A Quest of Heroes (Book #1 in the Sorcerer's Ring)

Chapter 3

CHAPTER THREE

King MacGil—stout, barrel-chested, with a beard too thick with gray, long hair to match, and a broad forehead lined with too many battles—stood on the upper ramparts of his castle, his queen beside him, and overlooked the day's burgeoning festivities. His royal grounds sprawled out beneath him in all their glory, stretching as far as the eye could see, a thriving city walled in by ancient stone fortifications. King's Court. Interconnected by a maze of winding streets sat stone buildings of every shape and size—for the warriors, the caretakers, the horses, The Silver, the Legion, the guards, the barracks, the weapons house, the armory—and among these, hundreds of dwellings for the multitude of his people who chose to live within the city walls. Between these spanned acres of grass, royal gardens, stone-lined plazas, overflowing fountains. King's Court had been improved upon for centuries, by his father, and his father before him—and it sat now at the peak of its glory. Without doubt, it was now the safest stronghold within the Western Kingdom of the Ring.

MacGil was blessed with the finest and most loyal warriors any king had ever known, and in his lifetime, no one had dared attack. The seventh MacGil to hold the throne, he had held it well for his thirty-two years of rule, had been a good and wise king. The land had prospered greatly in his reign, he had doubled his army's size, expanded his cities, brought his people bounty, and not a single complaint could be found among his people. He was known as the generous king, and there had never been such a period of bounty and peace since he took the throne.

Which, paradoxically, was precisely what kept MacGil up at night. For MacGil knew his history: in all the ages, there had never been as long a stretch without a war. He no longer wondered if there would be an attack—but when. And from whom.

The greatest threat, of course, was from beyond the Ring, from the empire of savages that ruled the outlying Wilds, which had subjugated all the peoples outside the Ring, beyond the Canyon. For MacGil, and the seven generations before him, the Wilds had never posed a direct threat: because of his kingdom's unique geography, shaped in a perfect circle—a ring—separated from the rest of the world by a deep canyon a mile wide, and protected by an energy shield that had been active since a MacGil first ruled, they had little to fear of the Wilds. The savages had tried many times to attack, to penetrate the shield, to cross the canyon; not once had they been successful. As long as he and his people stayed within the Ring, there was no outside threat.

That did not mean, though, that there was no threat from inside. And that was what had kept MacGil up at night lately. That, indeed, was the purpose of the day's festivities: the marriage of his eldest daughter. A marriage arranged specifically to appease his enemies, to maintain the fragile peace within the Eastern and Western Kingdoms of the Ring.

While the Ring spanned a good five hundred miles in each direction, it was divided down the middle by a mountain range. The Highlands. On the other side of the Highlands sat the Eastern Kingdom, ruling the other half of the Ring. And this kingdom, ruled for centuries by their rivals, the McClouds, had always tried to shatter its fragile truce with the MacGils. The McClouds were malcontents, unhappy with their lot, convinced their side of the kingdom sat on ground less fertile. They contested the Highlands, too, insisting the entire mountain range was theirs, when at least half of it belonged to the MacGils. There were perpetual border skirmishes, and constant threats of invasion.

As MacGil pondered it all, he was annoyed. The McClouds should be happy: they were safe inside the Ring, protected by the Canyon, they sat on choice land, and had nothing to fear. They should just be content with their own half of the Ring. It was only because MacGil had grown his army so strong that, for the first time in history, the McClouds had dared not attack. But MacGil, the wise king he was, sensed something on the horizon; he knew this peace could not last. Thus he had arranged this marriage of his eldest daughter to the eldest prince of the McClouds. And now the day had arrived.