Fortunes of war, p.1
Fortunes of War, page 1
The Drake Chronicles
Heart of Winter
Edge of the Wild
Blood of Wolves
Demon of the Dead
Fortunes of War
Avarice of the Empire
(coming soon)
Fortunes of War
The Drake Chronicles Book V
By
Lauren Gilley
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and events are all the products of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblances to persons, living or dead, is coincidental, or meant to serve as entertainment, rather than fact.
Names and characters are property of the author and may not be duplicated.
FORTUNES OF WAR
ISBN-13: 9798392789818
Copyright © 2023 by Lauren Gilley
Cover design copyright © 2023 by Lauren Gilley
HP Press®
Atlanta, GA
All rights reserved.
Author’s Note:
This book – this series – is rooted heavily in a combination of English, Norse, Swedish, and Danish history and mythology. Names and myths and bits of language have been borrowed liberally – though all are used fictitiously. It’s all just for fun! For historically-accurate fantasy fiction (and vampires), please refer to my Sons of Rome series.
But here…there be dragons.
FORTUNES OF WAR
Contents
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
1
Most nights, Oliver was so exhausted after a day of politicking, organizing, strategizing, and going for at least a quick ride on Percy that he barely had the energy to return Erik’s kisses, much less dream once he fell asleep. When he did dream, it was a vision of dragon-sight, sharing the view with Percy from up in the clouds. Sometimes it was through Percy’s eyes, memories or drake imaginings. Other times, like tonight, he was in his own skin, helmeted and armored, astride Percy as they plunged through clouds that shredded around them like damp parchment.
The strangest part was that he knew he was dreaming. The drake dreams were nothing like normal ones, in which he was generally stuck somewhere cold, dark, and unpleasant, surrounded by strangers or monsters, petrified of some formless malevolence that left him startling awake in a cold sweat. Nightmares, truly, and the most frequent of nocturnal wanderings, save the rare, pleasant occurrence he dreamed of strong arms and a deep voice. There’d been a dream lover before a real life one came along, and though he’d not been a Northman with long, braided hair and a mantle of wolf fur, he’d been as stalwart and gruff and big-handed as Erik.
Funny how dreams turned out for the best, sometimes.
Funny, too, that he could feel the sting of cold wind against his face, and feel the working of Percy’s great wings in the muscles along his back.
He could hear something, too, beyond the whistle of air past his ears. A kind of shrieking, distant but growing clearer. A bird? He faced forward and scanned the cloudscape that lay ahead of them, searching for the source of the noise. It sounded again, louder, shriller than it had seemed at first. Perhaps a hawk, then. A messenger falcon?
The stomach-grabbing thought that it might be someone who wished him ill struck the same moment a cloud just ahead tattered to bits. Through it came a sleek, pointed head with backward-curving horns, and a long neck; a pair of flexing wings, white and bat-shaped. A figure lay low along its withers, gripping tight to the spines along the drake’s neck without aid of saddle or bridle.
Oliver recognized the drake and human pair the same moment Percy did, and had his knowledge reinforced by a sharp surge of joy through the bond he shared with his dragon.
Percy bugled a greeting.
Oliver cried, “Náli! Valgrind!”
Valgrind screamed a hello, undulating through the air toward them as he accelerated – and nearly unseated a cursing, wildly-clutching Náli. “Stop! Stop, you – oh, fuck you, you fucking lizard – stop!”
Oliver laughed as Valgrind swung wide behind them and then swept up alongside. But his laughter died as Valgrind settled into a steadier pace and Oliver got a look at Náli’s face. He was nearly as white as his drake, his eyes huge, his expression terror-stricken. It was not, Oliver could tell right away, fear of flying that gripped him, but something much more urgent.
Oliver pressed his knee into Percy’s side so that his wings lifted high and he was able to glide in closer. Father greeted son with a nuzzle of noses.
Oliver fixed his attention on Náli. “What is it? What’s wrong? How,” he said, brows flying up when the weight of what was happening struck, “are you here in my dream right now?”
“It’s not a dream!” Náli was panting, shouting to be heard over the roar of the wind in their ears. “We’re in the Between!” When Oliver started to ask why, he said, “It’s another plane! Where the dead pass through!”
“That’s…alarming!”
Percy gave a trill of warning, and then angled his head down into a graceful dive. Valgrind must have done the same, if Náli’s curse was any indication.
When they’d landed in a field of swaying grey grass, Oliver swung – gracefully, thank you very much – down off Percy’s back to find that the grass was taller than his waist; it crackled, dry and dead beneath his boots.
Náli slid down less gracefully – he fell, really, and landed in a heap at Valgrind’s feet with a loud oof. Valgrind craned around to nose at him with a little bleat of alarm, and Náli batted him away and scrambled hastily to his feet.
Grinning, trying to swallow a laugh, Oliver walked to meet him, trailing a hand up Percy’s sinuous neck as he went.
Pink-faced, tugging at his disordered cloak, and breathing in harsh, ragged pants, Náli came to meet him, pushing his hair back with a frantic spark in his gaze.
He looked panicked, and Oliver felt his smile slip away. “What is it?”
