webcrawl/APGTE/Book-6/tex/Ch-018.md.tex

\hypertarget{kingfisher-ii}{%
\section{Kingfisher II}\label{kingfisher-ii}}

\begin{quote}
\emph{``A wise man fears heroes not for their nature but for what they
were made to fight.''}

-- King Edward III of Callow, the Fratricide
\end{quote}

\emph{Learn this well, nephew}, the Prince of Brus had told Frederic.
\emph{All pretty things are lies.}

Was this to be the bitter truth of the world, then? That men and women
gilded the ugliness of their works and smiled at each other, in tacit
accord never to pick at the paint? It was a foul thought but those
words, among others, echoed still in the boy's ears even as he was
formally proclaimed the heir to the Principality of Brus. The Florian
Basilica was an exquisite piece of work, at the heart of it a great
circle of stained glass windows tall as two men each and enchanted to
chance colours with the seasons, yet the pews that could have seated
five hundred bore less than a fifth of this. Frederic's prince uncle had
arranged for a brisk ceremony without frills, so that the unfitness two
rule of his two sons would not be lingered on even as they were formally
stripped of their right of inheritance. One of the Holies had deigned to
attend in person and even signed the act of disinheritance instead of
Brother Antoine, the appointed shepherd of the basilica.

Frederic was rather thankful for the attendance of the Holy, as
otherwise Cousin Nathanael might well have thrown a fit: even now he was
not bothering to hide his fury, though it was kept mastered. Even
Nathanael was not fool enough to indulge in a tantrum before such an
influential priestess as the one who had come, for the House's
disapproval was a weighty thing to even one of royal blood. The Holy One
personally saw to the appointment of Prince Amaury's new successor, a
gesture of great respect that Frederic could not help but see as two
great beasts scratching each other's back. His uncle borrowed the
authority of the Gods to see his own carried out, while the Holies were
recognized as having the right to grant that authority to begin with.
All benefited, the fair-haired boy whimsically thought, save perhaps the
Gods Above themselves. \emph{But when faced with silence, what can men
do save fill it?}

Frederic Goethal was anointed with blood and water, then draped in a
fine cloak bearing the colours of his house. The priestess led him in
swearing the ancient oaths -- \emph{he was to be true, to be brave, to
pursue the grace of the Heavens in all things} -- and afterwards he rose
to his feet the heir to the Principality of Brus in the eyes of Gods and
men. How strange, that he felt no different before and after. Almost as
if a crown was only ever a crown when seen in the eyes of others.

If Frederic caught sight of wings in red and blue high above in the
rafters, he kept it to himself.

---

The years passed and the Principate of Procer continued to eat itself
alive.

He'd been too young to understand it, but he was fourteen now and there
was more to his world than the walls of the palace and the few lessons
that took him beyond them. \emph{Princess said she had a right}, the
people sang in the streets, growing quiet when riders passed by them.
\emph{Princess said it'd be a fight}, the words picked up when the sound
of hooves passed. \emph{Now princesses are all aflight, and the pot it
is boiling}. The irony of it, Frederic had come to decide, was that this
war had already been won half a dozen times. It'd been won at the Battle
of the Swallows near the border of Orne, again at the Sack of
Lullefeuille in Creusens, at the Waltz of Fools in Brabant and even the
Treachery of One Mile just outside the Salian border. All victories that
should have broken the spine of causes, yet though the faces and the
friends changed the war kept marching on unabated. When even victory was
not enough to win a war, Frederic sometimes wondered, what was left to
it but \emph{losing}? Yet his unease did not matter, for the House of
Goethal had had already picked its man for the throne, Prince Dagobert
of Lange. The cause seemed promising, it had to be said, as the Prince
of Lange had lately become the preeminent crown of the northwest and
perhaps even beyond.

The year before Frederic was first brought to the palace had seen the
final death of the other great alliance in the north, the coalition with
Cleves and Hainaut that had formed around Prince Fabien of Lyonis. A
victorious pitched battle near the capital of Lyonis had forced Prince
Fabien into the fold under Prince Dagobert as well as inflicted grievous
enough casualties that -- at least for now -- the principalities of
Hainaut and Cleves had withdrawn from the Ebb and the Flow. Peace had
not followed, naturally, for victory ever brought danger with it. Now it
was the Malanzas of Aequitan that were turning their gaze north, eyeing
the southernmost ally of the coalition: Segovia. Though Princess Aenor
of Aequitan was no great general, she'd brought great numbers to her
side through skillful diplomacy. So far caution had kept her coalition's
attention on the eastern alliance under Princess Constance of Aisne, but
now Princess Aenor was wary of allowing Prince Dagobert to consolidate
his position in the northwest without Lyonis and its allies acting as a
check on his expansion.

Frederic learned all of this from his uncle, whose steady hand at the
keel had kept Brus out of the worst of the wars while reaping great
benefits. He could admire the man, even if he would never love him.

``An offer has been made for your hand by the Malanzas,'' Prince Amaury
told him one evening.

