A Day of Fallen Night (The Roots of Chaos)

The midnight sun gilded the calm waves of the Ashen Sea. Blood mixed with its waters on the shore, where Wulf wrenched his spear from a corpse with coiled horns and metal hooves. As the wound smoked, he watched the glow leave its eye, an ember turning cold in its socket.

His own eye had puffed shut. What had struck him, he had no idea. He had lost count of the talons scraping at his mail, the beaks striking his helm.

He planted the end of his long axe in the sand. Wheezing from the smoke, he scraped his hair from his eyes and peered towards Bithandun, so tired he was almost drunk with it, swaying. The Silver Hall had not yet fallen, but its roof glowed with fire, and no amount of thrown water could quench it. The wyrms had come for Virtudom, as Fýredel had sworn.

When your days grow long and hot, when the sun in the North never sets, we shall come.

A soldier ran into the sea to put out her burning clothes. For three days and nights, they had battled an onslaught from the Iron Mountains: housecarls, raiders, people of every trade and rank. All Hróthi were expected to be fighters, for theirs was a cruel land, a hard one.

The creatures of the Dreadmount could be slain, but not with ease. Scale like tuff enclosed their bodies. Some had vulnerabilities – places where the flesh gaped, often at the shoulder of the wing – but some were so encrusted, it was hard to find a weak point for a spear or sword to pierce.

He pulled off his helm and cloth mask to breathe, sweltering in his mail and wool. Einlek had commanded everyone to cover as much of their skin as they could, and even Wulf had not been given leave to break the rule. If you go about like some bare-chested berserker, so might others, Einlek had warned him. Set an example.

Wulf had told him about the Inysh plan to move people underground. Einlek would not brook it in his kingdom, except for bairns and those who were too old or frail to fight.

We do not hide in the dark in Hróth. No one sings songs of trembling in tunnels. If we die, we die with blades in hand. We die in a way that will be remembered.

So they fought for their lives in their burning capital, hardly able to tell day from night. They fought, and they fell, and they died by the hundred.

As Wulf tried to rally his strength, a lesser wyrm – a wyvern – swooped along the beach, unleashing fire. He lunged over a wattle fence and landed in a crouch, his body acting before his mind had grasped the threat. The fence burst into flame just as he rolled away from it, and the wyrmling swept its wings, lifting itself back towards Bithandun. Spears went sailing after it, and hails of arrows flashed from the walls.

A gasping cry drew his attention. A woman in mail was running towards him, drenched in dark blood and heaving for breath, with three serpents – lindworms – slithering after her.

‘Thella,’ Wulf bellowed at her, ‘drop!’

The housecarl pitched to the ground. His axe hit a lindworm in the breast, making it howl. Wulf drew his sword and charged.

The shrouded sun was still afloat. No day or night, and no reprieve.

His boot caught on a heavy softness. He fell into a pile of bodies. He was on the flaming deck of the Conviction, and Vell lay there, with tallow flesh and hair like tinder, a melted man . . .

Thella sprang back to her feet and kicked the lindworm with a shout, startling it away from Wulf. It tangled around her ankles and sank its teeth into her thigh as she fell. Grabbing hold of her spear with a furious scream, she plunged the head deep into its body, right through a break in its crust of scale. It bled gouts of steaming tar and collapsed, still coiled around her limbs. She made a small, wet sound as its weight crushed her.

Wulf tried to shake the memories off. Teeth clenched, he wrestled an arm around the beast, trying to heave it off Thella, but the other lindworms were enraged. He wrenched her spear free and swung it wide, almost blind from the soot and dry heat. The lindworms recoiled, only to slither towards him again with hisses like raw meat hitting a pan.

‘Wulf!’

Thrit ran towards them with a throng of housecarls. Mustering a war cry, they circled and harried, striking with axe and shield and spear until the two lindworms lay dead, steam curling from their injuries. Between them, the housecarls got the third off Thella, who coughed blood.

‘Warriors of Eldyng,’ came a familiar voice, pitched at a bellow. ‘All who remain, to me, at the gate!’

