Sci Fi & Fantasy / Son's Vengeance-Chapter Five
Atironen rode behind Arototas as they left the camp, the tents still standing, and forded the River Ombech. He focused his gaze ahead of him at the ridge on the other side of the river, counting his horse’s steps to distract him. The army of Palenyon was closer now, judging from the noise of the soldiers’ footsteps. Atironen almost expected to see them just over the top of the ridge, waiting for them and for the battle.
They rode a short distance from the river, the last lines of infantrymen standing in front of the ridge. Atironen stopped himself from squirming in his saddle; he quailed at the thought of his fears being confirmed and wished to turn his horse and gallop away, but his curiosity held him there. Part of him wished he was insane. He began to sweat under his armor as they waited there, each moment more agonizing than the last. He could see the army of Palenyon and heard the sounds of their marching, but they seemed stationary.
After what seemed like a lifetime, the army of Palenyon lined up several hundred feet away from them, their officers riding out to the middle of the field behind their king.
“Do we meet them, sire?” the general asked.
“Certainly. I could use a bit of humor this morning,” Atironen’s uncle said. He began riding out to where King Tonodel waited, his officers in tow.
Prince Tolodan sat behind his father, riding the same white stallion he had at the last battle. His head was helmeted, as it had been before, but Atironen could see his eyes flit in his direction through the gap in the metal. He thought for a moment that the prince had recognized him, but he decided against it. There were, after all, hundreds of soldiers wearing the same colors he did. He might be mistaken for any of them.
“Will you actually hear my terms, Arotosin, or are you merely going to laugh at me?” King Tonodel said the moment they stopped their horses in the center of the field. “In case it escaped your notice, I happened to win the last battle. You could simply make peace with me now, instead of wasting lives.”
“You know as well as I do that there will never be peace between us. Our children will continue to fight after our deaths. That is the way it has always been,” Atironen’s uncle said. Atironen thought he saw Prince Tolodan shift in his saddle at what he said.
“Will you or will you not hear my terms?”
“There is no point in me hearing them. However, you may tell them to me if you wish.”
“Well, thank you, my lord, for the incredible honor of listening to me,” King Tonodel said, his voice heavy with sarcasm. “My terms are, for the most part, unchanged. However, I now require a certain sum of gold in order to prevent me attacking Essiels.”
“You have become rather sure of yourself after just one battle.”
“I have won others, if it has escaped your notice. Perhaps not in this war, but past ones. Some of those wars I won as well.”
“I remember perfectly well. As for the situation at hand, I refuse your terms. I know you won’t want to hear any I have to offer, so I suggest that we merely get this battle over with and move on with the rest of the war. If that is agreeable to you, of course,” Atironen’s uncle said.
“I would be very curious to know why you are so confident, Arotosin. You seem to think yourself unbeatable.”
“Suffice it to say I know something you do not. Now, shall we begin?”
King Tonodel turned his horse, riding back to his army. His son followed after him, turning his head toward Atironen’s uncle. Atironen tried imagining what he thought, whether it was driven by fear, anger, or another emotion entirely.
They took their place in between two of the legions on their side of the field. Atironen gazed across it, scanning the soldiers of Palenyon for Prince Tonodel. There were rows upon rows of men dressed exactly the same and he soon wearied of looking. He would have time to find him later. And then he would see, if only for a moment.
“Volley,” Atironen’s uncle said. The general shouted the command, a hail of gold-fletched arrows shooting across the field in response.
Each side fired three volleys before Atironen’s uncle ordered an infantry charge. The lines of foot soldiers started slow, merely jogging, but gradually grew faster as they neared the enemy. The two sides, green and gold, collided in the center of the field, shouting and slashing with their swords. Atironen glanced at the blur of fighting, shrugging off the sight far more easily than he had at the last battle, and continued searching for Prince Tolodan. He found him to the side of the army of Palenyon with his father, facing the battle.
“Cavalry,” Atironen’s uncle said. All of the horsemen of Rhabryn prepared themselves, then joined the battle at a canter.
Atironen immediately headed for the side of the field where he’d seen Prince Tolodan and his father. King Tonodel had left to lead his cavalry as they charged, but Prince Tolodan was still there. Atironen urged his horse faster. Then, he was gone. Atironen looked around to see where he went, but couldn’t tell through the mass of soldiers in the middle of the field. With a deep breath, he plunged in, warding off anyone who tried to fight him with savage blows from his sword.
