Magi'i
of Cyador
by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
Copyright
Đ 2000
Edited
by David G. Hartwell
Jacket
art by Darrell K. Sweet
Jacket
design by Carol Russo Design
A Tor
Book Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175
Fifth Avenue New York, NY 10010
TorŪ Books
on the World Wide Web: http://www.tor.com
From
Inner Cover:
L. E. Modesitt, Jr., is one of the standard
names in fantasy entering the new decade, and his most famous series is the
Saga of Recluce. Each novel fills in pieces of the history of this land where
Chaos and Order strive to maintain a magical balance.
Magi'i of Cyador marks the beginning of a
new tale from deep within the rich depths of the history of Recluce. This is
the story of Lorn, a talented boy born into a family of Magi'i. A fastidious
student of remarkable talent, Lorn lacks the single most coveted attribute
required of a Magus of Cyador: unquestionable loyalty. Lorn is too independent
for his own good.
So Lorn is forced to become a lancer
officer, and he's sent to the frontier to fight off the all-too-frequent
barbarian raids-a career that comes with a fifty percent mortality rate. His
enemies don't expect him to survive....
Lorn is a fresh, new character who will
enrich one of the most important fantasy series of the decade: the Saga of
Recluce.
Robert
Edward Janes In memoriam, for the dreams he had.
CHARACTERS
Kien - Magus, Senior Lector, "Fourth
Magus"
Lorn - Son of the Magus Kien
Vernt - Younger son of Kien
Jerial - Eldest child and daughter of Kien
Myryan - Youngest child and daughter of
Kien
Nyryah - Consort of Kien
Toziel'elth'alt'mer - Emperor of Cyador
Ryenyel - Consort-Empress of Cyador
MAGI'I
Chyenfel - First Magus and High Lector
Kharl - Second Magus and Senior Lector
Liataphi - Third Magus and Senior Lector
Abram - Senior Lector
Ciesrt - Student/Magus
Jysnet - Lector
Hyrist - Senior Lector
Rustyl - Student/Magus
Tyrsal - Student/Magus
LANCERS
Rynst - Majer-Commander, Mirror Lancers
Luss - Captain-Commander, Mirror Lancers
Allyrn - Student/Lancer Undercaptain
Brevyl - Sub-Majer [commanding at Isahl]
Dettaur - Student/Lancer Officer
Eghyr - Captain
Helkar - Captain
Jostyn - Captain
Juist - Undercaptain
Kyl - Undercaptain
Maran - Majer [Patrol Commander, Geliendra]
Meylyd - Commander [Geliendra]
Thiataphi - Commander [Syadtar]
OTHERS
Bluoyal - Merchanter Advisor to the Emperor
Dustyn - Factor in spirits [Jakaafra]
Eileyt - Enumerator
Fuyol - Head, Yuryan Clan
Ryalth - Woman merchanter
Shevelt - Merchanter heir [Yuryan Clan]
Veljan - Merchanter [Yuryan Clan]
Part I
- Lorn'elth, Cyad
I
The man
wears white trousers and a white tunic, belted with white leather and secured
with a glistening white metallic buckle. His boots are white, including the
thick leather soles, and his hands are encased in white gloves. The only items
of color upon his body are the pair of gold star-bursts-one on each of the
short square collars of his tunic.
A dark-haired boy wearing shimmering gray
trousers and a short-sleeved shirt of the same shimmering fabric holds the
man's left hand. Both walk along a corridor. The floors, walls, and ceiling are
all of white granite, except for one window of a glass-like substance so dark
it appears nearly black. The black window is on the man's right, exactly
halfway between the two metal doors, each also of shimmering white metal.
When the pair reaches the window, the man
halts, bends, and lifts the boy, holding him so that their heads are almost
even with each other. The man inclines his head toward the dark expanse of
glass. "There. There is the First Tower."
The dark-haired youth, his amber eyes
shielded by the ancient dark glass, stares at the glittering trapezoid of light
beyond the wall. The dark transparency filters out all that lies beyond the
wall except for the blistering light that is the Tower.
"One day," says the man,
"one day, Lorn'elth... you and your brother will be Magi'i of the Rational
Stars. One day, you will direct the workings of Towers of Light to harness the
power of chaos and to continue to bring peace and prosperity to Cyad and to all
of Cyador."
Abruptly, the boy shivers, then stiffens,
though his eyes do not leave the chaos light of the Tower.
"To be of the Magi'i-it is a long and
difficult struggle." The man smiles at his son, and even his sun-golden
eyes smile. "But as you grow older, you will see that it is worth the
effort, for nothing compares to the glory that is Cyad, and the peace and the
grace of her people."
The magus slowly lowers Lorn'elth to the
polished white stone floor and takes his son's hand once more. They continue
along the corridor to the second door, where the father raises his hand. A
flicker of golden energy flashes from a point just beyond his gloves to the
door. Then he slides the door into its recess-to his left. The two enter the
second corridor, and the magus closes the door behind them.
Another window awaits them midway down the
second white stone corridor.
At this window, the man again lifts his
son, speaking softly as he does. "You will be the ones who will transfer
the pure chaos energy from the towers to the fireships, to the firewagons, and
to the firelances of Cyador. You will ensure that the fair city remains so, and
that her people bless the Emperor and the Magi'i of the Rational Stars."
Serious-eyed, the boy watches through the
darkened glass-not so dark as that in the first corridor-as the six-wheeled
firewagon rolls silently into the shimmering enclosure that flanks the chamber
holding the mighty tower. Figures scurry and remove the square cells from the
rear of the vehicle, replacing them with other cells that almost glitter. Then
the firewagon rolls out, and another rolls in and halts.
"This is the heart of Cyad, and
Cyador, and it can be yours, Lorn'elth." The father lowers his son once
more. "It will be yours."
The two return as they came, their heavy
boots whispering but slightly on the hard stone of the corridor.
II
Rising
above the bay and the Great Western Ocean to the south are puffy white clouds,
clouds not dark enough to forecast rain at any time soon, nor high enough to
block the sun that casts its mid-day autumn light upon the playing field that
had been carved from the hillside generations earlier. There on the field, with
a gentle sea-breeze cooling them, a score of students alternate jerky bursts of
speed with sudden stops, their polished wooden mallets glistening as they
jockey for position on the reddish surface. All wear white trousers and
undertunics, but the undertunics bear green collars and green borders upon the
sleeves.
"Lorn!" calls one student as the
polished wooden oval skitters from his mallet toward another youth.
"Thanks!" With his dark-brown
hair and wiry frame, Lorn is neither the largest nor the smallest on the
playing field, but he streaks past a defender, his mallet almost lazily precise
as it strikes the oval that is weighted unevenly. Lorn slips one way, and the
oval flashes the other way, yet both Lorn and the oval meet at full speed
beyond the defender as Lorn sprints inward and toward the trapezoidal frame in
the middle of the circular field of play. His eyes take in the last defender
and the smaller redheaded player dashing toward the goal. Lorn smiles and
flicks his wrist, calling, "Tyrsal, it's yours!"
Lorn's mallet strikes the oval, and it
skitters over the packed clay toward Tyrsal.
The small and redheaded Tyrsal darts around
the taller and more muscular young defender and swings his mallet. The oval
spins, but lifts off the clay and accelerates toward the trapezoidal goal. When
it strikes to one side of the goal frame, it veers sideways and skids into the
net of the opening.
"Goal!" The redhead jumps up in
glee. "I got by you, Dett!"
"That's the last time, Tyrsal!"
The tall and heavily muscled blond student drops his mallet and tackles the
redhead, whose polished wooden mallet skids across the smooth red clay as both
students lurch toward the ground.
Despite Tyrsal's struggles, Dett handily
dumps the smaller youth onto the clay and raises an arm as if to strike Tyrsal.
"Bruggage! Bruggage!" Four other
youths jump on top of the two who struggle.
The
dark-haired Lorn is the second to slam into the pile, but the first to put his
shoulder and then his elbow into the midsection of the larger Dett.
"...oooffff..."
Dett struggles to take his hands away from
the squirming Tyrsal, to fend off the hidden attack on himself.
A low voice whispers in the muscular boy's
ear, "Don't do it again, Dett. Ever."
"Says who?" The bully gets his
knees under him and one hand on the clay and starts to elbow his way clear,
unsure of who has spoken to him.
Snap... snap!
The other students fall away from the
larger figure, who bellows, then staggers upright holding an injured hand,
coddling two fingers that have already begun to swell. "Barbarians!
Sheep-loving swill-drinkers!" Dett turns toward the students who had piled
on. "Cowards! You just wait... You'll see."
"Dett... hurt his hand."
"...couldn't happen to a better
fellow..."
"...bullied enough... deserved
it..."
"...careful... get you..."
Even before he rises, neither the first nor
the last, Lorn slips the polished pair of wooden rods back inside his belt.
After he stands, he limps slightly as he walks toward the mallet he abandoned,
bending gracefully and scooping it up left-handed.
Tyrsal, the last to scramble up, quickly
extinguishes a grin and avoids looking at the injured Dett.
"That's it! Over here!" orders
the schoolyard proctor, a tallish man with a pointed goatee and wavy black hair
that stands away from his head. "All of you. You know the rules! Bruggages
are forbidden!"
The score of students slouch toward the
proctor and the columns of the low white stone building behind him. None move
to brush away the smears of reddish clay upon their student garments, nor lift
their eyes to the shimmering white of the Palace that stands farther to the
south and which dominates the gradual slope rising from the harbor, nor even to
the white structures that lie uphill of the school, the dwellings of the senior
Magi'i and Mirror Lancer commanders.
"Line up! All of you."
Lorn somehow materializes in the second
rank, nearly in the middle, the expression on his face one of mild concern.
"What happened? How did Dettaur'alt's
hand get injured?" demands the proctor. His eyes travel the youths,
picking out a stocky student. "Allyrn'alt? You always know."
"Ser... Dett fell on Tyrsal, and
everyone tripped in the bruggage. When we got untangled, Dett was holding his
hand. I guess he fell on it." Allyrn'alt's face is carefully blank.
"Tyrsal'elth?"
"I made the goal, and I jumped around.
I must have bumped into Dett, ser. We all got tangled in the bruggage. Maybe
Dett's hand got kicked by someone's boot." The small redhead looks
apologetically at the proctor.
"Ciesrt'elth?"
"No, ser. I wasn't even in the bruggage,
ser."
"...never is..." murmurs someone.
"Quiet!" The proctor turns to
another. "Shalk'mer?"
"Ser... I got tangled up, but I didn't
see anything." The square-faced merchant's son looks directly at the
proctor.
"Lorn'elth? You wouldn't know... of
course, you wouldn't." The proctor shakes his head. "You never see
anything."
"I'm sorry, ser." Lorn looks
contritely at the proctor.
"All of you, except Dettaur'alt, get
back to your studies." The proctor sighs and motions for the muscular
injured student to follow him toward the healer's room.
Before he turns to follow the proctor,
Dett's eyes rake over the other students, but each in turn meets his eyes
openly, without flinching.
III
Cyador
is a paradox, one wrapped in an enigma, and offered as a riddle to the world it
dominates by its sheer force of being. No land, no ruler, can contest the might
of Cyador, yet its people look no different from other folk, except by their
raiment and their deportment.
The Towers of Chaos descended from the
Rational Stars, yet they serve those upon the land and water, those who can but
observe the distant chaos of those stars, yet who can bring such chaos upon
their foes.
For does the White Empire not have the
fireships of war that can destroy all other vessels? Yet the trade vessels that
dock at Cyad and Fyrad and Summerdock are carried there by sails, and not by
the power of chaos. Do not the firewagons roll endlessly across the finest of
granite roads that link all of the Empire together, carrying passengers and
cargoes smoothly and speedily? Yet even within mighty Cyad, are not the white
streets of the great city filled, not with firewagons, but carts and carriages
pulled by horses, by men on horseback and women on foot?
Does not the Emperor, Protector of the
Steps to Paradise, Ruler of the Towers of Chaos, command the firelances before
which quail the barbarians of the north and east? Yet those firelances are
borne by lancers who ride the same horses as do the barbarians, and those
lancers also bear blades, even if such blades are of white cupridium, against
which the poor iron of Candar cannot stand.
Do not the towers of chaos send forth light
so bright that it must be shielded by solid stone? Yet the Palace of Eternal
Light is lit by the diffuse chaos of the sun and the lesser chaos of oil lamps.
Is not the Emperor himself a figure of
might and majesty? Yet all in power fear that an emperor may again arise who is
truly mighty, like the one who is seldom mentioned by the high in Cyad.
Maintaining this paradox, this enigma that
is Cyad, that is the task of the Magi'i, and the duty of every magus who has
ever lived and ever will live, now and forevermore....
Paradox of Empire
Bern'elth, Magus First
Cyad, 157 A.F.
IV
In the
blessing and warmth of chaos, in the prosperity which it engenders, and for the
preservation of all the best of our heritage, whether of elthage, altage, or
merage, let us give thanks for what we receive." The silver-haired man at
the north end of the table lifts his head and smiles.
The family is seated around the dining
table on the covered upper balcony, from where they can look downhill and south
directly at the harbor-and to the west and slightly uphill at the Palace of
Eternal Light. Although the sun has set, the sky remains the purple that
precedes night, and the white stone piers of the harbor glitter above the
darkness of the Great Western Ocean. The Palace gleams a shimmering white-both
from the white sunstone from which it was constructed all too many years before
and from the innumerable lamps which bathe its endless corridors and vaulting
halls in continuous light.
The dining table around which the family
sits is lit but dimly by two lamps set in gleaming cupridium brackets, each
affixed to a pillar, the two closest to each end of the table. None of those
seated appear to be affected by the dimness. The mahogany-haired Nyryah, who
sits at the end of the table opposite the silver-haired Kien'elth, lifts a
silver tray that holds both dark bread and sun-nut bread and tenders it to the
sandy-haired young man on her left. "Go ahead, Vernt."
"Ah... thank you."
"And don't take all the sun-nut
bread," suggests Myryan from where she sits across from the still-lanky
Vernt. "We like it, too."
"There's plenty there, children,"
suggests Nyryah, "and there's another loaf in the kitchen."
Vernt grins and takes one slice of each
bread, then passes the tray to Lorn, who takes only a single slice of dark
bread before passing the tray to his father. Kien'elth, like his younger son,
takes one slice of each, and hands the tray to Jerial, dark-haired, and the
eldest child. She, like Lorn, takes but a slice of dark bread, and smiles
across at Lorn as she hands the tray to Myryan, also black-haired, and the
youngest of the four siblings. Myryan takes a single slice of sun-nut bread and
returns the tray to her mother.
The fowl casserole that had been set before
Kien'elth makes a circuit of the table, but all helpings are so similar in size
that they would have to have been weighed for an outsider to determine which is
the largest-or the smallest. After the casserole comes the dish of buttered and
nutted beans.
When Myryan sets down the serving spoon for
the beans, all six begin to eat, silently for a moment, until each has had at
least one mouthful of something.
"You were a little late, dear,"
suggests Nyryah.
"We had to chaos-charge a second
complement of firewagons," replies Kien'elth. "The two new companies
of Mirror Lancers are being sent along the Great Eastern Highway tomorrow. The
barbarians of the northeast have tried to attack the cuprite mines. While they
were thrown back across the Hills of Endless Grass, the Emperor has determined
that the lancers of the northeast shall be more greatly reinforced to carry the
message to the barbarians that they may be reminded of the futility of such
attacks."
Myryan smiles.
"You find that amusing?" asks
Vernt.
"The name's amusing," she admits.
"Nothing's endless, not even the Rational Stars. So how can grass be
endless?"
