The Eastern Kingdom- Circa 522
Seven-year-old Gareth Ironclad, firstborn son of King Oren “the Juggernaut” Ironclad and Queen Ira Ironclad, loved everything about Ferria. He loved the aromatic smells as he walked with his father and brothers through the market—braised leg of lamb and smoked beef tenders and roasted quail. He loved the gleaming armor displayed by the Orian smiths, freshly oiled and polished. He loved the way the iron-sheathed trees grew amongst the village, the heart of the forest pumping life into the city he called home.
But, more than anything, he loved the way the Ferrians and Orians alike looked at him.
With respect. With admiration. They nodded their heads and tipped their caps and shouted greetings to him and his brothers. Even better was the reaction he received from the legionnaires, with their sheathed weapons and jointed plate.
In fact, a platoon was passing at this very moment. Gareth grinned as the men and women soldiers beat their iron chests with their fists in honor of the king. But once the king had passed, their attention turned to Gareth. “Bless the Shield!” some cried. Others shouted, “Hail the Shield!” Gareth didn’t understand how he’d earned such an impressive nickname—the Shield—but he loved it just the same.
And though he knew pride was beneath a prince, his chest swelled anyway.
One of his twin brothers, Grian, pouted. “We all have the same name day,” he pointed out, as he liked to do. “I don’t see what makes him so special.” Agitatedly, he ran a hand over the short tufts of reddish-brown hair poking from his scalp. Unlike Gareth and Guy, who wore their hair long, Grian liked to have the castle barber trim it every few weeks. Anything to look different than his brothers.
He can’t change his face, nor his chestnut eyes, Gareth thought with amusement.
“He was born first,” Guy said sternly. He’d always been the most serious of the three.
“So he pushed and shoved his way out of Mother before we did. That makes him the Shield?” Grian glared at Gareth.
Gareth beamed back. “It was my first victory!” He raised a fist in the air. His brother could complain all he wanted, but it wouldn’t change anything.
Grian tried to grab Gareth’s collar, but Guy stepped between them. For as long as Gareth could remember, Guy had defended him from Grian. Not that he needed it. When they fought with dull-edged swords he got in as many licks as he took. And yet Guy was always there, always by his side.
He was getting tired of it. He was a prince, destined to greatness like his mother always said, not a child.
Gareth pushed his brother away, but Guy muscled him back. For a few moments they struggled for dominance while Grian smirked at them, but froze when their father boomed, “Enough! I will not have the princes of the realm acting like street urchins.”
“Grian was being an ore monkey and Guy wouldn’t let me at him,” Gareth complained.
Guy said, “Grian was being an ore monkey.”
“Hey!” Grian protested.
The king cuffed Guy on the back of the head, followed by Gareth. Gareth stumbled, barely maintaining his balance. His brother did the same. It was like being clobbered by a mason’s sledge.
Grian sniggered, but was cut off when he received his own smack to the skull.
“You are all Ironclads,” their father said. He shielded his eyes from a wayward shaft of sunlight blazing through the branches. His bald head was already turning pink. His hand slid down his cheek and tugged on his thick, red beard, which was braided in three places. The expression he wore was thoughtful, distant, as he said, “The same blood and ore runs through your veins. Never forget that.” He turned away, but added over his shoulder, “You can settle it on the training grounds.” He strode away, his massive Foehammer swinging where it was sheathed at his hip.
Chastened, the three fell into stride behind him as he continued toward the castle. Just loud enough that Gareth could hear but not the king, Grian muttered, “Shield? Bah! More like a wilted cabbage leaf.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Grian,” Guy said.
“And you do? I should’ve been first. Anyway, Father was the youngest brother in his family, and now he’s the king. And I’m not an ore monkey.”
Guy said to Gareth, “Don’t listen to him. You are the firstborn and the Shield. Everyone says so.”
Normally, Gareth would relish such a reminder, but something about the way his brother said it sounded unusual. Almost strained, like a grimace of pain. Gareth studied Guy’s face. His lips were tight, his eyes narrowed. If anything, he looked even more serious than usual.
