Episode 86

Chapter 1 of the Winter's Heart Saga

Part I

A Note on Sources - The most part of the following chronicle is drawn from documents by the individual known as Corvath of Danwoode. These extraordinary records were generously made available to the author by an individual who wishes to remain anonymous; he has my sincere thanks. Certain supplementary details are taken from the chronicles of Gilliam Drakkar, bard to the good ship of that name. Although Gilliam himself did not accompany his shipmates on that fateful expedition, his transcription of their first-hand accounts (remarkably free of drunken embellishments) was invaluable in filling out and corroborating Corvath's story. My thanks to Dr. James Crape of the University of Ottawa's Antirrian Studies Department for his scholarly assistance.

The road from the royal city of Clinton to the coast wound along the edge of a great, dark forest. The forest began where the farms surrounding the city ended, and the road hugged its outer boundary all the way to the mountains which marked one boundary of the kingdom. At the mountains the road ceased to be the King's Road, and once it began to climb through the one navigable pass through those cruel, foreboding peaks, travellers had to take their chances with whatever persons or things dwelt among its stones and crevices, without hope of assistance from representatives of the Crown.

Actually, if anything nasty happened to you anywhere along the "King's Road", you were pretty much out of luck, although at least you or your next of kin knew who to complain to.

Separated from the point where the royal road entered the pass and ceased to be royal by a short, rolling meadow, lay an Inn. It was a pleasant and picturesque spot most of the time, if a bit rough, with a view of the dark forest, the blue mountains, and the road winding back to the city. But now the Inn, the meadow, the forest, hills and road all lay buried beneath winter's snows, which had come several weeks sooner than anyone could remember their coming, and had struck with a cruel ferocity completely out of experience.

The Inn's door banged open and three travellers strode in. They immediately commanded the attention of the others in the room. Their dress alone betrayed them as outsiders - a peculiar combination of luxury and rough, functional economy, in brocaded fabrics and leathers from more countries than most of the others in the drinking room had even heard of. Their walk also revealed them as sailors - albeit sailors with nearly-frost-bitten toes - and the swords hung on their belts - which one didn't have to be a smith to see were the finest available anywhere in the known world, and perhaps the unknown - suggested they were perhaps not the most honest sort.

But from their expressions they seemed disinclined to cause trouble - they showed signs of relief so profound it bordered on reverence. The one in the middle sucked in an enormous lungful of the musty, liquor-tinted air and exhaled, with all the exuberance of a city-dweller at the sea-side.

"An earthly paradise," he declared, "Thank your deity of choice!"

He was taller than his two companions, with a shock of improbably-arrayed yellow hair and a neatly trimmed moustache of slightly darker colour. He was rakishly good-looking, of the sort to make virtuous damsels swoon and the more experienced check their schedules. The others both sported longish hair and considerably heavier packs, but there the similarities ended. The one on the right was slightly stout with brownish hair; he looked like he could probably talk the salt out of sea-water, and make it feel lucky for the opportunity. The one on the left was of medium build and well-muscled beneath his tunic, with black hair and the air of someone who found whatever was going on just vaguely amusing.

"It's warm, dry, and serves alcohol," said the one on the right, "Close enough."

At this point they were confronted by a stocky, nearly-bald man of later years, whose marked resemblance to a blacksmith immediately identified as the Inn's keeper.

"Ah, Innkeep!" said the one in the middle. "You have no idea how relieved I was to come upon your establishment. It's not fit for man, beast, nor government employee out there."

"Aye," responded the innkeeper, "You be wantin' a room then?"

"If you've got one," said the one on the right.

The innkeeper hummed and scratched and spat, and then conceded that he did, in fact, have a room for them, if they had no objection to a rather cramped attic.

"Perfect," said the one on the left, "Can you get on the roof from there?"

The innkeeper observed he didn't care what they did, so long as they didn't knock holes in anything and paid in advance.

"An admirable attitude," said the one in the middle. "Callen, arrange everything, will you? And, " he added to the innkeeper, slapping a handful of coins into his palm, "send over two bottles of whatever it is you usually keep hidden from sight. And whatever's on the menu."

The innkeeper, far too experienced in the ways of the world to express surprise at the number and quality of coins in his hand, grunted.

