"If one is to teach, one must first learn." — Sebastian I of the House of Corvin
The Song of the Son
By Lucas Ithsarryn
Stratham born and Stratham bound,
A noble House on common lands
Lord and peasant sharing ground,
A nobleman with calloused hands
No need for gilding, no love for gold,
Flock and family, the same
A son of the people, raised to uphold,
The House of Corvin's righteous name
Taught with hammer, rake and saw,
The tools of a working man's trade
Schooled in letter, blade and law,
Lessons learned and foundations laid
Spit of his sire,
Tall and dark, bravest of folk,
A leader, true noble fire,
Stripling, matured to sturdy oak
Sebastian shifted uncomfortably in his dress uniform, watching a room full of lords from a secluded corner as they mingled about the large, lavish banquet hall. The heads of many of the various human trade houses insisted on hosting these affairs in an attempt to reinforce the idea of their own so-called nobility and to outdo one another with their extravagance. Their current host, the Lord of Fort Davas, Edran Adderly, stood out as the undisputed leader in the race for petty recognition, not only hosting the most frequent banquets, but also the most lavish. Sebastian found the sheer decadence utterly disgusting.
While his father was the head of House Corvin and lord of the city of Stratham, the man shared little else with these gilded, self-important fools. In the tradition of his house, Raen Corvin had always been a hard-working man who devoted himself wholeheartedly to the betterment of his town and people. Raen's two children, Sebastian and his older sister Seliece, had grown up with the same values. Unlike many other trade house children, they did not sleep in velvet beddings, nor did they eat from silver plates or routinely dress in silks and jewelry. Like their ancestors before them since the dawning of the new Age of Challenge, they worked the fields and trades alongside the very people who owned them. Raen always maintained that it was their house's responsibility to understand the needs of those who looked to them for leadership through first hand experience.
Dressed in an enchanting yellow silk gown with her blonde hair piled high atop her head, a young woman in her early twenties drifted across the room and sidled into the chair next to his with an amused smile.
"Why so dour, little brother?" she inquired, tugging teasingly at the snug collar of his dress tunic, "Your noblewear getting too tight for you?"
Sebastian swatted her hand away with false anger, unable to deny his sister's sharp eye and sharper wit. Although he was just past seventeen winters old, Sebastian was the spitting image of his father. He stood over six feet tall, with the same dark hair and gray-hued eyes, as well as the lean, solid musculature only a lifetime of labor could produce. The cuffs of his sleeves and pants hung short and he wore his jacket open for no reason other than the fact that he could no longer button it across his chest. Where the outfit had been tight the last time he'd worn it a year and a half ago, it now bordered on ridiculous.
"It's not the clothes, Seliece." he grumbled, flexing his shoulders and stretching the material just shy of its tearing point in annoyance, "I hate these parties. Why did father insist we make an appearance? He's never done it before."
Seliece chuckled knowingly and clasped his arm under the banquet table with a slender but work-hardened hand.
"There's something going on, Sebastian." she revealed, casting a subtle glance past him to an assembly of gathered lords which included their father, "Adderly's been approaching the other lords, looking for their fealty."
Sebastian's scowl deepened under the dark hair that hung just above his eyes. Edran Adderly's ambition was well-known throughout Larocia, as was the ruthless manner in which he pursued his goals. Sebastian understood now why his father had felt the need to attend tonight.
While House Corvin was not a rich house and most lords could not fathom why they generally shunned the trappings of nobility, Raen was well-known and respected as a man of intelligence and integrity. Whatever Lord Adderly had planned, it was no secret that House Corvin would be opposed. While Edran tempted the other lords with displays of affluence, Raen talked sensibly to them, explaining the folly of such short-sighted self-interest while quietly gauging just how much influence Adderly had acquired. A good ruler is an informed ruler, he'd always said.
"Oh, no." Seliece groaned quietly, rolling her blue eyes exaggeratedly as she noted the approach of a tall, blonde-haired young man dressed in rich purple velvet and lace.