“I’ve just – there was – and Matti is – gods, Matti.” Náli pitched forward at the waist and clutched his knees, fighting for breath.
“Shit.” Oliver laid a hand on his shoulder, and felt the fine tremors moving beneath his skin. “What’s happened? Is Mattias ill?”
“He could be dead, for all I know,” Náli said, roughly, and straightened. “We were on this plane, practicing his magic–”
“His magic?”
“It’s my magic, really, but he has some, now, a portion, and–” He cut himself off, made a face, and gave a sharp wave of dismissal. “I’ll explain later. But.” He gulped down a breath. “He was – and then he was – and Matti threw himself in front of me, and I don’t know if–”
“Who’s the second he? Whoever Mattias threw himself toward,” he said for clarification, when Náli’s face screwed up in a dramatic frown. His eyes were frantic, brimming with fear, and Oliver’s thoughts were racing.
How had Mattias crossed into this plane? Was he using Náli’s magic? How? Who was this other person? How had they become separated? Why was Náli so–
“The bloody – the fucking – Selesee Emperor!”
Oliver blinked. “I’m sorry. It sounded like you said–”
Nali gripped his biceps, hard, fingers digging bruises through his layers of shirts and coats. His pale eyes flashed wildly; the tendons stood out in his throat. “Listen to me. He’s here now, on this plane, and he’s looking for you.”
“The Sel–”
“The emperor of the Sels. The Immortal Emperor Unchallenged, Romanus Tyrsbane.”
Oliver realized that he’d never known the Selesee emperor’s name. He was always referred to simply as “the emperor.” More a looming figurehead than a man, a threat not unlike the monsters from fairy stories that children used to scare one another. But he’d never stopped to consider his name. There was something awful and too-intimate about hearing it, and from Náli, of all people.
His pulse tripped and quickened, Náli’s panic infectious. “You saw him?”
“Yes, and he’s bloody terrifying.”
“Why is he looking for me?”
“I don’t know. He called you a ‘red whore.’ Something about your magic. About how you stole it.”
“I didn’t steal–”
“I know, but he’s huge, and he’s angry, and he’s got this massive fucking sword, and he’s not exactly reasonable!”
Oliver took a deep breath, and then another. He’d been called a whore more than a few times in his life; that wasn’t new or even that insulting, given his current position. Last laugh, and all that. But the slur landed a little differently when huge, angry emperors with massive fucking swords delivered it – even by proxy.
“All right,” he said.
“What do you mean all right?”
“What do you want me to say?” Oliver asked, voice gone shrill. “I don’t…” Know what to do, he started to say. But held off. Because Náli was very young, and very frightened, and Oliver supposed it was his duty to take the situation in hand.
“All right. Hold on.” He closed his eyes, and willed himself to wake up.
What are you doing?”
He opened his eyes, and stood still in the field of waving gray grass, their drakes greeting each other with sniffs and blue-tongued licks over their heads. “Thinking.” It wasn’t a complete lie. “Where did you come from?” Still holding the boy’s shoulders, he leaned sideways to peer around him. Low, undulating hills stretched as far as he could see in all directions, the sky a washed-out blue so pale it was nearly white, the faint edgings of shadow all that delineated the clouds.
“The village,” Náli said, without explanation.
There were so many things Oliver didn’t understand about being on a different plane of existence. Truly, he’d thought these visions of his nothing more than dreams; at most, dreams that he shared with his drake, which wouldn’t have been unreasonable given their mental connection. But if he’d transcended into some sort of spirit realm, if they truly walked in the valley of in-between souls, then he had no idea what the laws of this place were. Could Mattias have been killed? Could they be killed? If he faced this emperor now, what would occur?
“Oliver,” Náli prompted, shaking him.
“Right. Yes. The village?”
“The first village. The very beginning of Aeretoll. I’ve been going there since I was little.”
“Ah, so you can walk me through it.”
“We have to go.”
Oliver very much did not want to go. He was full of questions: hadn’t Dreki Hörgr been the first village? Was this Dreki Hörgr? Some flipside, through-the-veil version of it? And he still had no idea what sort of physical limitations they possessed here. He hadn’t brought a sword – nor known such a thing was possible. If he faced an emperor empty-handed, and got cut down for his troubles, could he be killed? Would his body back in the waking world stop breathing? That was an unpleasant image: Erik rolling over beneath their heaps of furs and flinging an arm across a corpse.
But there was Mattias to think of, and Náli’s big-eyed, frantic terror, so he said, “Yes, of course. You two lead the way.”
They remounted – Oliver with the aid of stirrups, Náli scrambling with a firm grip on the spines on Valgrind’s neck – and took to the sky, flying back the way Náli had come. Valgrind, at least, seemed calmer in his father’s presence, neck stretched long, tail whipping behind, his wingbeats sure and quick. Náli’s face, though, was a grim mask of worry, and Oliver didn’t know if the tears winking at the corners of his eyes were the result of the wind, or fear for Mattias.