After turning thirteen, it had become custom for Frederic to spend one
evening every week in the Prince of Brus' solar to discuss lessons and
politics. Sometimes these discussions were only between the two of them,
but other evenings saw his uncles' favourite advisors and the powerful
men and women of Brus invited to share brandy and talks. Frederic had
grasped, without needing to be told, that he was being introduced to the
same faces he would need to use and be wary of when he came to rule.
Cousin Nathanael had savaged a salon with a knife in a fit of rage when
he'd heard of the invitations become regular. Frederic now had a taster
for his food and drink.

``Princess Aenor of Aequitan has daughter and a son,'' the fair-haired
boy recited by rote. ``Rozala and Hernan, with Rozala the eldest of the
two.''

``It is her hand that was offered,'' Prince Amaury told him, sounding
amused. ``She has a few years on you, though I am told she is a handsome
girl.''

Which added value to the match, though not as much as the fact that
Rozala was the heiress to Aequitan. Though it was true and Brus and the
other principality were far apart and that marriage alliances between
ruling royals always complicated matters of succession, the offer was an
attractive one. Most likely Rozala would follow her mother to Salia,
being groomed for a Malanza dynasty on the high throne, while her
younger brother served as Prince of Aequitan in all but name. Frederic
himself would be expected to come to Salia as Rozala's husband and his
uncle's man in the Highest Assembly, the two of them arranging matters
of succession so that the House of Goethal would be stable at home while
keeping a foot on the high throne. It was a tempting offer, befitting of
a woman of Aenor Malanza's reputation.

``If we turned on Prince Dagobert while his armies are gone south to
battle the Malanzas, this alliance might well collapse,'' Frederic
noted.

``Lyonis is still looking for a way to start another bid for the
throne,'' his uncle agreed, sounding pleased. ``And Luisa of Segovia is
too clever a woman to remain on a sinking boat.''

``Yet you'll refuse,'' the fair-haired boy said.

``Dagobert has daughters as well,'' Prince Amaury smiled. ``A hint of
the offer ought to open the dance for blood ties there.''

Without soiling Brus' reputation or risking quite so much, Frederic
grasped. And as he was young, he would be betrothed yet not wed:
betrothals could be broken, should the situation change. Prince Dagobert
was a proven military commander besides, in contrast to Princess Aenor's
shoddy record there, and marriage alliances from principalities far
apart were notoriously unstable besides. Brus and Lange were neighbours,
blood ties there would create a powerful bloc in the northwest that
might well serve as the foundations for a dynasty in Salia.

``Mind you, in matters of land the most eligible woman in Procer dwells
further north,'' his uncle mused.

``Cordelia Hasenbach,'' Fredric recited. ``Prince of Rhenia, heiress to
Hannoven.''

``Fine soldiers, the people of those lands,'' Prince Amaury said. ``Yet
I wager Old Klaus will want his niece wed to one of his kin, so that one
child can be a Hasenbach and the other a Papenheim. Lycaonese rarely
marry out, regardless.''

Frederic put the notion out of his mind, and the Lycaonese as well, as
their disdain for playing the Ebb and Flow meant were only ever
witnesses to its proceedings. Instead he began to correspond with
Perenelle Griffeu, Prince Dagobert's eldest daughter, at the tacit
invitation of the man himself. His uncle had, once more, navigated his
way to great gains. Perenelle was pleasant enough, and of a certain wry
humour that Frederic appreciated, so the cultivated relationship took
well. Frederic believed it was in part as a reward for this that Prince
Amaury invited him to sit at council when ambassadors from Rhenia were
entertained. The expectation was that, with relations tightening between
the four Lycaonese principalities, an effort was being made by them to
secure better trading rights in the south by negotiation as a faction.
Still, there was opportunity for profit there and there was palpable
excitement at the possibility of securing some Lycaonese soldiery as
\emph{fantassins}.

Yet there was little discussion of trade, when the ambassador was
entertained. Frederic found he agreed with his uncle's scorn when the
Rhenian envoys were laughed out of the room. Prince Cordelia Hasenbach
-- not even a \emph{princess}, that one, northern savagery at its most
glaring -- had sent warnings of Praesi gold pouring into Procer through
brokers, that if civil strife continued unchecked the Principate might
well splinter. The ramblings of a young Lycaonese fool, Prince Amaury's
councillors dismissed. Prince Klaus Papenheim would have been worth
indulging to an extent, if he could be roped in as an ally, but who
cared about the dubious doomsday prophecies of some slip of a girl at
the edge of the world?

The same councillors advised patience and composure, when the Neustrian
army began to muster. There would be raids, they said, as there'd always
been raids, but only that. The Lycaonese were a miserly people: they
always retreated after a slew of casualties was inflicted, fleeing back
north with what little wealth and warmth they'd managed to steal. The
garrisons of northern Brus had been thinned to fill the field armies,
true, but the fortress walls were tall and well-kept. The Neustrians
would retreat soon enough and the House of Goethal would make them pay
for their perfidy after Prince Dagobert of Lange became \emph{First}
Prince Dagobert of Lange.

