The Savage Queen

Well, I don't really have anything interesting to say today, so I thought I would throw this out there for your consideration. This is the prolouge to my novel The Savage Queen, for which I am currently seeking a publisher. Enjoy, and feel free to let me know what you think in the comments.


Prologue

The wind sliced through the narrow pass like a blade, stirring the thin blanket of snow and shaking the tall evergreens that stood atop the steep cliffs like a row of sentries. The rocky peaks of the Great Divide towered in the distance, casting the winding gash into darkness, the sun a dull smudge of light on the horizon, struggling to break through the overcast sky. Bannah’s Pass cut through the mighty mountains that divided the land in two, a deep winding crevice just wide enough for several wagons to travel abreast. The vicars would claim that mighty Bannah, the god of thunder, had cracked the earth itself with his legendary war hammer, throwing the god Tempal back to the underworld he ruled. That mighty blow had opened the east to the west, smashing down the jagged peaks, reducing them to rubble that clogged the twisting path.


A road had been built, blacker than night and as strong as granite, following the way of the pass, a road so ancient that no human remembered who built it. Despite the ages, the road ran unblemished and perfect, a tattoo upon the land that would forever tell of humanity’s passing. The Highway went on for miles, from coast to coast, east to west and north to south, connecting a once proud kingdom of man. The road burrowed its way through the mountains, and emerged on the wide Coorin Plains.

Stone assembled with skill formed a wall spanning the mouth of the pass, standing nearly forty feet tall and twenty thick, broken by a heavy gate mounting the old road. Atop the battlements one young boy strolled carelessly, his wide mouth set in a frown of boredom. Tobey Shuffle, of the clan Gidran, was young; too young, in fact, to hold the position he held with the garrison at the Watch. He strolled along the top of the wall, occasionally glancing out into the snow swept bareness of the pass, moving already with a touch of the wide legged gait of a man that spent more time on the back of a horse than on his own two legs. His reddish hair was an unkempt mess, tossed about in the strong mountain winds; he had been away from the courts of Lyre –and his ever watchful mother – for nearly a month, and the mop was considerably longer than when last she had seen him. Why, he laughed suddenly, he doubted she would even recognize him!

Tobey approached a guard standing watch over the lands below, decked out in heavy leathers, bearing a crude looking axe at his side. The guard glanced at him with a grin, and playfully rattled the weapon against the small buckler he held. The boy laughed, and continued on; the guard was his second cousin Ham, and had always treated him well, even if the grizzled old guard sometimes acted a little funny.

Of course, he admitted to himself, every single man stationed at the small castle was family; that was the way of the Watch. Each clan sent a force to man the walls for one month, thereby splitting the cost between the entire kingdom, instead of just one clan or another. The Gidran clan’s rotation was nearly finished; only a few days remained before they could return to their farms and steads, or quarters among the palace at Lyre, where Tobey called home. He smiled; though he would miss the Watch and even his duties there, he was looking forward to seeing his friends again. And besides, the Watch was kind of boring. Nothing ever actually happened in the lands beyond the towering wall.

He again glanced over the parapet with disinterest; his eyes narrowed suddenly. He was sure he had seen something move in the pass. As he leaned forward trying in vain to get a better view, the bell atop the watch tower began to toll, and he jumped back startled. Tobey glanced back towards his cousin; the guard stood still as stone, his mouth open in shock as he stared down at the ancient road.

Tobey frowned, and stomped down a sudden burst of excitement; well, this was new! Never in the whole month had the bell sounded, and he struggled to recall what his father had taught him.

Below, the winds seemed to stop, and the snow settled. Suddenly the road was visible, stretching off into the distance, winding its way deeper into the mountains. As the snow settled, a small host of creatures seemed to emerge from nothingness. Tobey felt one starring right at him, right into his very soul, and shivered. He fought back tears that suddenly wanted to form in his dark eyes.

They stood tall, those creatures that emerged from the west, atop two legs and swinging two arms, manlike in appearance, humanlike but inhuman nonetheless. They were pale, each and every one, untouchable by the fury of the sun. Pale eyes watched the watchers, and thin bloodless lips turned upwards in grim smiles. The inhumans moved with cat like grace, yet carried themselves with the strength of bulls, their thin bodies deceivingly frail looking. They emerged, marching right from legend and history and the nightmares of humans. The alfin had come again at last.