A war horn blew. ‘I’ll take Thella,’ Thrit said, pulling her arm around his neck. ‘Get to the king!’

Flame erupted across a roof. Wulf ran towards the blast of the horn, his limbs acting before his mind again. Beneath his mail, sweat drenched his tunic.

The fallen lay thick on the narrow streets, charred and mangled – barely human in death, as on the white ship. (Saint, you have kept me alive, let me crush them.) He picked up a spear, hurled it at a monstrous bird, stopped to reclaim the weapon, kept running.

Einlek was near a gap in the wall. Bardholt had built it with stone, even if Bithandun was timber. He had seen enough forts burned in the war to know when a little more gold was worth spending. The high-ranked housecarls – those who had served Einlek before he was king – had herded the beasts together and found a battering ram to force them out. Not all of them had wings; not all could surmount the wall easily. More survivors were waiting to block the way with whatever they had been able to salvage.

Wulf went to the battering ram. He threw his back into helping wheel it towards the creatures, building up speed until the ram hurtled of its own will to its mark. The din was enough to shatter the ears and daunt even the stoutest heart.

‘Shields,’ Einlek ordered, joined by others, as creatures flocked to attack from the sides. Wooden shields came up to give them something else to gnaw on. A united shout, and Wulf helped drag the ram a second time, first away from the wall, then towards it.

As soon as they had forced the beasts out, the battering ram was wedged into the gap, and the people found barrels, even brought corpses, stacking up as much as they could from the ruins of their capital. Wulf grabbed whatever he could throw: weapons, two oars, a rack that must once have held meat, a table with a broken leg. With so many hands working together, the pile was soon high enough to give the creatures trouble breaking through. Fire archers came to set it ablaze.

‘It’s coming,’ a voice cried. The wyvern was back, and it had them all caught like fish in a net. Wulf looked up, his knees turning to slurry as he remembered Fýredel.

A harpoon ripped into it.

The sound of its screech jolted him free. He stared as it rolled, like a foundering ship, and crashed down on a line of houses, blood spraying from under its wing. A rain from above should have smothered the fires, but where the blood struck, flame sizzled and abounded. On the city walls, a giant of a man took up another harpoon, lips skinned back.

‘Slay it,’ Einlek bellowed, as howls of triumph shook the street. He thrust up his iron arm. ‘For the Saint!’

‘The Saint,’ came the answering roar.

With that command, the Hróthi fell upon their foe, hitting with hammers and stabbing with staves and swords and pitchforks, drunk on their rage and the taste of revenge. They sawed and prised away its scales to reach the sweltering flesh beneath. They swarmed, like the bees that had haunted Wulf for a lifetime.

Yet it was not the bees he recalled as he climbed on to the wyvern. It was a tale he had once heard of needlers, fish that ate flesh, which lurked in certain Southern rivers. A single needler was no threat – but together, they could strip a lion to bone.

****

After that, the fight was over, for a time. When a wyrm fell, it seemed to strike panic into its followers. By dawn, they had all disappeared from Eldyng. In their wake, they had left hundreds dead, and thousands more grievously wounded. The wyvern was decapitated, its head paraded through the streets and mounted on the gate of Bithandun.

The king summoned his housecarls that night, along with those Hróthi who had shown the highest courage during the attack, including the whaler whose harpoon had struck the killing blow.

They ate beneath the broken roof of Bithandun. It might have collapsed altogether if not for a bold group of carpenters, who had climbed up to smother the blaze using the heavy banners from its walls, desperate to save the hall Bardholt built. It was disquieting to see it without the royal heraldry, but at least some of the roof remained.

Ash wafted like snowflakes across the tables, which had seen endless feasting not so long ago. By the light of the low-burning fires, they shared tales of their deeds, raising their cups to those who had ascended to Halgalant.

Hunger was the unwelcome guest. Where food had once been rich, now there was only simple fare, even for the king and his guard.

