Chapter Five Thera
CHAPTER FIVE
Thera
Thera Speldrenda, Queen of All Ascarlia, had never been skilled when it came to use of her hands, save for the proper employment of weaponry.
Throughout her childhood it had always been her youngest brother who excelled in such things.
Thera’s fumbling attempts to match Guthnyr’s efforts in woodcraft or metalwork often left blisters or cuts upon her hands, much, she recalled, to Felnir’s amusement.
He, at least, had the wisdom to focus his time on sword practice.
So it was with some awkwardness that she manoeuvred the hefty granite stone into place before taking up a trowel and slathering it with mortar.
If the onlooking crowd, Olversahl’s surviving scholars most prominent among them, noticed her clumsiness, they had the good grace to quell any amused muttering.
After handing the trowel to a waiting mason, Thera straightened her back to address her audience.
The storm had finally broken the day before, a sparsely clouded sky permitting the sun to cast its glow over snow-covered rooftops and the partly frozen fjord.
She could see boats at the fringes of the ice, those aboard wielding sledgehammers to shatter the pack that kept her fleet at anchor.
Thera reflected she would much rather be out there freezing her royal backside off than standing here, but she was learning that a queen’s chores were often irksome.
“And so the first stone of the Queen’s Library is laid,” she said.
“Upon this ground shall it rise, matching and in time exceeding the greatness of the archive that once stood upon this very spot. And it pleases me greatly to place it in the care of the first Queen’s Archivist.” Thera extended a hand to the flaxen-haired woman at the forefront of the crowd.
“Berrine Jurest,” Thera said. “Come forth and receive your chain of office.”
Even those who hadn’t known Berrine’s name before, certainly knew it now, for who would mistake the Spear Maiden’s mother?
If not for a few additional lines to her eyes and forehead, they seemed more like sisters.
Yet, where Elvine had grown comfortable, or at least accepting of public acclaim, Berrine clearly had not.
She lowered her head to allow Thera to place the silver chain about her shoulders before offering a strained smile in response to the crowd’s applause.
Thera had intended that the Queen’s Archivist mark the occasion with a few words, but, seeing Berrine’s tension, decided against it.
“Know that by order of the Queen,” she went on, “any who volunteer their labour to the building of this library shall receive double rations and promise of five silver coins once victory over our enemies is secured.” Her grand project to fortify the harbour already employed many townsfolk, but Thera felt there were still idle hands in Olversahl.
The combination of war and an unseasonably harsh winter had halted the normal run of commerce in this city.
To prevent a slide into indolence, and the accompanying disease of discontent, these people needed something to do.
“For now,” she added, casting a hand to the heavily laden tables set up on the rough waste ground where the great Library of King Aeric had once stood, “we have good ale, meat and cheese, to which all are welcome.”
Free food and drink, Thera was learning, were a simple and effective means of securing loyalty, or at least compliance, from folk beset by troubled times. The crowd proved no exception, quickly forming queues to receive their share.
“Might I trouble you for a moment’s time, my queen,” Berrine asked as a celebration began to develop around the tables.
“You have yet more additions to your plans?” Thera asked, gesturing for the archivist to follow as she started towards her carriage.
It had been discovered in the stables at the Elderman’s House.
Constructed at the whim of the notoriously corrupt Albermaine-ish puppet Maritz Fohlvast, it was a more ornate conveyance than she would have liked.
Its exterior, once apparently gilded in gold leaf that had thankfully flaked off, was covered in ornate carvings.
It was also needlessly bulky, requiring a team of four horses to draw.
Thera would have gladly ridden, or even walked, but her counsellors were of the mind that a queen required some concessions to finery.
Lynnea was also insistent that she use the carriage when going about the city, though her concern arose from the risk posed by any Volkrath assassins that might still lurk undiscovered in this port.
“No, my queen,” Berrine replied. “It regards another matter. Albeit one I believe of great import.”
Thera could see the course this woman was on, but abruptly ending this conversation would embarrass her newly appointed archivist. “Your daughter knows her mind and is of an age to make her own choices,” Thera told Berrine, adopting a patient tone.