When Frederic turned fifteen and the first fortresses fell, though, the
silence from the councillors was deafening. Word filtered in from the
north and the faced grew darker for it was not the Neustrians alone
who'd come: Rhenia, Bremen and Hannoven all flew banners as well. The
entire north had gone to war, and every day brought word of a fresh
defeat as the weakened and surprised defences of Brus utterly collapsed.
Prince Amaury Goethal grew sour, his moods darkened, and when Princess
Mathilda Greensteel was found to have led a host through the famously
treacherous Guiseron swamplands, the aging Prince of Brus led his
soldiers out of the city to break her army before it could rejoin with
the rest of the Lycaonese. Prince Amaury never returned, his life
claimed in single combat by the renowned warrior-prince Manfred
Reitzenberg.

Frederic did not yet know this, when he was woken up in the middle of
night with a blade to his throat.

``What is the meaning of this?'' he indignantly asked the soldier.

``Prince's orders,'' the man said.

``Prince Amaury?'' Frederic blinked, taken aback.

``Prince Nathanael,'' the soldier smiled as a floor of armed traitors
filled the room.

---

The armies of Rhenia and Hannoven had marched south with blinding
swiftness, Frederic learned, and had begun to prepare for the siege if
the city. By then he was in a cell, naturally, but dear Nathanel did
like to chat after savaging him. The fair-haired boy of fifteen tasted
blood in his mouth as his cousin retreated panting yet bright-eyed,
Frederic's bruises having been built on bruises -- the pain had been
atrocious, at first, now he felt almost divorced from it all. As if he
were stranger looking at his own body, at this entire farce.

``Are you weeping?'' Nathanael -- not Prince Nathanel, never prince,
Frederic would rather \emph{choke} on his tongue first -- asked,
sounding so very pleased.

Was he? The boy blinked, and found tears going down his cheeks. The salt
stung his bloody cheekbones, making it impossible to ignore.

``I weep at what you are,'' Frederic decided, which was untrue but
pleasing to say.

``The victor is what I am,'' his cousin laughed. ``But take heart,
little usurper. You'll be away from my tender care soon enough.''

\emph{All pretty things are lies}, Frederic thought, and being away from
Nathanael would be pretty thing indeed.

``Am I to be executed, then?'' the boy said, voice shaking through his
nonchalance. ``How very predictable.''

There was an ugly glint in his cousin's eye at having been denied the
pleasure of stripping away hope, but it passed.

``I would never kill one of my own kin, Frederic,'' Nathanael smiled.
``Dear me, cousin, think of my \emph{reputation}. But when I open the
gates of the city to Hasenbach, handing you over the Lycaonese as
Father's accomplice in foolishly disregarding the offered hand of the
savages ought to earn me some trust. I do wonder what manner of grim
execution they'll have in mind for you.''

Stepping out of this, looking at it like a stranger, Frederic almost
admired the wicked man across from him. Nathanael had acted effectively
to reclaim the birthright he considered himself unfairly deprived of,
seizing the opportunity with both swiftness and ruthlessness. Perhaps,
Frederic mused in the most darkly, his cousin was the true Goethal
between them after all. Who was the true child of opportunity, between
the one chained and the one standing? His cousin advanced towards him,
smiling.

``I'll have you moved to more fitting accommodations and healed,''
Nathanael mused, patting his cheek. ``Do complain I mistreated you, it
will do wonders to make you seem a liar.''

``You've such a pretty future ahead of you, cousin,'' Frederic smiled.

Nathanael's hand withdrew, then returned as a slap across the face.
Blood filled his mouth again, but Frederic pushed down the pain and gave
his tormentor nothing. Why, he was an Alamans prince of the blood: if he
was to die, it would be having had the last word.

---

The morning of what was to be Frederic Goethal's last day on Creation,
he was woken up by the light coming through the open windows of his old
rooms in the palace. He rose without attendants around him, padding all
the way to the open glass and letting the warm morning breeze caress his
face. There would be no escape from here, he knew. There were guards at
the door and in the gardens below, with orders to cripple him should he
attempt to flee. But it was such a pleasant morning. Some part of him
was not surprised, when he looked at the apple tree across from him and
found waiting there the slight silhouette of a kingfisher. It truly was,
he thought, a beautiful creature. The long beak and bright plumage, the
clever eyes watching him just as he watched them.

``Come to escort me on my way out?'' Frederic asked.

The bird looked at him for a long moment, as it had when he'd been a
boy. And then it took flight, leaving him with the same taste of
esoteric failure in the mouth he'd first tasted as a boy of five.

``Still unworthy, am I?'' he bitterly whispered.

Perhaps he was. He'd lost, after all, without ever having lifted a
sword. And now he was going to die. And so, as a son of the House of
Goethal, he put on his best and combed his hair so that he would at
least perish while presentable. The guards that came to get him he did
not recognize in the slightest, which meant they were likely
\emph{fantassins} hired by his cousin. Was he finding it difficult to
secure loyalties? How amusing. Frederic really ought to needle him over
it before he was handed over the Lycaonese for execution. Yet when he
was ushered into a parlour, there was only one person waiting for him.
Mute with surprise, Frederic was served wine and had a pleasant
conversation with a very dangerous woman.