"The barbarians are endless,"
says Vernt. "Every year there are more of them."
"More doesn't mean endless."
"And they're just as stupid every
year. Tens of scores of them try to cross the border, and most of them
die." Vernt looks at his father. "There must have been more than
usual if you had to do more chaos-charging."
"I was told that the lancers have it
well in hand," answers his sire.
"And they will push the barbarians
back across the not-so-endless Grass Hills," Myryan says, "no matter
what the barbarians call the grass."
"I do believe we've heard this
before," suggests Kien'elth politely. "We decided the name was a
barbarian affectation." He clears his throat, then takes another mouthful
of the fowl casserole, nodding as he tastes it.
"We just ought to take over all of
Candar-the western half, anyway," says Vernt. "That way, we wouldn't
have to worry about the smelly barbarians."
"The chaos-towers can't be
moved," Lorn points out. "That's why Emperor-"
"Lorn," interjects Kien'elth
quickly. "Not at dinner."
"Yes, ser."
"We don't need to move the
towers," continues Vernt, seemingly oblivious to his father's warning to
Lorn. "The barbarians' iron blades are so soft that a cupridium blade cuts
through any of their weapons." The younger son snorts. "We don't need
firewagons and highways to conquer them."
"No-but would you want to live in a
mud-brick hut or a tent?" Kien'elth laughs. "You wouldn't get cooking
like this, or cities like Cyad or Fyrad or Summerdock."
"We've heard this discussion before,
too," interjects Jerial. "Cyador already has more land than we'll
ever need, and so do the barbarians. They don't attack from need, but from
perversity. They want to take what we've built, because they're too lazy and
too stupid to make things for themselves."
"They do not have chaos-towers, nor
could they fabricate them if they wanted to," says her father gently.
"They don't have to live like
swine," counters Vernt. "You can smell them from kays away."
"They weren't born with your
advantages," Kien'elth points out.
"We've sent teachers out to the north
and east." Vernt's voice rises. "And those that weren't killed had to
kill the barbarians to escape with their lives...."
"Maybe they don't want to learn,"
suggests Jerial, with a hint of a laugh in her voice. "They don't like
books as much as you do."
Lorn quietly finishes his casserole, and,
while the others are looking at Vernt and Jerial, and while his mother has
slipped away from the table to bring the dessert platter, he slips a slice of
sun-nut bread from the tray and onto his platter. He eats it in precise motions
before finally speaking. "They still think we took their land."
"We didn't take anything, did
we?" asks Myryan. "I thought most of Cyador was the Accursed Forest
before the founders came, and it killed either the barbarians or us whenever it
could. They didn't live here. They couldn't have lived here." She shakes
her head. "It doesn't make sense. We're not using land that they ever
could have farmed or herded on. I agree with Jerial. They're just lazy."
"They are what they are," replies
Kien'elth, "and we aren't going to change that. We can only deal with our
own lives." He clears his throat. "Lorn... have you ever met Aleyar?
She's Lector Liataphi's next-to-youngest daughter?"
"He's met them all." Vernt
chortles.
Lorn manages not to flush. "She is
blonde, I believe, and quite well spoken."
"I told you so," Vernt hisses.
"Father..." Jerial begins.
Kien'elth turns to his eldest daughter.
"Liataphi has no sons. I am not asking Lorn to consort with her. I am
asking if he would at least talk to the young lady. There's no harm in seeing
if he likes an eligible young woman."
"...and it would be kind," Myryan
says with a sad smile.
"Because her older sister Syreal ran
off with that merchanter, and that means that unless she consorts with a Magi'i
she'll lose her standing in the Magi'i?" asks Jerial.
"It's true, isn't it?" counters
Myryan. "We're lucky. We have brothers who are carrying on as Magi'i.
Aleyar isn't, and she's sweet."
"You know her?" asks Nyryah.
"I like her," replies Myryan.
"She's too gentle to be consorted to a lancer or a merchanter." She
looks at Lorn. "And she is pretty."
Lorn shifts his weight in his chair almost
imperceptibly, then smiles. "I'll make a point of talking to her."
"That's all I ask," Kien'elth
says, as he turns and smiles at Myryan. "Lector Kharl'elth said that the
only young lady his son ever talked about was you."
"Ciesrt?" Myryan's expression
reverts to one of polite interest.
Lorn glances from her to their father, who
in turn watches the wavy-haired Myryan closely.
"Ciesrt'elth," corrects
Kien'elth. "You know him, Lorn."
"He's in my student group,"
concedes Lorn.
"He works hard," adds Vernt.
"Lector Hyrist'elth says he wishes all the students worked as hard."
Across from Lorn, Myryan's face tightens
ever so slightly.
"He's pretty serious," Lorn adds.
"These are serious times,"
Kien'elth begins, clearing his throat in the way that Lorn knows a long
pontification is about to begin.
"It sounds like a good time for
sweets." Nyryah sets the wide white-glazed platter in the center of the
table, then re-seats herself. "Baked pearapple creamed tarts." She
smiles at her consort. "You can talk about serious times after dessert,
dear."
Kien'elth laughs. "Undermined at my
own table."
"A good dessert doesn't wait,"
counters Nyryah, "and if you do, you won't have any tarts with this bunch
drooling over them."
Myryan and Vernt laugh. Lorn and Jerial nod
minutely at each other, but the corners of Lorn's mouth turn up ever so
slightly as he glances at the warm smile his mother has bestowed upon their
father.
"Outstanding!" Kien'elth beams as
he takes the first tart. "The barbarians and the serious folk have nothing
like this."
"They might." Vernt frowns, as if
in thought, then adds, "But they probably don't."
"You can't even argue just on one
side, Vernt," says Jerial after a mouthful of her tart. "Maybe you
should become a counselor. That's what they do-they argue both sides of
everything."
"What about something like being the
Hand of the Emperor?" asks Myryan guilelessly.
"Myryan," cautions Nyryah.
"One doesn't talk about the Hand."
"Especially since no one knows who he
is," adds Jerial dryly. "That's not wise."
Kien'elth, his mouth filled with the creamy
tart, shakes his head and finally swallows. "Argumentative counselors get
sent as envoys to the barbarian lands. Besides, no Magi'i should stoop to being
a counselor. Mostly, they mediate between merchanters."
Amused smiles fill the faces around the
table, smiles followed by silence as they enjoy the tarts.
"There are a few tarts left,"
offers Nyryah when all have finished, glancing toward Lorn, "and since you
didn't have as much of the sun-nut bread..." She looks at Vernt, on whose
face a frown appears and quickly vanishes, "and since you look positively
starved, Vernt..."
Myryan raises her eyebrows.
"...and you're still growing, youngest
daughter," Nyryah smiles at Myryan and concludes, "there are enough
extra tarts for each of you."
"The last thing I need is another
tart," observes Jerial, glancing down at her slender waist. "I should
not have had the one."
"You could eat three every night, and
it would scarce show," counters her mother, "but I know how you
feel."
Kien'elth glances at his consort. Nyryah
raises her eyebrows, and he closes his mouth quietly.
Lorn eats a second tart, deftly, with
motions that are neither hasty nor dawdling, yet leave no crumbs upon his
fingers or his mouth. "Excellent. You must tell Elthya." He smiles at
his mother. "If I don't first."
"You'll not only tell her, Lorn,
you'll charm her out of a third," says Jerial.
"A fourth," suggests Myryan.
"I'd wager a silver he had one this afternoon when they were
cooling." Her warm smile turns toward Lorn.
He shrugs. "It might be."
His sisters laugh. Even Vernt, seated
beside Myryan, smiles. So does Nyryah, although the mahogany-haired woman's
smile is more knowingly ironic.
As the family rises and as Elthya and the
shorter serving girl step forward out of the shadows to clear the table,
Kien'elth beckons to Lorn. "I'd like to talk with you for a few moments,
Lorn."
"Yes, ser." Lorn, slightly taller
and slightly broader across the chest than his father or his younger brother,
follows Kien'elth along the outside upper arched portico until they reach the
open door of the study.
The study is lit by the pair of oil lamps
at each end of the pale oak table-desk. Their silvered mantels-and their
separation-cast an even glow across the room so that the shadows are faint
against the warmth of the blond wood panels that comprise the walls and the
amber leather of the volumes set in the bookcase that is built into the wall
beside the desk. The scents of frysya and baked pearapples linger in the room,
reminding Lorn of the glazed tarts that had followed dinner.
Kien'elth turns and stands between his
desk, empty except for the lamps, and the stand that holds the shimmering white
cupridium pen that is yet another mark of his position as a magus. The polished
white oak case that holds his chaos glass rests on the small octagonal table to
the right of the desk proper.
Lorn's eyes pass over the glass, though he
has often felt its power when his father has employed it to observe him from
afar.
After a moment of silence, the magus turns
to his dark-haired son. "I spoke with Lector Hyrist'elth."
Lorn nods, waits for his father to
continue.
"He is not displeased with your
studies, Lorn, but he is not pleased, either. He and I both feel that while you
learn all that comes before you, and more, you learn because it is easier for
you to learn than to oppose us." Kien'elth smiles. "I have seen you
on the korfal field. There, you are unfettered, almost joyous. I would wish you
to show such joy in learning and in studies."
"I learn everything that I can,
ser," Lorn replies carefully, knowing he must choose his words with care,
for his father can sense any hint of untruth-as can anyone within the
family-and Lorn does not wish to have his father use his chaos glass to follow
him continually, though he can sense when Kien'elth-or any of the Magi'i-seek
him with a glass. Most of his actions are innocent enough, but there is little
sense in provoking his father into deeper inquiries. "It is true that, presently,
learning for me is not so joyous, but I will persevere until, I hope, it is
such."
"All Cyador rests on the Magi'i,"
says the older man. "Without the chaos towers, the firewagons would not
run, and neither lancers nor foot nor crops could be carried to where they must
go. The barges could not run the Great Canal. Without the chaos chisels, the
stone for the roads would have to be quarried by hand, and it would take years
to pave but a kay of road. The Great Eastern Highway alone... Without chaos
glasses, we could not see the storms or the larger barbarian forces,..."
Lorn listens politely as his father
continues.
"...and that is why it is a great
honor and a worthy duty to become a magus, and a goal for which you should
strive."
"I understand that, father."
"Lorn... you nod politely, and you
apply yourself diligently enough, and you have mastered the art of chaos
transfer, indeed more than mastered it, and you have even learned the basics of
healing from Jerial, though that be more of a serving art than a magely one,
and you have, I know, the skill to truthread, and that is something but a
handful ever fully master."
"Is that not what I am required to do,
ser?"
"You are capable of more, far more.
You have the talent to become one of the great mages. But that requires more
than talent." Kien'elth looks squarely at his oldest son. "I would
hope that you would see such." He shrugs. "I have told Lector
Hyrist'elth that, if you do not show great love of your studies, I will seek an
officership for you with the Mirror Lancers. You possess the skills to direct
the lances of an entire company already, and perhaps the time on the frontiers
would rekindle your love of chaos."
Lorn continues to meet his sire's searching
study. "I will do my best for the year ahead, ser, but I can promise only
diligence and hard work."
"That I know you will provide,
Lorn." Kien'elth shakes his head slowly. "But each one of the Magi'i
must possess the very fire of chaos within himself or the chaos with which he
works will consume him as surely as a firelance will consume whatever its fire
strikes. If you cannot find such passion, no matter how great your skill, you
would be better as an officer of the Mirror Lancers than as the highest of the
Magi'i." His lined face and silver and hair do not hide the sadness within
him as he beholds his eldest son.
"I understand, father. I will do what
I can do." Kien'elth nods. "I know."
Lorn cannot disguise the frown as he closes
the polished wooden door behind him and steps from the study into the open
pillared corridor that rings the upper levels of the house. As he had sensed,
Jerial waits in the shadows. Lorn turns to his older sister.
"How is Father?" asks Jerial.
"He was quiet at dinner, and you're frowning. It must have been a serious
discussion."
"It was. We discussed how, without the
Magi'i, the Great Eastern Highway-and the Great North Highway-would still be
under construction," Lorn finishes with a smile, "since even the
North Highway's length is four hundred and ninety three kays. We also talked
about how I should build a new chaos tower when I finish my studies."
"Lorn... someday you're going to have
to be serious."
"I am serious." The dark-haired
young man smiles at his older sister. "I'm always serious." The smile
fades. "Too serious in my studies for father. He wishes that I approach
them as a lover."
"Well..." Jerial grins,
"you've already had enough experience there, brother dear. Surely...
surely..."
Lorn laughs. "Ah... if I could."
Jerial smiles, then slips away.
After a moment, Lorn shrugs and takes the
outside steps down into the rear garden, past the fruit trees and the grape
arbor. He pauses by the rear gate, in the shielded darkness, and concentrates
on his adaptation of chaos transfer.
Hssst! A small firebolt arcs from his
fingers onto the white stone, splashing like liquid flame, rearing up a good
two spans into the gloom.
Lorn quickly steps on the twig that has
caught fire and stamps out the small fire with his heavy white boots.
"Careful..." He glances around, but there are no sounds beyond the
murmurs that drift from the servants' quarters beyond the garden. He should
have used even less chaos.
After a last look at the house, he leaves
by the rear gate, and walks down the paved and spotless alley to the lower
street, above which tower the three levels of the family dwelling.
Lorn strides along the Road of Perpetual
Light, eastward, away from the taverns frequented by the higher-ranking lancers
and the cider-houses that cater to the students. The cylar trees overhanging
the white-paved street whisper in the night breeze, and the autumn perfume of
the purple arymids fills the cool air.
Lorn senses red-dark chaos... or trouble,
and wonders what it might be. His eyes note little distinction between twilight
and night as he strides purposefully eastward, almost welcoming the
reddish-whiteness that he nears-after the talk with his father.
A couple walks toward him, nearly in the
white and sparkling center of the wide walkway flanking the road, and Lorn can
see from shimmering blue attire that both are from the merchanters. The man is
slender, and his attention is upon the red-haired woman he escorts. Chaos lurks
behind them, in the hulking figure that follows, apparently unseen in the
shadowed darkness of the trees.
Lorn eases onto the same side of the road
as the skulker who moves toward the couple, but the student magus is too late
as the heavy and tall man leaps and strikes the male merchanter, with a blunt
club or some such. The man collapses in a heap, and the woman turns to flee,
but the attacker grabs her arm.
"Halthor! Let go of me!" she
screams. "Help! The Patrol!"
The man called Halthor drops the club to
muffle her screams with his oversized hand.
Lorn steps out of the shadows, then ducks
and picks up the truncheon as Halthor releases the woman. Lorn moves as if he
had seen the large fist coming and steps under the giant's arms, bringing the
short wooden truncheon into the vee of the man's ribs. Something cracks. The
giant gasps, standing there immobile.
Lorn's eyes glitter gold for but an instant
as he speaks. "I believe that all would be best if you jumped off the
southernmost pier in the harbor and inhaled as much water as you can."
The taller man shivers, then turns,
breathing laboriously, and begins to walk westward along the Road of Perpetual
Light, ignoring the fallen trader, the woman merchanter, and Lorn.
Despite the sudden knife-like headache that
has shivered through his skull, Lorn lowers the truncheon and turns toward the
woman in shimmering blue, his voice filled with concern. "Are you all
right?"
"Ah... I think so. Yes." She does
not quite shiver, as she bends toward the fallen man.
Through slightly blurred vision, Lorn sees
that she is a redhead, and lightly freckled, with creamy skin, and a full
figure under the shimmering blue tunic.
"What did you do?" she asks.
"He... just turned away and left."
"Just offered an opinion...."
Lorn's laugh sounds easy. "He won't be bothering anyone soon." The
warm and friendly smile appears as he also steps toward the fallen junior
trader. "We need to attend to your friend."