As Callen, the one on the right, started the delicate process of negotiations, now made rather more difficult by his friend's generosity, the other two looked about for a place to sit. For such an isolated inn on an inclement night, the room was surprisingly packed. The only space that would accommodate them was a table in the corner of the room, whose sole occupant was an aged, monk-like man. A plate of cold, grey potatoes sat beside him, and he seemed to be poring over some kind of map.

"Excuse me," said the tall blond man, "may we join you?"

The old man looked up, startled. He had a pleasant, genial face, which lit up delightedly when he saw that it was in fact himself who was being spoken to.

"Of course! Of course, of course," he said, unnecessarily moving things around to make room. The newcomers sat themselves down.

"It seems extraordinarily busy here tonight," said the tall blond man, "My name is Ross, by the way, and this rather stringy pork chop here is Maximillian."

"Max", Max corrected.

"Corvath, Corvath of Danwoode," said the monkish man, shaking their hands enthusiastically. "Yes, it is a full house tonight. This rather freakish winter storm stranded or inconvenienced many travellers, myself included. I take it you're bound through the mountains?"

"Yes, back to our ship," said Ross.

"Oh! You're sailors?" Corvath sounded delighted.

"Highland Corsairs," Ross replied suavely, "of the Good Ship Drakkar."

"Pirates, really," said Max.

"Max."

"Well..."

"How fascinating!" Corvath did not seem the least perturbed. Quite the opposite, actually. "What brings you so far from the ocean?"

Some of the buckle fell out of Ross' swash. He looked back to where Callen, in the process of haggling, had a comradely arm around the innkeeper's shoulder.

"Our ship," said Ross darkly, "was impounded."

"Impounded!" said Corvath. "The English law is attempting to exact retribution for some past escapade of yours, I imagine? The sinking of a war galley, the raid of a colony? An indiscretion with the wrong wealthy merchant's daughter?"

A short, hollow laugh escaped from Ross's lips. "Nothing so prosaic, I'm afraid."

"Callen didn't send in the registration fee," said Max.

"For SEVEN CONSECUTIVE YEARS," added Ross.

A look of bewilderment crossed Corvath's face.

"Let me explain some of the intricacies of modern privateering," said Ross. "Most sea-going nations, as you are no doubt aware, have a great list of laws which must be observed and duties which must be paid, if you are to be allowed the privilege of flying their banner from your mast. Most of these laws and duties are, needless to say, a great deal more trouble than they're worth."

"For you," interjected Corvath.

"Well, from a strictly capitalistic standpoint, I'm the only one that matters, aren't I? However, for independent businessmen such as myself and my crew, there is fortunately an alternative. Certain nations are more than willing to allow entrance to their merchant fleets, including the right to fly their banners, in exchange for an annual sum which is negligible in comparison to the taxes and general harassment imposed by England, or France, et cetera. It's a rather reasonable arrangement - a land-locked nation such as Antirria gets a nominal merchant fleet and makes a profit selling something otherwise useless to it, and entrepreneurs such as Max, Callen and I get the convenience of having a perfectly legal flag to fly when entering ports, as well as complete lack of interference from a meddling government."

"So," Corvath interjected again, "you pay the Kingdom of Antirria to let them use their banner as a flag of convenience."

"Precisely," said Ross, "Only, as Max pointed out, Callen has in recent years neglected to forward the necessary gold and paperwork to the necessary persons. As a result, when we put into port a couple weeks ago and went ashore, when we returned we found the ship gone and a rather stern note from an Antirrian bailiff."

"But you're pirates, aren't you? Rough men of adventure?"

"Highland corsairs," Ross corrected.

"As you will," said Corvath, "but, what I mean to say is, why not simply seize the ship back from the bailiff?"

"They wouldn't tell us where they took it," said Max. "Bastards."

"Yes," said Ross, "the Antirrians obviously know what sort of people they sell their flag to. We never saw the actual bailiff, either, and all of this was related to us by the harbourmaster after a nominal amount persuasion. I swear to the moon and stars, Max, if those Antirrian pigs touched even a drop of our private stock -- "

At that moment Callen arrived, plunking two large, wide-bottomed bottles of some unidentifiable liquor down on the table.

"All set," he said. "Dinner's on the way. I was able to convince him that that absurd amount of clink you passed him was supposed to be for the whole deal. Oh, and I lifted his purse, too."

He bowed to Corvath before sitting. "Callen Drakkar, your servant, sir."

