I beg you to consider, my lords, what a friendly prince means to us here on the border. And what it could mean to have him consent to stay.
Felaras chewed the end of her stylus and considered the last phrase. Was there enough veiled threat in there? Too much? Damned diplomatic jockeying around—
Felaras raised her head from the palimpsest sharply as the triple-tap that identified Kasha as the knocker at her study door broke into her concentration.
Damn it, now what?
Kasha did not wait for an invitation to enter. The door was already half open anyway.
"Master Felaras, Jegrai and Northwind are here to see you," she said, opening the door completely and leaning through it. "They don't look happy. Ardun says there was some activity down in the Vredai camp earlier, and about twenty riders left and haven't come back. He says they had lots of spare horses with them, and what looked like all their gear."
"Lovely," Felaras muttered, rubbing her right eye. There was a headache starting there, springing into life the moment she'd heard what sounded like bad news. It's all this tension. The gods must hate me, I guess. "I suppose that grumbling in the ranks Teo and Mai told me about has come to more than grumbling. And they want me to do something about it."
Kasha shrugged, and kept her face expressionless.
"What do I look like, anyway?" Felaras demanded in sudden irritation, wishing she could consign the last half-year to oblivion.
Damn Jegrai and all his crew!
"Do they think I'm Ruwan Dyr, the Goddess of Peace? It's not enough to be Master and juggle all the personalities of the quirkiest lot this side of Targheiden, but now I'm supposed to work miracles for a lot of nomads too?"
Her Second wisely kept her silence.
Felaras got herself calmed down, and warded off the headache with a relaxation exercise. This isn't Jegrai's fault. He didn't ask to come here. If he had his druthers, they'd all be down on the steppes right now. "All right, bring them up," she sighed, wishing she'd gotten more than a couple hours of sleep. "We'll see if it's what I think it is, and if we can actually do anything about it."
Kasha closed the door of the study only to reopen it a few moments later for Khene Jegrai and Shaman Northwind. They entered and walked quietly forward to stand before Felaras's desk. Kasha stayed beside the door, but raised one eyebrow, asking Felaras in their own private code if she needed to stick around for this meeting. Felaras shook her head very slightly, and Kasha closed the door and took up her post as door-guard outside on the landing to make certain that there would be no unauthorized ears prying into the Master's affairs.
Although the Shaman was wearing his "inscrutable sage" mask, Felaras could see that Kasha was right. There was a tightness around his eyes and in the set of his shoulders that told her wordlessly that he was deeply worried. Jegrai was relatively easier to read than the Shaman, though she doubted that there were more than half a dozen folk in the Fortress who'd have been able to get past that deadpan "betting face" he had assumed. But she could see that the muscles of his neck and arms were tight enough to make him move a little stiffly, and that his eyes were narrowed in what, for him, was muted anger. Neither of them took the seats she offered them with a nod of her head.
Bad sign. They either are mad at us, or they think we're going to be mad at them.
"Master Felaras," the Shaman began, not at all diffidently, but with a haughty, stone-faced air of we're equals, and I'm telling you this only because I think you need to know. "There has been some trouble with our people, which we fear may cause some difficulty—"
"Pardon, Northwind," Jegrai interrupted, his voice flat and expressionless. "But Master Felaras deserves plain speaking in this." He turned to Felaras, and folded his arms across his chest. "I will give you the whole of it. There has been a revolt among the Vredai, and some two hands of warriors have broken off and ridden out. They say they will not ride with Vredai while I am Khene—and that they will not ride with Vredai at all as long as Vredai subsists on the charity of outsiders. In other words, they expect the next Khene to break water-pledge with you, and violate our treaty."
"Charity?" Felaras said curiously. "Hladyr bless, what charity?"
"The food you granted us, the new herds, the very valley," Northwind replied, ticking the items off on his fingers. "And yes, I know that the valley is ours by the treaty, the food was part of what was granted to us to seal the water-pledge, and the herd-beasts payment for those who have begun riding patrol with your Watchers about the Vale. These who have ridden out, however, are all young hotheads who would, I fear, far rather take than earn."
Oh, so. The ones who've gotten a taste for raiding don't like giving it up. I guess I should be thankful there's only "two hands" worth of them.