The male trader squints, rolls to his
knees, glances up at the redhead, then at Lorn. "What did you do to
Halthor? He'd like as kill you, student magus or not." He slowly rises to
his feet, but he shivers and staggers.
Lorn extends a hand. "As I told your
lady friend, I offered my opinion to the fellow, that he take himself
elsewhere."
"He's never heeded anyone's advice
before." The trader groans as he straightens up. "Cracked in my
skull."
"This... young man," says the
woman, "offered it rather persuasively. Halthor was almost doubled over.
He has a cracked rib or two, perhaps."
The male trader lowers his head and holds
it in both hands. "My head's splitting."
"I'm sure it only feels that
way," says the woman.
Lorn's fingers brush the man's skull.
"That's better," admits the
wounded trader.
Somehow the slight healing Lorn can offer the trader also lessens
his own headache, if marginally.
"Are you a healer, young ser?"
asks the woman.
"Me?" Lorn shakes his head
ingenuously. "I've picked up some from my older sister, who is, but I'm afraid
I'm poor in comparison to her." He looks eastward, along the white stones
of the road, past two couples who are strolling in a leisurely fashion down the
cross-street toward the pavilions that wait on the beach front park. "I
think you do need to lie down before long. Are your... quarters far from
here?"
"No. Just two streets up." The
trader takes a step and pales, then takes another.
"Are you sure you're all right,
Alyet?" asks the woman.
"For two streets... yes."
Lorn takes the man's arm once more.
"Just lean on me."
"And me." The woman takes his
other arm, and the three walk slowly eastward until they reach an archway on
the uphill side of the way.
"There..." mumbles Alyet.
"There."
The woman and Lorn guide the trader up three
steps and toward a darkened doorway to the left. She fumbles a shining brass
key from Alyet's belt wallet and unlocks the door.
Once inside, they cross a small sitting
room that holds but a small table with two chairs, and a low settee under the high
window. A sleeping chamber barely big enough for the bed and a chest lies
through a narrow archway.
They help Alyet lower himself onto the bed
that is draped with a dark blue coverlet.
"Are you sure he'll be all
right?" asks the woman.
"He has some bad bruises, and a lump
on his skull, but nothing's broken, I think," Lorn ventures, "and his
head will ache for days."
"Ryalth... be careful... sorry...
don't think I can see you home," Alyet apologizes.
"I'll make sure she's safe,;"
Lorn promises. "Don't you worry."
Ryalth raises her well-formed but narrow
eyebrows. She does not protest as they leave Alyet's quarters.
Once they are back on the Road of Eternal
Light, standing beneath the arch of curved white stone-merely alabaster, and
not sunstone-Lorn turns to Ryalth, "We should decide what we should do
tonight."
Her eyebrows arch. "I do not know you,
ser, and you appear to be a student."
"I am indeed a student, but that's all
the more reason for you not to worry. Besides, you scarcely need to end the
evening on such an upsetting note." Lorn takes the young woman's hand and
smiles winningly.
V
Cool
winter sunlight angles through the high windows and strikes the age- and
chaos-whitened granite walls well above the heads of the five figures in the
discussion room, illuminating the space with an indirectly intense light. Four
student Magi'i sit on straight-backed chairs facing the Lector who stands
before them in shimmering white tunic, trousers, belt, and boots.
Lorn wonders, not for the first time,
whether the Lector's smallclothes shimmer as well, even though he knows his
father's do not-but somehow, a Lector who monitors his studies is more
forbidding.
Ciesrt'elth shifts his weight in his chair,
and it creaks. Lector Abram'elth ignores the sound and looks across the group
of four with eyes that glow golden, as do the eyes of many of the senior
Magi'i. "The time has come for you to once again observe a chaos tower,
this time in light of the knowledge that you have acquired and with all your
senses, and not just your eyes. You will be escorted in pairs. Ciesrt'elth and
Rustyl'elth will be first. Tyrsal'elth and Lorn'elth will be the second group.
You two in the second group will wait here."
After the other three leave and the golden
oak door closes, Tyrsal glances at Lorn. "Why would it look different now?
The tower, I mean?"
"We've seen one before, and we've seen
the drawings. It probably looks the same, just like the drawings, except it
would have to glow with chaos. It is a chaos tower. That's probably what the
Lector wants to know-whether we can sense the chaos." Lorn smiles and
laughs gently.
"Maybe it doesn't look like that at
all with chaos senses. Maybe we just thought we saw a tower before."
"What would be the point of deceiving us about that? It would just
be a waste of time."
"They say that none of the halls in
the Palace of Eternal Light are actually the way people draw them," Tyrsal
counters. "And that they change them all the time."
"That's different. Anyone can request
an audience with the Emperor or his Voice or his Advisors. They don't know who
might be coming in, and I suppose the Emperor cannot trust-anyone. Except the
Hand, and that's because no one knows who he is. The senior and more talented
Magi'i could use a chaos glass to scree the Palace. That's why they have
lancers and firelances behind the screens throughout the Palace. Here... the
only ones who see the towers are the Magi'i, and the older students."
"Have you... a chaos glass?"
Tyrsal stumbles over his words.
"Hardly. If my father didn't
discipline me for that, the Lectors certainly would, and I'm not sure father
wouldn't be worse."
"Ah..." Tyrsal swallows, then
quickly asks, "What about the workings of the fireships and the
firewagons. They're all sealed, and anyone besides a magus who opens them gets
chaos-fried."
"Exactly," suggests Lorn.
"I suppose you're right," Tyrsal
concedes.
"Maybe I'm not, but we'll find out
soon enough."
"Do you know if we're going to see the
same tower or another tower for the Magi'i?"
"The same, I'd imagine."
"They all have to be close, don't
they?"
Lorn shrugs. "They could be anywhere
in the Quarter. They do have to be surrounded by the heavy granite and
sunstone, but everything in the Quarter of the Magi'i is built that way."
"That's true." Tyrsal lapses into
silence.
In time, the door to the discussion room
opens, and Lector Abram'elth follows the other two students back inside. He
does not close the wooden door to the corridor.
"Not a word," the Lector says to
Ciesrt and Rustyl, "not until we depart the room." He beckons to Lorn
and Tyrsal.
The remaining two students rise, and Ciesrt
and Rustyl re-seat themselves in the cool mid-day winter light that the very
stones of the building have amplified in some indefinable fashion.
Without speaking, the Lector leads Lorn and
Tyrsal out of the discussion room and along the corridor toward the private
study rooms of the Magi'i of the school, then through a gleaming cupridium
door, and along a narrower corridor which ends in another cupridium door that
has neither latches nor handles nor knobs.
Knowing what must come next, Lorn watches
the Lector with his senses as the man lifts his hand. The flash of golden
energy follows, and Lorn withholds a nod of understanding as Abram'elth eases
the heavy door into its recess. The three enter the second corridor where the
floors, walls, and ceiling are all of white granite Lorn remembers.
Abram'elth stops and turns to the two
students. "Up ahead you see the black shield. When you look through the
black shield, you will see the Magi'i tower-the one that powers chaos cells
used in the school and in the Palace of Eternal Light." The Lector pauses,
then adds. "Study the tower, not only with your eyes, but with your
senses, and see the variants of chaos that exist. Do not even think about
transferring chaos. If you do, both the tower and I will consume you with
unfocused chaos."
"Yes, ser." Lorn's and Tyrsal's
responses are nearly simultaneous. "Tyrsal'elth, you may go first."
"Yes, ser." The redhead takes his
place before the darkened square that is neither glass nor metal nor any
substance yet made in centuries within Cyador, a single pane so dark it appears
black. He stands there for a very long time before he steps away.
Abram'elth's eyes and senses shift from
Tyrsal to Lorn. "Lorn'elth." The Lector's voice rumbles in the
granite-walled corridor.
Lorn walks to the window shield, where,
through the dark aperture, he studies the shimmering tower enclosed within the
insulated granite walls of the chaos-power station. He recalls a similar such
vision, clearly unauthorized, from many years before, long before he had first
seen a tower as a student magus.
Knowing that, he concentrates, but his eyes
reveal to him little beyond the glaring silhouette of the tower. His chaos
senses focus on the reddish-white chaos surrounding the bluish-white barrier
that blocks the core from touching even the air that surrounds it. He feels,
though he could not explain why, that the tower, this particular one, teeters
on the edge of... nothingness... as if poised to fall into the world, or out of
it. Yet the reddish chaos and the bluish chaos do not touch, although each
pulses in response to the other.
After a time, Lorn steps away, his face
expressionless. After he does, the Lector studies Lorn, then Tyrsal, before he
speaks. "What did you sense?"
"The pulse of chaos," Lorn says
mildly. "It is constant, yet ever-changing."
"It is constant within chaotic
bounds," the Lector affirms. "It produces the same amount of chaos
energy at all times." He turns to Tyrsal. "The chaos that surrounds
the core," offers Tyrsal. "There is a barrier there," confirms
Lorn.
Abram'elth nods slowly. "Precisely,
and that barrier must remain for the tower to continue operating."
"What happens if it doesn't,
ser?" inquires Tyrsal. "Then the tower will cease to be." The
Lector frowns. "Your lessons should have taught you that."
"Yes, ser." Tyrsal looks down.
Lorn realizes he must speak or forfeit the
opportunity. Offering a guileless smile, he says slowly, "But there is
chaos-or something like it-on the other side of the barrier. Wouldn't that
escape or something?"
The Lector's frown deepens as his eyes
flick to the dark-haired student magus. "How do you know that?"
"You told us that there were several
kinds of chaos, and asked us to try to use our chaos senses to determine
them," Lorn replies easily. "The chaos behind the barrier feels
different, as you said it would."
"I did say that," muses the
Lector, almost to himself, then he straightens. "No one knows for certain
what will happen if the barrier fails, and no tower has yet failed since the first
years of the founding of Cyad nearly two hundred years ago. And one of the
tasks of the Magi'i, as you will discover, is to ensure that no tower does
fail."
Tyrsal and Lorn do not exchange glances,
but they might well have, for Lorn knows that the Lector misleads with his last
statement-not exactly a lie, but a statement verging on it, and Lorn knows
Tyrsal understands that as well. Lorn also knows that Abram'elth does not know
that Lorn and Tyrsal can sense such, for most students cannot sense such
shading of the truth.
"Remember, the towers are the heart of
Cyad and Cyador."
"Yes, ser."
The Lector believes his last statement, and
that belief troubles Lorn more than the statement that had preceded it.
The two follow the Lector back along the
corridor to the door where, again, Abram'elth raises his hand and focuses chaos
before sliding the door open.
Once the three have traveled the white
granite corridors and are back in the discussion room, where Ciesrt and Rustyl
are waiting, the Lector surveys the four students.
"Tomorrow, you will begin your
advanced chaos-transfer training in the firewagon hall. Consider what you have
seen. You may speak of it only to other Magi'i or to students as advanced as
you, and to no others. We will know if you speak otherwise. You may depart for
the day."
VI
The
Emperor Toziel'elth'alt'mer looks through the tinted glass windows of the
Palace. His eyes focus on the harbor of Cyad, and the piers that house the
White Fleet-although there are but two of the white-hulled fireships tied there
presently. To the east of the fireships are tied a handful of coasting
schooners, a brig that flies the jack of Brysta, and two other deep-sea vessels
without jacks or ensigns flying.
North of the piers and closer to the
Palace, the sunstone-paved streets glisten. The shops to the west sport green
and white awnings, and under those immaculate canvases are the cafes and
bakeries for which Cyad is known. Those who walk the streets are well-clad,
whether in the shimmercloth affected by the Magi'i, the higher merchanters, or
lancer officers-and their households-or in the hard-combed and tightly-woven
cotton of the common people.
"Yet the least of the common folk is
clad like a noble among the barbarians, and lives in greater comfort and
cleanliness," murmurs the Emperor. "And that is as it should
be." He turns and walks past the Great Hall, past the three-story-high
gilded doors that can open so silently and swiftly that an observer who blinked
might well miss their operation. Behind him follow two figures uniformed in
silver-trimmed green, each with hand firelances-used but by the Palace Guard
and those Mirror Lancers who guard the outside of the Palace of Light.
The Emperor Toziel-for he thinks of himself
without the multiple identifiers attached to his name-steps through a
silently-opening and cupridium-clad door that brings him to his own entrance to
the small receiving hall. After a moment, composing himself, he steps through
the archway and seats himself on the sculpted malachite and silver chair on the
dais. He looks out over a marble-floored room merely large enough for two or
three of the Cyadoran firewagons that speed endlessly along the Great North
Highway.
Those waiting cross the shimmering and
spotless white tiles, bow below the dais, and offer their felicitations.
"Your Mightiness..."
"Mightiness..."
Toziel gestures toward his Majer-Commander
of Lancers, standing on the left of those who await his scrutiny. "If you
would, Rynst'alt..."
"There were nearly ten score
barbarians in the raid on Pemedra, and nearly that many in the raid on
Inividra. We have not seen such raids, not on the base outposts, in many years.
The Mirror Lancers killed about half those in the first raid, perhaps a third
of those in the second. The barbarians vanished, as expected, into the Grass
Hills. They appear as endless as the blades of grass in those hills." The
gray-haired officer in cream and green bows slightly as he finishes speaking,
as if apologizing. "We have sent additional charged firelances to the
north, and replacement lancers as well."
"Thank you, Rynst'alt." The
tired-faced and silver-robed figure shifts his weight in the sculpted malachite
and silver chair and turns his head toward the golden-eyed magus with the
crossed cupridium lightning bolts on the breast of his tunic.
"The replenishment tower continues to
provide chaos flow for the lances and the firewagons, sire. We were required to
charge nearly double the number of wagons this fall as compared to the numbers
in any recent year in the past generation."
Toziel nods. "High Lector
Chyenfel'elth, can we move any of the towers that prison the Accursed
Forest?"
"No, sire." Chyenfel'elth bows.
"Attempting to move them would be far too great a risk."
"What about replenishing chaos for the
lances from those towers? They could be moved down to Fyrad on the Great
Canal."
"That we can do for now. For how many
years we do not know. You should be aware, sire, that two of the ward towers
have already failed. It will take all the chaos of those remaining to build the
permanent barrier you have approved, sire."
"You do not know yet even if you can
accomplish this," Toziel points out.
"We must try, sire. The towers will not
remain forever."
"And, if I rescind my approval?"
"You do as you see fit, sire. The
Magi'i obey."
"How long will it take to build the
barrier?"
"It is not precisely a barrier,"
Chyenfel says cautiously.
"It will bar the Accursed Forest, will
it not?"
"Yes, sire. We cannot say how long the
process will take. We estimate a full two seasons, if aught goes well."
"And that will provide protection for
the realm of chaos for generations to come? And keep the Forest from reclaiming
Cyador?"
"As we discussed..." Chyenfel
says smoothly.
"On a lesser scale, I know."
"Yes, sire."
"I will consider this, and I will talk
to the Hand." Toziel turns to the next figure, clad in shimmering blue.
"How stand the warehouses, Bluoyal'mer?"
Bluoyal bows stiffly. "All have been
inspected and their contents enumerated... this autumn season is a little
different from any other autumn season..."
"Have you been able to purchase the
additional cuprite?"
"Yes, sire, although in the quantities
required, the... acquisition necessitated spending nearly a thousand golds
beyond what we had estimated. You may recall, sire, that we had discussed that
possibility."
"We had." The tired eyes of the
Emperor watch each of those who act as though they serve him and Cyador.
