Lord of Mountains: A Novel of the Change by S. M. Stirling

Author:S. M. Stirling
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fantasy
ISBN: 9780451464767
Publisher: Roc Hardcover
Published: 2012-09-03T14:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THE HIGH KING’S HOST

HORSE HEAVEN HILLS

(FORMERLY SOUTH-CENTRAL WASHINGTON)

HIGH KINGDOM OF MONTIVAL

(FORMERLY WESTERN NORTH AMERICA)

NOVEMBER 1ST, CHANGE YEAR 25/2023 AD

The High Queen’s party cantered forward, her banner of the Lidless Eye taking the breeze beside the triangle-and-delta of the Grand Constable’s; another lance carried the Crowned Mountain and Sword of Montival between them.

Royal squire Huon Liu spat aside to get the harsh alkaline dust out of his mouth; tens of thousands of shod hooves and hobnailed boots had ripped the thin sere grass of late summer here on this stretch of the Horse Heaven Hills, and the few rains hadn’t been enough to lay the light volcanic soil beneath. Dust blew tawny about the fetlocks of the horses, and the rays of the westering sun behind them turned it to a mist of gold all along the front where the armies had met and clashed and parted since dawn.

“Grit gets right into your teeth, doesn’t it?” Lioncel de Stafford said quietly.

“Yeah,” Huon said.

He gave his friend a look; the dust of a hard day made him seem older and Huon was struck again with how much he looked like the Grand Constable, which was sort of odd when you thought about the…

Complex, Huon decided, pleased with his own sophistication. Complicated.

…complex family arrangements. Though you never knew how much of the rumors were true…Thinking about some of them was enough to make you shift uneasily in the saddle at the sinful images. Rather intriguing sinful images, at that; he was dolefully sure that “impure thoughts” were going to figure in his next confession, which was sort of doubly embarrassing when they were sinful thoughts about your friend’s mother, of all people.

It’s easier to be brave in company, though, he thought, and went on quietly:

“This is it.”

“Yup,” Lioncel said. “The jugglers and tumblers and dancing dogs have done their acts, the tables have been carried out, the floor swept, all the dancers are in place for the Grand Volta and the music’s about to start.”

“Dust and Sweat Pavanne with Scrap-Metal Accompaniment,” Huon said, and Lioncel chuckled.

Elsewhere the din of onset sounded where the great hosts came together in an embrace of desperate violence as they had all day, but in this space and moment on the northern flank the mutter was a far-off burr; Huon felt his brain stutter as he tried to take in how big this battle was. Half a continent was here, with edged metal in its hands and murder in its heart.

Beneath the distant surf-roar was the creak of leather and clatter of metal from the royal party and the hard clopping thud of hooves bearing the weight of horse-barding and metal-sheathed rider, and beneath that the same sound from so many thousands more at a little distance, turned into an endless grumbling rumble that you felt up through your seat in the saddle as much as heard.

The High Queen looked over her shoulder and grinned, her white teeth flashing in the shadow of her raised visor, the black ostrich plumes rippling above.

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