Atironen fought there in the center of the field for what seemed an eternity. There was always someone else to challenge him, always another enemy that needed defeating. Still, he saw no sign of Prince Tolodan. With a sudden pang of fear, he wondered if someone might have killed him. He fought back the idea and kept going with even more intensity than before.
At length, he began to weary. Each thrust of his sword felt like a weight on his shoulder, each of his horse’s steps jostling him. The sun grew stronger as the day aged, beating down on him mercilessly. His throat felt covered in sand.
Then he saw him, off to the eastern part of the field. Atironen turned his horse, navigating the bodies in the grass, and shook off his weariness. Already he told himself that all of his worry had been for nothing, that he had only been imagining. It was strangely easy for him to believe.
Prince Tolodan turned toward him, sword in hand, but he kept coming. Adjusting his grip, he struck, trying to knock the prince’s sword from his hand. Prince Tolodan parried, but was clearly unsettled by the force of Atironen’s blow. Atironen struck harder and faster, trying to disarm him or at least unseat him from his horse. Prince Tolodan responded, though Atironen was, by far, the better swordsman. His horse moved back as Atironen’s came closer to it, then stumbled as it stepped on a loose stone. Prince Tolodan fell from the saddle, landing in the grass. Atironen leapt down, stepping toward him.
“No!” Prince Tolodan cried as he fumbled in the grass for his sword.
Before he could reach it, Atironen grabbed him by the collar of his green surcoat. Please, he thought as he pulled off the prince’s helmet. Prince Tolodan looked unchanged. He groaned under the weight of it, forbidding himself from believing.
His grip on his sword tightened as his disbelief changed to anger. With a shout, he kicked Prince Tolodan, punishing him for stealing his face. The prince scrambled away, retrieving his sword, then vainly lashed out. Atironen parried with incredible ease, then, with a gauntleted hand, struck him across the side of his face, knocking him into the grass. He lay there, unmoving.
Atironen stood over him, hardly noticing anything around him. His weariness returned, pressing down on him with such force he could hardly hold himself up. He felt suddenly old, more ancient than even the sky, and all the years he had not lived laughed at him. He wished to run away from it all, but his feet would not move. He was stuck.
Prince Tolodan stirred, groaning and placing a hand to his face where Atironen had struck him. It had begun to swell, distorting his appearance. Atironen felt a grim satisfaction as he watched him struggle to sit up, still unable to make himself move. His whole body ached from exhaustion.
“Atironen!” Arototas’s voice drifted across the field, its tone strangely hollow. Prince Tolodan turned toward where it came from, his eyes widening.
“Go,” Atironen said. Prince Tolodan looked at him, his hand still touching his face where Atironen had struck it. “Go!” He reached forward with his leg as if to kick him again, but he crawled away, sliding his helmet back onto his head.
“Atironen!” Arototas sounded nearer now.
“Hurry!” Atironen said, shoving Prince Tolodan. He turned toward Arototas riding up on his horse. Arototas stopped right before him, his head pointing to Prince Tolodan.
“You let him get away!” Arototas said. He kicked his horse forward toward the prince, but Atironen stepped in the way. “What’s wrong with you?”
Atironen ignored him, heading back to the main battle in the center of the field. His horse was gone, no doubt fleeing from the battlefield, so he fought on foot, swinging his sword blindly at anyone near him, green or gold. The color of a surcoat made little difference to him now. He had been trained as a berserker, and so he fought as one. With each man he felled, he grew older. His limbs moved out of habit, out of all the years they had spent killing.
After some time, whether it was minutes, hours, even days, Atironen did not know, his uncle’s voice cried victory. Atironen slumped, feeling battered and bruised over every inch of his body.
The wounded soldiers of Rhabryn returned to their camp across the River Ombech while the rest of them stayed to clean the field. Atironen couldn’t remember cleaning after the first battle, but he’d been in such a daze that he might have done any number of things with no memory of them. His uncle and cousins had left, their position excusing them from such a base task as tending to dead soldiers. Atironen could have left as well, but something kept him there. He tried to determine exactly what it was, but could not. His body seemed to be behaving of its own accord.
Atironen and the other men who had stayed to clean the field piled all of the soldiers into shallow graves, covering them with thin layers of dirt. They had removed all of the armor and weapons, leaving it in heaps, all of it dull and bloodied. Atironen was surprised to see soldiers from both sides there working. The common men seemed far more temperate than their leaders. He knew his uncle would have called them simple.