VII
A cool
mist shrouds Cyad, a mist that holds the tang of salt air, the fragrance of the
late-blooming aramyds, and the faintest odor of the bitterness that reminds
Lorn of chaos, an acridness far stronger within the Quarter of the Magi'i, but
omnipresent throughout the great white city. Occasional drops of rain slither
through the silvery mist, and the white stones of the buildings and roads of
Cyad are gray with moisture.
Lorn slips along the covered portico on the
upper level of the dwelling and then down the outside steps to the garden,
staying close to the inside wall. In his left hand is a loosely rolled bundle
that appears to be a towel. Once in the garden, he takes the path by the wall
toward the postern gate, for that is directly under his mother's window, and
unless she leans out the window, she could not see him pass below.
There is a bench outside the rear gate,
where Elthya and the other servants often gather to talk, but no one will be
there while dinner is being prepared. After he eases the gate closed, in the
afternoon dimness, he quickly pulls off his green-trimmed student whites and
dons the shimmering blue merchanter tunic and trousers, then switches his white
boots for the dark blue boots, before adding a blue belt. He rerolls his own
clothes and places them and his boots into the pitch-coated basket that he had
left earlier and replaces the basket back under the feathered conifer beyond
the gate.
He walks swiftly down the alley and across
the Road of Perpetual Light, still taking the alley downhill past two other
roads until he turns westward on the Road of Benevolent Commerce. The heavy
heels of the merchanter boots barely whisper on the stone pavement. His stride
is that of the other junior merchanters who scurry to the beckoning of others.
As he passes the Empty Quarter-a coffee
house, almost a cafe, that caters to the most junior of merchanter
apprentices-and outland sea-traders-he nods to the two apprentices sitting in
the near-vacant establishment, giving them a perfunctory smile of
acknowledgement.
"Who's that... ?"
"Some junior enumerator... friend of
Alyet's and Ryalth's... saved Alyet from Halthor one night when he guzzled too
much...."
"...can't figure Halthor drowning..."
"...anyone'll drown... drinks and
walks the piers..."
"...looks young for an
enumerator..."
"...Ryalth says he's good..."
"...at what?"
Lorn represses a grin as he hurries
westward along the Way of Benevolent Commerce until it intersects with the
First Harbor Way. The corner is identified by the green-lettered placards
inscribed in the angular Anglorian script on the walls of the warehouse that
stands on the southwest corner. Only in the trading district of Cyad do such
placards exist. Elsewhere, one must know where he goes.
On the northwest corner, a woman in
shimmering blue waits for Lorn under the awning by the Honest Stone-the
unofficial merchanter coffee house for the warehouse district of Cyad.
Lorn waves and smiles as he nears.
"I was afraid you weren't
coming." Ryalth snorts angrily. "After all you said."
"I'm sorry." Lorn offers an easy
and fully apologetic smile. "I got here as quickly as I could."
"We'd better go. Aljak said at the
eighth bell." Ryalth heads toward the harbor, walking on the right side of
the white-paved First Harbor Way, as much by custom as to avoid the near-silent
cart on the left drawn up the gentle incline by a white pony.
Lorn inclines his head to the bearded
carter who walks beside the pony, leading him, then says quietly, "We have
some time."
Ryalth glances behind them, as though she
fears they are being followed.
"Don't worry," Lorn assures her.
"All we're doing is buying cotton."
"With our own coins-not clan coins-and
there's no one to back us if it's not good."
"That's why I'm here, remember?"
Lorn says.
"You can slip back into that mighty
house if this doesn't work."
"It's worked before. Why would today
be any different?"
"Because it's Hamorian cotton. Or
that's what Aljak has let it be known. You can't trust him, not even so much as
Jiulko."
"He was the one who had the
oils-Jiulko?" Lorn touches Ryalth's arm, gently, offering reassurance.
"I don't know why you talked me into
this," Ryalth murmurs.
"So that you can start your own
merchanter house. Merchanter women can refuse to consort, or consort by choice
if they have a business worth more than five hundred golds. Remember?"
"Don't remind me."
"My sisters would like that kind of
choice," Lorn says softly.
"Why would they need it? They're
protected women."
Lorn smiles faintly, deciding against
arguing. "If we take this Aljak's cotton... If we take it, did you arrange
for a cart?"
"Sormet has the next warehouse...
he'll let us use his hand cart and charge me a silver for storage until I can
sell it, if it's less than a season." Ryalth grins. "The oils... he
got a silver for an eightday. So he'll be happy."
"If the cotton's good."
"Some of it will be good,"
predicts Ryalth.
The two swing to the left and around a
two-horse wagon that lumbers uphill. The wagon bed is covered, as required in
Cyad, but the covering does not totally block the acrid odor of dyes carried in
the small demicasks.
"Green dye," Lorn murmurs.
"You'd think you'd been born a
merchanter, sometimes, and then... other times." Ryalth shakes her head.
"That's why we work together."
Ryalth laughs. "No... we work together
because you want to sleep with me, and it's the only way you think I'll keep
seeing you."
Lorn smiles, slightly more than faintly.
"Well... you're still seeing me, and you have a lot more golds."
"Alyet says you'll leave me once you
become a full Magus."
"More likely that you'll leave
me," he counters, laughing again. "I'm too young for you. You've told
me that more than once."
Ryalth turns again, this time along the
Road of the Second Quay, which is the second street back from the stone piers
where the trading vessels tie up.
Although the road is spotless, for it could
not be otherwise in Cyad, an air of disuse permeates the road that appears
narrower than it is, running as it does between the high and largely windowless
warehouses of gray stone. The acrid scent of ancient, chaos-carved stone drifts
up and around Lorn, a scent that he has discovered few others discern.
"His place is on the next corner, away
from the harbor."
"Are any of these used any more?"
Lorn gestures to the warehouse to his right.
"Most of them are empty. Aljak
probably doesn't pay a gold an eight-day to rent the space. It belongs to the
Jekseng clan, but they only have two ocean traders and a coaster left."
She adds wryly, "I wish I had just two ocean traders and a coaster
left."
"Is that it?" Lorn nods toward
the half-opened timbered door framed by weathered granite that had faded into a
whitened and dingy gray shade more attractive from the hillside above than from
where he viewed it.
"Yes." Ryalth squares her
shoulders, her hand brushing her belt wallet as she steps toward the open door.
Lorn follows Ryalth through the opening
created by a heavy wooden sliding door being rolled back perhaps five cubits.
He enters the warehouse a step behind her, his posture conveying that he is
indeed her lackey-or hired enumerator. His chaos senses flick across the racked
items, stopping for a moment on the barrels of seed oil stacked in a cube to
the left of the doorway. He does not nod, but his eyes sparkle, as he takes in
the other items-a pallet of dark timbers; five tall amphorae, one slightly
cracked, with darkness seeping from the crack; a stack of what appear to be
bales of wool; another set of nine curved canisters, half again as large as the
amphorae....
"Ah... the lady merchanter from the
House of the Lesser Traders." Aljak steps out of the gloom at the rear of
the cavernous structure toward the comparatively small groupings of goods just
beyond the open warehouse door.
Lorn focuses on the heavy-set but massively
broad trader with the oiled curly black hair and the bush-like beard. Heavy
bronze bands girdle overlarge wrists.
"Trader Aljak." Ryalth inclines
her head. "Sormet said you might have some cotton... some good Hamorian
cotton."
"That I do. That I do, lady
merchanter. Aljak has what others lack." The big trader offers a rolling
belly laugh that echoes falsely through the big warehouse, then turns and walks
a good fifteen cubits before pointing at five bolts of off-white cloth, each
hung on a rack above the stone floor of the warehouse. "Here ye be. Five
full-length bolts of Hamorian first rate cotton, thread count guaranteed
tighter than sixscore to the span, ready to bleach and dye. Twenty-five for the
lot or seven and a half for each bolt, and I pick the bolts."
Ryalth nods, then moves forward.
Aljak steps back, his eyes flickering
toward the darker section of the warehouse to the east.
Lorn sees the other two men, nearly as big
as the trader, with blades, iron blades, in the scabbards at their belts. His
eyes flick back to the barrels of seed oil, then to Ryalth. As Ryalth examines
each bolt of cotton, Lorn studies each with his chaos senses.
After looking at the last bolt, Ryalth
straightens and steps toward Lorn.
He steps forward and murmurs, "The
first two, the ones closest to the door, are garment class cotton, close to it.
The other three are leavings or burlap or something wrapped in the good
cotton."
"He's asking five golds a bolt, if we
take all of them."
"What's a bale of garment class
run?"
"Bales are for raw cotton. Bolts are
finished. I could sell it at ten a bolt to Guvell." She frowns.
"Maybe fifteen if it's really good."
The two burly men, each topping Lorn by a
head, appear just behind the trader.
"What say you, merchanter?"
"Offer him eight for the first two
bolts," Lorn suggests, noting the short timber leaning against an empty
rack. He does not let his eyes even register its presence as he bends toward
Ryalth. "Tell him we'd love to buy his cotton, but that it's far more than
we need."
"We'll take the first two bolts for
eight golds total," Ryalth offers firmly.
"Eight golds for that which will bring
twenty, or perchance thirty. Ah... my friends... Well... perhaps you don't wish
to buy my cotton after all. Sooner or later, you will. You merchanters won't
have the golds to keep buying shimmercloth from the Hamorians, not with the
barbarians pushing at your borders." Aljak and the two guards ease
forward. Each guard bears a heavy club, besides the blades in the scabbards.
Aljak has a coil of velvet rope in his left hand, and the teeth that his smile
reveals are crooked and yellow.
Lorn hides a frown, his attention on
Ryalth-and the two thugs.
"And lady merchanter... perhaps you
would like to spend some time with a real man, not a girlish enumerator."
Aljak laughs harshly. "To seal a bargain, shall we say."
"When I tell you, dash toward the oil
barrels... all right?" Lorn murmurs to Ryalth.
"You won't pay me twenty-five? How
about twenty-five just to leave here?" Aljak laughs again, and the two
guards step away from him, as if to flank Lorn and Ryalth.
"Now!" Lorn says.
As Ryalth bolts for the oil barrels, the
student magus concentrates- hoping he can pull chaos from enough places-then
flings the firebolt into Aljak.
Hsssttt!
"Aeeeeiiii Dung-devil..." Aljak's
words are cut off.
The two guards freeze as they see the
pillar of fire. Lorn uses the interval to cast two more firebolts. Hssst.'
Hssst!
The other two figures writhe, screaming,
momentarily, before they topple into charred heaps.
Lorn scans the rest of the warehouse, but
the space is empty, as he expected. Aljak had not wanted witnesses. So far the
student magus cannot sense the unseen presence of someone scanning the warehouse
with a chaos glass. That is good, since he has used chaos in ways reserved but
to upper-level mages. He wipes his damp forehead, ignoring the sudden headache.
"Ryalth, I need some help."
Ryalth's eyes are wide as she steps away
from the oil barrels. "What... what... did you do?"
"A small firelance, like the emperor's
guards have," Lorn lies. "I'm not supposed to have one, and it would
be best if you didn't mention it." He steps toward the small table behind
the last stack of goods, nodding as he sees the small chest on the table. His
fingers and his chaos senses deftly work a thin stick, and the lock clicks. He
opens the chest and nods.
"Who... who would I tell?" asks
Ryalth, looking over her shoulder toward the door as she hurries toward the young
magus.
Lorn picks up a two-cubit length of
greenish cloth from the samples on the table. Then, after pocketing perhaps
fifty golds, he wraps the small strongbox in the cloth and hands it to Ryalth.
"Here. It's yours."
"What?" Ryalth steps away, not
taking the wrapped chest. "Aljak's family will be looking for anyone with
more golds... they'll know it's stolen."
"Maybe not." He glances at the
three charred figures. "Take it, please."
"What?" She reluctantly accepts
the cloth-wrapped and heavy oblong.
"Come on." He tugs her toward the
warehouse door, then gestures. "Stand right inside the door. Be ready to
run. Tell me if anyone's watching."
Ryalth raises her fine reddish eyebrows.
"Please." Lorn follows her, but
halts a dozen paces beyond the rack oil barrels, his eyes on the redhead in
blue.
When she reaches the timbered door, she
glances out, and then back at Lorn. "There's no one near. Some people at
the cross-street up the way, though. They're coming this way."
"They're not near now?"
"No."
Backing toward the door where Ryalth waits,
Lorn concentrates on summoning chaos right into the middle of one of the center
barrels of oil, ignoring the headache that builds even more.
Whhhooossshhh! The wall of flame is so
sudden and massive that he stumbles out the door, dragging Ryalth with him.
Turning toward the figures less than a
hundred cubits north, who have already turned toward the warehouse, and
gesturing toward the blaze, Lorn yells. "Fire! Fire in the
warehouse!"
"Fire! Fire!" Ryalth's voice adds
to the clamor.
The heads of three others at the corner
turn.
From a narrow doorway across the road, a
tall man runs toward them. "It's the clan warehouse! You! What caused
it?"
"Oils, I think. We were talking about
cotton, and all of a sudden there were flames everywhere." Lorn glances at
Ryalth. "Excuse me, ser. I think she's a bit faint."
"Who are you?" demands the
trader, studying the two young people in blue. "What clan?"
"I'm an enumerator." Another
whoosh of flame flares from the warehouse, and the merchanter looks at the
flames, then back at the two. Ryalth leans, almost dramatically, on Lorn's
shoulder. The trader dashes past them toward the flaming section of the
warehouse, gesturing toward the three men who have piled out the opposing
warehouse as well. "We've got to get the water on the next building. Don't
let another one go."
Lorn takes Ryalth's arm. "Let's get
out of here. Don't drop that."
They hurry back along the road until they
reach the Second Harbor Way and turn uphill.
Ryalth glances back toward the increasing
pillar of smoke. "Did you have to do that? That could burn a whole
block."
"It won't. The roof's slate, and
there's nothing to burn but the oils. Maybe whatever was in the amphorae."
Lorn pulls Ryalth to the side of the Way as a the fire brigade wagon careens
past. "Aljak was ready to kill both of us. That's why no one else was
there-except he would have spent longer with you." He offers a crooked smile
as they walk swiftly uphill and then eastward along the Lower Hill Road away
from the warehouses. "Not that I fault his taste."
"You're frightening sometimes,
Lorn."
"Me? I'm just a student." He
grins disarmingly.
"That's hard to believe at
times." Without stopping, Ryalth looks down at the wrapped cloth.
"This is heavy."
"You've got your five hundred golds,
more or less."
"I can't take all that."
"You have to. I took what I dared. If
I had more, my family would find out in days, if not sooner."
At the corner of the Second Harbor Way and
the Road of Benevolent Commerce, the unofficial border to the merchanter
quarter, they stop under a tall feathering conifer, shielded from above by the
spreading dark green branches and by the afternoon mist. Lorn is breathing
heavily, but the worst of his headache has faded. He stands there silently for
a moment, thinking. Abruptly, he turns to Ryalth. "Do you have any scent?
A vial of what you use?"
The redhead frowns. "Why?"
"Just dab some on me."
She fumbles in her belt wallet, her arm
still around the cloth-covered strongbox. "You know that the City Watch
wouldn't be pleased with this."
"They don't care about scent,"
Lorn jokes.
"They care about people setting
fires," she whispers as she dabs some of the scent oil on his wrist.
"Better fires than outland traders
assaulting Cyadoran merchanters," he counters, adding, "More of the
scent."
"More? What's on you will cover any
scent of smoke." Her eyebrows lift. "You want your family to know
you've been with someone?"
"It's better than having them ask what
I've really been doing," he points out. "Remember, when you live in a
Magi'i family, questions are dangerous."
"People say that... is it true?"
"Only a handful of Magi'i can
truthread, but the Lectors can, and my father is a Lector." Lorn gestures.