"We were just relating our recent difficulties to Corvath here," said Ross as Callen produced a quartet of tankards, seemingly from thin air.

"I suppose he tried to pin the whole thing on me?"

"Well...," said Corvath diplomatically.

"Ross is a festering, pustulant sore of lies and deceit," said Callen, pouring a strong-smelling and oddly viscous liquid from one of the bottles. He offered the first tankard to Corvath, who waved it away, then passed it to Max. "I deposited that stuff yearly at the outpost on Paltru."

"Well, at least that's what you had Gilliam write in the books, anyway," said Ross, accepting the next cup with relish, "But it didn't make it to the King's coffers. At any rate, it soon became clear our only recourse was to journey to Clinton and, unthinkably enough, actually pay the damned fees. As much as the idea of actually paying for something honestly repulsed us all - with a penalty on top of it all, can you believe it? - that's what needed to be done. So the three of us got pulled for the job. I, because I'm the ship's nominal captain - we're a democratic economic collective, in truth, but you always need a figurehead - Callen, as procurement officer and the one responsible in the first place, and Max because... er... "

"Because I never get to leave the damn ship, that's why," said Max. "I'm always up in the crow's nest."

"Yeah, but you get to hold the spy-glass," said Callen.

"True."

"And you were out with the rest of us when the ship got impounded," said Ross.

"Well, I needed to get another tattoo. It'd been a couple months."

"At any rate," said Ross, "we did manage to get the matter cleared up, at only a slightly preposterous cost, which we managed to make back in the marketplace and taverns anyway. So at this point, with a warm hearth at my back, a drink in my hand, and only four days journey back to port, I'm willing to chalk it all down to future hagiographical material."

"Uh... about that four days journey back to port thing...," said Callen.

Ross lowered his cup. "Callen?"

"This storm's made the mountains nearly impassable," said Callen, "The pass is locked up tighter than a nun's knees. They're sending one party with a guide through at a time. That's why it's so packed in here, all these people are waiting for the next train to go through."

"It's true, I'm afraid," said Corvath, "I arrived here earlier this afternoon myself. I'd hoped to get to the towns on the other side of the mountains by tomorrow morning, but as the innkeeper told your friend, it's impossible."

"Blast," said Ross. "How long do we have to wait? And most importantly, how much more is this going to cost?"

"I already fixed it up," Callen said, winking. "The last group went out this morning, and the guide should be back here by tomorrow at sunset. We'll go out in two days."

"It's not a bad place," said Max, "We can hang out here for a while. Hey, they got our room in the attic all set up?"

"According to the innkeep," said Callen.

"Right," said Max, "I'm gonna go check it out."

"Dinner's on the way," said Callen.

"Save me a hank of something." He swigged the last of his tankard and rose from the table. "Be down later."

He ambled away and headed for the stairs. Ross leaned conspiratorially towards Corvath as he went.

"He's going to try and figure out how to get on the roof."

"Whatever for?" Corvath asked.

"Max, as we alluded earlier, is our man in the crow's nest," said Ross, "He's been up there so long he's grown a bit eccentric."

"He's mad as a loon," Callen clarified.

"He's extremely fond of high places, and tends to grow uncomfortable on the ground for long periods of time. This trip's been a bit harder on him than we anticipated."

"You should've seen him on the trip back from Clinton," said Callen, "we hard a hard time keeping him out of the trees."

A large plate of roast meat arrived shortly, and some time after that, another bottle. Max returned, considerably colder, but fully relaxed. As the night wore on, the three found Corvath an ideal companion. He was deeply fascinated with their wide repository of privateer's anecdotes and tall tales, and probed the details of many of these stories with eager questions. Of himself, he spoke only little. He was, he said, the second son of a minor noble some distance to the east, who had in his youth taken a monk's cowl and acquired the arcane arts of letters and illumination. As he reached a more mature adulthood, however, his quest for knowledge had led him outside the monastery's walls. He now lived as a wandering scribe and amateur scholar. Ross expressed doubt that anyone would be willing to pay for such an activity, but Corvath maintained that while the material benefits were sometimes scarce, the intellectual benefits were considerable.

