Murtagh

Dark ceiling, dark walls, floor of patterned wood…a fire roaring in the stone hearth along one side of the great hall. Dishes scattered across the banquet table, which all the guests had long since fled…. At the head of the table, the dark shape of his father, still wrapped in his travel cloak, hunched, brooding, the ever-present goblet of wine grasped firmly in his hand. Hovering behind him, the slim figure of his mother, speaking in low, tense tones.

Murtagh sat on the edge of the hearth. The sounds of his parents talking distracted him at times—his father’s voice was loud, brusque—but then his attention returned to the wooden horse he was playing with. It was painted brown and white, with crisp black hooves, and it had a mane and tail of real horsehair. He ran it back and forth across the hearth, making little sounds as he did. He jumped the horse over imagined rocks and hedges, and then, by accident, he brought the horse too close to the fire, and a spark landed on the tail.

A flame kindled in the hair. Frightened, he shook the horse, and the flame went out, but the smell of burnt hair stung his nose, and the tail was ruined.

He started to cry. That much he remembered. The horse was so handsome, and now it was ruined, and he had no others like it.

His father’s voice rose in an angry shout. “—don’t stop that brat and his mewling, then I will!” And there was the scrape of a chair being shoved back and a cry of terror from his mother, and a heavy weight struck Murtagh in the back and knocked him flat against the hearth.

Zar’roc fell beside him with a clatter, the blade’s edge so sharp it was invisible.

Murtagh knew he screamed, but he felt no pain, only a sense of cold and weakness as blood spread in a pool around him. His mother’s face appeared over him, her expression pinched with fear, and that disturbed him more than anything. He didn’t want her to worry, didn’t want her to be afraid.

Then the hall grew hazy, and the last thing he was aware of was his mother murmuring in an unfamiliar language as the dreadful chill settled in his bones.