Shimone

A short story of a young queen witnessing the fall of her husband, her King and her home in the short span of a chill late-summer dawning.

“A thousand thousand stars burn in the heavens and a thousand thousand fires burn on the Field of Lembrin.  Within the doomed Elbrest Castle, a thousand thousand eyes

burn with scalding tears for on the morrow will burn a

thousand thousand pyres.”

 

--Hastel Ogleby, Scribe of King Elbrest on the dawn of the

Fall of Elbrest Castle

 

 

Shimone walked along the castle’s crenellated battlement. She stretched out her hand as she walked and ran it along the cold gray granite stone that most of the castle was built from. It was roughly cut and beneath her delicate fingers it felt like the bark of some old and hoary tree. There were those who thought the castle looked harsh - its thick and unadorned walls standing cold and grim - but Shimone thought otherwise. To the trained eye of an artist, the stone’s color leaned just slightly to the warmer side of gray. The faintest tinge of iron oxide in its makeup kept it warm to her eye.

     She leaned her back against that stone �" seeking that warmth - and crossed her arms over her chest against the chill wind that blew down from the northern seas. It was and odd and ill wind for most often the Great High Plains were bathed in warm winds from the western coast. In certain parts, it was said, it rarely snowed. The idle thoughts distracted her, for a moment, from the pall that had laid over her mind for the past three days. I should have worn a cape.

     The wind and the chill drew her thoughts back to a day now ten years past, when she came to Castle Elbrest. It was not the first time she had been here. Shimone’s parents were of noble lineage and, even as a child, she had accompanied her parents on visits to the king. Yet on that day, ten years ago, she had come to Castle Elbrest not to pay tribute but to live out the remainder of her days as the wife of King Teren’s eldest son, Prince Rylan.

     As a little girl growing up in her family’s humble but comfortable manor she had never dreamed of being a princess but she had become so. Further, still, from her childhood imaginings was the notion that she would one day be a queen, yet a queen she had been for the three years since King Teren had died. How well she remembered the day, so very much like this day with its bitter, biting wind, when the king’s own guard returned to the castle bearing the body of their lord who had died in a skirmish with a band of brigands outside Langon.

 

     Shimone sighed and a shiver ran down her spine as the memories were abruptly pushed aside by the cursing and catcalls that had risen from the grassy plain beyond the castle’s walls. She turned to see the source of the noise, but she already knew what she’d see. It was the same scene she had seen for the last two days. Below her perch, high atop the castle wall, Shimone’s gaze swept across the Field of Lembrin, as the great plain was called. The grassland spread from the castle walls all the way to the mountains. At this time of year the grasses should be nearly ready to harvest for their grain made fine bread flour and hearty porridge. Yet a thousand horses had trampled the grass and it waved in the mountain wind no more.

     A fine-fingered hand reached up to pull a lock of strawberry blonde hair from eyes that were as gray as the stone upon which she stood. Her sight drifted closer to the base of the ancient fortress and there the army of King Logris of Bremman remained encamped.

Hundreds upon hundreds of small fires dotted the landscape around the castle illuminating a thousand tents still shadowed in the predawn gloom. In this faint and flickering glow she could clearly make out the movements of the ten thousand men reported to be in Logris’ service. Mercenaries, knights and holy warriors assembled to serve their lord in his self-styled righteous invasion of Elbreston. Amid the chaotic milling of bodies a tall man with wild red hair shouted orders from atop a magnificent black stallion.

“He looks every bit as fierce as the tales tell, no?”

“Rylan.” Shimone breathed her husband’s name as she turned to face the King of Elbreston. He was tall and broad shouldered. His green eyes twinkled with a humor and fire that had stolen her heart the moment she first laid eyes upon him. He was dressed now in leather armor with his mighty sword in its scabbard at his hip. She turned to face the field again and pointed with her chin to the mounted figure. “That is him, then? King Logris?” she asked.

“Aye, none other,” came his reply as he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against him, her back to his chest. He rest his chin lightly on the top of her head and they stood thus for many long moments looking down upon the sprawling army below. Shimone barely noticed the army for she loved it when he held her like this. She shivered once knowing the danger he would face in a very short time and that he would likely not survive to see the noon hour.