"Earning takes too long," Felaras pointed out with dry humor. "And costs in terms of real work; boring, routine work. Not exciting stuff like fighting and raiding."
"Aye," Jegrai agreed, "and they have forgotten that while Vredai have always been warriors, we were warriors only to defend the herds. And the herds came first, before raids and counting coups. I heard much about the glory of war before they stormed out of my tent; enough to make me wish to take a stick to their thick heads, one and all. I should think they had seen enough of that kind of 'glory' to last a lifetime."
Northwind interrupted him. "Na, Khene, I did not once hear prating of the glory of facing the Talchai. The only 'glory' I heard of was the 'glory' of running down land-folk and taking the spoils."
Jegrai snorted a disgusted agreement. "Tending sheep brings no glory—and riding patrol offers no chance of fortune."
Felaras's already high estimation of Jegrai rose more. It wasn't often that a man as young as the Khene who came from a culture that had faced and adopted violence could see the benefits of peace.
"So they're going to go back to raiding my land-folk, just as we've got them settled back on their farms and at least tentatively convinced that you folk are going to guard them, not hurt them—"
"Exactly so," the Shaman agreed wearily. "And I could wish they had chosen some other time and place."
"How many of these dissidents have families of their own?"
"None," Jegrai replied positively.
"Huh. That has both good and bad points," Felaras replied, propping both elbows on the desk and resting her chin in both hands. Jegrai frowned and shifted his weight a little, distracting her.
"Gentlemen, I am not going to pounce on you and turn you into frogs," she said impatiently. "You've proven yourselves my allies twice over by coming to me directly with this. Now, will you please sit down? We have some planning to do, and I'm tired of craning my neck up to look at you!"
Jegrai and Northwind exchanged looks—Jegrai's a bit startled, the Shaman's one of "I told you so" satisfaction—and they seated themselves across from her with a scraping of wood on the hardwood floor.
"All right; they don't have families, so we can't use blood-ties to lure them back. Or maybe I should ask first if you want them back."
"No," Jegrai said quickly. "Once traitor, what's to stop them from turning traitor again? Besides, to avoid the curse of having broken water-pledge, they have declared that they are no longer of Vredai. If they are not of us, why would we wish them back? And if we took them back, are they not oathbreakers? I should have to execute them. I had rather just eliminate them; either drive them back into the east or kill them in a raid-attempt."
"Good point. All right—are your people still using those red-and-black armbands we made up to identify them as allies of the Order?"
"Oh, yes," the Shaman replied with a tight smile. "Not the least because they are bright and handsome. The young riders are fond of ornament, and we lost most such things some time ago. And I think I see your next question—the rebels tore their armbands off and left them at Jegrai's feet ere they rode out, saying they had had enough of collars and leashes."
"Well, that means we won't have to change colors, at least," Felaras replied. "Seeing as your people like ornament, gentlemen, I'll see to it that the riders still with you get all they could desire. Headbands, scarves for their helms, ribbons for their lances, tassels for their bridles—anything you can think of, I'll have made up. Are you seeing where I'm heading?"
"Aye." Jegrai smiled a little. "Since your folk won't know one rider from another, you are intending that they should think my rebels have come from outside."
"That's it. Now . . ." she pulled a map of the Vale out of her desk and unfolded it on the desk top, clearing room for it by sweeping the papers she'd been working on to the side. "If you were whoever they'll pick to lead them, where would you go to hole up and make a base? And then, where would you start to raid?"
So. It's to be us.
Kasha's mare pricked her ears forward and brought her head up, and pawed the floor of the barn restlessly. Kasha put her hand over the mare's soft nose and forced it down before she could whicker a greeting to the horses she scented approaching and give them away.
Damn trouble with fighting a skirmish in spring, Kasha thought with annoyance. Damn horses are in season, and damn nomads only geld about half their stallions. Hope they don't scent us. They shouldn't, we're downwind of them, but you never know.