"Dab more on my skin, my neck," he suggests, "as much as you can
spare."
"You already reek." She wrinkles
her nose.
"Fine. Then, they'll all be ready to
condemn me."
"And me," Ryalth points out.
"They don't know you, and they'd have
to know your name to ask a decent question."
She shakes her head, then glances along the
road. "I think I'm glad I'm not from the Magi'i."
Lorn straightens the blue tunic. "You
said I could always retreat to my mighty house."
"It sounds as bad as an inbred clan
house."
"It's not that bad. My sisters are
nice. So are my parents."
"I'm sure they are." Ryalth
pauses, then adds, "I'll save your share of the coins."
He shakes his head. "They're yours. I
took some, but you took most of the risks," he exaggerates.
She frowns, but says nothing.
"I'll need some favors before
everything's done. Call the coins advance payment." He smiles broadly.
"I can't afford favors that expensive."
"I won't ask for anything that
big." He leans forward and touches the line of her cheek. "Use them
to get yourself free." Then he squeezes her hand and steps from under the
conifer, hurrying uphill.
After a moment, Ryalth swallows and begins
to walk eastward.
There is no one near the postern gate as
Lorn quickly changes into his student whites, leaving the blues and the blue
boots in the basket tucked behind the small tree. He readjusts the square of
cloth in his belt wallet to ensure the coins are muffled, and then walks
briskly through the garden and up the steps.
"You're late, Lorn." His father
stands at the top of the steps. "Your mother is worried. It would be
kinder if you let us know when you're going out."
"Yes, ser. I'm sorry. I know. I lost
track of time. I didn't expect to be so late." Lorn's statements are all
true, and he makes sure he doesn't look anywhere close to the billowing smoke
that rises to the southwest of them.
His father's nose wrinkles, and he shakes
his head. "That's a merchanter scent, isn't it?"
Lorn tries to look bewildered.
"Don't dignify it with a falsehood,
Lorn."
"Yes, ser. I mean it is. A merchanter
fragrance."
"Do you know what you're doing? What
if... ?" His father doesn't finish the question.
"I've been careful about that. There
won't be any child," Lorn says absolutely truthfully.
"Lorn..." His father shakes his
head again. "I trust you have not attempted a chaos compulsion with the girl."
"No, ser. I wouldn't do such with
her."
"Chaos compulsions are odious, and
over time, they weaken those who use them, and make them susceptible to the
compulsions of others." Kien's voice is stern.
"I have not with her, and I will keep
your advice, ser."
"Good. Would that you will be so
amenable to showing greater interest in your studies. If not, perhaps a time in
the lancers will settle you down... though this is not the best time."
Lorn knows he cannot manifest any greater
interest in his studies, although he has come to enjoy learning for its own
sake, feeling the sense and the power involved in transferring chaos from the
tower outlets to the firelances, and in seeing just how much chaos he can press
into each weapon. He also is less than enthused about the thought that he could
be posted to the frontiers and use a lance or blade in earnest, even if his
skills with the blade are among the best among the students, including those
like Dettaur who had been born with a blade in his hand. Using a blade in
earnest would definitely increase the odds of an earlier demise than Lorn would
wish.
"Vernt was right, then... about the
barbarians?" he asks his father.
"There have been more attacks than in
any time in memory-or in the records," his father admits. "And they
have even used archers in the far northwest." A faint smile appears on
Kien'elth's thin lips. "All the attacks have been repulsed, and most of
the barbarians killed."
"But they keep attacking?"
"Yes... Enough... we can talk about it
at dinner. After you wash off some of that scent. I'll tell your mother that
you're here."
"Yes, ser." As he hurries toward
the wash chamber, Lorn can sense his father's unease, as though there is far
more left unsaid. Yet, Lorn does not wish to push, not when he has apparently
misdirected Kien'elth's inquiries about his actions of the afternoon.
VIII
The
core of a fully functioning tower maintains an isochronic/isotemporal barrier
of approximately nine hundred nanoseconds. This temporal
"dislocation" effectively provides the points of energy polarity
which generate the raw power fed to the converter system...
The dislocation also provides a barrier
against the operating impingement of the physical energy transfer/generation/entropy
laws of the spatio-temporal coordinates of the systems hereafter described...
This impingement effect is illustrated by
more than ten local years of observation. No tower in which the
isochronic/isotemporal barrier has failed [failure being defined as a barrier
separation of less than 150 nanoseconds, with an error margin of three percent]
has ever functioned again in the spatio-temporal coordinates in which this
world is currently situated....
Tower cores have been run continuously without
shutdown for the operating life of a Mirror Ship. The longest known continuous
operation documented prior to the space-time shift translocating the
colonizing/planoforming expedition... was eighty-seven elapsed standard
Anglo-Rationalist years.
Given that a standard storage cell [model
CD-3A] discharges power at the same amplitude as before the
trans-spatio-temporal shift, but for more than quadruple the previous duration,
and that power amplitude requirements/discharges from various powered end-use
equipment [i.e., electro cell carriers, motor/dynamos, laselectroburst rifles,
antipersonnel electrolasers] varies by user, locale, and even spatio-temporal
planetary locales, accurate determination of tower core life is unlikely.
Consequently, despite considerable
depletion of technical personnel and transport equipment, in the interests of
pragmatism and maintaining a viable colonial structure with the infrastructure
necessary to adapt to the local parameters and paradigms, as described in
Section IV, the remaining tower cores have been located in physical
circumstances that would appear as most conducive to their continued and
uninterrupted operation...
Maintenance can be accomplished on the
secondary systems [see Section V], as well as the energy transfer and
conversion systems, since these are located outside the core, and the power
transfers are accomplished by field manipulations and impingements. Such
maintenance should be held to an absolute minimum, however, since macular
cellular degeneration has already been observed among personnel with high
exposure within the operating confines of the basic system, in contravention of
previously established principles and tolerances...
Overview
Maintenance Manual [Revised]
Cyad, 15 A.F.
IX
Lorn
grins as he peers into Myryan's chambers. "How's the studious
healer?"
His younger sister looks up from the old
and cushioned maroon armchair she had claimed years earlier from the
second-floor sitting room when their parents had considered sending it down to
the first-floor servants' quarters. She has a black leatherbound book in her
lap, and her green-trousered legs are slung over one arm of the chair. She
pushes a shock of black and wavy curls back off her high forehead.
"Lorn..." She grins back. "You're full of horse dung. Jerial's
the studious healer, and we all know it."
"You're the natural one, though."
He slips through the door and closes it gently behind him, dropping easily into
the straight-backed chair that has been turned out from the writing desk. He
ignores the half-written note on the leather desk pad.
"What were you doing yesterday?"
Lorn shrugs, half-embarrassedly.
"Everyone knows. I was with a girl."
"She wears a nice scent, even if it is
a merchanter fragrance. Who is she?" Myryan offers a knowing smile.
"A merchanter," he responds.
"She's more than that," Myryan
says. "Are you-"
"Don't ask... please?" Lorn
offers a truly embarrassed smile, hoping his expression displays enough chagrin.
"I won't... since you asked." Her
amber eyes smile with her mouth. "But only since you asked. Jerial would
have asked anyway. Is that why you're here?"
Lorn ignores the question and asks Myryan,
"You're worried about Ciesrt, aren't you? That father will consort you
two?"
"How observant." She shakes her
head. "I'm not mad at you, Lorn. Father doesn't see it, and consorting is
one thing where what mother thinks doesn't matter."
"Consorting is political." Lorn
shrugs again. "We know that. It doesn't matter whether you like
someone."
"It's unfair." Myryan almost
pouts, but reins in the expression. "You can have a merchanter girl, and
all anyone cares about is to make sure there's no child, and you're back in
time for dinner, and there are a few laughs about wearing too much scent. Can
you imagine what would happen if I arranged a tryst with a handsome
merchanter-or an outland trader?"
"You wouldn't like the outland
traders. They do smell, most of them."
"Is that why... ?" Myryan arches
her eyebrows.
Lorn laughs, easily and openly. "I
don't think so."
"You saved her from a fate worse than
death?"
"Once or twice," Lorn admits.
"How can you say that and be telling
the truth?" Myryan shakes her head, trying not to laugh. "You're
impossible."
"What about Ciesrt?" Lorn asks
again.
"He's dull as a pillar, and he's not
even sweet. People think he's nice because he's quiet. He's quiet because he's
only half alive. He only talks about being a magus."
Lorn nods.
"Father doesn't want to see." She
shakes her head and looks down.
"I won't promise... but maybe I can do
something. Talk to father, or Vernt."
"They won't listen. Ciesrt's going to
be a full magus, and no one could be a more wonderful consort than that."
Her voice, normally full and warm, carries a bitter edge that Lorn hears seldom
and likes not at all.
"Talk to me about healing," Lorn
suggests.
"Jerial knows more."
"I'm not interested in knowing. I'm
interested in seeing and feeling," Lorn replies. "Scroll or book
learning aren't enough." His mouth quirks into a self-depreciating smile.
"It'll be hard for you," Myryan
says.
"If you say so."
"I mean it. You've been handling
chaos."
Lorn raises his eyebrows.
"Don't look at me like I'm daft.
There's a white shimmer around you. Father practically glows all the time. So
does Vernt. You're not so bad."
Lorn nodded. "And there's a blackish
haze around you and Jerial, but it's stronger around you."
"You can see it?"
"More like feel it," he admits.
"Good. Vernt can't, you know. He
thinks healing is all imaginary because he's order-blind. Father can't sense
it, either, but he knows it works."
"Father is a pragmatist." After a
pause, Lorn adds, "About most things, anyway."
"And there are two kinds of
chaos," Myryan continues, "the deep white-gold kind-like surrounds
the Quarter of the Magi'i-and the ugly reddish white kind, and that's what you
feel when a wound goes bad or someone looks like they're going to die.
Healing's not what people think it is," Myryan states flatly. "A good
healer can combine order-that's the black-with wound chaos, so that someone can
heal, and we can bind things together for a time-"
"But their bodies have to heal by
themselves," Lorn finishes. Myryan waits.
"How do you bind or wrap the order to
someone?" he finally inquires. Myryan laughs. "I asked Kyrysmal the
same thing. People have chaos and order within them. You have to work with
that."
"Show me."
"Are you sure? They say that the
Magi'i shouldn't work with both." Myryan looks intently at her older
brother.
"I'm not going to be a magus,"
Lorn replies. "Before year-end, I'll be a lancer, and healing will
help."
"You're going to give up on
magery?" Myryan's eyes flick toward the closed door, as if to make sure
that Lorn's words do not leave the room. "What will father say?"
"He already knows, but he's hoping
that it won't come to that."
"But why? Father says you do well at
your studies and that no one learns things better than you do."
"I don't like being confined between
walls of granite. That much chaos... presses in on me." Lorn shrugs
helplessly. "I can't hide that. Lector Hyrist would have thrown me out a
long time ago if father weren't a Lector and if my studies weren't so good. The
Magi'i want people who eat, think, breathe, and sleep chaos transfers and
manipulation. Like Vernt... or father."
"All right." Myryan sighs as she
swings her legs around and stands. "Give me your hand. If you had a slash
there that wasn't healing it would be red and maybe puffy... really, you
wouldn't need healing. You could-"
"Cut it open and drain it, and wash it
with clear winter brandy or something." Lorn smiles. "I know."
He stands and extends his hand. As she steps closer, he can smell the clean
scent of frysya. "But if I were going to lose it... ?"
"I'd reach out and gather free
order... like this."
Lorn's senses follow hers as the unseen but
still real darkness forms above his left hand. He tries to replicate her
order-gathering. After a moment, a smaller, more diffuse, block of darkness
appears beside hers.
"Oh... you should have been a
healer."
"Men aren't healers-not in
Cyador," he points out.
"Like women aren't Magi'i," she
replies.
Near-identical ironic smiles appear on each
sibling's face.
"How do you bind it or move it?"
"You take the affinity within your
body...."
Lorn's eyes and senses are fully intent,
his amber eyes both searching and hard as he concentrates on his sister's
demonstration of order healing.
X
Two
figures stand on the westernmost balcony of the Palace of Light, enjoying the
comfortable breeze that heralds the beginning of the cool but moderate winter
in Cyad. Below them, the green and white awnings on the small plaza to the west
and north of the harbor piers ripple with a gust of wind coming off the Great
Western Ocean, enough of a gust that the rippling is visible nearly a kay away
on the Palace balcony.
"Someone used chaos to create the fire
in the warehouse district," First Magus Chyenfel says to the
Majer-Commander of Lancers.
"Was there any damage beyond the one
warehouse?" inquires Rynst.
"No. The damage was confined to the
western end. It had been rented to an outland trader by the Jekseng clan."
"Outsiders, again. Everywhere, from
the barbarians to the traders, we have difficulties with outsiders." After
a pause, Rynst ventures quietly, "Some had mentioned seed-oil
burning."
"It was-but you cannot get that heavy
oil to burn with a striker-or even a fallen candle or lamp." Chyenfel
smiles ironically, his sungold eyes flashing.
"Cammabark?"
"There wasn't any sign of an
explosion, and there were bodies and bones there. The dead men didn't try to
run."
"The fire was to cover their murder,
then. Anyone important?"
The High Lector and First Magus shakes his
head. "No. The bodies seem to be those of the man renting the warehouse-a
most unsavory Hamorian thought to be a smuggler-and his two bodyguards."
"How unfortunate. How very
unfortunate." Rynst lifts his eyebrows. "Then we cannot suspect the
Hand of the Emperor?"
"No... not in a dispute between
traders, not unless it is far more than it seems to be. But then, you know
that." Chyenfel smiles lazily. "You would like to know who the Hand
is, would you not?"
"Many would."
"True," muses Chyenfel. His face
hardens. "Perhaps, just perhaps, the most unfortunate demise of this Aljak
may put an end to a string of recent disappearances among the
merchanters."
"You do think it was
retribution?" Rynst turns so that the afternoon sun falls full on his
back, bright if cold in the green-blue sky, and so that he can watch both the
First Magus more closely and the harbor.
"It probably was, but we don't know
who killed Aljak." Chyenfel offers a theatrical shrug. "Unhappily,
the man comes from a prominent Hamorian trading family. They have threatened a
ten percent increase in the cost of Hamorian goods... or so Bluoyal tells
me."
"They cannot make that stick, not when
the Austrans will bring the same goods for a five percent increase. Then, the
Hamorians, should they Want the trade, would have to go back to the old
prices."
"That is true, and even Bluoyal would
agree. Yet... there is one thing."
"Oh?" offers the Majer-Commander
warily.
"There was a trace of chaos beneath
all the charred goods and ashes."
"You have assured me that all your
Magi'i would not do such."
Chyenfel nods. "I have already spoken
with every magus. All are innocent. None are hiding anything."
"Does that mean a wild chaos wielder?
Or that one of your Magi'i can evade the truthreading?"
"Even those few skilled at
truthreading cannot evade another's reading. Since no Magi'i are involved, it
mean the chaos was directed in another fashion. There was no spray. That I
could tell even after the fire, and wild types do not have that kind of
control."
"So... a former Magi'i?"
"Those who have such talents are
weeded out early-they are dead or in the lancers on the frontier."
Chyenfel fingers his smooth chin. "And we follow those who hold chaos with
the glasses until they can no longer do so or until they die. None have been
detected in Cyad in seasons, if not years."
"You have the impossible, then, and
that is less than satisfactory, especially in these times."
"It could have been a small
firelance-as your guards for the Emperor carry," suggests Chyenfel almost
idly.
"I would be most pleased to accompany
you as you question each of them." Rynst smiles tightly.
"I thought you would be."