“You should go inside.” He said at last thinking that she must have been shivering from the cold. “The morning chill is not healthy.” He released her from his embrace to take his leave of her, to face that which lay ahead.

“Don’t do this thing,” she begged him one last time in a desperate yet futile attempt to change that which she knew must be.

He laughed lightly hoping to disarm her fear and ease her mind. “Fear not, beloved. In but a few hours this will all be over. Logris will be no more and our home will be safe once again.”

     “As you say,” she conceded and managed a weak smile while she looked into those deep green eyes that always took her breath away.

     “Sire.” Both heads turned toward the squire who has just emerged from the door to the guard tower. “Sire, it is time. Your captains assemble at the gate.” Rylan nodded to the youth who in turn gave a small bow and reentered the tower.

     “I must go now.” Rylan said to his wife in a voice that was soft and heavy with sorrow. “Will you withdraw to the safety within?” he asked.

     “In a moment,” she answered while rising up on her toes to give him a long and passionate kiss. She broke away and gave him one last smile of affection. “Go.” She said at last and watched him depart the wall through the tower door. As his shape disappeared into the shadows within, she whispered to him. “Come back to me, Rylan. Come back to me,” but she knew that he would not.

 

     Once again she turned to observe the field below. She saw King Logris and his generals ordering the troops for their final assault. She looked eastward to where the sun would soon crest the horizon. Any moment now.

     Behind her now was the courtyard surrounded by the castle’s mighty walls. She heard Rylan and his captains there preparing for the battle. It had been a month since King Logris of Bremman arrayed his forces against the small wealthy Kingdom of Elbreston. Four weeks of bloody carnage that had destroyed the countryside of Elbreston. Bremman lay north of Elbreston and Logris’ army had stormed across the land laying waste to villages, fields and pasturelands. Before that wave of destruction the citizens of Elbreston fled. Some remained behind to defend their lands. None had survived.

     At last the fleeing populace had arrived at the gates of Castle Elbrest. Rylan gave them shelter within the massive fortress but it was only a matter of time before the enemy arrived at the gates. Arrive they did, just three days past.

     Three days the encampment of the enemy blackened the Field of Lembrin. Three days of endless attacks and retreats as Rylan’s small force defended the fortress alone. Shimone wrung her hands again recalling the frustration. The invasion had come so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that there had been no time for a muster. The castle guard along with a few warriors who had holdings nearby were all that stood between the enemy and the citizens seeking refuge within.

     It was the final day. Not only had there been no time for a muster, there had been no time to lay in the supplies necessary to support so great a number within the castle walls during an extended siege. Water there was a plenty for the castle had wells of its own, but not enough food. Not nearly enough food. Yet, Rylan could not surrender to the would-be conqueror. It was not in his blood, nor in his heart, nor in the hearts of his men.

     They would make a final stand here. As dawn would bring Logris’ charge so, too, would it bring Rylan’s own. He would face the enemy head on in what all knew would be a hopeless effort to throw back the invaders. Shimone shivered again as much for the certain fear in heart as for the damp, chill, misty morning air.

 

     The soft and quiet voice of Hastel Ogleby came from behind her and drew her attention from her dark thoughts, “My Lady.” She felt the sudden weight settle on her shoulders as the king’s chief scribe laid a cloak upon her.

     “Hastel,” her head turned on her long and graceful neck and she studied the face of the middle-aged man. His hair was white and thinning. His eyes were sunken and set within the folds of the many wrinkles that were the result of decades scribing the record of the court. “You are here to record the event?” she asked him even though she knew full well the answer and the absurdity of the question but she wanted �" needed �" to say something - anything.

     The man nodded once, showing no hint of ridicule in his oddly bright blue eyes. The ink stained fingers of his hand passed lovingly across the face of the wood box hanging from his shoulder by a worn leather strap. “It is my sworn duty, Lady.”

     Of course it was, she knew. It was indeed the sworn duty of the chief scribe to record all events and moments of import to the kingdom. Such was his father’s task and that of his father’s father and his father’s father’s father before him. How the service had come about and how Hastel’s family had found themselves bearing the great burden was one of the few important events not recorded in the journals they so faithfully kept. The Ogleby sons had served the kingdom diligently and were in every way, but by blood, part of the ruling family of Elbreston.

