10. Odd Kindness

“With the outworlder dwarven settlement now established, they are hewing a stone city into the wintry mountains along the southernmost ranges of the Quiet Isles.

Though my planned journey to see them was discovered, The Small King acquiesced and allowed me to visit them despite what might be seen as my undermining him.

Unfortunately, I learned nothing of use from the dwarves. Though they seemed unfamiliar with the goblins, they were nonetheless as prejudice and suspicious as were their forebears. And I do not know if they had hidden the females of their kind, but I saw among them only men.

That is if the histories are true, and, like the humans, the dwarves were gendered.

Despite their animosity, disrespect, and attempted violence, Agrak has bid us leave them in peace. Though I suspect, integrating with the humans as they are, they will not last long.”

Jarl Gudmund had been taken to a narrow room with a long table and two chairs. He sat with his back to one wall and faced what looked like another, but he had seen the unbroken stone open and close.

Gudmund had no weapons, not even a knife at his belt, so he spent the past hour pressing his palms into the long table, inching it back and force to test the weight. He was almost certain he would be able to shove it right into the serpentine old bastard. Hopefully with enough force to cause crushed ribs if not sever his spine.

Jarl Thrand would only need to be in the seat with the stone door closed behind him.

Gudmund’s thoughts shifted from rational to irrational fears, to desperate hopes and likely outcomes. As he grew more certain his plan would kill Thrand, he lost faith that he would ever have the opportunity. He began to wonder whether his three guards would have had the good sense to hide Sybille in Timilir.

“Muradoon,” he murmured in his own mind. “Muradoon… God of the Spirit World. Don’t let me die like a man walked into his own trap. Don’t let the sons of Geirulf end up as a story and a sword and a young woman with no family or joy. Don’t let this end with Jarl Thrand rasping out tall tales about how he slew the brothers Brolli and Gudmund.” He shook his head. “I’ve come here on the backs of scores of dead and now I’m about to join the pile. I should have just let those archers take their aim. I should have helped them along. I’m a bad joke. A bad brother. A bad son. I should have kept us all together in the Low Lands. I should have just cut Grim’s throat before he ever had chance to hurt Brolli. Been like half the other bastards in the throne and carve flesh to make my family of my own liking.

What did I get out of the life I chose? Short-lived everything. Best friend a man can have and I betrayed him. I sent him marching to his death. I had the love of a good woman, had good children, and now they’re all taken from me. My son had a grandson that I never had the chance to meet, and now I’m in the power of this bastard, a place I put myself in, because I wanted revenge. Well where’s your revenge, Gudmund? You bloody fool. You’ve got your back to the wall. You’re trapped. And your daughters out there with your last three friends… all running panicked in a great stone maze. What have you done? By the gods, what you have done? No wonder Muradoon asked for my soul. Everything I touch turns to death.”

“I suppose I better touch Thrand,” Gudmund muttered aloud, then sighed out a laugh. He brushed his palms across the cold grey of the stone table. “Can anybody hear me? Is anyone there? Is this how I die? You put bastards in here for a season and then send a man in to drag out the soiled corpse?”

As if in answer, stone shuddered and the wall opposite slid open. A tall, broad, armoured man strode in first. He covered his face with a helmet, but Gudmund knew he was old and bald and ugly.

Atsurr pulled out a chair, then moved to stand at the corner of the narrow room.

Jarl Thrand’s black cane clacked as he entered. It had a black shaft and a serpentine silver head. He wore all black and looked all the more older up close. Straggly grey hair had been combed over his liver-spotted pate.

Gudmund realised with a bitter smile that he had come he to murder a man who was soon to succumb to time, then he remembered Jarl Alfgeir of Vendrick, who had been expected to die of old age for nearly twenty winters. “Better to be sure,” he decided.

“Sure of what?” Atsurr demanded.

“Thinking aloud,” Gudmund answered in the lightest voice he could manage. “I was thinking it’s better to be sure of my loyalties what with the history between us. An off-hand commendation, you might say.”

“Or I could speak the plainer truth that Jarl Geirulf of the High Lands was well known as a treacherous liar,” Atsurr said. “As were all his sons… thank Muradoon for taking two of them, or was it just the one?”

Gudmund managed a benevolent smile. “It warms my heart that you would expect Brolli to end up anywhere other than the Lady’s Shadow. Though I suppose that place awaits most of us here.”

“In this room?” Thrand asked, settling into his seat.

“I wouldn’t change the phrasing for the city, or Tymir in entirety.”

“Ah.” Jarl Thrand smirked. “And that is an unfortunate truth honestly spoken. Perhaps you’ll offer us more genuine insight… and then you spending your days in shadow might be made less likely.” He rested his serpentine cane across the table. “Why have you come here, Gudmund?”