Chyenfel returns the smile.
XI
Two
figures in blue sit on a carved wooden bench that overlooks the harbor of Cyad.
Below the low hill, a half-dozen ships are tied at the white piers. Cargo carts
roll along the granite wharves, carts filled with the wool brought from
Analeria, cotton from Hamor across the Eastern Ocean, tin ingots from Austra,
and other goods from wherever the tall-masted ships sail. A single white-hulled
fireship is moored at the lancer pier.
The redheaded woman shivers in the cool
breeze. "Lorn?" Ryalth pauses. "Aren't you cold?"
"Me? No."
"I am." She eases next to him, so
that their sides touch. "You're warm, like a banked fire, or the
sun."
"I'd rather not talk about
fires."
"I have a gift for you." Ryalth's
voice is soft.
"You don't have to give me
anything," Lorn insists, as he turns. "The coins and the strongbox
are for you. I told you that. Don't spend them on me."
"It's not that kind of gift. It's something
I've had for a long time."
Lorn raises his eyebrows. "You don't
have to do anything like that for me. You know that."
"I know I don't have to. This is
because I want to." Her smile is warm, even as she shivers again.
Lorn grins, and puts an arm around her.
"You are cold."
"That helps. You're warm." She
pauses, tilting her head and looking at him directly. "Do you ever wonder
where the Firstborn came from? What they were like?"
Lorn frowns and shrugs. "They came and
used the chaos-towers to create Cyad and Cyador. They imprisoned the Accursed
Forest and opened the lands of the east for us. They built the firewagons
and-"
"That's history," Ryalth
interrupts him gently. "We know a lot about what they did. But all the
books and scrolls talk about is that they came from the Rational Stars and what
they built once they came here. Don't you wonder about them? What kind of
people were they?"
"They were people like us." Lorn
laughs gently, turns and touches her cheek with his right hand, then bends
forward and brushes her cheek with his lips.
Ryalth gently disengages him. "Were
they?" His brow wrinkles. "First you talk about a gift, and
now..."
"It's all the same thing." She
extends a shimmering oblong. "It's here."
"What is it?"
"It's an old, old book. My mother's
mother had it. No one knew she did. Father said no one could make anything like
that then, or, I suppose, today. He told me to keep it. Never to sell it, no
matter what I was offered."
Lorn looks into her deep blue eyes.
"Don't give it to me, then. It's yours."
"Then you'll have to keep it for
me," she says.
"I couldn't do anything like
that..."
"Open it to where the leather marker
is. I want you to read me the words there." Ryalth forces the thin volume
into his hands.
Lorn takes the book, its cover as unmarked
and as smooth as if it had been created in his fingers at that very moment. He
turns it sideways, seeing the light flare across the silvered green binding
fabric as the winter sun's rays strike it.
"Open it," Ryalth insists.
He slides open the book, his fingers almost
slipping on the pages that are more like shimmercloth than paper or parchment,
a surface so smooth it makes shimmercloth rough by comparison. The letters are
clear, but somehow slightly more tilted and angular than Lorn is used to
reading.
"That one." The redhead points.
Lorn's eyes go to the title. He reads it...
and continues.
SHOULD I RECALL THE RATIONAL STARS
There I had a tower for the skies,
where the rooms were clear,
and the music filled the walls.
The light clothed the halls,
and the days were long.
The nights were song.
Should I recall the Rational Stars?
Or hold my ruin on this hill
where new-raised walls are still,
Perfect granite set jagged on the dawn,
with striped awnings spread across the
lawn.
Then, gold was known as gold,
and long slow stories could be told.
White flowers filled the darkest room,
flowers that never lost their bloom.
Should I recall the Rational Stars?
And should I raise anew
old chaos-towers in the darkest wood,
leaving nothing where the forest stood,
turning the dark of day to sunlit pride,
to see frail windows throw the rainbow
wide,
with passages and courts in bloom
and white flowers in the darkest room?
Should I recall the Rational Stars?
I had a tower once, across heavens from
here,
with alabaster edges and silver domes.
Raised above the fields and homes,
it flagged my fires, flew my fear.
Oh... take these new lake isles and green
green seas;
take these sylvan ponds and soaring trees;
take these desert dunes and sunswept sands,
and pour them through your empty hands.
Lorn swallows, despite his resolve not to
show any expression.
"It's sad, isn't it?"
He shakes his head. "I don't
know."
"You do know," she insists.
"Why... why did you bring this?"
"Because it's yours now. Because I
want you to keep it and read every poem in it."
"It's yours," he insists once
more.
"You have to keep it and read from it.
At least every few days. Promise me."
"I promise." Lorn nods slowly.
"You don't sound like a merchanter lady now."
"Do you think that we're all just one
thing? That I can only be a hard trader lady? That you can only be a logical
magus?"
"You have to concentrate to be
good."
"You... we... have some time for other
things." She grins. "Other things besides making love, too."
He looks down at the book, mock-mournfully.
"Are you making me choose?"
"Silly man! We have time for
both."
Lorn looks at the green-silvered cover, so
fresh, and so spotless, and so ancient, and he wonders.
XII
Wearing
the merchanter shimmercloth blues and blue boots, Lorn walks hurriedly along
the Road of Benevolent Commerce. His destination is the building that serves
the Clanless Traders, the structure in which Ryalth has opened a very small
office, mainly, he suspects, to legitimize her status as a woman free trader.
He hurries because he has seen his father walking up the steps to Lector
Chyenfel's study in the Quarter of the Magi'i. That had happened in
midafternoon, as Lorn had passed along the lower Tower corridor-and Lorn had
known at that moment that he was now headed for lancer training.
There might have been another reason for
Chyenfel to summon Lorn's father, but Lorn strongly doubts it, and that means
he has little enough time before he is sent off for lancer training. Far too
little time for what needs to be done, because he has no doubts that once the
Lectors know he has been notified, he will be well watched until he is out of
Cyad, and probably far longer than that. He hopes the summons comes for his
studies, and not because of anything else-such as the chaos compulsion he used
on Halthor... but no one has said anything, and Ryalth has only mentioned the
trader's death as an accident.
The absolute certainty in his father's
voice was more than enough to discourage Lorn, for about magely matters, he
knows his father is always correct. He pushes away those thoughts as he
casually studies the street he travels.
No one he knows-or who knows him-looks out
from the Empty Quarter as he passes the coffee house, but the awning that shields
the vacant outside tables is furled, and any patrons are well inside and out of
the wind.
The air holds an icy chill, despite the
bright winter sunlight, and the salt air bites at his exposed face and neck and
hands.
He stops and waits on the edge of Third
Harbor Way West as a white-lacquered enclosed carriage, drawn by a matched pair
of white mares, whispers past him. A gust of wind brings a hint of warmth, and
the smell of fresh-baked bread, followed by the tiniest hint of erhenflower scent,
possibly from the woman seated in the shielded carriage.
Two lancer rankers stand on the far corner,
their eyes following the carriage, and Lorn cannot help but smile at their all
too obvious interest. Then, will he end up standing on a corner in some
out-of-the-way town like Syadtar? Or one of the towns bordering the Accursed
Forest-like Geliendra or Jakaafra?
Lorn shakes his head, then crosses the Way
and takes the white stone sidewalk on the far side down the gentle slope of the
Third Harbor Way to the lower plaza-the merchanters' plaza. Even in the late
afternoon chill, a handful of the green and white striped awnings remain up
over a few carts. Lorn makes his way around the carts toward the squat white
structure in the northwest corner of the plaza, his boots nearly silent on the
hard white paving stones.
Once he has stepped through the squared
open archway of the Clan-less Traders' building and is out of the wind, Lorn
can feel his face begin to thaw. Despite the near-abandoned look of the plaza
from outside, within the building is filled with figures in blue, as well as
some in red, or green, or white. None seem to mark the passage of the
enumerator Lorn emulates, at least not beyond an occasional frown, as he takes
the wide central stairs at the back of the covered central hall flanked by
balconies that rises all three stories.
Ryalth's trading place is little more than
a cubby with two doors swung wide at the back of the third level, so far into
the northeast corner that only the balcony railings can be seen from her doors.
The redhead sits behind a true desk with drawers, an antique of battered and
time-darkened white oak, writing in what appears to be a ledger.
As Lorn steps through the open doors, he
clears his throat, and with a hint of a smile, asks, "Lady Trader?"
"Yes?" Ryalth looks up and her
mouth opens, then closes.
Lorn steps forward until his trousers brush
the edge of the desk. "I wished to see you, honored trader." His
smile is both tentative and guileless.
"You shouldn't be here-not at this time of day. Enumerators'
times are either first thing in the morning or close to the close," Ryalth
murmurs, then adds more loudly, "I would that you had come at a more
appropriate time, young ser."
"I won't be able to do that,"
Lorn whispers. "I'll be leaving Cyad tomorrow or the next day, from what
I've overheard, and there's nothing I can do about it, and I couldn't have come
to see you once they told me." He cocks his head inquisitively, and says
in a normal voice. "I apologize, honored trader, but I was nearby, and
thought I would not be presuming too much. I do apologize."
"You're leaving-Like that?" she
murmurs. "Why?"
"Because I'm not a dedicated enough
believer for the senior Magi'i, and I'm either leaving, or I'll be found dead
in a chaos transfer accident." His voice is low. "I care for you...
and I wanted to let you know. If I wait until it's official, then I couldn't
tell you." Ryalth shakes her head ruefully.
He slips a purse into her hand. "Business.
I'll be back, one way or another, and I couldn't take these. I wouldn't have
them without you. Use them as you can." He offers a warm smile.
"A purse? Like that, and you expect me
to wait for you? As if I were bought and paid for like... cotton?"
"No." Lorn meets her eyes.
"I care for you, well beyond our shared interests." He swallows and
shrugs. "I can't ask you much... not with what's happening. But if you'd
wait... at least a bit."
"I'd have to. Then... we'll see."
Ryalth laughs softly, not quite bitterly. "But you have to take the book
and read it... all of it."
"You're sure? I could be gone for
years."
"Then... it's even more important.
Read it." Her words are half choked, half hissed. "I will."
"Promise?"
"Promise." He reaches out and
squeezes her hand, then lets his hand fall away as he hears footsteps in the
open arched corridor.
"I appreciate your interest, but there
won't be anything where I can use you for at least another eightday,"
Ryalth says firmly, although her eyes are bright.
"I see. I will check with you
then."
"During enumerators' times, if you
would," Ryalth adds. Lorn can see the brightness in her eyes, and feels
the same in his own. He swallows. "Yes... Lady Trader."
Then he turns, letting his shoulders droop,
a gesture not totally of pretense, and walks dejectedly down the corridor
toward the plaza overlooking the white harbor.
As he leaves the plaza, he can feel the
chill of his father's chaos glass surveying him, but he has already done what
must be done, and he doubts that Kien'elth will pry further. He hopes for that,
at least.
XIII
Even
the Emperors of the Land of Eternal Light embody the elements of paradox that
infuse and suffuse Cyador....
Most paradoxical is the treatment of the
memory of the Emperor Alyiakal. Despite his many successes in establishing the
current borders of modern Cyador, and his formalization of the balanced power
structure that has come to govern Cyador, he has become the "One Never to
be Mentioned" among the Magi'i and Mirror Lancers of Cyad. The Magi'i wish
to forget him because he was a stronger magus than the First Magus and turned
his back on what he saw as the ever-narrowing traditions and inbreeding of the
Magi'i, then became a Mirror Lancer officer who used his magely abilities to
lead the northern Mirror Lancers in the devastation of Cerlyn and the
establishment of the northeastern cuprite mines. By doing so, he assured peace
with the northern barbarians for more than a generation, and a continued supply
of cuprite ore for the continued formulation of cupridium. When he used those
same lancers to become Emperor, he insisted that the chaos energies be diverted
from mere experimentation to power chaos-cells for stonecutting and thus the building
of the Great Highways of Cyador, the completion of the Palace of Eternal Light
and the strengthening and lengthening of the Great Canal.... Yet for all this,
for which he and his memory should be revered, the paradox is that he remains
the magus of whom the Magi'i will never speak.
The Mirror Lancers avoid his name because
it reminds them all too clearly of their deficiencies in arms and other skills
and because his success continues to imply that merely being a Mirror Lancer is
less than sufficient to be a successful or great holder of the Malachite
Throne.... The simple fact that no Lancer commander has since matched his feats
makes the comparison even more odious... and, again, the paradox is maintained:
the greatest Mirror Lancer officer in the history of Cyador is the least known
as such.
Even the merchanters dislike the image of
Alyiakal, for they have none of the talents that he embodied, and, therefore,
they cannot aspire to place one of their own, truly their own, upon the
Malachite Throne, yet it was largely the result of his policies as Emperor
through which they came to prosper....
Paradox of Empire
Bern'elth, Magus First
Cyad, 157 A.F.
XIV
Lorn
walks slowly along the covered upper portico of the dwelling, trying to ignore
both his faint headache and the patter and splatting the sudden winter rain,
such a change from the frost of the day before or even from the dryness of the
afternoon. His head seems to pulse with the hissing of the rain and the
dripping of the larger droplets that have rolled off the tile roof and fall
onto the edge of the walks and the walls.
He finally stops outside the open door to
his father's study, waiting for a moment, as if to see whether his sire will
notice. When there is no response or invitation, Lorn steps into the study.
"You summoned me, ser?"
In the storm-dim gloom, lightened by the
oil lamps at each end of the pale oak desk-table, Kien'elth looks up from the
scroll he peruses. "Sit down, Lorn." The silver-haired magus sets the
scroll aside. The crossed lightning bolts on his tunic radiate a faint golden
light of their own.
Although the silver-manteled lamps cast an
even glow across the room, suffusing with a warm light the blond wooden wall
panels and the dark amber leather of the volumes set in the bookcase built into
the wall beside the desk, the room is chill. Lorn lowers himself into the hard
seat of the single armless and straight-backed wooden chair. He faces his
father and waits.
"I have been talking to Lector
Hyrist'elth and Lector Chyenfel'elth...." Kien'elth's fine eyebrows lift
as if asking for Lorn's response. "Yes, ser."
"They have noted that while your
knowledge and scholarship remain outstanding, you do not manifest the love of
the Magi'i and our works that are necessary for true success as a magus."
Kien'elth studies his son. "We have discussed this before, Lorn, and I had
hoped you would change your approach to your studies and to the senior
Lectors."
"Ser.... I have learned a great deal,
and even the Lectors have indicated that my studies have been superior."
Lorn lets a puzzled expression cross his face. "Have I not been diligent
and enthusiastic in my studies?"
"Mere excellence in studies is not
enough for a magus, Lorn. Enthusiasm for studies alone is not sufficient,
either. One must always carry the awareness that the Magi'i are what
distinguishes Cyador from the barbarians or the Hamorians-and what
distinguished the Rational Stars from the black angels. Without the understanding
of chaos as the font of life and the core of prosperity, a flame lance is
little more than a brighter, sharper barbarian blade. A firewagon is little
more than a more powerful eight-horse team."
"I have always understood and accepted
that, Father," Lorn says truthfully.
"Yes... you have. But you have not
understood that there is a greater good beyond personal accomplishments."
The older man offers a rueful smile. "Nor do you understand with your
heart that golds are mere counters in child's game, or that all Cyador rests on
how the Magi'i balance chaos and the black order."
Lorn represses a frown. While his studies
and his practical work as an advanced student magus have touched upon the
balancing of chaos with the cold and deadly nature of order, this is the first
time his father has directly mentioned such balancing-or even suggested that he
has observed Lorn's clandestine merchanting ventures.
