A Cavern of Black Ice by J. V. Jones

Author:J. V. Jones
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fantasy - General, Fantasy fiction, Fiction - Fantasy, Fiction, Fantasy, General, Fantasy - Series, Epic
ISBN: 076534551X
Publisher: Tor Fantasy
Published: 2009-01-05T05:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-EIGHT

Strike upon Bannen

The Dog Lord stood in silence as his fifth son, Thrago, fastened his armor to him. The plate was thirty years old, bashed in places, its many punctures packed with solder, and its pot-black finish scratched to hell. Vaylo almost smiled to see it. Two stone of case-hardened iron… and it had been with him longer than any friend.

"Not so tight, Thrago. I'm not a chicken to be trussed for the spit." Thrago Bludd looked at his father with eyes that were the exact same shape and color as those of old Gullit Bludd. It gave Vaylo a chill to see them. Gullit Bludd was dead thirty-five years now, yet his likeness was borne by all seven of his grandsons. Sometimes Vaylo thought the Stone Gods had arranged such a thing just to spite him.

He scowled as Thrago tightened the cinches around his waist. Five winters ago this armor had fitted him perfectly; now it rode over his belly like a loose collection of bowls. Damn the thing to hell! Who'd have thought iron plate could shrink?

"You should have Croda forge you some new plate," Thrago said, putting his back into the task of making the runnels meet. "Else use the Bludd armor Gullit had made for his—"

"No." Vaylo's voice was hard. He would not wear that man's armor. Put the knife here, boy, so that it will enter the upmost chamber of my heart. Vaylo breathed hard at the memory. He could still see his father lying on his bench of old black wood, his face shrunk with disease, his eyes bulging with swollen veins. Do it! For gods' sakes, do it! We both know you've dreamt of little else for the past seventeen years. Now, when I finally hand you the knife, you stand there with your balls shriveled to hailstones and a bastard's fear upon you. What's the matter with you, boy? I thought you had more jaw.

That was when the knife went in. To this day Vaylo truly didn't know if he thrust the blade or his father moved forward to take it. It hardly mattered. His hands had been on the hilt. His fingers were covered with the red wetness that gushed from the hole. So much blood… pouring over the bench and onto the floor, running between the cracks in the stone. And his father's eyes… triumphant. He had thought himself rid of his bastard son.

Vaylo rubbed a hand over his face. It had all gone as smoothly as any epic sung by a hearthsinger. Right on cue Arno and Gormalic had burst into the room. He was still standing there, knife in hand, his father choking on his last breath below him. Vaylo hoped very much that he hadn't seen his father smile then, that the stretching of Gullit Bludd's lips was nothing more than a death rictus or a trick of that bloody light. Of all the things that happened that day in the chiefs chamber at Bludd, that was the one thing that haunted him the most.

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