Erak's Ransom

Let me get this straight. They ambushed all of you? The entire ship's crew?' Horace frowned at the thought. Svengal nodded.

'They let the rest of us go because they needed us to collect the ransom. They even returned our weapons once we were back on board. Said they didn't want us captured by pirates while we were fetching the money.' He snorted in bitter amusement. 'Ironic, isn't it?'

'How much is this ransom?' Will asked.

'Eighty thousand reels,' Svengal said and the two young men whistled.

'That's a lot of silver,' Horace said.

Svengal shrugged. 'Erak is Oberjarl, after all.'

Will was frowning as he thought over what Svengal had said. There was something he didn't understand.

'Svengal, eighty thousand is a lot of money. But surely Erak could put his hands on that amount. As you say, he is the Oberjarl. Why did you come here for it?'

'Erak told me to come here. It could take the best part of a year for us to get to Skandia and then back to Arrida with the money… ' He trailed off, the thought not quite completed.

Will nodded. 'That makes sense,' he said. 'And I'm sure King Duncan will lend the money. After all, Erak saved his daughter's life.' He sensed that Svengal had something else on his mind, something he was reluctant to say.

'But?' he prompted and the seawolf sighed heavily.

'Erak didn't want me to go back to Skandia with the news that he was a captive,' he said. 'He's pretty sure that he was betrayed by one of our own people.'

Chapter 8

'Betrayed?' King Duncan said. 'Why would his own people betray him? Last I heard, Erak was a popular choice as Oberjarl.'

It was the following morning and even Baron Arald's spacious office was looking slightly crowded with the members present. In addition to the King and his daughter, Sir Anthony, Crowley, Halt and Pauline, Baron Arald and Sir Rodney, Horace, Gilan, Will and Alyss were all seated around the central desk, where Arald had given deference to the King. Svengal, exhausted by his ride to Araluen, was still sleeping off the effects of the journey. Although, Will thought with grim humour, the effects might be longer lasting than he expected. A novice leader, Svengal would be stiff and sore in every muscle and joint when he awoke.

The previous evening, after Will had reported the basic facts of Svengal's arrival, it had been decided to leave a detailed discussion till the morning. The wedding celebration had continued as if there had been no interruption. That had been Lady Pauline's decision. As she had said to Halt some weeks earlier, this was a big occasion for many of the guests – perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to brush shoulders with royalty.

'Let them enjoy themselves,' she had said. 'We can deal with this in the morning.'

Halt smiled at her as she said it. It was confirmation of the Baron's good judgement in appointing her to her high diplomatic position.

Pauline also had an ulterior motive. She knew full well that this would be one of the few occasions in her life when she would persuade Halt to dance with her and she had no intention of letting it pass merely because Oberjarl Erak had carelessly got himself captured by the Arridi. It was, she thought, a matter of retaining a sense of perspective.

So the dancing and feasting had continued. Then, just before midnight, an open carriage, pulled by two white mares, had arrived at the entrance to the dining hall. The newlyweds led a procession down the central aisle and were cheered aboard by a horde of well-wishers. In addition, hundreds of others had arrived from the village itself, where the Baron had contributed two steers to be roasted and several kegs of ale for a giant outdoor feast.

These newcomers lined the path to the gatehouse, where the massive drawbridge and portcullis were open. Others waited outside, on either side of the road winding down the hill towards the forest. As the carriage passed by, they pelted it with flowers and cheers in equal amounts. Halt, who had spent his life in covert activities, moving unseen and unnoticed through the country, found it a novel and uncomfortable experience to be the centre of attention. He felt strangely exposed without the comforting concealment of his camouflage cloak and slumped low in his seat, trying to disappear into the plush cushions. Lady Pauline, on the other hand, sat upright and waved regally to the cheering people. And since the vast majority of those who arrive to gawk at any wedding go to see the bride in any case, his reticence went largely unnoticed.

'Where will they be going?' a blacksmith's wife asked of nobody in particular as the carriage clattered down the hill.

A housewife next to her – one of those people who always know the answer to every such question, replied with smug certainty.

'I've heard that, deep in the woods, there's a special love-nest been built for them. A bower of flowers and precious materials where they'll spend the night.' Her imagination aided by her own statement, she then added authoritatively, 'What's more, there are specially trained songbirds in the trees and pure white deer will be grazing in the clearing for my lady's enjoyment.'

The actual facts were more mundane. The carriage would stop at the little cabin just at the fringe of the forest, where Halt and Pauline would wait until the crowd had dispersed. Then they would board another, less ornate, carriage drawn by two nondescript bays and return to the castle, where Arald had set aside a suite of rooms as their permanent residence.

So here they all were, discussing the remarkable turn of events that Svengal had brought to their door.

'Erak's popular with the majority,' Will told the King, in answer to his question. 'But there's a small faction in Hallasholm who would like to see him lose his position. Small, but vocal and persistent.'

'I assume our treaty has something to do with this?' Crowley asked. When Halt had led the Skandians to victory over an invading Temujai force, he had capitalised on the situation to create a treaty where large-scale raids on Araluen were discouraged by the Oberjarl. In Erak's case, 'discouraged' translated pretty much as 'forbidden'.

'It doesn't help, that's for sure,' Will said. 'And the anti-Erak faction are using it as a lever to create dissension among the others. But it goes deeper than that.'

'If there's an anti-Erak faction,' Lady Pauline said, 'one assumes that they must also have their own leader in mind. Who might that be? Do we know?'

'We do,' Will told the room. Although he and Horace had both been privy to Svengal's news, they had decided that Will would conduct the briefing for the others. It was part of a Ranger's training to know how to assemble and report facts as cohesively as possible. 'It's a man called Toshak, a crony of Slagor's.'

His eyes met Cassandra's as he said the name and he saw understanding dawning there. Slagor had tried to have Cassandra executed when she and Will had been among the Skandians. Later, she had discovered his part in a plot to betray the Skandian forces to the Temujai.

Alyss saw the byplay between Will and the blonde Princess. Her lips tightened slightly but, trained diplomat that she was, she swiftly composed her features before anyone noticed.

'Slagor?' the King said. 'But surely he's dead? Erak had him executed for treason at the end of the war, didn't he?'

I tried to convince him not to,' Cassandra put in. I thought it was a bad idea and I felt… responsible, I suppose.'

The King shook his head. 'No. It's unpleasant, my dear, but it had to be done. Slagor betrayed his country in time of war. You can't leave people like that unpunished. He deserved what he got and you have nothing to blame yourself for.'

'The Princess has a point, however,' Halt said. And as the others looked at him, he went on to explain, 'Executing a criminal often makes a martyr of him. Once he's dead and gone, people all too often forget the crimes he's committed and start to see a more sanitised version. A person like that starts to be seen as a victim, then as a figurehead for anyone who has an axe to grind. No pun intended,' he added, remembering that Slagor had been beheaded. Will nodded in agreement. 'That's pretty much the way Erak sees it, according to Svengal. Toshak, the leader of a rebel clique, doesn't give a fig about Slagor's fate. He's using him as a symbol to further his own purpose. Which is to take over as Oberjarl.'