``Nathanael Goethal,'' Cordelia Hasenbach pleasantly told him, ``was
seventeen thousand thrones in debt to the Pravus Bank. He entertained
envoys from them on the day of his `coronation', seeking further
loans.''

Cousin Nathanael, Frederic aptly deduced from the context, had been met
with an unfortunate accident. Auguste's mental illness made him highly
unsuitable to rule, and so the Lycaonese were turning to him as a
candidate to secure Brus. He was hardly the only choice, given that
there was another branch of Goethals, but he could be said to be the
\emph{natural} choice. He was certainly Prince Amaury's heir by right,
should the northerners care the slightest whit about upholding these. He
could not know, not when those terrifyingly -- beautiful -- cold blue
eyes were studying him without giving away anything going on behind
them.

``I owe no debts,'' Frederic told the fair-haired woman.

``You would owe one,'' Cordelia Hasenbach coolly corrected.

And thus the game was played, the ancient song of Ebb and the Flow. He
could rise, if part of her alliance. So be it.

``My uncle's was a fair death, dealt in open battle,'' Frederic
admitted. ``There would be no disgrace in swearing myself to you.''

``You misunderstand me, Frederic Goethal,'' the Prince of Rhenia said.

She was not beautiful in the way that ladies of Brus were, slim and
delicate and sophisticated. Prince Cordelia was\ldots{} regal. It was
intoxicating, from up close.

``A crown is not a privilege,'' Cordelia Hasenbach calmly said, meaning
every word, ``it is a duty. You will owe a debt to your people, to
Procer itself. See it is paid pack in full, Prince Frederic.''

Frederic Goethal looked into the blue eyes of the Lycaonese princess and
something burned in his blood. Something demanding that, one day, he
would get to look there again and find \emph{respect}.

---

Three days after Prince Frederic of Brus was crowned, one of his uncle's
councillors praised him for having tricked the Lycaonese brutes and
suggested that the principality should now pledge its faith to Princess
Aenor of Aequitan in secret. Fredric idly wondered if the man had
suggested the same thing to Nathanael, before. He could not quite
remember running his sword through the councillor's stomach, but as he
ripped it free he cast a cool gaze on the pale-faced men and women he
still needed.

For now, anyway.

``Cordelia Hasenbach will be First Prince of Procer,'' Frederic said,
and it rang like an oath.

Never again did any of them speak of treason to him.

The Prince of Brus readied himself for the war that would end the war,
the peace by the sword, and brought to heel the commanders sworn to his
crown. Even as he did the Lycaonese armies trampled Lange, Lyonis
betrayed Prince Dagobert to the northerners without batting an eye and
Segovia began negotiating its entry into the alliance before the gates
of Lange's capital were even breached. All of Procer trembled at the
swift turn in fortunes, the great princesses of the east and the south
beginning to muster their armies in fear -- fear enough, Frederic knew,
that they might just ally long enough to bury the Lycaonese together.
But before the Prince of Brus could bring his steel to the Rhenian
cause, there was one last matter to see to. One last debt left
unbalanced.

When he sent for his father, it was not to receive him the throne room.
Frederic ordered for a seat to be brought at the edge of the great pond
in the depths of the royal gardens and he sat there, looking out into
the water. Herons hunted for fish, ducks slumbered in the shade and an
odd peace reigned over the place, as if the chaos and war of the outside
world was prevented by some ancient enchantment from reaching here.
Robert Goethal was brought to him and his father was visibly miffed by
the fact that no seat had been prepared for him, but he held his tongue.
Frederic gestured for the guards to withdraw far enough the conversation
would remain private.

``Your Grace,'' Robert Goethal said, bowing.

``Father,'' Frederic replied.

He said nothing, after. Silence stayed.

``It is a pleasant sight,'' his father finally said, sparing a glance
for the pond.

``Is it?'' Frederic mused. ``You are right, I suppose. I shall offer you
better, however.''

He felt the man tighten with anticipation, at the though of years of
patience and offering his own son -- his property, in the man's eyes --
to his brother. Finally, finally his day in the sun would come.

``There is summer house on the shores of Lake Pavins,'' the Prince of
Brus said. ``It has, I am told a most beautiful view. It is yours.''

Robert Goethal was not the cleverest of men, but even he would not
forget the house he had sent his wife in exile to.

``The death truly \emph{was} an accident, Frederic,'' his father
insisted. ``I would not have-''

``And you'd begun so well,'' Frederic mildly said. ``\emph{Your Grace}
is the proper address. You will not be reminded again.''

The man's mouth closed. Frederic could glimpse the fury in them, the
same that would have seen his cheek stinging as a boy. And had he not
dreamt, over the years, of the many revenges he would take in this man?
Of the torments he would inflict, the pains and humiliations. And yet
now he thought of Nathanel's bright eyes as he struck the arrogant boy
who'd stolen his birthright, of how righteous he must have felt when
unleashing his wrath. And so the fair-haired boy wondered: would he have
that same feverish glow in his eye, taking his revenge from Robert
Goethal?

