He paused, then said, ‘To that I cannot speak. Your father was a man to hide much within. But this I can tell you: whatever you read in that missive take to heart and count an honest telling, for there is no deceit in the man’s nature.’

He rode off, and Erik found himself alone. Then he began to laugh. Everything in his life had stemmed from a deceit. Either Greylock was a poor judge of his lord’s nature, or Otto had reformed his ways after deceiving Erik’s mother. But to Erik it was of little significance which was the case.

Unsure of his own feelings, he began the trek home. But one thing he knew: Greylock would not take the time to underscore his father’s warning if it wasn’t real and deadly. For the first time in his life, Erik considered leaving Ravensburg. He laughed again at the irony of no more than a month’s having passed since word returned from the guild that it had approved Nathan’s registration of Erik as apprentice.

A bitter taste of tin filled Erik’s mouth, and his stomach knotted as he moved through the twilight. His desires were few and his needs simple, yet it seemed fate had decreed them to be impossible.

Not knowing what he could possibly say to his mother, he walked like a man three times his age, each step slow and deliberate, his shoulders bent under an incredible weight.

• Chapter Three • Murder (#ulink_c883caec-6a40-5b0f-bc84-c8f5db5ca46c)

Erik halted.

The sound of so many horses’ hooves pounding on the cobbles nearby was unusual in Ravensburg. He put down the bundle of clothing he had tied a moment before, and set it upon the trunk containing his mother’s personal belongings.

The sound was definitely louder now, and Erik knew a group of riders was heading for the inn. He glanced at Milo, who was speaking softly to Freida on the other side of the kitchen. The decision to leave Ravensburg had been difficult, and to Erik’s surprise it had not been his mother who objected. She seemed resigned to never realizing her girlhood dream of her son’s being legitimized by his father. It was Nathan who had been the most vociferous in urging them to stay. When it was clear they were leaving, he bade them travel to the Far Coast. He spoke in almost reverent terms of the nobles of the Far Coast, Duke Marcus, cousin to the King, and his own Baron of Tulan, who had done everything in his power to aid those who had suffered in the massive destruction of the Far Coast at the hands of pirates a quarter century earlier. Stefan’s threats were repulsive to Nathan, whose view of the responsibilities of the nobility to the commons was at odds with the experience of most of those at the inn. All Milo would say was that nobility in the West was vastly different to that in Darkmoor.

Erik and Freida had been gathering up their belongings, making ready for the morning coach that would take them west to Krondor. Erik was to call at the Hall of the Guild of Smiths with a letter from Nathan, explaining that his leaving the forge at Ravensburg had nothing whatsoever to do with his skills. It explained more of the situation than Erik was comfortable with having known by strangers, but Nathan had assured him the guild was like a family. The letter urged the guild to find Erik a position somewhere on the Far Coast or in the Sunset Islands.

The sound of horses entering the courtyard of the inn caused Freida to cast a worried look Erik’s way. It was only two days since Greylock had burned Otto’s message, but still she was worried that Stefan might act prematurely to harm her son.

Erik opened the door to the rear courtyard and found twenty men in the baronial livery dismounting, Owen Greylock at their head. ‘Master Greylock, what is it?’

Erik half expected to hear Owen say they had come to arrest him, but instead the Baron’s Swordmaster took Erik by the arm and steered him away from the soldiers. ‘Your father. He suffered another seizure. We turned around yesterday afternoon, and now we must stop. His chirurgeon says he will not live to reach Darkmoor. He’s being taken to the Peacock’s Tail’ – the most lavish inn in Ravensburg – ‘and the rest of the men will be quartered in the other inns around the town. Another company rides all night to Darkmoor to fetch the Baroness. Your father will not live more than a few days.’

Erik felt surprisingly devoid of any feeling at the news of his father’s impending death. The message from him had made whatever childish fantasies about the man evaporate, to be replaced by a distant image of a man unable to do the right thing by a common woman and his own child. The closest feeling Erik could muster was pity. At last he spoke. ‘I don’t know what to say, Owen.’

‘Have you given thought to our last conversation?’

‘Mother and I are leaving tomorrow morning.’

‘Good. Keep out of the town square tonight, and see you are on the coach when it leaves. Stefan and Manfred are understandably distressed, and there’s no telling what that hothead Stefan’s capable of doing. As long as the Baron’s alive, he’ll probably remain close at hand, so if he doesn’t catch sight of you, all should be well.’ Glancing at the soldiers, he said, ‘I will stay here, with this guard, until I’m summoned to the Baron’s side.’

Erik knew that Greylock had intentionally chosen to bring his own contingency of guards to the Inn of the Pintail, against the possibility of trouble, and he said, ‘Thank you, Owen.’

‘Just doing as my lord would want, Erik. Now go inside and tell Milo I need all his rooms.’