The Thunder King (Bell Mountain) Read online

  “Nobody human. Oh, there’s folks here and there who come by now and then and do things for me. And there’s my dog, but he’s out hunting in the woods.”

  “So you live here all alone? Aren’t you afraid?”

  She laughed. Ryons soon noticed that she laughed a lot, sometimes for no reason he could see.

  “Why should I be afraid?” she said. “I’ve been here longer than the bark on the trees. Besides, I’m going to die on the first full moon of autumn. Would you like a bit of cake?”

  So she was mad, that was it. The Wallekki believed mad people were touched by the gods, and treated them with great respect—unless they were violent; then they killed them. But usually there was nothing to fear from such a person.

  “Yes, please,” Ryons said.

  It wasn’t bad cake, and she had plenty of it. Someone who lived a few miles away had given it to her. “I can make my own,” she said, “but it tastes horrible. Tell me—how did you come to be lost, and where are you lost from?”

  “I’m lost because I don’t know how to find my way around in a forest. I was a slave with some Wallekki, and I ran away. That’s how I got lost.”

  Merry Mary chortled. “Lies, is it?” she said. She threw back her head and guffawed, revealing toothless gums. “Don’t look so surprised! I can always tell when someone’s lying. And who might you be but that same King Ryons that I’ve heard so much about? I’m surprised Helki the Rod didn’t teach you better woodcraft. He must be getting careless.”

  “Do you know Helki?” Ryons asked.

  “Known him since he was a boy like you. And he knows me—we’re friends. Only now that he has an army and a castle to play with and a king, he doesn’t come around here anymore.”

  “I’m trying to go back to him. Do you know the way?”

  She chuckled and leaned toward him with her chin resting on her hands and her hands on the cane. Ryons thought she looked like a vulture waiting for something to die. Maybe he ought to be afraid of her, he thought.

  “Listen to me, boy!” she said. “I knew you’d be coming to me; I had dreams about it. I have dreams about a lot of people, and they usually come true. Everybody knows it.

  “You can’t go back to the castle: that’s what my dream told me. You have to go to Obann and get there as quick as you can. I don’t often have a dream quite like the one you were in. I dreamed I saw the city burning—me, who’s lived in the forest all my life and never seen a city. But I dreamed that you would come to me, and I would send you on to Obann. And I don’t even know where it is!”

  She cackled over that, almost falling off her rickety chair. But it chilled Ryons. Had God sent her that dream—or had it just popped into her head because she was crazy? Was God speaking through this mad old lady, as He spoke through Jandra? Obst could have told him “yes”: Scripture spoke of such a time, when God would pour out a spirit of prophecy on those who were lowly and despised—and woe to the proud and mighty ones who wouldn’t listen. But Obst had not gotten around to teaching him about that, and he had no way of knowing that Obann itself was full of such prophets these days.

  “I have a dog. His name is Cavall,” Mary said. “He’s very smart, understands every word you say to him. He’ll go with you to protect you. Helki thinks he’s put down all the bandits, but there are still a few of them on the loose. You’ll need Cavall.”

  “But he’s yours! And you’re all alone—”

  “Pooh! I’ll show you.” Mary pursed her lips and let out a surprisingly loud whistle. A moment later, a big black crow flew in from the doorway and landed on the little wobbly table next to her. She stroked it and fed it some cake crumbs.

  “I’m not alone,” she said. “I’ll be just fine: it’s you who’ll be in danger. Anyhow, seeing as I’m going to die in a few months, Cavall won’t have any reason to stay here anymore.”

  “But how will I find the way to Obann?” Ryons cried. Things were going too fast for him.

  “Ask people for directions! Once you’re out of the woods, everyone you meet will know where Obann is. It’s famous.”

  I never should have left the castle, Ryons thought.

  CHAPTER 12

  The Survival of the Temple

  It took some doing, but at last Lord Gwyll persuaded his wife to go with Nanny to their eldest son’s country house—and to leave the very next morning.