Eventually, a dark smudge appeared along the horizon. It resolved, as they flew, into the jagged, black silhouette of a mountain range, stamped boldly against the faded sky. The peaks grew larger and more distinct the closer they drew, and then Valgrind swung wide, and angled himself, and dove.
Oliver could hear Náli berating the drake, and chuckled to himself as Percy executed a much more reasonable, swooping descent that spiraled them over what was indeed a village.
From above, Oliver spotted a large, central longhouse surrounded by smaller, sod-roofed dwellings, the whole of it connected with well-trammeled paths. He could see no sign of habitation: no smoke curling up from chimney holes, no children playing in the street; could hear no bark of dogs nor shouts of alarm as the two drakes landed in the yard outside the longhouse.
Oliver held to his reins a moment after Percy folded his wings, scanning the area for threats.
Náli, though, slid down off Valgrind’s back. “Mattias!” he shouted, voice echoing off the timbered fronts of the houses. “Matti!” He let out a shocked cry, and darted around the side of the longhouse.
“Wait!” Oliver jumped to the ground – Percy snorted and made a drake-like sound of protest – and dashed after the Corpse Lord, reaching for a knife that wasn’t there on his hip. “Bollocks.”
Around the front of the longhouse lay the crumpled shape of a man in familiar gray tunic and brown leather armor. He faced away from Oliver’s approach, on his side, long, single braid coiled in the dirt.
Náli choked out his name – “Matti” – and knelt by his head, cupped his face.
As Oliver rounded his booted feet, Mattias groaned. He was alive, at least. Oliver moved to stand at Náli’s side and saw Mattias blink his eyes open and squint up at them, blearily. The front of his tunic was clean, free of blood or any obvious rents. He looked at Náli first, and then, as Náli exclaimed gladly and petted his brow, at Oliver. His glazed eyes sprang open. “Your – your Lordship? How–”
Náli spoke over him. “Where are you wounded? Where is he?” He lifted his head and snapped it side to side, searching for the emperor, hair flashing in the hazy sunlight. To Mattias again, gripping the shoulder of his tunic with white-knuckled fervor: “How bad is it?”
Mattias winced, but sat up, Náli clinging to him and fussing over him. “I’m fine. He didn’t…” He touched the back of his head and then examined his fingers, as if expecting to find blood.
Náli shifted around so he could take his face in both hands and hold him still. “Matti, what happened?”
Oliver thought someone out to be on the lookout for this Immortal Emperor Unchallenged character, and had just turned to do so himself when Mattias’s words snared his attention.
“It’s all right, love.”
Love? Oliver whipped back around in time to see the faintest, gentlest smile touch Mattias’s lips.
When had love happened?
“I was looking right at him,” Mattias went on, Mattias who now called Náli love instead of my lord, “and then there was this sharp pain in the back of my head, and everything went black.”
Oliver again surveyed their surroundings. The doors to several dwellings stood ajar; one swayed on its hinges as a gusty breeze shot down the path. The gates of animal pens were chained back, the yards with the split-rail fences overgrown with weeds. Not so much as a solitary chicken pecked at the ground. Spiders had colonized the windows, and the stretched-thin hide used in place of glass had yellowed and cracked, gone brittle without regular care.
It was a place abandoned, and Oliver was grateful for the looming presence of the drakes behind them.
When he looked, Mattias had gotten to his feet, rubbing at the back of his head, still. Náli held his arm and looked up with him with an unmistakeable sort of worry. A pining child no longer: Náli’s gaze was that of a concerned lover. They’d consummated things, then. Oliver found himself wildly curious about the current political situation in the Fault Lands.
“You didn’t see where he went?” Náli asked, finally turning away from his Guard – Oliver checked, and yes, Mattias still wore the skull badge of Dead Guard Captain, so not everything had changed between them – to search their immediate area.
“No,” Mattias said, dropping his hand with another wince. “On account of being unconscious.”
Náli made a fretful clucking sound, like a nurse fussing over a child, but strode away from the longhouse, head swiveling back and forth as he searched. He walked to the nearest home, pushed the door inward, stuck his head inside, then turned back to them. “He’s had plenty of time to find a good vantage point. He could be anywhere.”
“Perhaps he left this plane once you fled,” Mattias suggested. “He wasn’t interested in me, after all.”
“Well, he wasn’t truly interested in me, either, he was – wait. What do you mean fled?”
Oliver walked toward the door of the longhouse and attempted to read the runes carved into the lintel. They’d been done with hammer and chisel, and looked fresh, the wood still pale where each line had been gouged. The language, though, was very old. An archaic set of runes that he couldn’t quite read. He could interpret individual words – “dragon,” “wolf,” – but not the meaning of the sentence.
“You took off with Valgrind–”
“I was carried away. The beast snatched me up and carried me up into the air! What was I to do?”
“Well,” Mattias said in a subdued tone. “You might have flown back down to check on me.”
“I–! Was–! I had to get Oliver!”
The door was built of worn-smooth wooden boards held together with two cross-pieces, top and bottom. In place of a more modern doorknob, he found a rudimentary latch that could have proved a liability should the villagers want to keep whoever was inside from coming out. He lifted it, and stepped inside.
