Great Kings' War Read online

  Kalvan hoped Klestreus wouldn't call his bluff and force him to use Skranga to crack Balph. It was good strategy to keep both intelligence agencies mistrusting each other; he paid a price, however, when it interfered with their real work.

  He turned to the advisors nearest the throne. "I want a message taken to Chancellor Xentos that the Great King and Queen would like to seek his help in drafting a response to this—he paused to hold his nose—this Edict of Dung from Styphon's Foul Den."

  Everyone of suitable rank within hearing immediately started arguing about who should have the honor of doing the Great King's bidding. Kalvan a slipped an arm around Rylla's waist, although it felt like embracing a suit of heavy-cavalry armor. The Zarthani were a long way from the "I say to one, come, and he cometh; I say to another, go, and he goeth," of the Roman Legions. In the Great Kingdoms at least, they tended to regard that sort of obedience as fit only for serfs, barbarians and the Middle Kingdoms of the Missouri/Mississippi Valley.

  "Why must we take council with Xentos?" Rylla asked, but apparently at the world in general and Styphon's House in particular rather than at him.

  "First, for the same reason we made Xentos Chancellor, he's the top highpriest of Hos-Hostigos and everybody respects and kowtows to his opinions. Besides, he'll know the right tone to take when we answer this piece of offal."

  "What's a kowtow?"

  "In the Great Kingdom of China, back in my homeland, the vassals would kneel before their Great, Great King and touch their heads on the floor to show their submission and deference to his authority. They called it kowtowing."

  "Oh, something like what King Theovacar would like his nobles to do?"

  "Exactly, but if the Greffan nobles are as hard headed as the traders, such as Colonel Verkan, he will have a tough job of it! But getting back to the point at hand, I want to write a Writ of Denunciation before everyone has had a chance to read Styphon's propaganda sheet. I also want to hold a Great Council for the same reason we held one before the Battle of Fyk. Styphon's House has stolen a march on us, we may have to move fast to catch up, and I don't want everybody and his uncle complaining they weren't consulted."

  "Answering Styphon's Edict, I can understand, but for a Great Council to meet, it will take the better part of a moon to have all the Princes of Hostigos assembled in Hostigos Town. Can we give Styphon's House a gift that big?"

  "We can't and we won't," Kalvan answered. "What I want to find out is how much I can safely do by way of appointing men to represent each Prince and telling the Princes themselves afterward. Also, if I can do that at all, Xentos may have good advice about which men we can trust. Finally, all the priests of Dralm in Hos-Hostigos look up to Xentos, and many of the other priests as well. If we have his support for what we do in advance, we'll be more likely to have the priests on our side if any Princes make a fuss."

  Rylla giggled. "You have a devious mind, Kalvan. A wise one, though. If you were not a prince in your own land, you should have been."

  Kalvan tightened his grip on her waist and felt some of the stiffness go out of her spine. Devious? Maybe I look that way, but if it makes my job easier, I don't mind. What he really wanted to be was intelligently cautious about this business of setting up a Great Kingdom to make war on Styphon's House, while learning how to rule it as he went along.

  Maybe he did have some natural talent for ruling. Right now, though, it looked as if it would be mostly on-the-job training that would make the difference between keeping or losing both his throne and his head.

  II

  Kalvan sighed heavily as he hitched his shoulders and pulled the neck ruff up over his head. The neck ruff was four hundred years out of fashion back on otherwhen; here-and-now it was the latest fashion craze out of Hos-Agrys—all the Great Kings and Princes wore them, or so Rylla claimed. As far as he was concerned, ruffs were far worse than neckties, or even the clerical collar his father used to wear. For at least the five hundredth time, Kalvan reflected that there was more to the business of being a Great King than leading armies and taking Great Queens to their bedchambers!

  At least his afternoon audiences were over. The first had been a group of Nostori merchants come all the way from Nostor Town to inform him that this was a bad winter. Thump! What did they expect him to do—raise his arms, mumble abracadabra, sending the storm clouds fleeing? The sad part was that's exactly what they expected from Great King Kalvan, Sent by Dralm to Save the People of Hos-Hostigos from the Armies of the Evil Styphon.