Tobey stifled a scream. With sudden clarity he knew what the bell meant. He turned, and ran as fast as he could. He passed his cousin Ham, who seemed frozen as he watched the alfin form up below, beyond the range of their defenses. Shouts filled the air, and the courtyard was filled as the clan sprang into action. He barely noticed his father and Clan Lord Danerick enter the watch tower from the ground almost directly below him.

The watch tower stood in the center of the wall, granting an almost unobstructed view of the Pass, when the weather was clear. Tobey reached the tower quickly, and slammed open the door, entering the tower from the wall. He sped through the small war room within, ignoring the shocked looks from clansmen, and crashed back out the other side onto the wall; He thought he heard his fathers voice from the stairwell leading down as he passed by. The boy sped along, eventually reaching a smaller tower on the northeast end of the wall, which he entered in a rush.

The middle floor of the tower was packed with stores, which he ignored; sacks of seeds, bundles of dried jerky, heavy jugs of the dark nectar the carrier shriekers enjoyed. He snatched a big piece of the meat, and mounted the stairs at a sprint, his lungs burning. Above, he could already hear the screams of the shriekers– the sound of the watch towers bell had upset them, or maybe they sensed something unusual was going on.

Tobey ran into the kennel, and moved immediately to the small desk near the stairs. He produced a small slip of paper, and found pen and ink. Carefully, he etched out the message. He bounced impatiently from foot to foot as he waited for the ink to dry.

He had learned to care for the shriekers in the church at Lyre; the kennel master there had exclaimed he had a natural talent with the creatures, and his father claimed that skill was a good part of why he had been allowed to join the clan when they garrisoned the Watch, several years too young. He glanced at the note, which was nearly dry; his only duty here was to care for the creatures, and, in the unlucky event of an invasion, send a warning to Dimir. That’s what the bell meant, at least for him.

Carefully, he rolled the thin paper into a small leather tube, and turned toward the cages. Each enclosure was walled in with heavy steel bars. The shriekers could easily tear through the strongest wood if they chose, and the creatures could be somewhat moody; the steel bars made sure they stayed put. He reached one cage, and the monster within. Barnacle, the shrieker was named; it was Tobey’s personal favorite.

He crouched in front of the cage, and tossed the jerky. Barnacle caught the meat easily in his long beak, and swallowed it without pause. Satisfied for the moment, the carrier shrieker screeched in greeting; the time was not long past when Tobey would have covered his ears at the piercing sound that had given the creatures their name, and he grinned despite the situation.

Barnacle waited as Tobey swung open the heavy door, and then shuffled forward awkwardly. Carefully, avoiding sudden movements that might startle the shrieker, Tobey reached forward with the leather tube, as he concentrated on sending calming thoughts to the creature. Quickly, with an experienced motion he was proud of, he fastened the message to the shriekers leg, and stepped back slowly.

Barnacle emerged from the cage, shaking its head like a dog shedding water, and then spread its wings in a stretch. The shrieker was larger than any other bird Tobey had ever heard of, weighing sometimes half as much as a full grown man. It bore no feathers, but was covered in leathery skin, much more alike the lizards he used to catch as a boy. Its small head stretched out to a point, a beak a foot and a half long, and lined with hundreds of tiny razor sharp teeth; there were stories of wild shriekers that had taken the arm off a full grown man. Its wings stretched out like bat wings, a thin leathery membrane stretched tight over a deceivingly gentle appearing framework of bones and cartilage, its wingspan often ten or twelve feet wide. Some used the creatures as hunters, or even trackers, but the uncanny speed and distance the shriekers could cover made them ideal as carrier birds, carrying message from one city to another far faster than any horse could hope to travel.

Follow me, Tobey thought at the shrieker, and once again wondered just how much the creature understood. Surely, it was his imagination that Barnacle seemed to nod before waddling after him. Tobey turned, and made his way to the large barn doors in the south side of the tower. He removed the crossbeam, and pulled the heavy doors open; his view of the plains to the south was unobstructed, and he would swear he could almost make out the towers of Dimir somewhere in the distance. He grinned; his imagination was working overtime.

He knelt before the bird, feeding it another large piece of jerky; “Dimir,” he said, concentrating on the capital city of the kingdom. “The message is for Dimir.” The shrieker shuffled to the edge, and threw itself out; its wings filled like sails, and the creature sped off into the distance.

Tobey turned, and went to a north facing window, not even bothering to shut the doors. He glanced out again, and shuddered. Already, hundreds of the inhumans had gathered in Bannah’s Pass.