"I have prevailed upon my friendship
with Captain-Commander Luss'alt to have you accepted as a probationary officer
trainee. Luss'alt is in charge of the Mirror Lancer operations throughout all
Cyador, under Majer-Commander Rynst'alt. You also know, I am certain, that
lancer training is well away from Cyad." Kien'elth pauses.
Lorn considers both the words and the
pause. Knowing that his father is a closer acquaintance of Rynst'alt than would
be normal from their relative positions within the Quarter of the Magi'i, Lorn
also understands that there is much he does not understand, except that his
father thinks it is important that Lorn know a favor has been called in, and
that Rynst'alt has not been involved. "Yes, ser."
"High Lector Chyenfel'elth and Lector
Hyrist'elth are most impressed with your talent, but not your attitude."
The older man gestures as if to wave off any objection Lorn may raise.
"Yes, you are most respectful. Yes, you learn everything before you, and
more. Yes, you have greater mastery of chaos forces than any other student
magus and probably a mastery greater than most of the fourth level adepts, and
even some third level Magi'i. And you have greater potential than that, even if
you receive no more training. However..." Kien'elth draws out the word.
"Now is not the best of times for a talented magus to manifest less than
perfect adulation."
"So Vernt is safe, then?"
inquires Lorn, understanding his own danger, if not precisely all the possible
forms that danger could lead to were he to remain a student and become a full
magus. If he were allowed that far. Then he realizes what else his father has
said and nods.
"He is safe. He does not have either
excessive talent or excessive skepticism, and he will learn more, because he is
patient, if not so precociously brilliant as his elder brother."
"Is this because the towers are
failing?"
Kien'elth raises his eyebrows. "I
should have guessed that you would puzzle that out." He pauses, steepling
his fingers together. "It would not be wise for me, or for you, to discuss
this farther. So let us talk of other matters. You may recall that the
barbarian attacks are increasing, and increased attacks require greater chaos
transfers for firewagons and fire-lances. A greater number of firelances must
be charged and transported north and west. Likewise, more lancers must be raised
and trained, and more cupridium blades must be forged." Kien'elth smiles,
but his golden eyes remain concerned, and their expression does not match that
upon his mouth.
Lorn understands. His father-all the
Magi'i-live and work where the truth, or falsehood, of every word they utter
can be sensed and used in one fashion or another-at least by the most talented
of the Magi'i. That understanding breeds caution even in settings that others
might consider safe from scrutiny.
"The need for more lancers means a
need for more junior officers, and that affords you an opportunity." This
time, his father's smile is more complete. "Although Luss'alt and I do
not, shall we say, see exactly eye to eye, he needs more capable junior
officers, and he has heard of your skills with a blade. He has not heard of
where you have been... such as this afternoon. I would not repeat such a
visitation as that before you leave Cyad, no matter what her charms may
be."
"Yes, ser. Thank you. Very much. I
will do my best."
"I'm sure you will. And in the Mirror
Lancers, success is measured more by ability than by attitude." Kien'elth
laughs. "Not totally... but more."
"I understand." Lorn also
understands the warning. The Mirror Lancers are no different from the Magi'i,
except that most Lancer officers cannot truthread, and therefore must judge
more by actions than by hidden intent revealed by truthreading.
"You will leave for Kynstaar tomorrow.
There will be a firewagon departing from the school. You will doubtless face
some difficulties, there, but... you have surmounted such before, and I have
every confidence that you will again."
"Yes, ser." Lorn nods.
Kien'elth stands slowly. "I
wish..." He shrugs apologetically.
Lorn also stands. "I know, ser. It's
not your doing."
"I can still wish, my son."
Lorn lowers his head for a moment.
After he leaves the study, Lorn walks
slowly along the covered portico of the upper level of the house, pausing to
look southward through the rain that is beginning to taper off toward the gray
stormy waters of the harbor, waters more often than not usually an intense
blue, with the intensity of the water's color underscored by the white sunstone
piers. Today, the piers are gray, like the sky and the water.
Then he descends one level and slips toward
the rear of the dwelling. There, he pauses before the closed door of his older
sister's chambers.
"You can come in, Lorn," Jerial
calls.
He opens the heavy oak door, slowly, and
closes it behind him.
As usual, Jerial wears a form-fitting
tunic-this one of a silky black that shows her petite but well-endowed figure.
She stands beside a polished white oak table desk that is almost empty, and her
eyes are intent as she studies Lorn. Beyond the narrow archway, Lorn sees the
bed chamber, with the dark blue coverlet set neatly on the narrow bed, and the
tables as neat as the sitting room where they stand.
"Dice?" Lorn looks at the six
white cubes on his sister's table. "I suppose there's the uniform of a beardless
junior lancer in your wardrobe?"
"No." Jerial smiles back.
"That of a young merchanter, a spoiled youth who has more coins than
sense. Someone who loses most of the time, but loses little, and wins seldom,
but well. Not, shall we say, a scholarly enumerator."
Lorn looks from the dice to the wardrobe
and then back to the dice.
"Why not?" asks Jerial. "I
can be a healer, or a brood mare. Neither will gain me golds nor
independence."
"You have the golds invested in the
Exchange?" Lorn raises his eyebrows.
"No. The Bank of the Clanless Traders.
There's no interest, but far fewer questions."
"Something like Jeron'mer?"
"You might say so," Jerial
replies, "but I'd appreciate your not asking."
"In case you're forced into being a
brood mare? So I can't reveal anything to father?"
Jerial nods, then smiles wryly. "I
like Cyad, Lorn, but not enough to consort with someone I detest. So far, I've
managed to steer father away from people like Ciesrt...."
"I see." His sister's words
remind Lorn-again-that he has yet to do anything about the impending consorting
of Myryan to Ciesrt. His eyes light on Jerial's face, taking in the determined
and set chin, the hard and piercing blue eyes. "What's Ciesrt's
weakness?" Jerial shrugs. "He has no strengths." Lorn nods.
"And no principles, except self-interest."
"You, my brother, do well enough to
conceal such." Jerial's eyebrows both arch.
"Maybe I'm like him, then."
"No one would ever say that, even
Dettaur, and he detests you. He thinks you're the one who broke his fingers
years ago."
"That could be a problem in time to
come. I'm leaving for Kynstaar in the morning," Lorn says quietly.
"Is that why you're here?"
"I thought you'd like to know."
He grins insouciantly, as if he were on the korfal field or in a coffee house.
"At least you can be an officer, and
Dettaur won't be that senior to you."
"If I don't get thrown from a mount or
'accidentally' incinerated by a firelance, you mean?" Lorn's laugh is half
humorous, half deprecating. "I have some chance of surviving there."
"You have no illusions, brother
dear?" Jerial's laugh is somehow both ironic and supportive. "That
will doubtless help."
"I wanted to talk about healing,"
he says.
Jerial nods. "You would."
"I've seen you and Myryan do it.
There's a black mist that enfolds you-is that why you like black?"
"Black has its uses, one of which is
illusion."
"Ciesrt wouldn't like black,"
Lorn notes. "About the healing?"
"I think of it almost as an order of
sorts. It's the opposite of the surging power of chaos, and there really are
two kinds of chaos, the unclean kind in a wound and the kind in the towers and
the power cells of the firewagons-"
"You've never been near a tower,"
Lorn says.
"I don't have to be. Father has been
clear that the chaos that powers the firewagons is the same as the chaos that
come from the towers. You've all talked about how the Magi'i transfer that
chaos into the firewagons, and I've certainly been close enough to firewagons
to sense the difference."
"And you've looked with all your
senses. Most healers don't."
"Except healers raised in this
house," counters Jerial.
"That's true enough." He glances
from Jerial to the dice, and then back to her fine-featured face, a visage
that, for all its beauty, might have been carved from sunstone or granite.
"What do you want to do with what I
show you?" Jerial asks.
Lorn offers a lazy smile, hoping he will
not have to respond verbally.
"Brother dear... you're sweet when you
want to be, but you use everyone and everything." Her hard smile softens.
"Sometimes."
"I've tried not to hurt either of
you."
"You've learned to use people,
including us, without hurting them, but it's still use, Lorn. Remember when you
gave both Myryan and me those chaos-cut emeralds set in cupridium."
"Yes," Lorn admits warily.
"You never told mother and father, did
you?"
"No."
"But they knew all the same."
Jerial smiles as if the answer were obvious.
"I suppose so."
"How would either of us wear something
that costly without mother or father asking?" She laughs. "That way,
you created the impression of modesty and caring." A shrug follows.
"I know you care, but you also wanted them to know you cared, and you
impressed them all the more by doing it quietly." A crooked smile follows.
"And... they couldn't ask you how you managed to come up with all those
golds."
Lorn flushes.
"How did you? Gambling... or
theft?"
Lorn steels himself, then shrugs
reluctantly. "Neither. Trade. You know that. That's why you talked about
enumerators."
"You aren't allowed handle coins, and
the Lectors-oh... who is it? What woman, I should ask. It would have to be a
merchanter woman." Abruptly, she laughs. "The scent! Of course."
Jerial shakes her head. "So much scent that we all thought..."
"I don't believe you've met her,"
Lorn says quietly. "I've known her for over a year. Over two," he
corrects himself.
"Do you... I won't ask that."
"Thank you."
"You must want to know about healing
badly... or you wouldn't have given away so much. You can't use it on yourself,
you know? Except to keep flux-chaos out, if you have the strength."
"I know."
"Very astute." Jerial nods.
"I'll show you some more." She smiles. "Myryan told me what she
showed you."
"A man has no secrets...." he
protests.
"From his sisters?" She laughs
warmly. "Not too many, but you hold more than most men."
Lorn sincerely hopes so. Most sincerely.
XV
Lorn
stands beside the immaculate white oak desk-table in his own chambers, glancing
out through the glass window at the cold mist that has replaced the earlier
rain. He will be leaving in the morning for Kynstaar, and his promise to Myryan
remains unfulfilled. He purses his lips as he looks toward the rain he does not
see.
The problem with Ciesrt is not the student
magus himself, who is about to become a fourth level adept, but his sire,
Kharl'elth, the Second Magus and Senior Lector. Consorting Myryan to Ciesrt is
advantageous to both families. The talent for handling chaos runs strongly in
Kien'elth's children, even in Vernt, if slightly less powerfully, and any
children that Myryan might bear will have a far better chance of holding the
talent than those of anyone else that Ciesrt might take as consort. The
alliance will also benefit Vernt, and both parents-even Lorn. The one person it
will not benefit is the sensitive Myryan.
Lorn frowns. With the little time he has
remaining, so far as he can determine, he has limited choices. To remove
Ciesrt's father or to persuade his own father to act otherwise. Can he justify
murdering a man because his sister Myryan is unhappy with her proposed consort?
Yet Lorn has promised to do something.
He has to do something.
For a few moments more, he watches the
misting rain. Then he turns quickly and walks out of his chamber, leaving the
door open. He makes his way up the stone steps to the uppermost level of the
house, pausing briefly in the open air of the covered portico to look through
the late twilight toward the harbor, mostly obscured in mist and rain, with the
evening beacons not yet lit for late-arriving ships.
Finally he approaches the study door,
closed-and knocks. The brief chill that is in the mind and that betokens
screeing crosses him.
"You can come in, Lorn."
Lorn steps into the warmth of the study and
closes the white oak door behind him. His father looks up from behind the wide
desk, but does not stand. The two look at each other for a time.
Lorn waits, the bare hint of a smile on his
lips, an expression that is one of his most somber.
"It's too late for last chances, you
know," Kien'elth says mildly. "I warned you for almost two years
about your lack of enthusiasm."
"I know. You did what you could. That
wasn't why I wanted to talk to you. It's nothing about me."
Kien'elth raises his fine white eyebrows,
then fingers his chin. "Lorn, pardon me if I appear somewhat...
skeptical... but many of your exploits have not exactly borne the stamp of
altruism. I felt your mercantile ventures were, shall we say, useful for your
education and understanding of how Cyad operates, and you did maintain yourself
with a certain dignity and were not involved in anything too sordid." The
older man clears his throat. "What did you have in mind?"
"I'm worried about Myryan, ser."
Lorn wasn't sure how else he could put it. "She's more sensitive than most
people realize. That's why she's a good healer, of course."
"You don't think she should be a
healer?"
"She should be a healer. I'm not sure
she should be a consort," Lorn says slowly, deciding against elaborating
immediately.
"Lorn..." Kien'elth draws out his
son's name, as he always has when he disagrees with Lorn-or anyone else.
Lorn steels himself to wait, knowing that
his father always draws things out to make an adversary more uncomfortable and
to force revelation or haste.
Kien'elth looks directly at his son, as if
to press for more explanation. Lorn resists the impulse and continues to wait.
A wry smile crosses Kien'elth's face, and
he finally speaks. "Your mother was a most sensitive healer, but she has
managed to be both consort and healer."
"Yes, ser." Lorn nods. "But
much of her ability to be both has rested upon you, ser."
Kien'elth laughs. "You'd use my own
vanity against me, Lorn. Or anything else, I suppose."
"Vanity or not, ser, it's true."
"I can tell you believe
that-mostly." Kien'elth leans back slightly in his chair and steeples his fingers,
not looking quite directly at his son.
Lorn waits, noting absently that the
pattering of the rain on the roof has returned. Or perhaps the pattering is
sleet, since the sound is harder than that of rain droplets. He cannot tell,
because both windows are shuttered.
"Tell me. Lorn... are you opposed to
Myryan's becoming a consort of Ciesrt-or of anyone?"
Lorn offers a frown. "I think that
Myryan is not ready to be consorted to anyone. I also think that being
consorted to someone like Ciesrt would harm her. I don't think she could
continue her best as a healer, and..." He shrugs in trying to convey
without saying exactly those words that being a consort might have extremely
detrimental consequences for his younger sister.
"No one is ready for being consorted.
I wasn't; your mother wasn't; you won't be; and Myryan's no exception."
Kien'elth's words carry a sense of finality, as if the argument is over.
"Myryan's different." Loin's tone
is stronger than he intended.
"You believe that. You really
do." Kien'elth shakes his head, and his sun-gold eyes somehow darken.
"All you young people think that you're different, that we were never
young, not the way you are, that we never felt what you feel, that we can't
possibly understand what you're going through." Kien'elth snorts.
"I'd wager that every generation has felt that way about its
parents."
"I'm not suggesting that, ser. Not at
all. I'm suggesting that, out of the four of us, Myryan is different. Jerial
will handle anything that comes to her, and so will Vernt. I hope that I can.
At the very least, Myryan needs more time to learn who she is. And she needs a
consort who is as considerate as you have been to mother." Lorn fears he
has said too much, but what he has already said has made little impression.
The pattering on the roof rises to a
violent drumming, then abruptly dies away, and a gust of cold air sweeps into
the room through the closed shutters, indicating that perhaps one of the
windows is not completely tight.
"You would judge such?"
"No, ser. I would offer my thoughts
and my understandings to you. I offer them in part because I will not be here
after tomorrow, and I do fear for and care for my sister. Were I not leaving, I
would not speak."
"Such caring does you credit, Lorn,
but do you not think that I also care for the well-being of my daughter? Do you
not think that I see her sensitivity? That I wish to see her protected in times
that are likely to be turbulent and changing? That I can only offer her that
protection through a consort who is strong and well-placed?"
Lorn almost responds, then checks his
tongue, and nods. "I have never questioned your concerns for us. Or your
efforts to help us as you can. Any decision about consorting Myryan will be yours,
and I know you love her dearly. So do I. I would only see the best for her,
ser, and I have offered my concerns to you, knowing you will do as you
must."
Kien'elth shakes his head slowly.
"Still... you surprise me, Lorn. There are times when I wonder if you were
ever a child."
Again, Lorn waits for his father to
continue.