They cleaned until after nightfall, digging shallow graves and sorting armor. Once they had finished, men from each side carried the ownerless armor back to their camps. Atironen’s position spared him from hauling armor across the river, so he forded easily, watching the other men raise helmets and swords above their heads. As soon as he was back in his tent, his exhaustion overpowered him, dragging him into a dreamless sleep.
The air inside his tent felt thick when he woke. He stumbled through the door flap, longing for a sweet breath. The sun was already high above the camp, bright and warm, and men bustled about, tending to chores. Atironen squinted in the sunlight, shading his eyes with his hands, and drank in the fresh air. Memories of yesterday’s battle began to rise in his mind, but he forced them back, concentrating only on the morning.
“About time you woke up.” Arototas stood to his left, his arms crossed.
“Morning, Arototas,” Atironen said, lowering his hands from his eyes.
“Is that all you can say? I sincerely hope you have an explanation.”
Atironen already knew, but he asked anyway. “For what?”
“Don’t give me that. You had Prince Tolodan right in your hands and you just let him go! Why? I would have thought you’d be just as eager to kill him as to kill his father.”
“Nevermind, Arototas.” He turned to head back into his tent, but Arototas grabbed his shoulder, the heat of his sorcerer’s glove seeping through Atironen’s sleeve.
“Don’t try that with me, Atironen. You’re not going soft now, are you? Atelaya said you wouldn’t be the first. She said you never really had it in you to kill Tonodel, much less his son. What would my father think if he found out that you willingly let the future king of Palenyon slip through your fingers?”
“I don’t know. Will you just leave me alone?” Atironen tried to duck into his tent again, but Arototas strengthened his grip on his shoulder, dragging him away from it.
“What’s wrong with you? All I want is a simple explanation!” Arototas said, his face flushing.
Atironen stopped himself from bursting with all of the reasons. Arototas would never understand, that much he knew.
“I don’t have one,” he said at length.
Arototas scoffed, releasing his shoulder. “What would my father think of this?”
Atironen watched as Arototas stalked off in the direction of his father’s tent. He returned to his own, sitting down on his bedroll with his face buried in his hands. He needed some kind of explanation, something infinitely better than the one he’d given Arototas, for his uncle. For a few moments he sat there, playing through some short, easy lies in his head and chose the best of them.
“My lord?” a voice outside his tent said.
“Yes?” he said, taking his hands from his face.
“My lord, the king requests your presence in his tent immediately.”
As the sound of footsteps retreated, Atironen emerged and headed for his uncle’s tent. He practiced his explanation in a whisper, hoping his uncle would believe it. The door flap was tied open, revealing his uncle and both his cousins inside waiting for him as he neared the tent.
“Come in, nephew,” his uncle said, motioning toward him.
“Yes, uncle?” Atironen approached him, trying not to look at either Arototas or Atelaya. He was certain they both glared at him with furious venom.
“I understand that you had an opportunity to kill Prince Tolodan during the battle. Is that correct?” his uncle said.
“Yes, sir,” he said, forcing himself to look his uncle in the eyes.
“And I understand that you spared him.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You need not look so ashamed, nephew, unless, of course, you’ve no reason for this.”
“I have, sir.”
“And what is it?” Perhaps it was only Atironen’s imagination, but the tent fell deathly silent, the lack of sound bearing down on him.
“I considered killing him, sir, but then I decided not to. I thought Prince Tolodan deserved to live a life without his father, as I have lived mine.” Atironen felt his face begin to draw up into a wince as he waited for his uncle’s reply and stopped it.
For an eerily long time, his uncle said nothing. “I see. An excellent thought, nephew. I can see now that you have truly mastered the art of revenge. You may go now, if you wish.”
Atironen felt his shoulders relax in relief as he turned away.
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Overall this wasn’t a bad chapter. I can see why it’s not your favorite. It seems to fall flat. I’m not sure why. If I have a chance I will reread it again and if I come up with something I will let you know.
A couple of other things.
“to sweat under his armor” where else would he sweat?
“Will you actually hear my terms, Arotosin,” The problem with this section and it may have happened in a previous chapter, is that you have been writing from Atrionen point of view. Unless he is with the king and can hear the converstation we wouldn’t know what was said. Either eliminate the converstation or put a line space in a change view points. It might be interesting to have Prince Tolodan’s view point. Did he recognize Atrionen? Etc.
“Prince Tolodan responded, though Atironen was, by far, the better swordsman.” This doesn’t make sense. Why wouldn’t he respond. He’s a trained fighter, he’d defend himself no matter how good his opponent.
“all the years they had spent killing.” I thought this was the first time he saw real combat? He’s still very young, how many years could he have seen?
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