“The risks are substantial.”
“I know. And I don’t suppose anyone besides me would even think twice about taking them.”
Questor thought a moment. “Maybe not. But no one else stands in your shoes, High Lord.”
Ben sighed. “Well, in any case, the matter’s settled. I’m staying and that’s that.” He straightened slowly. “What I have to do now is to concentrate on finding ways of dealing with Landover’s problems before they bury me.”
Questor nodded.
“And the first of those problems is the refusal of any of the King’s subjects to recognize me as King. Or themselves as subjects. They have to be made to pledge to the throne.”
The other nodded one time more. “How will you do that?”
“I don’t know yet. But I do know one thing. No one is going to come here to make that pledge. The coronation would have brought them, were they at all willing. Since they refuse to come here, we’ll have to go there — there being wherever they are.”
Questor frowned. “I have reservations about such a plan, High Lord. It could prove very dangerous.”
Ben shrugged. “Maybe, but I don’t see that we have much choice in the matter.” He stood up. “Care to make a suggestion as to where we should start?”
The wizard sighed and stood up with him. “I suggest, High Lord, that we start at the beginning.”
Lords of the Greensward
There had been many who had pledged service to the Kings of Landover — families who for generations had fought in the armies of the High Lords and stood beside their thrones. There had been many who could point with pride to their record of loyal and faithful service. But none had served so well or so long as the Lords of the Greensward, and it was to them that Ben Holiday was advised he should go first.
“The barons trace their bloodlines back thousands of years — some to the time that Landover came into being,” Questor Thews explained. “They have always stood with the King. They formed the backbone of his army; they comprised the core of his advisors and court. Some of them were Kings of Landover themselves — though none in the last several hundred years. They were always the first to offer service. When the old King died, they were the last to depart. If you are to gain support anywhere. High Lord, it would be from them.”
Ben accepted the suggestion — although it was really less a suggestion than a caution, he thought — and departed Sterling Silver at dawn of the following day for the estates of the land barons. Questor Thews, Abernathy and the two kobolds went with him once again. Ben, the wizard and the scribe rode horseback because the journey to the Greensward was a long one. The kobolds could have ridden, too, had they chosen to do so, but kobolds in general had little use for horses, being quicker of foot and stronger of wind than the best racer that had ever run, and so almost always traveled afoot. Besides, horses were unusually skittish when ridden by kobolds. Ben had no trouble understanding that. Anything that could dispatch a timber wolf, a cave wight, and a bog wump with such ease made him skittish, too.
It was a peculiar-looking group that departed that morning. Questor led the way, his tall, brightly cloaked figure slouched across an old gray that must have been ready for pasture years ago. Ben followed on Wishbone, a sorrel with the oddly shaped white blaze that gave him his name and a propensity for seizing the bit and bolting. He did that twice with Ben hanging on for dear life each time. Questor, after the second incident, whacked him hard across the nose and threatened magic in horse tongue. That seemed to bring Wishbone to his senses. Abernathy followed atop a white-faced bay gelding and carried the King’s standard with its bynow familiar insignia of the Paladin riding out from the castle at sunrise embroidered in scarlet on a field of white. It was strange indeed to see a soft-coated Wheaten Terrier with glasses and tunic riding a horse and holding a flag, but Ben kept the smile from his face, because Abernathy obviously saw nothing at all funny about it. Parsnip trailed, leading on a long set of guide ropes a pack train of donkeys with food, clothing, and bedding. Bunion had gone on ahead, sent by Questor to advise the land barons that the King of Landover wished a meeting.