The Swordsman: Book One of The Everwar by Jacob Peppers

Author:Jacob Peppers [Peppers, Jacob]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-04-02T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Declan had heard about the city of Alderwall since his youth. Not just a city at all but a beacon of hope, a bastion of strength to stand against the savage Keldens of the north. A city as revered as—perhaps even more revered than—Aldheim, the capital itself. It was a place where great legends were born, where heroes were forged.

Alderwall had always been to him an almost mythical place, a place as famed and legendary as those who fought in and around it. And yet, as Declan followed the caravan farther into the city, he found it not to be a place of hope or strength or resolve but instead of…squalor.

Alderwall was, in short, a disappointment, and that was coming from someone who knew quite a bit about being a disappointment. It wasn’t just that he had half-expected walls shimmering gold and crystal like those of some child’s fantasy or that he had expected the cobbles to be made of pure marble from some of the more outlandish stories he and the other children had told each other when growing up. It was that even by the standards of regular cities, Alderwall was…well.

A dump.

It was, in size, considerably larger than the village where the assassin woman had nearly killed him but the buildings were just as crudely made. It wasn’t just that they had clearly been crafted with an eye toward practicality instead of beauty—though that could not be denied—it was also that what was there seemed to be old, perhaps even ancient. There were the buildings, of course, some of which looked like a heavy breath or light kick would be enough to send them tumbling down. But it wasn’t just those.

It was also the men and women Declan saw weaving in and out of streets—if that was, avenues with more cracked cobbles than whole ones could be called streets. He spotted tradesmen, smiths and cooks, cobblers and prostitutes—in short, all those professions necessary to keep a city running and running smoothly. But among those he saw quite a few soldiers, too. And while he was gladdened by that sight—damned hard to fight a war without soldiers to fight it—he was considerably less relieved by the weapons and armor they carried. Weapons and armor that, by and large, looked a hundred years old and more, like antiques that ought to be decorating the mantles of men whose fighting days were long behind them. Or, in some cases, looking like they shouldn’t be decorating anything at all except, perhaps, a midden heap.

It all, buildings and people and road, had a worn look, the men and women they passed not walking so much as trudging down the streets. And worse, the poor state of the buildings and people was not unique to them but also extended to those parts of the wall that Declan could see. Once, stairs and wooden scaffolding had run along the inside of the wall, allowing soldiers and those supplying them with arrows and other tools quick and easy access anywhere along the wall.

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