‘You all fought like the Saint himself today,’ Einlek said, when they had scraped every plate. ‘None more than Góthur Wyrmkiller, whose harpoon felled the beast.’

For the first time, the guests raised their voices in a cheer. Góthur was pounded on the back.

‘In the past, our people longed for a glorious death in battle,’ Einlek called. ‘Now we can only hope to die well for the Saint, and for our best patron, the Knight of Courage, who smiles on us tonight. This may seem a small victory in a rumption, but remember what we did today. We slew a wyrm.’

The cheers rose. Wulf smiled at Thrit, who hitched up a weak one in return.

‘I might replace this throne with that foul creature’s head,’ Einlek said, to raucous laughter. ‘Though he’d kill me for saying it, I think my uncle would agree that a wyvern is a finer trophy than a whale.’

‘Finer,’ someone agreed, ‘but not finer than Fýredel!’

Cups banged on the tables. ‘Aye, his head would make a dread throne.’ Einlek lifted his own cup. ‘We will drink from that horned skull before I sit upon it. I will carve my uncle’s name into his bones.’ The din that ensued would have raised the roof, had there been much of a roof left. ‘Now,’ he declared, ‘a song, to exalt those who dine in Halgalant this night.’

More cheers. Wulf slipped his last scrap of gristly meat to the hound under the table, scratching between its ears. When he looked up, Einlek beckoned him with a raised eyebrow.

He sat alone on that cold skull. As always, his mother was absent. Ólrun Hraustr had fought in the war, but had since become a recluse, tortured by a belief that she was made of ice.

‘I hear you killed many,’ Einlek said, when Wulf was close. ‘I would keep you at my side, but I have another task for you – one that must be yours alone, Wulf. I must send you away again.’

‘I’m starting to think you don’t like me, sire.’

‘Unfortunately for you, I only send people I like into danger. Those are the people I usually trust.’ He flexed his fingers on his battle axe, which leaned against the throne. ‘Have you ever ranged on the Northern Plain?’

‘No.’

‘We have an outpost there, in the Oxhorns. It serves as a waystop for those going east, a safe place to trade with friendly Hüran, and a last defence against those who would encroach into our territory. The Yscals gave us two springalds to defend it,’ Einlek said. ‘Among those who hold this outpost – Járthfall – are many strong warriors. We need every fighter back in our cities.’

‘You want me to get them.’

‘You would have to go through the Barrowmark, but the plague cannot kindle your blood. We also know you can survive the very hardest cold. No doubt there will be wyrms there, too.’

‘I’ll manage.’

‘Good man.’

The task was as a relief. A long ride would test him, but he could escape the fire and foul smoke, if only for a while.

‘I will spare you as much food for the journey as I can,’ Einlek said, watching the others. ‘I would offer you a knighthood on your return, but it seems my cousin has already promised that you will receive one when the war is over.’

‘You’ve heard from Queen Glorian, then?’

‘Yes, a few days ago. She asked me to thank you,’ Einlek said. ‘For the gift of your loyalty.’

Wulf stood very still, realisation unfurling its feathers.

‘She plans to be crowned soon, now the heathen Eller is gone.’ Einlek smiled coldly into his goblet. ‘My cousin is a Hraustr. If that Yscali greybeard thinks he’s going to gain any power over her, he will taste both our blades.’

‘Aye, sire.’ Wulf cleared his throat. ‘When should I set out?’

‘Dawn will do. I want those fighters back as soon as possible. The whaler struck a lucky blow today, but if there had been more than one wyvern, we may not have saved Eldyng. Our foe was also not as large as Fýredel, or its heinous siblings.’

‘Siblings?’

Einlek drank from his cup of mead. ‘Heryon Vattenvarg wrote to me,’ he said. ‘There are at least two other great wyrms – one like ironstone, one grey. The Southerners call the former Dedalugun; the other, the Ments call Orsul. There is also at least one that crosses between the North and the East, which we Hróthi have named – Valeysa. I suspect they fly here as we speak.’ His knuckles blanched. ‘Meet me in the stables. For now, Wulf, drink your fill, and laugh. This day will be a song.’