“But what does that even mean?” Gareth asked.
Guy looked away as if he hadn’t heard. He changed the subject. “What do you think Mother has planned for our eighth name day?”
“Only the biggest feast of our lives,” Grian said, licking his lips. “I saw a dozen wagons entering the castle gates this morning. They were full.”
Gareth frowned, still trying to catch Guy’s gaze, but his brother refused to look at him. The conversation had already moved on.
“I heard there’ll be Orian channelers,” Guy said. “They’re going to put on a show.”
At that, Gareth completely forgot about the strange tone his brother’s voice had taken just a moment before. “Truly?”
“Aye,” Guy said, finally meeting his eyes with a smile. “They’ll be riding ore hawks and ore panthers.”
“If Grian is there, they can ride an ore monkey too!” Gareth said.
“I’m NOT an ore monkey!” Grian said, trying to reach around Guy to hit Gareth.
The castle’s iron gates loomed ahead, guarded by the largest soldiers in the realm, including Beorn Stonesledge, the ironmarked, standing a head taller than anyone else. His iron-fist pendant hung heavily from his neck.
“Ho, Iron Fist,” the king bellowed. Behind the giant man, the gates began to open. Well, perhaps “open” was the wrong word. Instead, they seemed to liquefy, melting away to either side and vanishing inside the wall. Gareth craned his neck and tried to spot the Orian gatekeepers who were channeling the ore. He frowned, seeing nothing but metal. They were well hidden.
The king and Beorn Stonesledge embraced with a hearty slap on each other’s back. “Any news from the front?” the king asked.
The “front” was currently the Black Cliffs, the razor-like rocks separating the east from the north. The Hundred Years War between the Four Kingdoms had started long before Gareth was born. Talk of “the war” and “the front” were so commonplace that he barely thought about it anymore. He knew one day he and his brothers would lead the legionnaires into battle, but it felt so distant it might’ve been a thousand years off.
Grian, on the other hand, always seemed to perk up at talk of war, and now was no exception. “Have we smashed Darrin to bits yet?” he asked, rubbing his hands together.
King Ironclad chuckled at his son’s question. “If only it were that easy. First we have to find safe passage through the mountains.”
“A difficult task under normal circumstances,” Beorn agreed. “And almost impossible while being harried by northern archers the entire time. We received a stream from Crow’s Nest while you were away from the castle. That promising tunnel we discovered at the beginning of the last moon cycle? A dead end.”
The king shook his head in frustration. “If only Raider’s Pass wasn’t swamped with westerners right now.” He waved the thought away with a large hand. “Let them destroy each other, and then we shall have them both.” He laughed gregariously, which was the only way Gareth had ever known his father to laugh.
“We could scale the Razor, like Uncle Coren once did,” Grian suggested. “I could do it, I’m a top climber.”
It was so easy Gareth couldn’t help himself. “That’s because you’re an ore monkey,” he said, barely bothering to disguise the insult behind a cough.
It drew a rare smile from Guy. Grian fired a scathing look at them both, but the adults didn??
?t seem to notice the exchange.
The king said, “I admire your enthusiasm, son, but the Razor is as steep and slick as a bare metal wall. Mine brother was the only one to ever lead a platoon over the Black Cliffs, and he paid the ultimate price in the end. Even if we had enough soldiers who could climb it, Darrin has the finest archers positioned strategically along the cliffs. We would be cut to ribbons at best; at worst, we’d drown in the sea. No, it’s better to go through the Mournful Mountains if we can find a way.”
Grian blushed, which only made Gareth’s grin widen further. Guy said, very seriously, “We found a way through once. We can do it again.”
“That’s the spirit, my boy!” the king said, slapping him on the back. Despite his bravado, Gareth noticed his father’s grimace at the reminder of the last time the mountains had been breached, more than fifteen years ago, a story he’d heard half a hundred times.