Reeking of arrogance and rich cologne, Kavas Adderly, Edran's only son, sauntered directly up to Seliece with a lascivious glint in his dark eyes.
"And who might you be?" he inquired boldly, draining a nearly full glass of Laulciir wine and leering across the table at her, "A guest of House Corvin, perhaps? You should share your company with real nobility, not that pack of farmers and sheep herders."
Sebastian forced his hands not to clench into fists. Although Kavas was more than half a decade his elder, he was not intimidated. Where Sebastian had the healthy physique of a laborer, Kavas was gangly and pale, the result of a life of opulence and luxury.
Seliece folded her arms across her chest.
"I am a Corvin." she declared resolutely, glaring at him.
Kavas' expression turned sour for a moment then proceeded into disdain.
"Oh, I see." he yawned drunkenly, "I should have recognized you by the calluses on your hands."
"Rightly so." she replied, unimpressed, "A far cry more than anything you've ever earned, Kavas."
His lips tightened and his face flushed in outrage.
"Stratham scum." he swore viciously, deliberately spitting on the bodice of Seliece's dress.
No strangers to defending themselves, both Sebastian and Seliece jumped to their feet, although he proved to be the quicker of the two. Angrily, he grabbed two fistfuls of Kavas' fine purple suit and shoved him to the floor. The entire room stopped and the lords and all the members of their associated entourages gaped in stunned awe. From a crowded table, Lord Adderly pulled himself from near-constant scrutiny of Raen and noted the exchange darkly, his mouth turned down and his knuckles white around a golden, wine-filled goblet.
Kavas staggered to his feet, his face doubly flushed, and glared fiercely at Sebastian.
"You'll regret this when I'm king." he snarled spitefully, spinning on his heel and irritably shaking off a pair of Adderly servants who moved to help him.
Sebastian blinked in surprise. King? There hadn't been a king in Larocia since the last Age. The towns were so spread out, no one person could hope to control them all.
As Kavas slunk back into the crowd, Raen efficiently made his way through and hooked his thick arms around his children's shoulders, guiding them toward the door.
"I fear we may have overstayed our welcome." he stated knowingly in a low tone as the three made a hurried exit into the night.
Within minutes, they mounted up and started on the dark road southeast back to Stratham. They traveled at a quiet, leisurely pace, as if out on a feast day exercise with the horses, with a full, silvery moon overhead to light their way. Sebastian found the lack of conversation deafening. He couldn't help but regret his breach of conduct and every second of silence weighed heavily on him.
Fountain - Talus, Larocia
"I'm sorry." he blurted, knowing full well that he had forced them to leave earlier than his father would have preferred.
Raen shook his head softly with a bemused smile.
"Never apologize for standing up for what's right, Sebastian." he counseled, "It was no real loss to leave that banquet early. Under other circumstances, I would have avoided it altogether."
"Yes." Seliece smiled devilishly, "Besides, if you hadn't knocked him down, I would have."
Sebastian kicked his horse into a trot and pulled up next to his father.
"You went there looking for answers." he said, feeling an anxious pit growing in his stomach, "I think I know what's going on. Kavas said something . . . "
"I know." Raen nodded gravely, keeping his eyes focused on the road ahead, "But that isn't going to happen. We won't let it happen." |
|
Sebastian looked to his sister who nodded in steadfast agreement, but the feeling inside him would not settle. They spent the rest of the ride home in silence, pensively considering what the future would hold.
After a day and many hours work in the fields since their return to Stratham, Sebastian tumbled into his modest bed in Corvin manor utterly exhausted. He lay perfectly still, his body drained, but sleep refused to come. His mind kept replaying the events of the previous night over and over. He remembered the sheer hatred in Kavas' voice, the arrogance in his eyes. Such a man could never be king. Kings were kind, heroic and intelligent men from ancient Larocian history. He couldn't even begin to imagine an Adderly as king of all Larocia.