 

     With reverence, the scribe set the box upon the stonework. A flick of nimble fingers released the catches and he raised the lid and placed it to the side. From within the velvet-lined interior he took out a sheaf of parchment, a sealed silver inkpot and several long white quills tipped with silver nibs.

     Shimone watched him as he prepared his tools with a reverence and purpose that made the act seem as a religious rite. Perhaps it was. She knew that Hastel was a follower of Untamo, god of the written word, patron of bards, and seeker of knowledge. In fact, all the chief scribes had been dutiful servants of the god of dreams, as Untamo was also known. Part of it was indeed a ritual, she knew, but just how much was ritual and not tradition, was something she did not.

     “Mine eyes, mine ears, mine hands,” began the customary prayer as the scribe extended his ink-stained hands over the carefully arranged tools of his trade �" of his faith. “By the will of Untamo, Patron of the Sacred Words, Seeker of all Truths, Dreamer of all Dreams, I pledge that the words I pen are true that those who come after know the truth through Untamo’s blessed gift.” Before the final words of the benediction left his lips a silvery-blue flash of light bathed the items and flickered away in an instant leaving only the shadowy silhouette behind the eyes to mark its passing.

     Even as Hastel uncapped the inkpot the first ruddy rays of the rising sun washed his face in a scarlet glow. “It is time,” he observed absently �" matter-of-factly. Before Shimone could reply, the enemy camp below erupted in the blare of a hundred trumpets. Her breath caught in her throat and she turned toward the field that, apart from the sounding horns, was silent as if in grim anticipation of the bloody turmoil to come. The enemies’ horns were answered almost immediately by Rylan’s own trumpet. The clarion call of the ancestral silver horn rang off of the hard granite walls of the ancient family castle.

     Hastel took up one the white quill pens and, for the first time, allowed himself to focus on the scene below. The early morning sunlight kissed the weapons and the armor of the enemy. Sword edge, spear point, and gilded helm flashed and flickered like fires in the night.

     “It’s like a thousand thousand fires,” the shaken scribe said more to himself than to Shimone. She didn’t answer him but, instead, moved to the wall and looked down. If she agreed with Hastel’s observation she did not say. When he turned to look at her the royal archivist concluded that she had darker thoughts turning in her mind than the poetic observances of a king’s scribe. For just a moment the old man’s odd blue eyes softened with an empathic compassion that broke through years of practiced detachment.

 

     Just then, Rylan’s horn sounded the call to arms once again. The bright tinny notes of the horn rung in a seemingly endless chorus as the fortress’ massive walls echoed the sound across the courtyard and back again. A deep and grumbling groan joined the sterling silver sound as the massive oak and iron doors to the castle were swung open on aged iron hinges.

     Within the span of two heartbeats, Rylan, on his dappled gray stallion, rode into view as he emerged from the open castle gates. As proud and as noble a lord had never been seen before on a field of battle. He sat tall in the saddle and the tabard of Elbreston, deep rich blue emblazoned with the silver fox device of the Elbrests, lay plain over his leather breastplate. Rylan presented, to all, the warrior king gone to war. The king was in the center of a line. To his left rode his flag bearer, Joseth, holding high the banner of Elbreston. So high in the air did he hold it that the silver fox caught the ruby glare of the sun and seemed to burn with a vengeful fire.

     To Rylan’s right his squire, young Leander, rode stiff in his saddle. Even from such a distance Shimone could see his knuckles turned white as he clutched the reins of his mount in a death grip. The boy, for he was really no more than that, had never seen war, had never faced an enemy, and had never faced death. Flanking these three rode the eight warriors of Rylan’s personal guard four to each side. These were good men and honorable knights. Their families, like the Oglebys, had served the house of Elbrest for generations. Each also wore a tabard bearing the royal device. A row of silver foxes rode to the edge of a small shallow ditch that formed a line across the field.