``It is a beautiful view,'' the Prince of Brus repeated. ``Though I
suppose in time you will tired of it.''

``You can't mean to-''

``There will be only one way you are ever allowed to leave that house,''
Frederic Goethal said, and then he turned to smile at his father. ``And
that is by going swimming.''

He never spoke another word to Robert Goethal.

The Prince of Brus turned his eyes to the pond, after, but there was no
flicker of red or blue to be found. He was, it seemed, entirely own his
own. But then, was that not ever the way of princes?

---

Frederic Goethal, Prince of Brus, was sixteen years old when he fought
his first battle.

It was not a glorious affair: his vanguard accidentally ran into Prince
Etienne of Brabant's just north of the fortress of Saregnac, leading to
a quick and confused engagement. Frederic followed the advice of his
uncle's generals of and of his old teacher Captain Ghyslaine of the
\emph{Lances Farfelues}, trading three charges of horse with the
Brabantines and getting the better of the last two. It was enough to
have the enemy withdraw, as Brabant was fresh to the cause of Constance
of Aisne and less than eager to bleed on her behalf. Perhaps three
hundred people died on the field, in the span of an hour that Frederic
spent mostly trying to find out what was happening. He never even drew
his sword. Half a month later he led his retinue in relieving a Lyonis
force further east that'd been ambushed by Brabantines and took three
lives in the struggle, two by lance and one by sword.

Soldiers told him, after, that he was one the finest lances in the north
and devil in a fight. It surprised him, for steel in hand war was never
more than a blur. They were all chewed out by the Iron Prince for having
strayed from the planned march and skirmishing unnecessarily ahead of a
battle, but the grizzled old general then slapped his back and praised
him for being acting decisively. His soldiers took to him after that, as
much for the deaths to his name as the praise by a famous general, but
Frederic found himself unmoved. Sometimes he thought of the third man
he'd killed, up close with his sword. Of how shoddy the equipment had
been, of the fear in his eyes when a boy wearing armour worth more than
he'd earn in a lifetime had come at him with a \emph{gilded} blade. He
thought of it still, astride his horse as thousands upon thousands
slowly lined up on the plains to the northwest of the capital of Aisne.
There must have been near a hundred thousand men facing them, between
the coalition armies of Princess Constance and Princess Aenor.

How many of them were soldiers, instead of shopkeepers in ill-fitting
armour?

The Battle of Aisne would be marked as a famous one in the histories of
Procer, for it had all the ingredients for exciting interest: one side
badly outnumbered, two princes and a princess changing sides halfway
through, valour from soldiers of all sides and a clear-cut ending:
bloody, overwhelming victory for Cordelia Hasenbach and her allies.
Frederic remembered little after he'd dismounted and gone to fight with
the ranks, ceding command to more seasoned hands: it was all streaks of
blood and mud and sweat, cut through by spurts of crimson. When darkness
fell that night he returned to the field, though, to watch the carpet of
corpses spreading as far as the eye could see.

``\emph{A horse and a fall was all it took},'' Frederic softly sang,
looking at the dead.

He did not hear company approaching until it was close, and belatedly
laid his hand on his sword.

``Easy now, princeling,'' Prince Klaus Papenheim said.

``My apologies, Your Grace,'' the Prince of Brus said, dipping his head.

``Klaus is enough, after today,'' the old soldier said. ``You fought
well.''

``Did I?'' Frederic murmured.

He could hardly remember. All evening he'd been lauded for having
scythed through enemy ranks lance and sword in hand, for his bravery,
but they might as well have been singing the praises of another man
entirely.

``I was told this would be a glorious thing, Iron Prince,'' he found
himself saying. ``I was raised to \emph{fight} this war, to earn acclaim
through it. And now\ldots{}''

He spat on the muddy ground.

``All it took was a horse and fall,'' the Prince of Brus said, ``for us
to make ourselves into the great charnel yard of this world.''

It was a pretty thing, the dream of Procer. Of the greatest nation of
Calernia, proud and powerful and righteous. And like all pretty things,
it was a lie. \emph{The ugly truth of us lies on this field, being
picked at by carrion under night's veil.} The Prince of Hannoven said
nothing, standing by his side in silence. Death spread out around them
in every direction, like weeds devouring the earth, like an open maw
breathing out poison. Frederic felt his throat close, his vision swim.
Was it the wind he was hearing, of a chorus of moans whispering:
\emph{up and north, south and down}, \emph{Ebb or Flow, we'll still
\textbf{drown}.}

``How do you do it?'' Frederic croaked out. ``How can you see a smile
without seeing a skull, how can you sleep? How do you suffer \emph{even
an hour}?''

``When I close my eyes,'' Klaus Papenheim gently replied. ``I dream of
spring. Of the green in the ground, of the singing rivers, of the fawns
on the mountainside. Of the warmth that chases out the cold.''

``Springs is the season of war, for your people,'' Frederic said.

With the melting of the snows the Chain of Hunger came south, even
Bruseni knew this.

``And so I open my eyes,'' Klaus Papenheim said, ``knowing I am what
stands between war and that dream.''