She was the only Sword among the nomad ambushers hiding in this barn, but she looked just as wild as any of them. Besides her normal dark clothing and armor, she was bedecked with a gypsy-motley of identifying ribbons. The rest of the nomads had even more; given choices of ornaments, most took everything. Red-and-black streamers and ribbons fluttered from the tips of lances and javelins and even from the pommels of swords. Red-and-black braided bands encircled upper arms and helms, and held hair off of nomad foreheads. Red-and-black tassels hung from reins and bridles, and some of the warriors sported several red-and-black scarves tied jauntily around their necks and around their legs just above the knee. The three young women in this party had even braided their hair with red-and-black cords before coiling it around their heads. They looked like they were decked out for a festival. But there would be no mistaking where the allegiance of this party lay.
There were a half-dozen of these ambush parties hiding at this end of the Vale, now that they knew where the dissidents had holed up. Between them, Felaras and Jegrai had identified that many likely targets—mostly flocks—among the Vale folk back on their lands near the rebel base. There had already been two raids by the rebels; one had succeeded, and one, by sheerest luck, had been foiled by a party returning from riding border-guard.
The rebels hadn't done much damage—yet. Mostly they'd ridden a destructive swath through a field of young oats, and stolen a handful of sheep. But both Felaras and Jegrai feared that was subject to change at any moment. The next raid could include fire, rapine, and murder—
Probably would, as they grew more sure of themselves.
And if that happened, no amount of red-and-black trimmings would convince the Vale folk that any nomad was trustworthy.
The lookout on the barn roof slithered down on the rope leading through the hatch to the second floor. Kasha tensed and turned to see what the leader of the party would signal. Though she had long since graduated to the rank of "serjant" in the Sword, this time she was not the leader of the party. That honor had fallen to one of Jegrai's older trackers, a hard-faced man called Abodai. Each ambush party had at least one Sword with it; and not one single Sword had been appointed as leader.
This was a calculated risk. The Watchers were going to prove themselves to Jegrai's folk—as fighters, but also as true allies, and not order-givers.
Abodai, watching through a crack in the door, jerked his fist, thumb up, in a silent order to mount. As neatly as if they had trained together, the ambushers swung into their saddles. Abodai did the same, then backed his horse a few paces.
Silence, except for the stamping of a hoof, the twittering of birds in the hayloft. Sunlight streaked through the cracks in the barn walls, the beams almost solid with dancing dust-motes. -Hay-scent and dust-scent mingled with the salt smell of horse-sweat and the tang of the herbs the riders used to wash with. Kasha suppressed a sneeze.
Then—thunder of hooves in the distance, growing nearer by the moment. Abodai pulled one of his javelins from the quiver at his back; those with bows took that as a signal to nock arrows, those armed only with swords drew them.
Nearer—nearer—
War cries, and the splintering sound that meant somebody's mount had split the top rail of the fence.
Then, with a war cry of his own, Abodai spurred his horse forward, shouldering open the unbarred barn door. His horse was the only one clever enough and well-trained enough—and with enough innate trust in his rider—to do that little trick. Kasha spared half a second to envy him, and another to wonder if he'd let her put her mare to his beast when this was over—and then she was through, clattering past him in the boiling mass of flying ribbons and hooves and dust that slammed right into the path of the oncoming raiding party.
Horseshit! Torches—
They'd made this stand just in time. Given a free hand, the rebels would have burned this farm to the ground.
Even as she saw the four riders with torches, the distance-fighters cut them down; the torch-bearing rebel nearest Kasha fell out of his saddle with a javelin in his throat, to kick out his life in the dust as his horse galloped on. The black and red ribbons decorating the javelin fluttered with incongruous gaiety as he quivered and jerked.
But there was no time to stop and watch—the horses were crashing into the midst of the raiding party. The charge took them out of bow range, and it was hand-to-hand work. Kasha picked her target and spurred her mare at him; a man a little older than Jegrai, with an unkempt, straggly moustache. He saw her coming and snarled, pivoting his own horse to meet her.
Her blow bounced and slid off his shield, a smallish round-shield of brass-studded leather. She deflected his return with her own shield. Then cheated.
Felaras had warned Jegrai before this began that the Swords fought with any and all weapons, by any and all means. For a Watcher confronted by an enemy, there was no such things as "fair" or "foul;" there was only "win" or "lose." If they had not fought this way, there likely would have been no Order—but that was not yet for a stranger's ears.