As the night wore on, the conversation grew somewhat less distinct, and the party eventually made the decision to turn in. Ross reiterated his conviction that this entire situation, being trapped by a freak winter storm miles from anywhere, was entirely Callen's fault. It was a theme he would return to frequently in the years following what was to come - that if it weren't for Callen, they would never have gotten involved in the whole stinking mess, and that just a little foresight would have saved everyone a lot of very-nearly-fatal trouble.

On this last point, Ross was perfectly correct. Had Callen not made his oversight regarding the ship's registration fees, he not only would have saved his two shipmates a great deal of trouble, but future generations of dozens of worlds across the galaxy as well. Such as the Doomians, the Grylix, the Zxanxi, the Shareholder... all would have been spared the expense and inconvenience of their failed campaigns against the planet Earth.

No one would have bothered trying to conquer a dead, frozen ball of ice, anyway.

Beyond the road, and beyond the inn, the dark forest was covered in snow. Winter had smothered the place like an icy, wet woollen blanket. Even in the warmer months, the people of the region did not venture into the forest unless they had to, but now when nights were longer, darker, and brutally cold, they avoided it altogether. Things were active in the wood when they were shrouded in ice that lay dormant in the spring and summer, terrible things which even the ravenous wolves feared.

The Ice Witch walked in the heart of the forest.

She was tall and slender, dressed in a gown of icy blue, woven with icicles and stitched with frost. Her snow-white hair trailed down her back to her ankles and was twisted into braids of ice. Her skin was delicate and unblemished, but of the deathly pallor of a frozen corpse. Her beauty was unearthly and terrible to imagine; mortal men who laid eyes on her were rumoured to freeze into pillars of ice.

She glided over the snow of the forest, a pack of vaguely spectral wolves following her in attendance. She looked upon the forest, and decided she liked what Winter had done with the place. She had it in mind to keep it that way.

She had been following the snows south for years, then north in the spring, over and again for centuries. For all of that time, she never ceased to read what Winter's winds wrote in the snow. When she was a young girl, and mortal, her village had perished from Winter's blight. She resolved to master its power, and sought the frost giants of the Northern Mountains. They taught her what they could at the cost of her own warmth; when it was gone, they could teach her no more, but by then she had learned how to read the wind's writings, and needed them no longer. In the ages since, the giants had diminished while she grew in power, and now they served her. Still Winter had much to teach her. Or it had, until that morning, when she at last read the most final of Winter's writings.

They told that Winter did indeed have a heart, and that this heart had been hidden at the beginning of the world. A sorceress who could find this heart - and she was the only sorceress of the cold powerful to do so - would have the power to wrap the world in Winter for all time. This was the Ice Witch's greatest longing, to make all suffer as she had suffered, and to rule over a frozen world inhabited by those cold things that creatures of warmth and light feared.

And the final thing she had read made that possible. She knew now where the Winter's Heart was hidden.

The next day passed agreeable enough for the Drakkar's crew. As much as he chafed at the delay, Ross conceded that a break from travelling wasn't entirely a bad thing. The inn was a little small, and the weather a little harsh, but the bar was well-stocked. Most of their idle hours were spent playing cards or dice amongst themselves and Corvath, or with the other travellers stuck at the Inn. The latter proved profitable, as many of them were merchants with heavy purses and an over-inflated opinion of their own shrewdness.

Wenching, the third core subject in the studies of the highland corsair, was little a scarce, however. The serving women were admittedly not much to look at. Shortly after sunrise, however, three slender, feminine figures cloaked in heavy robes appeared at the Inn. The robes offered no hints as to even so much as a face or hand, but nonetheless Ross saw immediate possibilities. They did not stay long, however, and retreated to wherever it was in the frozen country they had come from after a brief conversation with the innkeeper.

Ross
Where could such mysterious creatures come from in this wasteland, I wonder?

Ross had engaged in a game of chess with Corvath. Max and Callen sat watching nearby.

Max
Somewhere off behind us, away from the forest. I saw them coming about half an hour before they got here.

Ross
Max, do try and limit your perching hours to between sunrise and sunset. I have no desire to chisel your frozen corpse off the roof. Or pay for the resulting damage to the shingles.

Callen
You mean they came from the south-east? Where? Is there a town or something close by?

Max
Haven't seen any smoke. Looked like they came from a long way off, and they were taking trouble to avoid the road. They left the same way. Guess they didn't want anyone to see them coming and going.

Ross
Little did they count on our Max.

He moved a pawn. Corvath captured his knight.

Ross
Damn you, scholar.

