The Blood Prince Read online

before he was sealed away in his resting place, but for now they were denied entry. Only ranking officials, and certain prominently connected citizens specifically invited by house Edorin, of which there were a great number, would be permitted access today.

  Aisen dismounted and handed the reins of his horse to a waiting stablehand. He asked the boy where Beonen was, but looking intimidated, the young servant stumbled through his answer. “Captain,” he began, accustomed to addressing Aisen by his rank in the Sigil Corps. “Lord Aisen,” he said correcting himself.

  “I will be resigning my position in the corps, and I am not yet officially a lord either,” Aisen said. “For now, you should just call me Aisen.”

  These instructions inspired a look of horror on the boy’s face, and caused him to tighten his grip on the reigns of Aisen’s horse. He couldn’t possibly speak to the duke’s grandson, a man who would in two days be the next duke, in such a familiar way. “I do not know whether he is here, or if he is here… where it is he might be,” the boy finally answered, sidestepping the whole issue by not formally acknowledging Aisen’s name or title at all.

  The servant’s discomfort could be understood, and forgiven. Aisen had spent as little time as possible in Alsegate, and as such he knew only a few of the men and women who lived on the grounds while providing their services to House Edorin. Aisen always felt uncomfortable, both here and in the surrounding town, so he routinely found excuses to be away, out on extended patrols as an officer of the Sigil Corps. As a result, Aisen was more familiar with many of the people and places in the small towns and villages across the breadth of Nar Edor, than he was with the ever growing port city where he had been born.

  These circumstances placed Aisen out of his element inside of Alsegate. There were not many people here in whom he felt he could comfortably rely. His brother was one such person though, and not having seen him in nearly a year, Aisen was eager to meet up with him now. Beonen would certainly be on the property somewhere, and Aisen was going to need his help bridging relationships with their peers amongst the nobility, if he ever hoped to rule effectively. Aisen supposed that his brother would find him soon enough, so he looked away, off towards the chapel near the crypts at the southernmost edge of Alsegate. It would be disrespectful to do anything other than immediately go to see the body of his grandfather.

  Retrieving his sword, the Edorin Sigil Blade, from where it was tied to the saddle, Aisen fixed it to his belt before instructing the boy to take the tired horse to the stables. His armor made him appear imposing, but Aisen, though he was not short, was not tall either, and the length of the long blade looked awkward at his side. It hung at a sharp angle ensuring that it would not come into contact with the ground.

  Aisen normally wore the sword in a sheath that was open near the top on one side, making it easier to draw, but today the weapon was in a handsomely decorated scabbard of leather and wood. This aged work of art was not original to the weapon, which was far more ancient, but it had been paired with the sword since before the memory of anyone now living, and was always used for formal occasions like this one. It was beautiful, but also impractical in a way that made it impossible to clear the Sigil Blade in a swift or fluid manner.

  Now on foot, Aisen felt the full weight of his armor. It was the heaviest set of Plate that he had ever worn, and when the time came, he would be grateful to store it away. Aisen was young and strong though, and it was not the weight of his armor that caused him to slow his progress as he walked towards the crypts.

  Aisen had loved his grandfather, as had all the duke’s vassals and servants, but the relationship had never been an easy one. Aisen’s father, Aedan Elduryn, had parted on difficult terms with the duke some fifteen years ago, leaving Nar Edor while Aisen and Beonen were still very young, with no promise of ever returning. Kyreth Edorin had been unable to see Aisen, without recalling bitter memories of the boy’s father whom Aisen so resembled. It had formed a distance across which neither one of them had ever been able to travel.

  It wasn’t that Kyreth Edorin had ever been unkind. He simply had never been able to sustain much warmth or regard for his oldest grandson. His love and adoration had instead been lavished on Beonen. Aisen knew that in Beonen, Kyreth Edorin could see a continuation of himself, whereas Aisen only reminded him of a man who had taken things from him, things that he could never again reclaim.