And Jegrai had agreed to having the Swords along, knowing that they would resort to tactics his people would consider completely dishonorable.
Kasha deflected another of her man's strikes, ducked under a third—and swatted his horse with the flat of her blade as hard as she could.
Startled, it half-reared before he could control it, exposing the rebel's stomach as he threw his arms out and fought for balance. Her vicious backhand blow nearly cut him in half. She felt the soft shock up her arm, then ducked behind her shield; blood sprayed her as he toppled from his horse's back.
No time to think. She turned on the one behind him, feeling the fighting-drunk she'd described to Yuchai take her and spread her mouth open in a savage grin of blood-lust.
He was already busy—when did I get turned to face the barn? She took this one from behind as he struggled with one of the Vredai women. The nomad had lost her helm, her sword had splintered, and she was desperately trying to protect her head behind the inadequate cover of her target-shield. Kasha was not about to thrust and have her own blade lodge in the corpse, though the fighter's unguarded back presented a tempting target. Instead she shouldered her mount into his as he beat down the woman's guard, and split his head just below the line of his helm. Cutting into bone this time—it was like hitting wood, and the impact quivered up her arm. The blade lodged for just an instant before she pulled it free.
She snatched his sword in her shield-hand as it fell from his fingers, urged her mare past the horse now standing puzzled and spent, and pressed the nomad's blade into the Vredai woman's hand.
Then instinct made her turn with shield up, and she was forced to defend herself from a furious attack.
He was taller than she, stronger, and just as well trained. All she could do was to use her shield to try to keep him off.
She didn't entirely succeed in that either; before too long her ears were ringing from one too many solid hits on her helm, her left arm going numb from wrist to shoulder, and her right arm burning from wrist to elbow with the pain of a long, shallow gash. He'd managed to cut the strap of her vambrace, which now was lying somewhere under the dust churned up by the hooves of the milling horses.
He was giving her no openings, and no chance to back out.
Never go head-to-head with a man your equal, she could hear Ardun saying sardonically in the back of her mind. Better reach and more muscle will kill you, girl.
Time to cheat again.
There was one glaring weakness in the strategy of these nomads—they lived by their horses, so it was unthinkable to make a horse your target. Alive, it was a trophy, and a possession that was nearly part of your family. Dead, it was just so much meat. So the horse was off-limits.
Guess again. Sorry, horse.
She maneuvered her mare in front of his, got in reach of its throat, and slashed open the great vein of her opponents mount.
Its knees buckled as blood fountained over her and everyone else nearby, and it collapsed almost immediately.
The fighter screamed a curse at her as he kicked free of the falling horse. He staggered, caught his balance, and prepared to attack her with berserker fury glaring at her out of his bloodshot eyes.
Then fury was replaced by shock.
He fell with a javelin pinning him to his dead, twitching mount, a javelin rammed through his body at close range.
She looked up in surprise to meet Abodai's feral grin, white teeth gleaming in brown face, and then they each turned away to take on a new opponent.
They had begun this outnumbered almost three to one. Now the odds were even after a few moments of combat. They'd lost two: the rebels had lost at least a dozen, probably more. There was no way of telling for certain how many had fallen, not with the riderless horses dashing around in panic, adding to the confusion.
Only now were the remaining survivors realizing that this was a fight to the death, no holds barred.
Once again, this was something the strategists had counted on.
For Jegrai had finally told Felaras the bones of the story of how Vredai had been driven into the West. And what that meant to the people who had suffered the physical and mental torments of that drive.
They may try to wound, rather than kill, unless they know they face strangers, Jegrai had said of the rebels, soberly. There are so few of us compared to the Talchai, and of us all, only I had acquaintances in that Clan. We are more used to saving each other than killing—and only I of my Clan have faced those who were once my friends over the sword-edge.
This reluctance to kill—won't that hold for your people, too? Felaras had asked him soberly.
Not after I finish speaking to them, had been the grim reply. We have been betrayed twice now within my memory. We are not growing to like betrayal, let me tell you.
Evidently Jegrai had been right.
Each of the surviving ambushers had a single opponent now, and the combat had turned from chaos into individual fights.