 

     Beyond the ditch, just a few yards away, Logris and his escort rode forward until, they too, were lined up along the depression. Beside the enemy king, his flag bearer, a young woman with tightly braided flaxen hair and tightly pressed white lips, sat astride a chestnut mare. She held steady the wood pole, supported by a leather cup beside the stirrup, from which flew the banner of Bremman with its tawny rampant lion on field of forest green.

     Logris gave all his attention to Rylan. No smile lit his lips hidden within the neatly trimmed beard that was just a shade darker than the coppery red hair covering his head. “King Rylan of Elbreston,” he addressed the warrior king. His deep and resonant voice carried his words well within Shimone’s hearing and although his words made her heart cry out in fear and anguish, his voice was not unpleasant to her ear. That, if nothing else, made Shimone tremble as she stood upon her granite perch. She shook her head to dispel the sensation.

“We have defeated your armies,” the king of Bremman continued. “Much of your lands now lie in ruin. Will you surrender that we might end this now without further bloodshed?” He held out his open hand toward Rylan in an almost pleading posture.

Shimone turned to Hastel to gauge the man’s reaction and the sight that met her eyes made her take a step back. Although she had seen the scribe under the thrall of his blessed duty many times before, she was still shocked by the sight of it. The man’s face was as set as stone and his hand moved in a blur as it darted from inkpot to parchment. He recorded the event for history with unearthly energy and with divine accuracy. Not the slightest detail was missed nor the most insignificant of words omitted.

“Elbreston will never surrender.” Rylan replied to Logris and Shimone’s attention was instantly diverted from the scribe back to the scene below. “Return to your land in peace, King Logris, or die here, today, on this field of battle.” Although his voice lacked the compelling resonant pull possessed by Logris, it was sincere and honest and decent. It was a voice Shimone loved.

“An unfortunate response,” Logris answered with what, to Shimone, sounded like sincere regret. Yet, regretful or not, the unspoken threat in his words forced Shimone to swallow a lump of dread that rose in her throat. “On this day one of us will die,” said the Logris. He pulled his sword out of its scabbard and raised it above his head where the red orange glow of the ever-rising sun turned it scarlet. Shimone imagined for a moment that the blade dripped blood.

The vision passed an instant later when Logris lowered his sword and pointed it at Rylan. “Now,” was all the King of Bremman shouted and his army sprang forward with shouts and bone chilling screams. Rylan’s men readied their weapons and, with matching cries of war, met the superior force of their enemy.

 

With her heart pounding and her breath coming in short gasps, Shimone watched the opposing forces come together with a clash of steel that seemed to call thunder and lightning from the sky. Time became meaningless to Shimone as she watched, in horror, the carnage created before her very eyes. She grasped the cold stone of the wall as young Leander was thrown from his horse by a thrown spear. She saw the terror plain upon his face despite the distance between them. She knew, and she knew that he knew, the time of his death had come

She moaned in helpless despair as Leander’s enemy grabbed up his spear and then plunged it into the heart of the fallen squire. She closed her eyes and turned from the scene as the young man thrashed on the ground while the life fled from him. Her shoulders shook as sobs of grief wracked her. Cries of war and shouts of anger arose anew and she forced herself to look again upon the tragedy being played out before her.

     Scalding tears ran freely down her cheeks and she saw the cause of the shouts. Rylan had at last come face to face with Logris. She did not hear Hastel as he quickly gathered together his equipment. “Lady, I must find a better vantage.” Still under the thrall of his sacred task he excused himself absently and hurried through the gatehouse door.

     On the field below, the battle continued to rage but a wide space formed around the two kings. Not one soldier on either side would dare to interfere. The kings circled one another each taking a measure of his opponent. The stallions, each born to combat, whickered and danced in challenge.

 

     Suddenly, the contest was on. Logris’ horse stepped in toward Rylan and the king of Bremman swung his sword in a wide arc. Rylan only just parried the blow before the sword could gut him. He returned with a sword thrust to Logris’ chest but Logris’ steed, attuned to his master, turned in time to save him from a killing blow. Nevertheless Rylan drew first blood as his sword cut into Logris’ arm.