  “She can’t go by herself,” he said, “and Allyk will be glad to see the both of you. You don’t want to see the poor old thing hanged, do you? Let her do her prophesying out in the country, where no one will care.”

  To that Rhianna had no answer. There was precious little time to think of an answer. For people were leaving the city, slipping out like rats. Rhianna knew how the High Council worked. They would not give Nanny a second chance; and if the Heathen didn’t stop people leaving the city, the oligarchs would. Everyone would be needed to fight fires.

  “My mother told me it’d never be easy to be a soldier’s wife,” Rhianna said, forcing a smile. “It won’t be the first time we’ve been miles apart while you fought battles. But after all these years, it still isn’t easy.”

  “I’ll make the arrangements,” Gwyll said.

  “And I’ll make our supper,” said his wife.

  In another day or two the multitudes of the Heathen would be encamped around Obann. They’d crossed the river yesterday, the whole vast horde of them. They’d captured every boat and barge in Cardigal and made a thousand rafts. Hundreds of warriors drowned, but tens of thousands crossed to the north bank. And Gwyll had just ten thousand men to hold the city—all that could be called up from the provinces.

  There would be no marching out to offer battle to that Heathen host, Gwyll thought. Even with bad generalship, the enemy’s numbers would prevail. It galled him to have to sit on the defensive behind the city walls, but there was no other strategy open to him. Obann had water from the river and a two years’ supply of food. If the enemy could maintain a siege longer than that, starvation would do what troops and catapults could not.

  Gwyll prayed for a hard winter.

  The Temple was among the most ancient buildings in Obann, and by far the biggest. It had been added onto over the centuries: city blocks demolished to make room for expansion, stories built on top of older stories, cellars and tunnels dug in all directions. There were ways into the Temple, and ways out of it, known to few among the living.

  Lord Reesh had replaced Martis with a spy named Gallgoid. The man hadn’t killed as many people as Martis had, but he was more well-traveled and better educated, and he knew the ways and byways of the Temple even better than Martis.

  Between them Lord Reesh and Gallgoid selected a chamber in the Temple cellars where anything might be done in secrecy, and where a secret tunnel ran under the city walls and into the bowels of the Temple. These were details not included in most plans of the Temple. Reesh doubted there was any set of charts that revealed the whole plan of the Temple.

  Now, in the middle of the night, Reesh and his chosen successor, Prester Orth, waited in that chamber. It was a dark and stuffy room, far underground, unrelieved by decoration. Somewhere nearby, water dripped monotonously.

  Orth shivered, but not with cold. Reesh had told him the purpose of this night’s work, and his mind was still digesting it.

  “If you’re getting squeamish, Prester, you’d better say so,” Lord Reesh said.

  “It’s only natural, First Prester,” Orth answered. “You can rely on me.”

  “There are times when we must do things that appall us,” Reesh said. “Just remember it’s for the preservation of the Temple. That’s the only thing that matters.”

  “Of course, Excellency.”

  After what seemed a very long wait, they heard footsteps outside. The door creaked open, and two cloaked and hooded figures entered. The room was lit by a single fitful lamp and another lamp carried by one of the new arrivals.

  Gallgoid shook off his hood. He was an unremarkable
man, which made him good at what he did. People who saw him every day would be hard put to remember him.

  “Greetings, First Prester,” he said. “I bring you Mardar Kyo, emissary of the Thunder King.”

  The second man took off his cloak and hood. Gallgoid had provided him with ordinary Obannese clothes, but this man could never have walked the streets of the city without turning heads. Short, squat, and powerful, with the shoulders of a wrestler, his head was shaved clean except for a strip of bristly white hair down the middle of his scalp. He wore copper plugs in his earlobes, which had caused them to stretch nearly to his shoulders, and his eyes were like hard coals.

  “Welcome, Mardar Kyo,” said Reesh. “This is Prester Orth, who will be First Prester after me.”