Temple of the Three Orders -Talus, Larocia
He drifted for many hours, late into the night, until his bedroom door flew open and Seliece rushed in, crouching down close to his bed. Her hair was disheveled and she wore a shirt of chain mail with her longsword belted around her waist.
Instinctively, he sprang out of bed and went for his own weapons and armor in alarm.
"What? What's happening?" he demanded.
"Marauders." she panted, breathless, "Scores of them. Father's already organized the peacekeepers and met them at the gate. Meet me outside."
As Seliece ran back down the stairs, Sebastian hastily pulled on a pair of sturdy boots and donned his chain mail shirt. He could hear the sounds of fierce combat outside, concentrated at the gates. Who could these marauders be? And how had so many of them organized together in the region and escaped notice?
He rounded the corner with his claymore drawn and headed for the stairs where a dark-clad man armed with a curved blade was just reaching the top. Sebastian kicked the invading soldier in the chest and followed him as he fell backwards down the stairs. Pausing only long enough to drive his sword into the fallen man's chest, he continued past him outside and into the street.
The chaos that greeted him outside was beyond belief. They were everywhere, humans dressed in non-descript black, swarming all over town. Screams cut through the darkness all around him as townsfolk fled in every direction only to be brutally slain by the bloodthirsty men. Scattered Stratham peacekeepers put up isolated resistance, but they were outnumbered and falling by the minute.
A bandit burst from the doorway of a nearby house, spurting blood from a fatal chest wound, and Seliece followed close behind, disheveled, but none the worse for wear. Bounding over the fallen man's body, Sebastian hooked a strong arm around her waist to catch her as she stumbled weakly against the doorjamb.
"We can't keep this up." he lamented, cutting down another invader, one-handed, as he ran past.
"We have to." she responded, pulling herself to her feet and pushing off him toward a group of fleeing townspeople.
The three of them, a man and two little girls, all froze when they saw her, too frightened to think.
"This way!" she shouted to them, beckoning with her sword, "Head for the swamp!"
Sebastian ran to her and intercepted the attack of another marauder, blocking an overhand stroke with the length of his blade.
"What are you doing?" he asked over his shoulder, smashing the black-clad soldier to the ground and cleaving his head from his neck in a single, sweeping motion.
"They have taken the gates. The only way out is through the swamp now. Mother and Father are already at the south wall helping people escape."
Sebastian nodded and gestured toward a cowering family of four hidden in the mouth of a dark alleyway, urging them to follow. As he and Seliece fought their way through the chaos, they collected more than three dozen townspeople and furtively guided them toward the south wall. The fighting was significantly lighter on this end of town with most of the raiders either scouring the houses or surrounding the gates, but they kept low and moved in short, rapid bursts just in case.
The siblings found their parents behind the stable at a low point in the southern palisade with half a dozen of the few remaining Stratham peacekeepers and a score of terrified townspeople huddled around them, desperate for escape. They had overturned a cart and stacked hay bales under it, wedging it up against the wall to create a climbable slope. Their mother rushed forward and hugged them both tightly in relieved greeting. Atop the small mountain of hay bales, their father nodded reassuringly to them over his shoulder as he carefully lowered an elderly woman to the ground on the other side of the wall. Like their children, both were worn from constant fighting, but seemed to have weathered so far without serious injury.
Down the road, a group of five raiders spotted the exodus and charged with weapons leading. Sebastian and Seliece spread out on either side of their father and the peacekeepers filled in the gaps between them in a rough semi-circle protecting the townspeople. Raen spun around the first attacker's strike and cut him down with a heavy blow. Sebastian and Seliece paired up against another one of them, while the peacekeepers kept the other three busy.
As townspeople went over the wall in a steady progression of twos and threes, more soldiers centered on the area, alerted to the escape. Five more joined their fellows, closing around the Corvins and their people with deliberate, predatory steps.