Frederic Goethal closed his eyes and though he dreamt of nothing, he
could almost hear the beat of wings. It was not spring, he thought, but
it was something. It would have to be enough. The Prince of Brus fought
fiercely through the rest of the war, he was told, brought honour to his
house and his subjects and the cause he had come to support.

If sometimes his gaze lingered strangely on the kingfisher embroidered
on his banner, no one ever said anything of it where he could hear.

---

The same year Cordelia Hasenbach was crowned First Prince of Procer,
Princess of Salia, Warden of the West and Protector of the Realms of
Man, she received him in a cozy little parlour within the palace that
had now become her own. This conversation had been coming for some time,
they both knew. Frederic had brought into his circle the last kin he
cared to claim and among them his surviving uncle's eldest daughter,
Henriette, showed great promise. As an heiress-presumptive, he was
satisfied with her. Yet he was young and unwed, and there was no reason
he could not have a child of his own siring should the proper wife be
found.

``An invigorating brew,'' Frederic said, after having taken a sip of the
offered tea.

``I am fond of the spices,'' Cordelia Hasenbach said, gracing him with a
smile.

It was measured, as were most things with her, but that did not
necessarily make it untrue.

``I will not waste too much of your time, Your Highness,'' Frederic
said. ``I not unaware that my hand in marriage is not so tempting as
some offers you might be entertaining. Still, I can offer hunting and
fishing rights for Lycaonese in the swamplands, waiving of all tariffs
for your people in Brus and my services as intermediary with
\emph{fantassin} companies.''

Compared to the full coffers and untouched lands allying with the
Milenans of Iserre would bring, the great fleet and foodstuffs that
taking Princess Luisa's son Alejandro as a consort would secure or even
simply the docile husband, prince and vote in the Assembly that choosing
the debt-ridden Louis Rohanon of Creusens would acquire, his suit was
hardly worth a second look. The First Prince sipped at her cup,
seemingly pensive for all that this should be the easiest decision in
the world.

``I had expected,'' she slowly said, ``that you would speak instead of
the battles you fought under my banner. Of the support you have given me
in the Highest Assembly.''

Frederic Goethal still heard the beat of wings when he closed his eyes.
Even now, and perhaps he would until the day he died. But when they were
open, sometimes he glimpsed spring and it bore the face of Cordelia
Hasenbach. She was knitting back together a realm decades in the
wounding, one step at time, running roughshod over southern royalty in
the Assembly just as her armies had over theirs in the field. She did it
so politely, though, that half the time they'd not even noticed it
happened.

``That I cannot offer you now,'' Frederic said, ``for it was already
promised to the payment of another debt.''

He would not quibble now and pretend the woman seated across from him
was the not the best thing to happen to Procer in many years. This time,
he thought, there was less measure to the smile she offered him.

``I do not intend to wed, Prince Frederic,'' the First Prince gently
said. ``But if I did, the words you just spoke would have made you a
finer suitor than any other I have entertained.''

The moment passed and though he left that parlour as unmarried as he
expected to, Frederic found he'd somehow been eased into a rather
lucrative arrangement to transport steel into Neustria that would nicely
fill the coffers of Brus. And likely quiet any talk back home of
ungrateful Rhenians, he realized with a start of amusement as he
returned to the Goethal manse in the city. It seemed, though, that he
was not to be freed of politics for the day: before evening came, he was
called on unexpectedly by another royal. Prince Amadis Milenan of Iserre
was a rising man these days: wealthy, ambitious and not afraid to use
the former in the service of the latter. He was handsome enough,
Frederic found as they sat together and drank a lovely Creusens white by
the window, yet there was something about him\ldots{} \emph{For this
impiety, the Gods Above punished them}, he heard in his mother's voice,
telling the old story again\emph{, turning their three sons into
beasts}. \emph{The eldest into a wolf, the youngest into a bird\ldots{}}

Amadis Milenan smiled and complimented Frederic's deeds at the Battle of
Aisne.

\emph{And the second into a snake}, the Prince of Brus finished in the
privacy of his own thoughts. Oh, there was a forked tongue behind that
smile. Prince Amadis spoke of the peace, of the many changes the First
Prince was bringing to Salia. Some, perhaps, were ill-advised. Brought
by ignorance -- quite understandable, if unfortunate -- of the way
things were done, here in the south. The Prince of Iserre spoke of the
great costs of war, of keeps that need be rebuilt from the ravages of
Lycaonese warmaking, of trade arties disrupted and merchants yet afraid.
Amadis Milenan spoke then of his daughters, the second oldest of which
was yet unwed, and of the trust that could only be had by ties of blood
in these uncertain times. Did gratitude not fade so very quickly? Why,
was the Prince of Brus himself not unwed? \emph{You are everything my
uncle wanted to be and more}, Frederic thought, admiring, but also:
\emph{how many shopkeepers would you force into ill-fitting armour, to
get even a step closer to the throne?}

``You speak such pretty things to me,'' Frederic said, ``Alas, I must
confess my heart has been broken. I simply cannot conceive of marriage
until such grief has passed.''

Amadis Milenan's pleasantness trailed down his face like rainwater.