Sweat trickled down the back of Kasha's neck, and dust caked her lips. Her mouth was dry as the dust her mare's hooves threw into the air, and her right arm throbbed.
And none of this mattered. The intoxication of fighting had hold of her again, an exalted state where time stretched and she was focused in on herself and out on her foe. Nothing mattered but him, and she could see clearly every little detail of what he looked like and what he did, as if she was living a little bit faster than he was. This man was her size, her weight; a perfect opponent in every way.
His image branded itself in her memory. If she lived to be a hundred, she'd be able to describe this man so that an artist could paint him accurately; that was the effect of the battle-fever. He had dark skin, no facial hair; two braids that had probably been tucked up under his helm but which now were hanging free on either side of his head. Sweat was running into his eyes, and there were splashes of blood across one cheek. She wondered if it was his, but decided not. He had a gash across one leg, but like the one running up her arm, it looked to be shallow.
They circled their horses warily about each other, taking the measure of one another. She saw him frown uneasily, as her mouth was tugged again into that hideous grin by the rush of battle-lust.
It is lust. Gods, don't let Zorsha come near me until I get a chance to clean up and cool down. Or my good intentions will go right out the window with our clothing.
The man apparently decided that he didn't like the odds, and abruptly wheeled his horse in a tight little circle and spurred him at the fence.
Sorry, horse. Time to cheat again.
There was one lone difference between them, other than sex. Her mare topped his scrubby little gelding by three hands, and outweighed it proportionally. Over a long run that might have given him an advantage; all that weight could slow her horse down.
But out of the starting blocks the advantage was all hers—the more especially since her mare was a lot fresher than his beast. She spurred the mare after him; they had him in less time than it took to breathe. And she used the other advantage of her bigger horse: she rammed the gelding with her mare's shoulder; literally bowled him over and rode them both down.
As the gelding went over she heard bones snap, and heard it scream in agony—heard him scream too, as he went down trapped under the weight of his horse, and as her mare stepped on him at least once. And then he gurgled and wailed behind her as the gelding began to thrash in pain.
That was no way to leave even an enemy.
She wheeled the mare around, and saw the gelding spasming wildly in the dust, saw the nomad clawing at it in mindless agony with one arm flopping useless and the leg he had free still lying over the horse's barrel like a thing of wood. Two paces closer and she could smell him—and knew his back was broken.
That was no way to leave anyone.
She dismounted, walked over, and dealt with it.
And when she looked around, after cleaning her knife on the dead gelding's hide, she saw the others in the ambush party staring at her with a mixture of approval and fear, as if they were wondering if she was now going to perform some kind of trophy-taking on the body. And she saw that the only ones left standing were wearing red and black.
It was over.
"You look like you took the first layer of skin off," Ardun observed, filling the mugs before him with wine—Kasha's full, his half full. He pushed the mug across the little table between them, then sat back in his chair, cradling his own mug in both hands.
"I feel like I have," she said, taking her wine and gulping down half of it. "I thought I'd never get the smell of blood out of my nose."
He nodded; candles on the table between them softened his age-lines and made him look younger; about her age. "Took me that way too. I'd come out of a fight and scrub for an hour or more—then I'd go find Felaras and she'd get me drunk and I'd bawl like a baby."
"Just like you do for me," Kasha observed.
Ardun shrugged, and a breeze from the open window behind him made the candle-flames flicker. "When you get battle-fever the way we do, you need somebody steady around you after—somebody who gets drunk on death like you do, who can tell you that you aren't an animal for feeling that way." He gave her a long look over the top of his mug. "And somebody who won't let you rape him."
She laughed shakily, and ran her fingers through her damp hair. "You got that right. First time it happened, if you hadn't been around, I'd have taken Teo right there in the courtyard. Poor Teo. He was only worried for me, and glad to see me back alive. He thought I was angry with him. He never knew how close he came to being raped in public. Gods, that makes me feel like some kind of savage. An animal; a brute beast."
Ardun shook his head at her. "You know what it is—your body figuring out you just escaped dying, and trying to force you into procreation before you go put it in harm's way again. Your body thinks your duty to the world is to leave a copy of yourself if you go out in glory. So do you listen to your body or your mind?"