Raen swung his weapon aggressively, forcing the leading marauders back while his wife rushed the last of the townspeople over the wall.
"Go." He commanded Sebastian and Seliece over his shoulder as he deflected a lunge aimed at his midsection, "Take your mother, see that the people reach the road to Merriton safely."
Sebastian and Seliece pulled back and allowed the peacekeepers to fall in, flanking their father protectively. The pair wasted no time running up the overturned cart to the top of the wall and lowering their mother down on the other side.
Sebastian paused after helping his sister down and looked back on Raen just in time to see the sword of one of the raiders pierce his side. The man grunted in pain and slapped the weapon aside a fraction of a second too late, clapping his hand to the wound and continuing to fight one-handed. Instinctively, Sebastian wanted to return and defend his father, but he knew that would be a mistake. In the distance, he could hear more marauders converging on the area and understood that staying behind would accomplish nothing. He had been given a task and needed to achieve it for the good of his family and his people.
Sebastian turned back and dropped down to the ground outside the wall, rolling to absorb the impact and coming up next to Seliece and his mother. They stood at the trailing end of a column of fleeing Stratham citizens that stretched haphazardly into the murky, night time swamp. Ushering the two women before him, Sebastian ran with them down the hill, forging into the tall, spiky grasses and bubbling, stagnant water.
A thick bank of cloud cover swept across the moon, obscuring most of its light and making their journey that much more treacherous. The skin over Sebastian's ears tightened in the gloom, every splashing footstep seemed to echo in the darkness, but he knew they couldn't afford to take the time for stealth. It wouldn't be long before the raiders followed them into the swamp. He stepped on something heavy and slightly yielding floating in the water and stumbled. His mother caught his arm and froze at the same instant he recognized what he had tripped over.
It was the body of a man, a Stratham citizen who had been pierced through the chest by two thick crossbow bolts. Squinting, he discerned more corpses in the murky darkness, dozens of them, bobbing just above the surface of the brackish water. His heart stopped as the simultaneous clicks of three crossbows being fired echoed into the night. He lurched desperately, diving for his mother and sister as the volley of bolts screamed in. Three sickening, meaty thuds resounded in the still air and his left thigh exploded in pain as he sprawled in the fetid water.
He lay perfectly still, gritting his teeth against the pain and fear. He didn't dare cry out to his family for fear of exposing them or himself. The bowmen were near, but likely as near-blind as he was. He could hear them moving, patiently sweeping through the darkness. Supporting himself mostly on his right leg, he stayed low, skimming through the shallow water with his claymore in his trailing hand. He remembered hunting with his father not long ago, how the man had taught him to move with the lay of the land and approach from an advantageous angle. He never imagined at the time that he would use that knowledge against human prey.
Two of the bowmen were close together, advancing slowly and scanning a broad span before them. Sebastian crept up behind them with the cool surety of a serpent and lunged. He slashed the first bowman across the back on the upswing then brought the blade down across the second one's crossbow before he could turn and fire. Bereft of his weapon, the man went down within seconds. Water splashed nearby, far closer than Sebastian had expected, as the third bowman whirled on him. Sebastian burst forth, dragging himself desperately through knee-deep water to cross fifteen short feet between them that had become an impossible expanse. Time slowed to a painful crawl as the marauder raised his weapon and took aim. Sebastian's wounded leg collapsed beneath him and he hurled his sword with every ounce of strength he could muster, hoping to at least spoil the shot. The crossbow string sang and a foot-long shaft of wood slammed into his chest, punching clean through his chain mail shirt and wedging between two ribs.
All strength left his limbs and his mouth worked soundlessly, bringing a froth of blood to his lips. He could only stare in shock as he collapsed forward, spilling a crimson cloud into the water. Alongside scores of his murdered people, Sebastian, the last son of Corvin, sank slowly into the swamp and then into darkness.
- From the Book of Sebastian |