``Hasenbach's hound to the end, then,'' the Prince of Iserre coldly
said.

\emph{Every time you speak}, Frederic kept himself from saying, \emph{I
can almost hear a thousand corpses from the fields of Aisne singing that
same old refrain.} The fair-haired prince laughed, instead.

``Woof,'' Frederic solemnly replied. ``I expect you can find your way
out, Prince Amadis.''

He did not bother to watch the man leave. On the windowsill, looking at
him, was perched a kingfisher.

``You are far from home, old friend,'' the Prince of Brus smiled.

The bird considered him, for a long moment, and then trilled once before
flying away. Frederic kept looking at the sky long after, in startled
fear and delight.

It was the first time one had ever sung for him.

---

Frederic Goethal sometimes thought he'd been born to fight a war, but
it'd simply not been the one he'd fought.

The Tenth Crusade seemed like it might just be that war, he mused years
later. The Dread Empire's conquest and rule of Callow was a blemish on
the face of Calernia, and it seemed like the old beast's hunger was not
yet sated: a city had been slaughtered, some sort of fearsome doomsday
fortress raised by a rebel Praesi noble and a fresh madness of undeath
unleashed on the world. A hundred thousand `wights', Gods save them all.
Yet the talk in the Highest Assembly, at the edges of conversation where
truths were whispered instead of lies proudly proclaimed, was not of
\emph{liberation}. Promises were being made of fiefdoms carved in the
Kingdom of Callow, and it left a foul taste in his mouth. He yet
remembered the endless stretches of death after Aisne, the cloying
choking smell of rotting flesh, and he would not brave this once more to
repeat old mistakes by new hands. Not even for Cordelia Hasenbach.

The Callowans rallied behind the Black Queen, on the other side of the
mountains, armies and knights and fresh devilries coming fresh out of
the earth with every stomp of her feet. They too glimpsed a spring when
they closed their eyes, Frederic thought when he heard, and Procer had
no part in it. That dream was a dangerous thing to fight against.

He sent one of his kin to command the Bruseni contingent he'd pledged to
the crusade, pulling strings so that it would be under the trusted
command of Klaus Papenheim where he would be able to learn the trade of
war without too much risk. The greater part of Brus' army, though, he
kept home. He may yet march it east when the war against the Wasteland
began in earnest, and he took to formally preparing his cousin and
heiress Henriette to hold a command should it be so, but instead the
invading armies of the Principate were struck by disaster north and
south. Prince Amadis had been beaten and taken prisoner, Rozala Malanza
retreating west with the salvaged remains of that army, while the Red
Flower Vales had held and instead spat out the Carrion Lord so that he
might ravage the heartlands while the Iron Prince dug his way back into
Callow. Madness and chaos, all the while Ashur played pirate against the
Wasteland's coasts and the Dominion dragged its feet.

Frederic ordered the army of Brus readied, upon reading the letters from
his people in Salia, but one more letter came before he moved south to
fight for the restoration of order. \emph{The Dead King marches}, it
said. \emph{Hannoven has fallen. All soldiers make for Twilight's Pass.
Ready yourself.} So wrote the brisk hand of Prince Manfred Reitzenberg,
who had years ago slain Frederic's uncle and predecessor. Something in
him shivered, when he read the words. A primal fear, an ancient terror
bred in the bones of men. \emph{The Dead King marches}, he thought, and
the world shivered with hum. Doom had come for Procer, had already
swallowed Hannoven while its armies were fighting far south. So were
those of Neustria, and while both Rhenia and Bremen would bring
reinforcements the Lycaonese had still been stripped of great strength
and their finest general.

``North,'' Prince Frederic of Brus told his captains, dropping the
letter on the table. ``We march north.''

---

The Bruseni made haste, but the Prince of Bremen was dead by the time
their host arrived.

So was the Princess of Bremen that followed him and the Princess of
Bremen that followed \emph{her}, all dying in the span of same night
carrying out the same unflinching charge. Now only one of the House of
Reitzenberg remained, bearing a red crown: Otto Reitzenberg, dour and
brooding and so transparently haunted by the thought he might not be
equal to the duty he had taken on. Frederic sympathized, yet only so
much. The first time he stood on the snowy grounds to meet the dead,
steel at his back and the back sea of the Enemy's horde in front, he
closed his eyes and smiled. Terror should have swelled in his breast,
for the armies of Keter made those of the Great War seem like the
mischief of children, but instead it felt like he was breathing fresh
air for the first time in his life. The banner of his house flew high,
the sun shone bright and even the cold felt \emph{crisp}.

The dead came and somehow Frederic laughed.

The strange joy that'd taken hold of him, though, had not spread
throughout his soldiers. In their eyes he saw fear, for this was not a
foe they had faced before and it was not a foe anyone with any sense
would ever want to face. It was his duty, as their prince, to replace
that fear with something else. Frederic dismounted, to show he would
fight with the foot that would not be able to flee if the tide turned,
and in silence of the mountain pass raised his voice to address his own.

