The Bastard King by Dan Chernenko

Author:Dan Chernenko [CHERNENKO, DAN]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781101498217
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2003-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Chaos in the camp. The racket a little while before had been bad enough. Anyone who hoped to sleep would have had a hard time of it. Now the endless moans of the wounded - and their shrieks when surgeons set about trying to repair their wounds - were joined by a sudden chorus of outraged shouts. And those shouts didn't ebb. They spread over the whole encampment like wildfire, getting louder and more furious at every moment. Running feet were everywhere, too. All at once, no one in Grus' army or Hirundo's seemed content to walk anywhere.

At first, the shouts had been wordless - expressions of raw, red rage and horror. Little by little, though, men started yelling one king's name or the other's. And they started using a word that, when connected to any king's name, meant nothing but trouble and worry and sorrow ahead for the realm the man had ruled. They started yelling, "Dead!"

Up till then, it had been possible to ignore the racket, especially for someone who wanted nothing but food and rest. But hearing the word dead connected with the name of Grus and with the name of Lanius proved impossible to ignore, even for the most detached, scholarly individual in the whole encampment.

With a sigh, and with a look of regret aimed at the bread and dried meat he wouldn't be able to eat, at the cup of wine he wouldn't be able to finish, and at the inviting cot he wouldn't be able to fall into any time soon, King Lanius got to his feet and ducked his way out through the tent flap and into the night.

"What on earth is going on around here?" he demanded of the first soldier he saw.

He expected an answer. He might have gotten an excited answer, an angry answer, even an incoherent answer, but he thought he would acquire something in the way of information. Instead, the soldier gaped at him, mouth falling open. The man's eyes bugged out of his head. "A ghost!" he cried. "Sweet Queen Quelea guard me, a ghost!" He fled.

Lanius said something nasty under his breath. He drummed his fingers on the outside of his thigh. Why me? he wondered. Why do I find the maniacs when all I'm looking for is the answer to a simple question?

The frightened soldier's wails made other men stare his way. He walked toward them, repeating, "What on earth is going on?"

"Oh, by the gods," one of them said fearfully. "It is him. I know his look, and I know his voice, too."

Then they all cried out, "A ghost!" and fled every which way.

King Lanius pinched himself. It hurt. He was, emphatically, still flesh and blood. He hadn't really needed to do any pinching, either; all the time he'd spent on a horse that day had left him saddlesore. Avornan lore said a great many things about ghosts. Some he'd heard from servants, some he'd found poking through the royal archives. Never in all his days had he heard of a saddlesore spook.

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