Wulf nodded. As he turned away, he concealed a smile. He had never expected to be a father, least of all to a daughter he could never claim, but the thought still made him warm.

Glorian must be relieved, but nervous. The thought made his smile fade. Happy though he was that none of it had been in vain, he already feared for her, being with child in a time like this.

When the healers arrived, the drunk housecarls bedded down for the night, weary to the bone. An unconscious woman was borne in, her insides peeping out of her belly. One man had an unhinged jaw, and another had been so deeply clawed that he screamed as the healer dabbed honey on the ruin of his skin. Thella coughed into a rag.

Thrit was in the corner with one arm under his head, clean bandages around his middle, two fingers splinted. ‘How’s your shoulder?’ Wulf asked, sitting beside him.

‘Fine.’ Thrit was looking past the ceiling. ‘Calling this a war is like a lamb calling the shambles its battlefield. It’s dead before it even smells the blood. Queen Glorian is right – we should be finding places to hide.’

‘You know that’s not the Hróthi way.’

‘If this goes on, there won’t be a Hróthi way.’

Wulf agreed, but in silence. He could no more convince Einlek to hide than he could tuck the midnight sun beneath the sea.

They slept under the sky. Wulf woke to almost the same light, finding Thrit still asleep. The cocks never crowed in the summer, but he had trained his body to know when it was morning.

Outside, the welkin was a queer yellow, the sun washed pale. In the silence, people were no longer celebrating, but loading corpses into carts that had once burst with fish and cloth. Einlek met him at the stables, where his ostler was tending to a muckle Inysh destrier, white with a grey mane

‘So many dead,’ Wulf said. ‘Will you burn the bodies, sire?’

‘They’ll be weighted with stone and dropped in the sea. Their bones will endure, but the plague will not spread.’ Einlek patted the destrier. ‘Wulf, this is Prúth, one of my uncle’s favourite steeds. He has been to Járthfall before, and his coat should help you pass unnoticed. You have as much food as he can carry. He’s yours when you return.’

‘My king.’ Wulf took the reins. ‘This is too generous.’

‘Just come back alive. If you meet the Hüran, be wary. Some tribes are affable enough; others will attack on sight.’ Einlek gripped him by the shoulder. ‘Get my fighters back.’

‘And just where in Halgalant are you going?’

Wulf turned to see Thrit stood at the door, arms folded.

‘Thrit,’ Einlek said. ‘Wulf is leaving us for a time.’

‘Forgive my intemperance, sire, but fuck that,’ Thrit said grimly. ‘We’re down to four in our lith. Where Wulf goes, I go.’

‘Thrit, you can’t,’ Wulf said. ‘I’m going through the Barrowmark, to the Norther—’

‘I don’t care if you’re going through the Womb of Fire,’ Thrit told him, eyes flashing.

‘Let him go,’ Einlek said, before Wulf could gainsay. ‘Thrit, you made an oath to your lith, and I’ll respect it – but if you catch this bloodblaze, I do not expect you to return. We can’t have it spreading any farther than it has.’

‘It will never enter Hróth through me.’

‘Good.’ Einlek nodded to the ostler and gave Prúth a last stroke. ‘Perhaps this is a task from the Saint, so you can all be reunited.’

‘Sire?’

‘Karlsten and Sauma are both at the outpost,’ Einlek said. ‘I sent them to bolster the ranks.’ Wulf and Thrit exchanged a surprised look. ‘Saint go with you. When you return, you will find me still fighting.’

He left in a sweep of cloak. Wulf mounted Prúth, while Thrit was handed another horse, grey as fog.

‘Can’t believe you were trying to sneak off without me, Wulfert Glenn,’ he said darkly. ‘Don’t you know by now that a lith belongs together?’

‘If I ever forget, I have you to remind me.’

They rode out of the city, side by side. Had they looked back, they would have seen a small Inysh ship on the horizon, fighting against the Ashen Sea to reach the smoking shore.