``I see fear in you,'' Frederic Goethal called out. ``I offer no scorn
for it, for what sane man would blame you? Is it not a thing of horror,
this army of the damned?''

Corpses and monsters and worse, legions dark and darkly led.

``But I tell you now, there is nothing to be afraid of,'' the Prince of
Brus. ``I have already killed you all.''

The murmurs bloomed, uneasy.

``You stand at the edge of the world, sons and daughters of Brus,''
Frederic said. ``There is nothing but doom waiting beyond the horizon,
and with every beat of your hearts it crawls closer to you.''

And in the distance, as if to prove him right, the dead quickened their
pace.

``And yet there is nothing to fear,'' the Prince of Brus continued,
``for you are all dead and I share a grave with you. So I'll not offer
you gold or glory or even honour -- what are these worth to a corpse?''

He could feel in the air, now, and they must too. The weight, the scent
of steel about to be drawn.

``Instead I tell you this: we can claw our lives back from this day. All
it takes, Bruseni, is to \emph{win}.''

His voice rang out against the mountain pass, defiant.

``Win, and tomorrow you will be alive,'' Frederic Goethal said. ``Win
tomorrow, and you will push back death by one more day. Every victory
claws back one more hour, one more song, one more cup of wine.''

He bared his sword, raised it high, and ten thousand blades rose with
it,

``There will come a day,'' the Prince of Brus roared, ``where we who
stand beneath the banner of the kingfisher will falter. Where our swords
break, our shields splinter and valour flickers out like a candle in the
dark. Where the Enemy, at long last, keeps our deaths clutched too
tightly too steal back.''

He laughed, bright and merry and somehow he could feel the fear in them
vanishing like morning mist.

``But I ask you, Bruseni, you children of opportunity -- is today that
day?''

No, they screamed. No, they thundered, until it echoed down the pass.

``To doom,'' he screamed back, ``and glorious death!''

Doom, they screamed back, and glorious death. These loyal fools who had
followed him north to seek out the end of days and \emph{fight} it. It
was like a shiver that went through all of them, a fearsome and
intoxicating pride. \emph{We are here, King of Death}, they sang with
every swing of the blade as they drove back the dead, \emph{we are here,
so is this the best you can do?}

Frederic closed his eyes, just before the lines collided, and found he
could not hear even the slightest echo of the song he'd caught in the
wind after Aisne.

---

From that day onwards, it was a dazzling dance of defeats with three men
leading the beat: somber Otto and smiling Frederic against the Dead
King, the pair never more than a missed turn or step away from utter
annihilation. Otto Redcrown grew on him, for the hesitant kindness
behind the rough manners and the solemn honour the man refused to
surrender even an inch of no matter how dark the days grew- and the days
grew dark indeed, for all that the nights were even darker. Yet it was
when Volsaga fell and the two of them together hammered an iron farewell
into the side of the mountain pass that Otto Reitzenberg ceased being an
ally and became a friend instead. He was, Frederic decided, the kind of
man it would be a pleasure to die with.

Loss after loss they were driven back to the Morgentor, Morning's Gate,
the last fortress between death and lowlands of the north. The last gate
between Keter and the Principate. And when even that last redoubt seemed
about to fail, in that last hour the dead withdrew: truce had been
forged, a breath before the last plunge. It was a magnificent courtesy
that the Black Queen had extended, Frederic mused. When death came, it
would be after he'd had time to properly arrange welcome for it: he and
Otto ran themselves ragged, preparing for the end of the three months.
Preparing themselves, Frederic sometimes thought, to die in the full
splendour of their ruinous pride. And so when the truce ended, when the
dead came again, Frederic Goethal was ready to perish slightly drunk on
fine wine and exquisitely dressed, as was only proper for a prince of
the House of Goethal.

They lost the eastern peak first, then the western. Frederic fought in
the same red haze he'd always known for the last peak, the last standing
stones in the way of the King of Death, and he knew deep down that he
was going to die. For he had met the snake, in the heart of Procer, but
know he knew at last the true face of the wolf: hunger unceasing, death
that would swallow whole the world. This was the last of his story, the
death that could not be snatched back, and he found himself at peace
with the notion.And yet in that smoky stairway where the dead howled and
soldiers died, among the torches and the flashing lights of desperate
sorcery, Frederic Goethal caught sight of wings in red and blue.

``One last time, is it?'' the Prince of Brus smiled, strangely moved.

His blood burned. Yes, he decided. One last time, in the face of the end
of the world. He sent for his horse, for his riders that the Lycaonese
had taken to calling the Kingfishers, and \emph{up} the stairs they
rode.

``Doom,'' Frederic screamed, chasing the beat of wings, and they
screamed it with him.

Through death and fire they charged, a whirlwind of steel and hooves,
until the dead broke and Frederic Goethal found himself at the summit of
the peak under the morning sun. The kingfisher trilled, but the sun
blinded his sight, and when he could see again he found only one of his
own banners trailing in the wind. But now, oh now\ldots{}

The Kingfisher Prince smiled. They won, and so the day after they were
alive.

It was a pretty thing and it was not a lie.

---

In Brus there was a story every child knew, about the birth of
kingfishers.