"My mind, of course. That is why I'm here in your room and not in Zorsha's."
"And here I thought it was because you wanted my -company."
Kasha laughed shakily.
"And I'll tell you again, because you need to hear it; no, you aren't an animal because you get drunk on killing, or because you're ready to jump anything male in sight when it's over. The fever is just your body again—trying to keep itself from getting killed, it makes you drunk so that you don't think, you just react. You're not an animal, because when it's all over, you agonize over your reactions. Zetren doesn't—he is an animal, a rabid one. And if it weren't that he's useful to the Order, I'd have contrived an accident for him a long time ago."
Kasha nodded soberly; Ardun was far more than the Sword Leader—he was a past master at every assassination technique the Order had ever encountered. Some he taught everyone. Some he taught privately. Kasha had gotten some of that private tutelage, as had others. One of those others, and she had no idea who, would be Ardun's successor. That wouldn't be known until he died, and they opened his papers to see who he had left a certain little set of "tools" to. And whoever became his successor would secretly choose and train another.
So if tiny, wizened Ardun decided that Zetren needed disposing of—it would be done. And only Ardun would know that it had been no accident. Because if he ever did eliminate Zetren, it would be in a way that would leave nothing suspicious.
"You're not drinking," Ardun pointed out, breaking into her thoughts. "You're supposed to be getting drunk."
"I daren't get too drunk," she admitted. "Just enough to believe I'm all right. I've got guard on Felaras and the boy tonight, and I'm getting uneasy feelings. . . ."
She paused long enough to empty her mug and hold it out to him for refilling.
"Ill-wishing?" he asked.
"I think. But getting at the Master indirectly. There's just too damned much going on, and it's all muddled. Like there's a half-dozen plots going on that are not quite lurching into each other."
"Could be. It's like that last siege, when Kyle was Master. I remember the same feeling. Like there's something behind the door that hasn't made up its mind to try breaking in, but you can hear it breathing."
"Ardun—did the fever take you during siege-fighting too?" she asked, curious, and with the wine making her bolder than she might otherwise have been. The siege—the last in the history of the Order—had been long before her time. Felaras had been no more than one of Kyle's possible successors, and Ardun had only just been promoted to full Sword status.
He shook his head. "It wasn't that kind of fighting. Mostly I didn't even see the results of what I did. I was one of the ones chosen to sneak out the escape tunnels, infiltrate the army, and doctor the food supplies. What I did didn't even have any effect until the next afternoon."
"Aconite in the spiced meat?" she guessed.
He nodded, his face gone inward-looking as he called up past memories. "And ground glass in the salt, ergot in the flour, jimson weed in the fodder. Then Kyle up on the tower right after they'd eaten at noon, calling down death and madness on the besiegers. It was pretty damned impressive, let me tell you; he timed it to a hair. Between the ones dropping over dead and the ones taken by fits—and then even the horses going wild—your common soldier was pretty impressed with our direct line to heaven. Then we let loose with the mortars, which we hadn't used yet. We didn't hit much but the command tent; it was the only thing we could range on, but having the commander's quarters go under heavenly retribution was damned disheartening for them. That's why the Yazkirn, at least, don't condemn us as heretics, and haven't disturbed the sister-house we have down there. They figure we're under some kind of divine protection—by their theology, the powers of darkness can't strike at high noon."
Some of that Kasha had already known, but some was new. This was the first time she'd ever found Ardun willing to talk about it, and Felaras didn't even want to hear about the subject, much less talk about it. "Weren't you risking them getting those doctored supplies at morning meal?"
He shook his head. "No, that was what made it work so well. You can set a clock by the Yazkirn army cooks. Oat-and--barley porridge for breakfast, because they've cooked it the night before in big kettles. Stuffed rolls at noon, because they can be handed out to those on patrol. Two each, one spiced meat, one root-vegetable, and the men are known to trade, so some would have gotten a double-dose of aconite and some nothing but the ergot in the flour or the glass in the salt, and some nothing at all, depending on whether the barrels we doctored were close to being empty. We didn't doctor anything that wasn't already open."
Kasha nodded, stowing all that away for future reference. It was all written down in the chronicles, of course, but it was always useful to have certain things at hand, in memory.