  Next he had heard from a delegation of the Fletchers Guild with a list of complaints, chief of which was a strongly worded query as to why the new Royal Army of Hos-Hostigos wasn't using any archers. When he had suggested that they consider joining the Gunsmiths Guild, they'd reacted in horror, as if he'd asked them all to undergo a voluntary orchidectomy!

  Finally, to put a cherry atop his day, Rylla had insisted that Hos-Hostigos needed a Throne, and not just any throne, but one with a 'name.' After all, all the Great Kingdom thrones had their own names: Hos-Harphax had the Iron Throne; Hos-Zygros the Ivory Throne; Hos-Ktemnos the Golden Throne; Hos-Bletha the Silver Throne—which made sense since it was originally an off-shoot of Hos-Ktemnos. Hos-Agrys, the richest of the Five Kingdoms, had the Throne of Light, a jewel encrusted throne. Rylla had insisted it was only proper that Hos-Hostigos have one, too.

  And, as to be expected, everyone and his brother in the Great Hall had his own suggestion: Xentos came up with the Throne of Dralm—Kalvan overruled that, too religious and bound to make Hos-Hostigos more enemies from the priesthoods of the other True Gods. Harmakros came up with the Granite Throne, which he thought was a strong name but Rylla nixed it. "It's a stone!" Someone in jest had suggested the Wooden Throne which almost got him tarred and feathered! Skranga came up with the Throne of Steel, and almost got into a fight with Sarrask who thought it would make them look like vassals to the Iron Throne.

  Finally, Rylla came up with the Fireseed Throne; a name even he found uniquely appropriate and had given it his blessings. Furthermore, she was going to design and commission the throne herself as a present to their Great King! Afterwards, to celebrate, casks of ale and winter wine were brought into the Hall and opened.

  Kalvan sat as his desk trying to ignore his wine headache. He had the only "desk" in the Hos-Hostigos (although Skranga claimed to have seen one in Hos-Zygros) and he'd had to make it himself because no one in the Fitters and Joiners Guild would be responsible for such an abomination. Furniture-making, like so many other crafts he'd once taken for granted, had a long way to go here-and-now. The only 'real' furniture were tables, chests, cupboards, stools, benches and contraptions that looked like a old-fashioned upright wardrobes for holding clothes. Valuables were kept in chests, such as the implements that passed for silverware here-and-now, tinderboxes and candleholders. Chairs were new and all the rage, but hardly found outside palaces and the homes of the wealthy. Kalvan would have given a couple of cavalry regiments for a Lazy-Boy armchair with a footrest!

  The top of Kalvan's desk was made from the bole of an oak tree that had been young when Leif Ericson sailed to Vinland, and it was covered with scrolls, maps and parchments weighted down by one of the new rifled pistols he'd designed for his own use. The workmanship of the pistol was magnificent: mother-of-pearl inlay in dark walnut wood, worked and etched silver facings and an ivory butt with a carved representation of Galzar Wolfhead. It must have taken a master gunsmith and his apprentices all of three or four months to handcraft it for the King. Three or four months in which the craftsman could have turned out a dozen utilitarian pistols, or even five or six muskets.

  With the immediate crisis over, everyone—well, almost everyone—seemed to want to return to the old ways of Before Kalvan. Output at the rifle shop had dropped from fifteen rifles a day to six. Part of the slowdown was due to the harsh weather, but what was really happening was simple economics; the gunshop could turn out five smoothbores for each rifled musket it produced. Despite the
fact that the Royal Treasury was paying them five times as much for each rifle, every time they thought their Great King wasn't watching, they went and stepped up production of smoothbores. The only reason they were still making at least six rifles a day was because Kalvan had threatened to mount a few of their heads on the palisade of Tarr-Hostigos if production dropped any lower.

  Cannon production had dropped to almost nothing because they'd run out of brass. Last month, he'd had them melt down every brass chamberpot and ornamental vase, brass utensil and brass coin in Hostigos Town and the outlying towns and villages. Result: one cast-brass sixteen-pounder, three eight-pounders and one six-pounder.

  Note: find local source of copper.

  Kalvan could well appreciate the love for handcrafted quality goods; after all, wasn't he from the land of Maytag, Westinghouse, Sylvania and General Electric? The real problem here-and-now was not one of aesthetics, however, but of survival. Now, how can I get that across to the provincial-minded guilds and mercantile associations?