  The mardar bowed stiffly from the waist. “I give you the greetings of my master, the Thunder King, lord of all the world.” Kyo spoke Obannese, but in a fashion that sounded like the speech of an enchanted reptile, or so Orth thought. “I congratulate you on your servant.” He nodded at Gallgoid. “He blindfolded me, as agreed, and led me by a devious route, all without offering the least discourtesy.”

  “I am an old man, Mardar Kyo, and not strong,” Reesh said. “Let’s proceed at once to the object of our negotiations.”

  “Certainly. I am here to discuss with you the surrender of your city, and the terms.”

  Orth shuddered. Should word of this unauthorized transaction ever reach the ears of any of the ruling oligarchs, he would be hanged just for being in this room. How they would punish the First Prester didn’t matter.

  “On your part,” said Kyo, “you will open the city to our troops at a time and place agreed upon; and you will make submission and obeisance to my master, the lord of all the world. This Temple, and all the treasure in it, you will surrender to my master—including the image of your god, which will be transported to his castle at Kara Karram.”

  Reesh cleared his throat. “Mardar, we have no images of God,” he said. “It is against our law to fashion any images of Him, or to worship before any object made by human hands or any natural object. This is one of our most ancient laws, and we observe it strictly.”

  “Hmm! I’ve heard something of this,” the mardar said. “And it’s true that when we took your city of Cardigal, we found no image of your god. Of course, we presumed you kept it here in this Temple. How do you worship a god you cannot see?”

  “We have done so for thousands of years,” Reesh said.

  Kyo pondered that. “When we burned the temple that you had in Cardigal,” he said, “the priest refused to come out. He and all his assistants remained inside, singing sacred songs until it was all consumed by fire. It was like nothing I have ever seen before. And yet you will surrender to us this great Temple!”

  “On the condition that the Temple survives!” Reesh said. “And that the servants of God continue to serve the Temple and carry on all our business as before—but under your master’s overlordship. In return, we’ll pay him reasonable tribute.

  “Your master cannot but gain by this, Mardar Kyo. Unless we open the gates of Obann to you, you’ll find our defenses formidable indeed. The entire populace has been organized into fire-fighting teams. We have an inexhaustible supply of water and provisions to withstand a very long siege. Our soldiers are better equipped than yours and better trained; and they will have the advantage of fighting on their own ground for their lives.

  “Besides which, even if you take the city by force, what would it profit you to take a burned-out heap? If your fires fail to destroy Obann, our leaders are themselves prepared to destroy the city utterly and perish in the ruins, rather than let you have it. Would you not rather have Obann whole, as a great jewel in your master’s crown, than as a worthless desolation?”

  Reesh knew it was the barbarians’ dream to sack the city, take its people into slavery, and become rich and famous for it. He knew little of the Thunder King; he didn’t even know the man’s true name. But he supposed that the Great Man desired nothing so much as to feed his greatness and that the surrender of Obann would be a powerful temptation to him.

  “You may extract all the wealth that you desire from the city,” Reesh went on, “but you must guarantee the survival of the Temple. It’s in your master’s interest. Surely you can see that.”

  “I will surely consult with my master, the lord of all the world,” Kyo said. “You must understand that I had not expected this. It will take some time to decide. Meanwhile, the fighting will commence. It would be a grave error for us to try to hold back our troops, once they see the city.”

  “As to fighting, the city is prepared,” said Reesh. “By all means, consult your master. I am sure he’ll see the merits of our proposal. The city intact will be worth much more to him than the city in ruins.”

  “Yes, of course,” Kyo said. “But all the other peoples conquered by my master have surrendered their gods to him. How will you surrender yours?”

  Reesh took a long time to frame his answer. The question raised up issues he had debated with himself all his life. He chose his words with care.

  “Mardar Kyo, this may be difficult for you to understand; but our God has no substance in this world, even though we believe this world has its substance in Him. We cannot surrender Him to you because we have no handle on Him.

  “No man has ever seen Him. He is invisible. He is nowhere, and yet He is everywhere.