"So to answer your question, no—the killing didn't give me the fever. The actual sally out to do the dirty work did. And I've gotten the same fever just sneaking out to look over a bandit camp, with no likelihood of combat. It's the going into danger that does it, girl, not the killing."
"Oh my head knows that," she admitted, pulling on her wine, and feeling a little "cleaner" than she had when she'd ridden in. "But you have to tell my gut every time."
"Ah, well, I know that." He gave her a crooked grin.
"So what do you think of Yuchai?" she asked him, feeling comforted enough to change the subject. "I was a little surprised to see you sparring with him."
"His moves are different enough that I didn't want to chance him getting hurt, especially with him only just out of bed," Ardun replied. "Put him with the novices and he would get hurt, sure's stars. I like the boy, Kasha, I like him a lot. If his people are anything like him—damn if we don't have more in common with them than any Ancas tightass. That boy is bright, he's quick—and in no way is he ever going to be in Sword. He gets in over my dead body."
She let out her breath in a long hiss. "You have no idea how happy I am to hear that. Why?"
"He thinks too much, and at the wrong time. You think too much, and so do I, but it's after everything is over and done with. He thinks about it when it's happening. So long as he's planning on going into one of the other two chapters, I'll tutor him all he wants—but you can tell him from me I don't want him thinking he's coming into Sword, because I won't permit it. If I have to hamstring him to convince him, I will. So help me."
"Good—you're going to make all of us happy, I think, right down to Jegrai. The boy's his heir until he breeds one, you know. Teo says he loves him like a younger brother. Maybe more, because there isn't a great deal of love between himself and his real brother."
"Aye, I can see where there wouldn't be," Ardun replied, -looking a great deal happier about the situation. "If that's the way Jegrai feels about it, and you, and me, then we should be able to convince Yuchai. Unless he really wants it?"
"Thank the gods, no," she told him. "No, fighting makes him sick—combat, that is. He likes the physical exercise, so long as it's for points and touches, but I'd be willing to bet he likes dancing as much. Told me earlier that points and touches is the way fighting used to be between the Clans until some outsiders began stirring things up."
"Interesting. Accounts for their accepting Jegrai as Khene. So—what is it with Yuchai being so keen on fighting even though he hates it?"
"He's determined that he won't be the only able-bodied person in the Clan that can't defend himself. Given their past and their intra-Clan loyalty, I'm not surprised at that."
"Agreed. About the boy: do you have any idea how much of a thinker he really is? And how far ahead he plans things?"
Kasha shook her head. "My part's been mostly confined to teaching him Ancas and Sabirn and teaching him to read. Zorsha's been the one involved in lessons that didn't involve just memorization."
"Let me give you a notion." He put his mug down on the table with a soft thud, and leaned forward, half-resting on the tabletop. "You know that pup of his follows him everywhere, and I know that breed—golden gaze-hounds are protective bastards even as pups. I was going to lock the pup in the ward-room until his lesson was over, figuring it'd come for me the way Zorsha's did—" He chuckled reminiscently. "You know, I still have the tooth-scars on my ankle? There I was, dancing around on one leg with the pup holding on like grim death, my ankle bleeding like fury, and Zorsha screaming at me not to hurt his dog. I wasn't minded to repeat the experience. So I asked the boy to put the dog in the room and explained why—told him I'd rather listen to howls than have my ankle perforated."
"And he said what?" She waved the pitcher of wine away when he offered it; her head was buzzing enough, and she didn't need the guilt-numbing effect anymore.
"That he'd already thought of that. He gave the dog a command in his tongue, and told me to go ahead and start a drill. Well, I did, though let me tell you, I was not at my best, watching that pup out of the side of my eye."
"Nothing happened?"
"Not a damn thing, though the pup looked fit to burst every time I touched the boy. So then, when I laid him on his butt, he went over and made a fuss over the dog, then asked me to pair him for a minute with somebody I wasn't ever likely to again. Said he wanted to show me something. I set him up with Davy. They went at it for a couple passes, then he yelled something, and damn if that pup didn't come flying across the yard like an arrow—and before Davy or I can even blink, the pup's got his sword-hand wrist in his teeth, growling like he's going to chew it off."