     Shimone would never recall how long the battle lasted. In her memory it would always be a moment that lasted an eternity. It wasn’t long, or maybe it was, before Logris got through Rylan’s defense. Shimone could see the dark ugly stain spreading across the leather armor covering Rylan’s side. She watched as the pair continued to battle �" she could not take her eyes from the dread dance. The horses began to slip and slide as the ground was turned into a sucking, slippery mire of blood-born mud. Both men suffered now from multiple wounds inflicted by the other. The contest could not continue forever.

     Logris came in with a sudden burst of energy. His sword was a blur as he pressed Rylan further and further back. Then Rylan’s tiring mount stumbled at the edge of the small ditch. Valiantly the horse tried to maintain its footing but he fell to his knees in the dire muck. Rylan lost his seat and fell into the mud beside his horse. Shimone gasped. “Get up!” she cried desperately, knowing that he could not hear her above the din but somehow believing her will alone could raise him to his feet. An instant later Logris was on the ground before him. Rylan didn’t even have time to raise his sword in defense.

     Shimone bit down on her lip against the cries threatening to tear from her throat. She drew blood but did not notice as she watched Rylan, King of Elbreston and beloved husband, die on the field of battle. She turned from the sight and fell to her knees on the cold granite and wept. The battle did not last much longer. The clashing of steel, the snorting of horses, the screams of the dying, were nothing to her �" did not even reach her. With Rylan dead, those of his men still alive were quickly defeated and surrendered. Of some two hundred warriors of Elbreston that stood beside their king that day only twenty survived.

 

     So wrapped in her grief Shimone did not hear the approach of the dark robed figure. Shrouded in a long black veil and wearing slippers that merely whispered on the stone, the woman came to Shimone’s side.

     “You have heard,” the woman with an aged and tired voice said more than asked.

     “I have seen,” Shimone fairly snarled at the veiled woman.

     “You knew it would come,” the elder woman offered matter-of-factly.

     “Be gone, witch! Your presence sickens me,” Shimone replied sharply and stood to face the other woman squarely. Wrinkled hands reached up to the part the veil. The black robes of the woman were encircled many times with a long string of silver beads.

     “Mind your tongue, girl,” commanded the woman with a voice of authority. Eyes of deepest blue, set within the folds of aging skin, blazed with controlled fury and unfathomable power. “Do not forget I serve Ilmatar, the mother goddess. To speak thus to me is to speak so to her.”

     Shimone staggered back a step in the face of the angry woman. So long had the woman been a part of Shimone’s life that she often did forget. The priestess’ features softened as she looked into Shimone’s grief filled gray eyes. “I know you grieve, child,” the priestess continued more gently. “You know also that I would have done anything to spare you this, but it was already fated.”

     The two women, as one, turned to look down upon the scene of the battle. Logris had Rylan’s body taken away to prepare for a king’s funeral. Even as they watched, he gathered his entourage to accompany him into the castle.

     “What will I do without him?” Shimone whispered into the wind revealing all her pain.

     “You will do what was foretold you years ago, what is best for you and the people of Elbreston,” the priestess answered thoughtfully. Another long silent moment passed before the priestess stirred. “I must take my leave of you now, child. There are many souls this day that will need my guidance and protection for their journey to the next world.”

     Shimone’s only answer was a silent nod as the priestess recovered her face with the veil that marked her as a Sister of the Shroud �" one of the four orders of the church of Ilmatar. The woman spared Shimone one last look before leaving the high stone wall. It was her first duty, as it was with all of her order, to see to the needs of recently departed spirits. As she had come, she went - soft slippers barely making a sound.

 

     As if sensing her eyes upon him, Logris looked up to see Shimone standing on the wall high above. He blinked his eyes once before casting his gaze downward as though he did not wish to intrude upon her grief. A light tap of his heels on his steed’s flanks set the horse in motion and the King of Bremman, now King of Elbreston, disappeared from sight as he and his escort entered the castle.

     With a sigh of resignation Shimone turned to the dark opening that led into the guard tower and the stairs within. The steely gray stone seemed much colder to Shimone’s eyes now despite the warming of the mid-morning sun. She doubted they would ever seem warm again.

     “I will do as was foretold,” she said to herself as she stepped to the guard tower door. She paused in the doorway as if unsure. “What choice do I have?” she asked herself and stepped into the cool shadows to descend the cold stair and to face the man who would be her new husband.

 

----end