Gudmund showed no hint of the numb fear seeping through his veins. He seemed a man sitting at his own table. He leaned forward, resting his hands ahead of him, then raised his brows as if in forethought. “Ever for the same reason. I sent my sons before to marry my daughter to your youngest son. Now I have come in their stead.”

“I see,” Jarl Thrand’s rasping voice had no warmth. “That would explain why she arrived at the gates, then. Does she not take issue with being married to a corpse?”

“I had meant your namesake,” Gudmund said. “Young Thrand… once husband to a recently deceased young woman.”

Jarl Thrand met the sentiment with a thoughtful murmur. “And do you think me fool enough to dishonour the bonds so hard fought for with a rushed marriage? To marry my son to a new woman while his dead wife is not yet cold?”

Gudmund shook his head. “I am in no rush at all, friend. Not for my daughter to marry, but the offer will still be there when your son has finished grieving. I do find myself in a worrying haste to find a wife. If I grow any older, I doubt I’ll be much good at pleasing a woman or giving her a child.”

“I had no idea you longed for a new son, Gudmund. Indeed… that is a plight with which I can well empathize.” Jarl Thrand smiled in regret. “I’ll have Atsurr escort you to a whorehouse. I hear high praise of a place named the Toothless Grin. Though that’s for women… and I remember you were always so close with Grettir. Is there anywhere else you’d prefer?”

Gudmund upturned his palms. “Wherever Luta works would please me best… that is your daughter’s name?”

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

Jarl Thrand’s stare turned baleful. “I am afraid she is due to be married.”

“To Jarl Adelsteinn.” Gudmund nodded in appraisal. “An old man though, known to drink and gamble and pay high prices for goods of low quality. A man older than me… not likely to give her a child. Which might make things difficult when the Low King moves to steal his land. Though I’ve been away from the Low Lands for a long while, so who can really say what that mad bastard’s planning to do? Still… it seems to be a match that would be short-lived, and perhaps shorten your daughter’s life as well.”

“I—” Thrand glanced at Atsurr, then narrowed his eyes on Gudmund. “I had no idea you were so well informed.”

Gudmund laughed a soft laugh, but his gaze turned hateful. “Is the Low King not the man who stole my own lands?” he asked with venom. “Is he not the man that murdered my first wife…? My first son,” he pointedly added. “An old enemy, is the Low King to me. As he was to my father, as was the Low King before him a foe for my ancestors. And, yet… they succeeded where I failed. They held ground where I gave it away, and I fear that Adelsteinn will do the same.”

Jarl Thrand nodded. “I forgot you were once a man of import in the Low Lands.”

“Well… that is one thing that I will never forget. And were there open opportunity, I would take my revenge against the man that took everything from me.”

Jarl Thrand took interest in those words, not seeming to understand that the description well fit him. “Yet in all these years, you never mentioned it to me. You seemed happy enough to spend your life in a place of no worth, known only as a disgraced fool. Why…?”

Gudmund smiled through awful grief as he remembered his happy life. “I had conquered Horvorr and fully intended to pay my debt to you… as soon as possible, in any way possible. I had two sons, healthy sons, and I was expecting a third child. I had no mind to spend my life in Horvorr. I can tell you for fact my wife was not best pleased with her new arrangements. And then… she died. I tried to end my life that very night. I would have, had Grettir and Brolli not wrested the blade from me. I still would have… had Brolli not threatened to murder Grettir, his wife, and both my children should I take my own life. And so I lived, as a draugr of a man, without the heart to murder my brother, who I did not doubt would happily deliver on his threat.”

Gudmund paused, and sniffed. “I recovered slowly over the winters… came to love my children. And I did, as it happens, raise my sons and daughter with a mind to force my way back into the Low Lands. And I promised, as well, that I would help Grettir take his revenge against Jarl Alfgeir who had so sullied his name and reputation. What you see is not a man who had no plans, but a man that failed to enact them.”

Gudmund regrettably sighed. “Had Sybille married Thorfinn as I desired… well, perhaps you would have heard of my plans before now. Perhaps the Low King would not be nipping at your heels. Perhaps Jarl Alfgeir would have more respect for the city that stood as a bastion to allow his town’s survival.” He spread his hands across the table. “I can see it plain that the prospect of me marrying your daughter does not appeal to you. But even if you think me an unlikely match, I would advise finding someone else, anyone else, other than red-faced Adelsteinn.”

“This man is a snake,” Atsurr muttered.

Gudmund frowned. “Is your own symbol not serpentine?”

“The World Worm did not slither on his belly through grasses.”

“Say what you will.” Gudmund shrugged, not bothering to look at the sentinel. “Questions asked have been answered.”

Jarl Thrand studied the fearless man opposite, his proud face still colored by old bruises, his bear-fur cloak torn and muddied as if he had been both using it to sleep on and to catch blades. “Did I not give that cloak to Grettir?”