"He didn't hurt Davy, did he?" Kasha asked in alarm.
"Not a bit, though I wouldn't have reckoned what would have happened if Davy'd tried to fight him. Pup just held on without even bruising the skin. So the boy gives the dog another command and it lets go, though it keeps a mighty suspicious eye on young Davy all the rest of that session. Turns out the boy had another dog when he started learning sword-work that pulled exactly the same stunt Zorsha's did. So he taught this one while he was laid up that everything was all right unless he yelled for help. See what I mean by thinking ahead?"
"Uh," Kasha grunted, nodding thoughtfully. "Uh-huh. So, what do you see him as? Book?"
"Not a chance; the boys too inquisitive. Tower, I'd say, and Hand for preference. He's always asking questions, and they all run on how does this work, not why. Showed me why those swords of theirs are curved, and single-edged, and it makes damned good sense for horseback fighting. Going to have some made up for us and start training you good riders with them."
"So that the blade doesn't lodge and pull out of your hand?" Kasha hazarded.
He nodded.
She grinned. "Uh-huh, I wondered about that. Tell you what else would be nice; a bit of a lanyard on the pommel-nut. Lose your blade on the ground and you have a chance to get it back. Lose it on horseback, and you might as well forget it. But loop a lanyard around your wrist, and if it gets knocked out of your hand, you've still got it."
"Good thought. What do you think of their soft stirrups?"
"Not much," she said, "And some of the lot I rode with are modifying theirs to match mine. Too damned easy to get your foot caught in the thing, even if it does mean you need a heeled boot to use our kind. I don't fancy being dragged, and I can't see any advantage in the soft stirrups."
"Fine. Anything else?"
"We ought to show them our soft iron javelins. If they're really going to be with us, they won't have any problem with getting metal, and the way the soft javelins foul a shield is even more useful in a horseback fight than a ground battle. I mean, figure how much is your horse going to like getting his ears whacked with a stick every time you move your shield, hey? And I don't know how Abodai trained that stallion of his to do some of his tricks, but somebody ought to see if it's the horse or the training. You already know about those laminated bows—"
"Aye, with lust in my heart. We're working on it, but not just anybody can make a bow. That Losha up here can, but it's a long process. Seems it involves wood, horn, sinew of all damn things, all laminated into the bow, and somehow bone plaques get into it too. We've got one about half made, but with that much work I don't wonder that they won't sell or trade them. Might as well ask a farmer to sell his house. Or his wife!"
"Sounds like. But the range on those things—"
"Makes them worth every damn hour you put on them. Well, feeling more like a member of the human race again?"
"Feeling more like the human race won't reject me, anyway. And it's about time for me to take my watch."
She got up, did an internal assessment of the wine on her judgment and reflexes, and decided it wasn't too bad. But just as a check, she dropped her wrist-knife down into her hand, and pivoted on her heel to place it in the target she knew was behind her.
Ardun peered at it as she went to pull it out. "In the black?"
She shook her head. "No, a hair out."
"Don't aim for the eye then, until the wine wears off. Throat's a better target."
"Yes, Father," she replied with mock humility. "Anything you say, Father."
"Watch your tone, girl; I can still take you any time I want."
"Don't I just know it." She walked back over to his side of the table and kissed his forehead. "Throat it is. And thanks for getting me out of my depression again."
He hugged her waist. "Any time, baby-girl. You do me proud, I hope you know that. I'd like to see you with the badge some day."
"Hm, well that'll depend on who happens to be Master—which is Zorsha at this point, which could be touchy."
"Seven hells, girl, I told you to think ahead, I didn't tell you to map out the future!"
"Yes, sir." She bowed. He made a fist and tapped her cheek. She covered the hand with her own for a moment. "I'll bet Yuchai will still be awake; your permission, I'll tell him what you said about him being in Sword—and that you think he belongs in Hand."
"Do that. It would make me feel better."
"Suspect it will make him feel better too. And me. And Zorsha. Thanks again, Father."
He waved a hand at her. "Off with you. Or I'll dock your pay for being late."
She laughed and ducked out the door, heading for the Master's quarters with a lightened step.