  “But for practical purposes, mind you, in terms of the realities of this world, the God of Obann is the Temple. This Temple is the only approach to Him that the people have. So if we surrender the Temple to your master, and acknowledge his ownership by paying tribute to him, we will have gone as far as it is possible to go toward surrendering our God to him. If he owns the Temple of Obann, he owns the God of Obann. But if he destroys the Temple, then he will have let God slip through his fingers.”

  It was all Prester Orth could do not to cry out. What blasphemy was this! And yet it was nothing more than many high clerics in the Temple believed. He supposed he believed it himself.

  Kyo bowed, this time with both hands folded on his breast.

  “I understand your position,” he said. “I will let you know when we have an agreement.”

  They parted with suitable amenities, and Gallgoid led the mardar out of the chamber. Lord Reesh collapsed, panting, onto the only chair in the room.

  “You’ll have to help me to my bed, Orth,” he said. “This business has stolen away all my strength.”

  “Of course, Excellency.” But first Orth would have to pull himself together. His legs threatened to buckle under him. He leaned against the nearest wall. “First Prester, did you mean what you said about the Temple being God? If the people should ever hear of it …” He couldn’t finish the sentence; the thought was too terrible to put into words.

  Reesh sighed. “When you’re an old man, Orth, and have served the Temple for as long as I have, you’ll find that the faith that drew you to her in the first place has long since ebbed away, and you didn’t even know it.

  “What is God? Does He even exist? It’s been a long time since I knew the answers to those questions. But the Temple exists. The Temple must live on, even if all the rest of Obann perishes. Obann without the Temple isn’t Obann.

  “If this Thunder King is half the man I take him for, he’ll be shrewd enough to realize that if he destroys the Temple, he won’t destroy God. No—all he’ll do is turn God loose among the people, not bound to this Temple anymore. Not bound to us, not bound to our interpretation of the Scriptures. God will be free. The people will be free to make of Him anything they please.

  “Whether God exists or not, He has been God in this land since time began. If He is cut loose from the Temple, there’s no telling what form He’ll take. If you think we have a plethora of prophets now, that’s nothing. Imagine what we’d have without the Temple to control it.”

  He leaned back in the chair and gasped. His face went pale. Orth helped him out of th
e chair and spent all his strength getting him back to his bed. There Reesh fell into a fitful sleep before he could be undressed and changed into his silken sleeping robe.

  “We are all surely damned, First Prester,” Orth said, although Lord Reesh couldn’t hear him. “Even so, it’s better than being burnt alive in the ruins of the Temple.”

  He could not pray that night, nor any other night for a very long time afterward.

  CHAPTER 13

  The Walls of Obann

  Cavall was a big dog, bigger than Ryons himself. Big and brown, with curly hair, massive jaws, and big feet, he looked perfectly capable of taking down a bear and devouring a horse. He came home in time for supper, which for him was a bowlful of mush—the same supper Mary served herself and her guest. A well-brought-up person would not have eaten it, but Ryons did.

  “Eat up; it’ll give you strength,” Mary said. “It’s mostly venison, with a bit of possum to give it flavor. The hunters ’round here like me to make it for them, especially in the winter.”

  After their meal, the old woman made a clucking noise and the dog came and sat in front of her.

  “Now listen, Cavall.” She spoke to it as if it were another human being. “This is Ryons, the boy from the dream. You remember me telling you about it. Tomorrow you must go with him and lead him out of the forest so he can get to Obann. Your job will be to guard him. Stick with him, and don’t let him come to any harm.” She put her hands on the dog’s large head. “Don’t scruff it up—you hear?”

  Ryons could have sworn the dog nodded.

  “You can set out first thing tomorrow morning, Your Kingship. I’ll give you some bread to carry along, and Cavall will hunt for you until you get the hang of it. I see you didn’t think to bring any weapons. That was foolish! I can let you have a knife, but I wish you had a bow and arrows.

  “You sleep with Cavall tonight. Sorry, but I’m too old to sleep on the floor, so you can’t have my bed. Anyhow, you might as well get used to sleeping with him. You’ll be thankful to have him around, before long.”