  Despite this, Kyreth Edorin had entrusted Aisen, and not Beonen, with the continuation of his legacy. His grandfather had achieved much during his long life, contributing to the formation of a new set of ideals, which Aisen had sworn to preserve at any cost, and had established himself as a servant of his people. His accomplishments included the founding of the Sigil Corps, guarantees on freedom of travel within Edorin lands during times of peace, building up the Port City from almost nothing, and establishing overseas trade with the nations of the Ossian League. Duke Edorin’s policies had promoted an unprecedented prosperity which had spread far beyond the lands that the duke governed himself. Aisen considered in sober terms, the heavy task of protecting these improvements and building upon them.

  Aedan Elduryn too, had been a catalyst for all of these changes, though few outside the Sigil Corps, where he was an almost mythical figure, would ever acknowledge it. Whatever had caused the breach between the two men, no one seemed to know, but it had not lessened the reverence with which the men of the Sigil Corps regarded Aedan Elduryn. It was a view held by some, that they regarded Aisen’s father more highly even, than their patron the duke whose vision it had been to revive the ancient order.

  His descent from two such important figures had not made Aisen’s life easy. He had been abandoned by one, and barely accepted by the other, and their legacies had created expectations that he could never fulfill. He had earned, and in other ways inherited, a great deal of respect within the Sigil Corps, but he was never going to be the equal of his father, and no one believed Aisen capable of ruling as wisely as his grandfather had. It made Aisen feel, as it always had, as though he were very much alone, and he pushed forward now under the fear that he was not equal to the challenges that he would be expected to overcome.

  He yearned for the sight of a friendly face, someone sympathetic to his cause and his plight, someone who could help him carry his burden. But the stares and cautious reactions that greeted Aisen as he encountered people on his way, offered no such support. They looked instead to him, anxious about whether or not he would serve them well, and seemingly afraid that he would fail.

  Pushing these fears and dire thoughts away, Edryd climbed the steps of a bright stone building, and proceeded across a narrow terrace on his way to the building’s tall arched doorway. The interior of the chapel was illuminated by sunlight that entered through rows of windows near the ceiling on either side of the building, painting the stone surfaces within in a soft white light. There were more people inside than out, and the space was filling up with groups who were taking advantage of the cool beneath the high roof, which was supported by the vaulted chapel’s perfectly rounded stone pillars. It was however, a large enough space for Aisen to maneuver past the scattered mourners, without ever deviating from the broad central aisle that bisected the room.

  Aisen was glad that he would not need to force a smile for any of these people today. He would not have been able to manage it. Although they all must have recognized Aisen, barely anyone acknowledged his presence, and if they didn’t appear to ignore him altogether, it was not because they were not trying. Only once he passed beyond them, did they begin to stare, watching Aisen with uninterrupted interest as he proceeded east down the length of the room. They continued to watch as he entered the enclosed apse at the far end the chapel where the body of his grandfather, Kyreth Edorin II, lay in full armor within an open stone sarcophagus.

  There was less light in this room than there was in the rest of the chapel, from which it was walled away, but it was not dark. There were torches se
t in the back wall, and light also came in through the entrance and through holes in the stone latticework screen atop the walls through which Aisen had just passed. The back of the domed space was carved directly into the rock face of a long jutting uplifted scar in the earth, against which this entire funerary building had been raised. A descending passageway tunneled through the cliff face, leading directly from this room down into the Edorin family crypts.

  Removing his helmet and setting it upon the floor, Aisen lowered himself upon one knee, and offered a prayer, a silent appeal that his grandfather should be welcomed into the Houses of the High Realm. Aisen was not sure whether he believed in such things, but if there were any truth in the traditions of his people, he was certain that his grandfather had earned a place of honor in the world where his soul would now reside.

  Aisen rose in response to footsteps, the sounds originating from behind him and echoing off of the stone walls and domed ceiling. Someone had been waiting for him, standing against the back wall where he would not be seen. Aisen did not need to turn to know that it was his brother, Beonen, but he could not have