Corvath
I overheard the innkeeper speaking with the cook. He was much disturbed about their arrival. Apparently the women are priestesses of the 'old religion'.

Callen chuckled.

Callen
Ahh. Best give'em a wide berth, Ross. I hear these druidesses can put curses on different parts of the body that cause withering.

Ross expressed his chagrin by sacrificing another pawn to Corvath.

Corvath
They asked when the train was leaving for the pass, and when he reluctantly told him, they said they'd be back.

Ross
So we'll be travelling companions. Well, well. Perhaps they'd be interested in an exchange of pagan philosophies.

Max
Or body fluids.

Callen
They're probably about ninety years old and have complexions like sawdust.

Ross
I must disagree, my dear procurer. My finely honed instincts tell me they are young, lithe, and comely. It's the way they move, something you can't hide with a cowl. Like dancers.

Corvath
Or warriors. Check, my good Captain, and I believe, mate.

Ross examined the board in surprise, and found the old man was correct.

Ross
So it is. Hmf. Callen, I believe you wanted to be Corvath's next bit of cannon fodder? Come, Max, I hear the kegs calling.

The next night was colder still than the last two, and even Max was driven off the roof and down to the hearthside for the evening. Nor was the morning much warmer; plus a thick fog had descended from the mountain peaks and now obscured the pass from the outside world. The guide had returned as promised, a wiry man of middle age who had practically been raised by the mountains themselves. He did not like the weather, and said so; it was too queer, he said, for such a chill to come at this time of year, and the harsh quality seemed to hint at an unearthly malevolence. He did not voice those opinions, though he was not alone in holding them. He said extra prayers to ensure a safe passage; and just for good measure, quietly said an extra one to the older gods of the mountain who had watched travellers in the pass long before the tame Christian saints.

Just after sunrise, the guide and twelve travellers gathered in front of the inn. The guide, and many others of the party, did not know whether to be relieved or apprehensive when the three hooded priestesses appeared just after they set off; on the one hand, they were no longer thirteen, but on the other hand --

Callen
Ross, I don't care what they look like under there, they're giving me the creeps.

Max
Callen, I don't think "the creeps" is really a medieval expression.

Callen
What?

Shut up, Max.

Max
Sorry.

Corvath
What's the difficulty?

Ross
Oh, don't mind Max, he's just talking to that invisible "Narrator" of his again. It's the long hours in the crow's nest... Callen, you have nothing to worry about. All that superstitious nonsense of the highlands aside, I'm sure the worse pox these druidesses could call down upon you would pale in comparison with what you could pick up at your lower class of brothel.

Callen
It's not that, Cap'n, I just don't trust anyone who isn't carrying any visible weapons... It makes me wonder what they're concealing, and who they intend to use it against.

Corvath
Come, Callen, surely your adventurer's instincts are simply over-compensating after a day's inactivity. I'm carrying nothing but this dull blade I use for eating and sharpening pens, and you don't think I'm a threat.

Callen
I never said that.

Ross
They're nothing we can't handle, Callen. Three pagan priestesses are no match for a trio of trained swordsmen, no matter how supple they may be under those cloaks.

The large party travelled on foot, with the guide in the lead and two young boys, apprentice guides if you will, acting as shepherds at the rear. Several of the party, the wealthier merchants, rode horses or donkeys; most, however, travelled on foot. Ross, Max, Callen, and Corvath stuck close to the middle of the group; the three hooded women hung near the back. The others in the party tended to avoid them.

The road rose steadily into pass. The temperature dropped, and the snow on the ground around them grew thicker. Near the crest of the pass, Ross noticed Callen scanning the slopes above them on either side.

Ross
What is it?

Callen
I thought I saw movement up there.

Ross
Human or animal?

Callen
Not sure... could be nothing. Max...

Callen trailed off as twin sounds captured the attention of the travellers - the high, plaintive baying of wolves, apparently close by and on all sides; and then a deeper rumbling, which was felt as much as heard.

Corvath
What --

Max
AVALANCHE!!

They barely had to time to react before an advancing wall of snow swept down upon them.

Ross's last conscious thought before being entombed in snow was, "This is entirely Callen's fault."

Forsooth! Is this the end of our swashbuckling protagonists? Who are these guys anyway? What unspeakable evil lurks within these mountains of madness? Find out in Part II of ...

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