  Not that there weren't successes. His army reforms had gone over well throughout Hos-Hostigos, especially standardization of regiments and ranks: primarily because the career army officers loved them. There were now three grades between captain and captain-general where before there'd been only one—grand captain. All of this meant promotions and pay raises—in peacetime, too! The career officers weren't so happy about the Royal Army; perhaps, they'd caught a glimpse of the future to come. In return for the promotions and raises, they'd still swallowed it and helped quell their Princes' objections.

  The only question now was: would these reforms be enough to allow the Royal Army to defeat Hos-Harphax, destroy Styphon's House and enforce the peace? And that was a question—barring a revelation from Dralm—that only time would tell. Time and the mettle of Styphon's House.

  Kalvan looked down at the at the mountain of parchment and vellum piled on his desk and wondered if here wasn't doing a bad thing, reinventing paper? He was certain that legions of his descendants would curse him for it. That is, if the papermakers ever produced anything better than the soggy throw rug they'd brought him this morning. At least it didn't smell as bad as the last batch; he never remembered paper smelling much—certainly not like rotten eggs! It had to be the primitive sulphuric acid by the Nordhausen process (that he remembered from Jules Verne's Mysterious Island) made by distilling iron sulfate which was reacting to the pulp and causing the stench, but they needed to use something to bleach the pulp after it was pounded and beaten.

  Maybe he was going in the wrong direction. It was becoming obvious that acid, even in mild solutions, was destroying the fiber. Why not try a completely different bleaching agent? What about lye or slaked lime? It would certainly bleach the fibers, and without the smell. Maybe I'm on to something? As soon as he finished with today's paperwork, he'd visit Ermut and suggest a lye solution. He'd leave it to the papermaker to discover the right strength.

  It was nice to have people around him he could depend upon, even if he could count their number on the fingers of his two hands. Now, back to work!

  He picked up the first parchment; it was a plea from Ryx Town, a small hamlet some thirty miles north of Hostigos Town, for a party of hunters to track down a wolf pack. Kalvan made a note to sent it to Colonel Hestophes, the hero of Narza Gap, whom Kalvan had put in charge of Hos-Hostigos internal security, which right now meant wolf-and-bandit hunting.

  Good officers were another thing in short supply; Chartiphon had politely refused to leave the Army of Hostigos for an appointment to the Royal Army. That was just as well, since Kalvan didn't want Ptosphes to lose all his best officers. Harmakros was now Captain-General of the Mobile Force and Colonel Alkides was now Brigadier-General Alkides in command of the Royal Artillery. Phrames was a proven fighter and Kalvan was grooming him for better things—maybe a princedom or second in command—behind Rylla, of course—of the Royal Army.

  There were other requests—some of them desperate—for hunters, trappers, food and fireseed; there was even one ludicrous request for two hogsheads of winter wine! The last request was the easiest to fulfill; he placed the parchment into a basket for scraping and reusing. The only groups in Hostigos that this ill winter wind had blown good were the innkeepers and royal scribes.

  Kalvan kept at his work until he could see the wood grain of his desktop, then used the bell pull to ring for his body servant, Cleon, to bring him some sassafras tea. It was a poor substitute for coffee, but...

  Arriving along with the steaming sassafras was Chancellor Xentos, wearing his blue robe, with the eight-pointed white star of Dralm on the breast. Xentos had an aristocratic face that looked young despite the deep lines in his face and snow-white hair. Perhaps it was his perpetual alertness and twinkling blue eyes that made him appear young; in truth, he was only three winters older than Prince Ptosphes. The Highpriest was both hated and loved, and in some cases even feared. Kalvan had heard stories about his fearsome temper.

  Xentos' nose was still red and dripping from the end of his cold, but otherwise he looked far better than when Kalvan and Rylla had waited on him three days before.

  "It appears I arrived at just the right time, Your Majesty."

  Kalvan nodded and motioned for Xentos to sit down. "Cleon, bring the Chancellor some hot tea, but add some tincture of willow bark."

  "Yes, Sire."