“You did. But he was set on burning it, so I traded him for an axe.”

“And I have heard news that he is dead,” Thrand mentioned. “Along with your sons, and your brother. Yet for all that you sit there defiant. Asking for more, making offers of compensation that you cannot afford to pay.”

“I have coin enough to pay you this day.” Gudmund stared at the tabletop. “As to why I’m not weeping… loss is something I have long had to suffer and long since grown used to. My own mother died in child birth. My eldest brother when he had only just become a man… my father not long after that. Most my oldest friends found their ends in wars with neighbors. So I was a man alone until I met my first wife, and then I was a man alone again. Hilda, and her sons, did not enjoy a long life. I have lost, and I have suffered, but I will not weep because if I begin I might never stop.” He sniffed. “My daughter is still living. And I am here to safeguard her future.”

Jarl Thrand nodded in understanding. “And what of Hjorvarth?”

Gudmund met the sentiment with a knowing smile. “No blood of mine.”

“Nor of mine,” Thrand rasped, “I assure you that.” He paused in thought. “Why offer up coin on his behalf?”

“Purely as a gesture of good will between us, with the knowledge that you may have took my message with offense unintended.” Gudmund’s gaze hardened. “You did meet with Saxi?”

“Yes, I did. A pleasant enough messenger.” Jarl Thrand rested his withered hands on the table. “As to the son of Isleif the Disgraced… if you did not pay for his sake, what would you recommend I do with him?”

“How honestly would you have me answer?”

“As honestly as you please.”

“Then as we sit here word spreads of what happened outside not a stone’s throw from your own gates.” Gudmund drummed his fingers. “I arrived in Timilir today, but have already heard word of worrying troubles. So, and perhaps I’m mistaken, I would guess that there is unrest in the stone city. Unrest soon to fester and flourish when rumor is left to fill the panicked silence. In that sense, you could keep the son of Isleif here… torture him, and make him suffer for the insult he paid you. Or… you could march him down the streets naked. March him down the streets in disgrace.”

Jarl Thrand measured his words. “And what gain would there be in that?”

Gudmund upturned his palms. “A day to make good use of rotting food? Or a spectacle to turn the words on people’s lips away from the events at your gates. Perhaps Atsurr could use the opportunity to lure out members of the Crooked Teeth.”

Atsurr grunted. “And why the Crooked Teeth risk themselves for a man sentenced to a life in the mines?”

“They abducted him once before, or so he told me. He seemed to think that he had come close to killing their leaders. So in that sense they might be out for revenge, and in another they might simply want to lay claim to killing the foster son of Brolli the Black and the new leader of the Black Hands.”

Jarl Thrand narrowed his sunken eyes. “The man that murdered your brother?”

“As much a shock to me as it was to anyone,” Gudmund dismissed. “Of all the battles Brolli had won. Of all the times he had striven to hold onto his life… only to end up drowning not a stone’s throw from the embankments of the Lake.” He shrugged. “But then the gods were never known for being fair.”

“True enough,” Thrand acceded. “And if I were to ask you to stab the man in his heart? Or to cut away his limbs and torture him for days? Would you flinch at any of that?”

“Flinch? No.” Gudmund shook his head. “I would reject the request outright.”

Atsurr chuckled in derision. “And here he shows the worth of his loyalty.”

“Indeed.” Gudmund nodded. “Loyalty to my brother when I swore I would best protect a man he saw as his own son.”

“The man that killed him,” Atsurr added.

“Perhaps the irony would be more clearly seen if you knew that Brolli murdered our own father.”

Jarl Thrand smiled. “Why then put the son of Isleif forth for a public disgrace?”

“It seemed the only outcome that satisfied both your needs. My brother’s foster son believes that he must serve in the mines of Timilir. And you rightly deserve to see him suffer for the wrong he has done you.”

Jarl Thrand stared as if displeased. “I see.”

Gudmund wondered whether he could push the table all the way through the open door and into the marble wall behind it. He decided that he could, but feared for his daughter and guards too much to take the risk. He was not so brave or foolish to think that he could best Atsurr in a narrow room without sword or armour of his own.

“Jarl Gudmund,” Thrand began in a kind tone, “I must take some time to consider what you have told me. In the meantime, I will have a guard escort you to your daughter.” He smiled. “Three guards are also in her company… did you bring no one else with you? Or should I have the city searched to collect those waiting for word?”

“No need.” Gudmund rose from his chair. “I brought as small a party as could be spared. There is still much rebuilding to be done in Fenkirk, and even in Horvorr itself.”

“Ah, of course,” said Thrand doubtfully. “But then are you sure you can afford the compensation you’ve offered to pay?”

Gudmund’s answering smile was kind and magnanimous. “I would not waste your time with falsities, Jarl Thrand… and I am nothing if not an honest man.”