“If it is your intent to ask me to order that she remain in this city, I will not do so.”
Upon reaching the carriage, a warrior opened the door for her and she had to resist the urge to snap out a reminder that she was capable of doing some things herself. Perhaps one day I’ll get used to this, she thought before inclining her head at Berrine. “If there’s nothing else…”
“Your great-grandfather burned the library that once stood here,” Berrine cut in. The set of her features, hard but red about the cheeks, made it plain that she knew she risked much. But her eyes were flinty with determination. “And it was no accident.”
Thera paused in the act of climbing into the carriage, flicking her eyes at the warrior who duly retreated several paces.
“I once asked my great-grandfather if he truly had a hand in the library’s fate,” she said, facing Berrine squarely.
“He said, ‘In war there is no such thing as a predictable outcome.’”
“Did he also tell you that I was once a spy in his service?” Berrine reached into her robe and extracted a familiar object on a cord.
Thera peered at the small silver knot and huffed in discomfort.
It appeared completely genuine, banishing any hope Berrine might be lying.
“I was here that very night,” the archivist went on.
“I watched it burn. Moreover, I saw the guilt of it in his eyes. Should the people of Olversahl learn…”
“I caution you, good woman, say no more.” Thera’s tone was gentle, but the steady gaze she locked on Berrine’s eyes left no room for doubt as to her intent. “For I will not be extorted, even by the Spear Maiden’s mother.”
Berrine’s mouth closed, her lips taking on a twist that told of poorly contained anger. A mother’s love is the greatest thing, Thera reflected, feeling her annoyance seep away. But is also dangerous in the blindness of its need.
“Know this and know it well,” she said, voice low.
“I could order your daughter chained in the deepest cell this port has to offer and she would still find a way to go in pursuit of her enemy. The plain truth is, as I think you know, I could never give such an order in any case. She stopped being merely the scholar Elvine Jurest the moment she wielded an Altvar-blessed weapon in defence of this city. Now she is the Spear Maiden and her legend will only spread, not diminish.” She put a hand on Berrine’s shoulder, watching her close her eyes tight against welling tears.
“I am sorry. But when the queen’s fleet sails from this port, the Spear Maiden will be with us. This war demands nothing less.”
She found her great-grandfather in the scorched bowels of Mount Halthir.
Efforts had been made to clear out the many burned Nihlvarian bodies littering its tunnels and corridors, and swab the oily soot from the stones, but the place still stank like a great, unwashed oven.
Since vacating his rooms in the Elderman’s House, Margnus Gruinskard had chosen to take up residence in the connected caves where the head gaoler once resided.
Charged with overseeing the city’s principal dungeon, the fellow had been seen sailing away on one of the last merchant vessels to leave Olversahl before the arrival of the Nihlvarian fleet.
His quarters had been spared the flames that consumed the enemy host attempting to force its way through these tunnels at the height of the siege.
But still, the lingering odour was such that Thera wondered if advanced age had robbed the sense of smell from the former Tielwald to the Sister Queens.
Gruinskard offered no greeting when she entered, continuing to sit at the former gaoler’s desk and tinker with some form of device affixed to a leather cap covering the stump of his right wrist. “Bought it from an Albermaine-ish artificer who got trapped here when the siege started,” he said, sparing her a short glance.
“As the wrist flexes, it’s supposed to open and close like a true hand.
So far it’s done fuck all but add weight to my arm. ”
Looking closer at the device, Thera thought it finely made, the various steel and brass digits combined into a pleasing facsimile of a human hand.
“A pretty thing,” she said, dragging over the only other chair in the chamber and sitting down.
“Even if broken. I have a number of skilled folk who can look at it for you. Teylhar, Veilwald Synghild’s son, is particularly adept at such things. ”
“My queen’s generosity is unmatched,” Gruinskard muttered, tossing aside his thin steel probe and sitting back.
“Why have you come?” he asked after a period of silence Thera refused to break.
“I’m sure your new…” he paused, beard shifting as he ground his teeth “… Tielwald has told you I did what was required. Coelnyr is forever retired from my service.”