It was the battle in which his uncle, Coren “Thunder” Ironclad had been killed. As his father had alluded to, Coren had led a platoon over the Razor as a distraction for the main force, which was commanded by Oren as they snuck through a tunnel and into the north. By the time Oren’s soldiers had arrived, the battle was nearly lost, and his brother was already grievously wounded. To make matters worse, the northerners had mounted a fierce counterattack and forced what was left of Oren’s army back through the passage, which they then destroyed with hammer and chisel. The mountain had been sealed ever since.
Later, Gareth’s grandfather had died of natural causes. That was when Oren Ironclad was proclaimed king of the east and protector of the realm.
Gareth, try as he might, couldn’t remember any of it.
He was nudged from his revelry by Grian’s shoulder as they entered through the gates. “Ready to settle things?” Grian asked.
“I’ll even give you the first hit,” Gareth retorted.
Guy rolled his eyes. “I’m going to see if Mother needs any help with tonight’s preparations.”
While Grian raced off to fetch a pair of dented practice swords, Gareth watched his other brother depart around the bend of the first of the castle’s walled inner rings. Just before Guy disappeared, he turned around and met Gareth’s eyes. From a distance, his gaze looked haunted, like he’d seen a ghost.
“On guard,” Grian yelled, tossing Gareth a sword and springing forward.
Hours later, as the sun began to disappear into the thick of Ironwood, Gareth and Grian were exhausted and breathless, but friends again. Grian clapped him on the shoulder and said, “You fight like a westerner.”
“You fight like an ore monkey,” Gareth spat back, but this time it wasn’t meant as an insult.
Grian laughed. “Have you seen the way they gnash their teeth? Those creatures are vicious!”
Gareth tried to return his smile, but now that the fight was over his mind had returned to the strange things Guy had said, that unhinged look in his eyes.
“Hey, Grian?”
“Yeah, weakling?”
Gareth ignored the comment. “Has Guy been acting strange?”
Grian snorted. “He always acts strange.”
“I mean more strange.”
Grian seemed to consider, finally waving the idea away with his sword, now even more scratched and dented then before. “Nah. He’s just excited for our name day.”
Gareth wanted to feel relieved at his brother’s words, but didn’t. Instead, he felt like there was a big hole in his stomach, with wind whistling through unfettered. Or maybe he was just hungry.
Giving credence to that very thought, his stomach rumbled as they approached the grand banquet hall. Something smelled divine.
Grian grinned at Gareth and said, “Last one to the roast duck is an ore monkey’s cousin!” He shoved Gareth and took off, but Gareth managed to keep his feet and give chase, catching him halfway to the entrance. As they jostled for the lead, neither of them noticed the broad form stepping from the hall and into their path.
By the time they did notice, it was all they could do to skid to a stop. Gareth was a heartbeat too slow, stumbling awkwardly into his mother, who was wearing her very best dress armor. He rattled off and tumbled to the ground, collecting dirt in his mouth.
Shaking away the stars that blanketed his vision, his mother’s face materialized a piece at a time. She already had Grian by the scruff of his shirt. His feet were dangling from the ground, his face turning red. “Where have you been?” she demanded.
“Training,” Grian squeaked. “It was Father’s idea, I swear on the Great Forest of Orion! Tell him, Gareth.”
Gareth tried to nod, but blinked instead. His vision was still swimming, his head full of angry bees. Queen Ira Redfern Ironclad was a large woman on her worst day, both tall and strong, but from this particular vantage point she might’ve been a giant. He felt like he’d run into a metal wall, and the wall hadn’t won so much as annihilated him.
“I don’t care if Orion Herself descended from Her Forest in the clouds and told you to train, today is your eighth name day, a very auspicious day. The feast begins promptly at sunset and you smell like a chamber pot. Get cleaned up before I’m forced to scrub you myself!”
She dropped Grian and he landed on his backside with a yelp. Frantically, he helped Gareth to his feet and they hobbled away as fast as they could. Being scrubbed by their mother was akin to torture. Given her current mood, Gareth thought, torture might be the better option.
“Thanks,” he managed to say to Grian, who continued to help him walk.
“I was afraid she was going to eat you,” he said, and they burst into a fit of giggles.