  When Cleon returned with the tea, Xentos took a sip. "This is good. I seem to feel the cold in my joints more with each passing year."

  Kalvan laughed. "Even I felt this cold."

  Xentos nodded. "Young and old are suffering from this chill breath of the Cold Lands. A winter to stay close to the hearth, if ever there was one. Which reminds me of one reason for this visit, Your Majesty: Brother Mytron was threatening to chain Rylla to the bedposts if he caught her riding bareback again! In her condition and with her mother's example, Dralm be merciful!" He struck his forehead with the palm of his hand.

  Kalvan had to swallow a fist-sized lump in the throat before he could trust his voice. "Dralm-blast it! I've told her—ayyyy! I'd have more luck talking to a hurricane. I'm just glad she's in Mytron's capable hands; Prince Ptosphes and I..." Kalvan made a washing motion with his hands.

  "She been like that since she first learned to crawl," Xentos said with a smile. "And the cries she could make! I love her like a daughter, but I wish Allfather Dralm, in his wisdom, had paused to mix a little caution into that bundle of fireseed." The Highpriest paused, his eyes peering into a realm no one else could see. "She's the very image of her mother, Demia... Enough of that! At least, now that Rylla's with child, we won't have to worry about her riding off into battle once more."

  Kalvan laughed. "Don't let her hear you say that, Xentos!" Kalvan felt pretty good about Rylla being laid up; her pregnancy had turned out to be one of his best-executed plans—even if it had cost him the help of one of his best generals. Also, it had been a plan in which he'd enjoyed the campaign even more than the victory. Now if only the spring campaign against Great King Kaiphranos went half as well...

  "Chancellor, have you heard anything from the Harphaxi priests about King Kaiphranos' plans for this spring?"

  The Highpriest pulled out his pipe and made a full production of knocking out the heel, cleaning the bowl, filling and tamping it with tobacco and lighting it, before beginning to speak. "We have had few strangers from outside Hostigos Town this winter. I did recently meet with a priest of Galzar from Arklos who came to pray at the Allfather's Temple of Hostigos. In our talk he mentioned that Kaiphranos has ordered his princes and nobles to call forth their levy and prepare for war against the Usurper—excuse me, Your Majesty."

  Kalvan winced. He wondered if that had been a purposeful slip of the tongue. Or maybe he was just too sensitive on the subject, being exactly that: a Usurper who now called himself a Great King.

  "He also said that many of the Uncle Wolfs Kaiphranos has sent out as heralds have not yet returned to Harphax City, wh
ich may be due either to the storms or to those who would rather not reply to their Great King."

  That was about what he'd expected. Some of Kaiphranos' nobles would use the winter as an excuse for not preparing for a war they did not intend to fight. Others would heed their liege lord's call. The fewer the better for Hos-Hostigos; unfortunately, the winter worked as much against Kalvan sending out antiwar propaganda as it did against Kaiphranos' calling up his levy.

  Earlier in the year Kalvan had stopped using Uncle Wolfs as heralds—the custom here-and-now—not because he didn't trust them, but because he didn't have enough of them. Healers were few and far between in the Five Kingdoms and the Uncle Wolfs were the best here-and-now medicos. He intended to keep his priests of Galzar busy doing what they did best, fixing broken limbs and giving herbal potions, not haring off on errands better done by the lesser sons of the nobility. To give the office some prestige, he'd created the Royal Office of Heraldry and designed colorful costumes to appeal the young nobles; it was working well enough that he had two applicants for every position! Not only that but Skranga was enrolling the brighter lads into the Secret Service.

  Now, it was time to start the work of passing on his real legacy—knowledge, before it was lost to a stray bullet. "Xentos, I want to discuss with you the founding of a university in Hostigos."

  "What's a university?" Xentos asked, his forehead wrinkling.

  Kalvan understood the Chancellor's perplexity. Other than the temple schools for priests and scribes, there were no institutions of higher learning in the Great Kingdoms. The nobility learned to read and write the Zarthani runes with tutors; everyone else picked up what he could at home, joined one of the temples or served an apprenticeship with a scribe.

  "A university is similar to temple school, only instead of just teaching about religion and ritual, it teaches reading, writing, arithmetic and everything in the world."

  "Everything?"