“Or both of us,” Gareth said. “You for an entrée and me for dessert.”
“With whipped cream on top!”
Gareth laughed again, feeling good, despite his throbbing head and beating heart. He hadn’t laughed like this with Grian in a while.
Their laughter faded, however, when they spotted Guy striding toward them. He was dressed in fine gray trousers and a white tie-up shirt bearing the northern sigil—the crossed swords on a field of black. “Guy Ironclad” was also embroidered on one of the breasts. His face looked freshly washed, practically glowing. His long ginger hair was tied back in a knot.
To Gareth, he looked like he’d swallowed a frog. A plump green one.
“Glad to see you find the most important day of our lives so amusing,” Guy said, brushing past them.
Grian looked ready to stalk after him, but Gareth stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “He’s just mad we’ve been training all day while he’s been working,” Gareth said. He said it as much for himself as for his brother’s temper.
“Aye,” Grian said. “That’s probably it. C’mon.”
They headed inside, passing metal walls that changed from day to day, channeled by the Orians into intricate patterns depicting scenes from nature. More than once, the king had requested battle scenes, but the Orians refused. “Battles are meant to be fought, not channeled,” Gareth had heard one of the forest dwellers say.
Although Gareth would never admit it out loud, he preferred the nature scenes. They were calming, with blooming flowers, ore panthers springing from branch to branch, massive trees standing sentinel. The walls of the castle were just another thing he loved about Ferria.
Grian pushed into the bathing room, a gout of steam bursting through the door. Two iron tubs were filled to the brim with hot water. One was being emptied by a bath worker—Guy’s tub.
Grian stripped down and catapulted into the water with a splash, screaming as it burned his skin. Gareth took his time, folding each sweat- and dirt-stained garment as he placed them in the washing bin. Slowly, he eased into the scalding water.
Grian was staring at him. “You act like a woman sometimes,” he said, smirking.
Gareth’s cheeks reddened, and he hid his embarrassment by submerging himself. When he came up, a soapy cloth smacked him in the face. Gareth retaliated with a splash, and soon half the water
was on the floor and they were hastily toweling themselves off.
Still laughing and pushing each other, Gareth froze when they came to the bench that had their clothes already laid out. All amusement vanished like an exploding green star.
“What the hell?” Grian said, speaking first.
“I—” Gareth didn’t know what to say. Inside he felt his heart beating faster, his chest swelling with pride, and he had the all-encompassing urge to smile, to leap into the air, to run around the room in excitement. It took every bit of his self-control to just stand there, staring.
“Figures,” Grian muttered, grabbing his clothes—a black pair of pants and black shirt stitched with his name and nothing else—and stalking off.
Any bond the day’s activities had formed between them seemed to snap like a broken rope.
Gareth reached for the glittering armor suit engraved with his name and an ornate, curving shield. The moment his brother was gone, his lips curled into a smile so broad his cheeks began to ache.
Gareth stared at himself in the mirror, unbelieving. Though it was only his eighth name day, a tall boy who might’ve been twelve stared back at him. The boy was clad in beautiful new armor, form-fitting in the Orian style, the seams nearly invisible to the naked eye. He held a helmet under one arm, casually, like he did it all the time. There was a gleam in his eye so foreign it might’ve been that of a Calypsian, or Phanecian.
The gleam was confidence, he knew. More than he’d ever felt in his eight short years of life.
Is that really me? he asked himself for the dozenth time.
I look like—
“My warrior. My son,” a voice said from the side.
Startled, he spun to find his mother standing in the doorway to his dressing room. “I—I look like a warrior? Truly?”
She smiled, but the expression didn’t seem to reach her eyes. Still, she nodded. “You were always meant to be a great warrior, Gareth. When you were born, I looked at you and said, ‘He is so strong.’”
Warmth spread through his body, until he had to breathe out heavily to release it. “Guy and Grian are strong, too,” he pointed out. At the same time, he was remembering what the legionnaires had shouted to him as they’d passed. Hail the Shield! Bless the Shield!