"You remind me more of
Toziel'elth'alt'mer than anyone in our family, with layers upon layers hidden
behind your eyes." Kien'elth straightens. "I hope so, because you will
need all that devious honesty, and more, in the years ahead. Now... I will
think upon what you have said. That is all I will promise."
Lorn bows his head. "Thank you,
ser."
"If that is all... ?" Kien'elth
rises.
"That's all, ser. Thank you for
hearing me."
"I'd be a poor father if I didn't
listen, Lorn." Kien'elth clears his throat again before he adds.
"I'll think about your words, but we don't always have the choices others
think we do. Try to remember that."
"Yes, ser." Lorn bows again
before he leaves the study.
Outside, he looks out through the darkness,
seeing the fragments of white on the neighboring roofs, white tatters that are
all that remain of the brief hail that has pelted Cyad. Night has replaced
twilight, and the harbor is marked only by the pier beacons, while the Palace
of Light beams through the mist that enshrouds Cyad.
Lorn walks down the steps and then enters
his own room.
Myryan sits at the straight chair turned
away from his desk.
"Myryan..."
"You were talking to father about me,
weren't you?" She stands quickly to face him.
"Weren't you?"
"Yes."
A faint smile crosses her face, and she
half-consciously pushes back strands of curly black hair. "You upset him.
I could feel it. He upset you, didn't he?"
"Some. I don't think he understands,
and... that bothers me."
Abruptly, she lurches forward and hugs
him-tightly. "Thank you don't know if... but... thank you."
As he holds Myryan, Lorn's eyes burn, for
he fears that his effort may have been too little.
XVI
In the
chilly midday light, Lorn stands by the sunstone bench beside the main entrance
to the Quarter of the Magi'i. Beside the bench is a single canvas bag,
containing smallclothes, toiletries, and a few small personal items, including,
buried deeply, Ryalth's ancient book, the book he has promised to read and has
not-yet.
Behind him, the squared arches of the
entrance glitter in the sun. The light reflecting off the chaos-altered
sunstone shifts moment to moment even though the sky is clear and cloudless,
all traces of the rain and hail of the day before gone, except for hints of
dampness on the stones where the sun has not struck.
As he waits, Lorn turns and studies the
square arch that leads into the center building, a structure seemingly of
smooth stone and tinted windows. The arch itself bears no decorations, no
carved figures, no embellishments. Then there are few embellishments and only
scattered statuary throughout Cyad. The City of Light is its own art, Lorn
reflects as he notes that the only breaks in the seamless stone are the words
across the center of the arch itself.
"Chaos is the heart of life; the
Magi'i serve life and chaos." He murmurs the words to himself. Is that why
he will never be a magus, because he cannot bend himself to serve? Or serve
blindly? He frowns, but the frown vanishes as he turns toward the sound of
heavy footsteps.
Ciesrt, nearly as lanky as Lorn's brother
Vernt, but more broad-shouldered and far heavier on his feet, lumbers awkwardly
toward Lorn. "Greetings," Lorn offers.
"So... you're going to be a
lancer?" Ciesrt half-smiles, but the smile conceals nervousness.
"I'm being sent for lancer training.
If I become a lancer officer depends on how I do." Lorn follows the words
with a rueful smile.
Ciesrt nods, thoughtfully. "I suppose
it doesn't matter how good we are, but only how well our efforts are seen by
those above us."
Lorn conceals another frown. He hadn't
expected something like that from Ciesrt. "Someone has to decide."
"You always wanted to be the one,
Lorn," Ciesrt adds quietly. "You're pretty good at concealing it,
but... not good enough for the Magi'i. Maybe you'll do better with the
lancers." Ciesrt's muddy-green eyes fix on Lorn. "Sometimes, it's
better to go with the chaos flow on more than the surface."
Lorn nods, waiting.
"Good luck." Ciesrt offers a
half-smile, then turns. "Thank you." Lorn watches the lanky student
magus for a moment, wondering if he had indeed made a mistake in not trying to
deal with Ciesrt's father. Yet... all he had to go on were his feelings, and he
didn't think murder should be based on feelings alone. Should it?
He turns at the sound of another set of
lighter steps on the white stone pavement.
The red-haired Tyrsal stops short of the
bench. "I'm sorry, Lorn. I don't understand. You were the best
student."
"It's probably better this way."
"Is there anything I can do?"
Tyrsal grins. "I mean, here in Cyad. If you're careful, you can take care
of yourself better than I could. I still remember how you handled Dett."
The redhead frowns. "He's probably a lancer officer now. You'd better be
careful."
"I will." Lorn pauses. "You
could stop by the house a few times and talk to my sisters. You've met them,
haven't you?"
"Just Myryan."
"Jerial's my older sister. They're
both healers, but Myryan's got several years before she's finished."
"Like Kylernya, except she's just
started."
"She's that old?" Lorn remembers
Tyrsal's sister as barely waist-high, watching a korfal game.
Tyrsal nods. "It will be a while
before she gets into real healing." He pauses. "I'd be welcome at
your house?"
"You're a student magus in good
standing." Lorn laughs gently. "If you're worried about it, tell
Vernt that I asked you to."
"We'll see. I will call on them."
Tyrsal pauses. "Are you sure that's all I can do?"
"For right now." Lorn shrugs.
"I really don't know what to expect... but if I need anything else, I'll
let you know." If I can.
"I'll be here," Tyrsal promises,
before he turns away.
The lancer firewagon is late in getting to
the Quarter of the Magi'i, and Lorn has been waiting on or standing beside the
hard sunstone bench for most of the afternoon before the vibration of six chaos-driven
wheels shivers through the pavement, and the shimmering white vehicle slows to
a stop opposite the squared stone arch. Shadows from the uphill buildings that
hold the chaos towers of the Magi'i cast two bars of darkness across the
gleaming white lacquer of the firewagon. The curved glass of the driver's
station reflects the shadowed sunstone behind Lorn enough so that Lorn cannot
see the driver of the vehicle that looms at least another six cubits above the
smooth pavement.
As Lorn stands quickly, he can sense the
flickers of chaos from the storage cells that are hidden behind the shining
white cupridium panels at the rear of the firewagon. As quickly as the former
student mage has stood, a lancer officer in a cream and green uniform is already
out of the forward compartment. The two single silver bars, one on each side of
his short stiff green collar, glow. The officer's eyes take in Lorn and the
canvas bag beside the bench. "You Lorn?"
"Yes, ser," Lorn answers.
"Hop in. Rear compartment. Only three
of you today. Be close to midnight before we reach Kynstaar."
As the officer watches, Lorn opens the side
door to the rear compartment, a door of white-lacquered cupridium, light, but
stronger than iron.
"Put your stuff under the seat."
"Yes, ser." Lorn glances at the
two other young men. One is clearly older and far burlier than Lorn, with a
swarthy complexion and a short-trimmed black beard-one of the first beards Lorn
has seen on a young man. The second is slighter and far more wiry than Lorn,
with hair that is somewhere between sandy-blond and light brown. "I'm
Lorn."
"Akytol'alt," rumbles the larger
man.
"Kyl'mer," follows the slighter
figure.
"Well... I was Lorn'elth," Lorn
corrects himself as he places his bag under the curved white oak bench seat and
seats himself beside Kyl and facing Akytol and the other seat, "but that
will change."
"One way or the other," snorts
Akytol.
Even before Lorn closes the door, the
vehicle begins to glide away from the Quarter of the Magi'i with the thin and
distinctive whine that marks all firewagons. Despite the hardness of the
lightly padded seats, their curvature makes sitting tolerable, and the
suspension is strong enough that the ride is almost without bumps.
Through the right window, just before the
firewagon turns north, Lorn takes what may be his last look for a long time at
the Palace of Light, its windows bright with the light from the innumerable
lamps within its sun-stone walls. Despite the gleaming whiteness and the
lights, for a moment, or so it seems to Lorn, the Palace seems empty.
"Ever lifted a blade?" asks
Akytol.
"I've had some training," Lorn
admits.
"Some? Well... better than most."
Akytol shakes his head, then leans back and closes his eyes.
Lorn turns to Kyl. "If one might
ask... ?"
"How did a merchanter's son get sent
off to lancer training?" Kyl shakes his head. "Another time... if you
would."
"That's fine by me." Lorn nods.
He suspects neither of them is interested in revealing much, especially not
with Akytol present.
Kyl turns his head to watch the buildings
on the west side of North Avenue pass by.
In turn, Lorn watches those on the east
side-and the few carts and carriages, and the scattered handfuls of people, a few
in shimmercloth, but most in the green cottons of workers and crafters. Before
long, Cyad lies behind them and the firewagon has turned eastward onto the
Eastern Highway. The sun has dropped below the horizon, and the clear
green-blue sky has begun to purple.
Lorn sees as well as senses the glow of
chaos that surrounds the fire-wagon as it rolls through the twilight toward
Kynstaar, the only sound the low rumble of the six cupridium-coated iron wheels
on the whitened granite of the Great Eastern Highway. To an outsider the
vehicle would indeed resemble a horseless and fire-swathed wagon or carriage.
Across from him, Akytol sits back, his eyes
closed, a faint snore punctuating his sleep. Kyl glances nervously from Lorn to
Akytol, and then for long periods out the tinted window. There is no sound from
the front compartment and the unnamed lancer officer.
Finally, Lorn closes his own eyes. He can
do nothing until he reaches Kynstaar.
Part II
- Lorn'alt, Isahl Undercaptain, Mirror Lancers
XVII
Lorn'alt
stands rigidly in formal lancer whites, white-scabbarded sabre at his side,
white garrison cap set squarely in place over his short brown hair. He is the
fourth man in the front line of five new Mirror Lancer officers, listening to
the graying but trim lancer commander standing on the podium before the score
of new undercaptains ranked in the open sunstone arena-an arena nearly empty
except for the officers who had trained them, who had whittled down three score
possible candidates to the score who remained nearly a year later. A score had
left voluntarily, and a score had died or been too severely injured to
continue.
"...you are the first line of defense
against the barbarians of the north. At times, you will be all that stands
between Cyador and the black order of death...."
Standing one rank back and three junior
officers to his left is Kyl'alt, and somewhere farther to the rear,
surprisingly, is Akytol'alt, towering over most of the other new undercaptains.
Lorn concentrates on the commander's words, as though they were new, as though
he had not already heard similar banalities all his life.
"...never has our world had a land
that offered so much to so many for so long... never has our world had a light
that has shone so brightly as that raised by Cyador... and you are here to
ensure that light will shine forever, and that peace and prosperity will reign
endlessly. You are a Mirror Lancer officer. Never forget that! Never forget
that you are here because generations of Lancer officers have stood between the
dark tide of the order of death and the light and prosperity of chaos. That was
their duty, and they did it well. May you carry out your duty as well."
After a moment of silence, the commander
adds, "You will step forward as your name is called." He pauses, then
announces, "Undercaptain Bruk'alt."
When the commander calls Lorn's name, the
former student magus steps forward as had the others. The commander hands the
two silver bars to Lorn.
"Thank you, ser."
"Don't thank me, Undercaptain. You
earned them, and you will continue to earn them every day you are on duty in
the service of Cyador- and even when you are not."
"Yes, ser."
"Lorn'alt..." the commander
offers in an even lower voice.
"Yes, ser?"
"Perchance I am wrong, but you could
easily have been first in the training company." The flint-gray eyes never
leave Lorn's.
"Ser... I wanted to do well, but I
also was more concerned about learning everything I could. I made mistakes that
way, ser."
The faintest of smiles crinkles the
commander's lined face. "I hope that's the truth, Undercaptain Lorn. The
Lancers have no place for officers who let someone else be first to blunt the
charge, and then rise to take credit. Do you understand that?"
"Yes, ser."
The commander nods brusquely, and Lorn
turns and steps back to his place in the formation.
"Undercaptain Jykan'alt..."
XVIII
Lorn
stands in the narrow hallway, sabre at his side, white garrison cap rucked in
his belt, waiting for his interview with the majer who will inform Lorn just
what duty he will undertake for the Mirror Lancers in the service of Cyador.
Although it is early winter, nearly a year after he had left the Quarter of the
Magi'i, the air flowing through the outside arch to his left is warm and moist,
more like spring in Cyad, carrying with it a hint of arymid. But then, Kynstaar
is actually south and east of Cyad, where the southern currents of the Great
Western Ocean first touched Candar before swinging westward and north.
Lorn shifts his weight, trying to hear the
conversation beyond the door, but even his magus-honed skills can only enable
him to catch phrases.
"...being posted to Hristak... Great
Canal south to Fyrad... Majer Derin'alt... two scrolls... and seal ring...
understand?"
"Yes, ser!" Rydenber's words are
far louder and clearer than the ma-jer's.
After Rydenber steps out through the open
white oak door, Lorn waits a moment before entering Majer Styphi's office.
Light floods into the small space from an open window to Lorn's right and the
majer's left. The office contains little besides the desk, an oil lamp set
head-high in a bronze bracket on the stone wall, and two chairs.
Majer Styphi sits on one chair, behind the
small desk that he dominates. At his right hand is a neat stack of scrolls. His
cream and green tunic is slightly wrinkled, and darkness fills the hollows
under his eyes, but his green eyes are hard and fix on Lorn. "Undercaptain
Lorn'alt?"
"Yes, ser."
"You're being posted to Isahl. First,
you will take the lancer firewagon tomorrow morning. It will take you and a
number of others to the transfer station on the Great North Highway. There you
will wait and take the regular firewagon to Syadtar. That's where you will pick
up the replacement lancers and Nytral-he's a seasoned squad leader. Then you'll
take the lancers and the replacement mounts on the trade road northwest to
Isahl. Sub-majer Brevyl is the area commander. You'll report to him." The
majer hands a scroll to Lorn. "This scroll confirms that." He hands a
cupridium seal ring to Lorn. "There's your seal ring. Don't lose it.
Nytral will ask to see it, just like every other good squad leader you'll
command when you're coming in alone." A second smaller scroll follows.
"Here are his posting orders. There are two copies there for you-one goes
to Commander Thiataphi's clerk in Syadtar, the other to Nytral. You
understand?"
"Yes, ser." Lorn slips the seal
ring onto the third finger of his right hand. The ring fits well enough that it
will not slip off.
"You'll draw a mount in Syadtar.
Choose it carefully."
"Yes, ser."
"Get your kit together. Then spend
some time with your fellows. Most of you won't see each other for some
time."
Lorn bows once more before he turns and
leaves.
Kyl is waiting outside in the group of
undercaptains who have yet to see Majer Styphi. He glances inquiringly at Lorn.
"Where are you headed?"
Lorn grins. "Where every good lancer
goes. To fight the barbarians of the Grass Hills. In a town called Isahl."
"It's better than the guard detail in
Geliendra where you have to patrol the borders of the Accursed Forest,"
volunteers Kyl.
"Right," murmurs someone.
"Dark-angel-right..."
"You won't get Forest duty, Kyl,"
Lorn says. "You know trade. They'll probably assign you to one of the
coast patrols to deal with smugglers or something like that."
"I'll know in a bit." The
sandy-haired undercaptain inclines his head toward the building door and Majer
Styphi. "I wouldn't mind that." Kyl smiles. "I wouldn't mind
anything, actually."
Lorn is not so sure that he would be
equally happy with all duties, but since he has no choice over his duty
assignment, he sees no point in comparing the potential satisfaction of duty
assignments he would be unlikely to get. "I'll talk to you later, and you
can tell me where you're headed."
"I will," promises Kyl.
As Lorn turns, he overhears the comments.
"...good as he is... not many make it
back from the Hills of Endless Grass...."
"...anyone who does makes full captain
and majer quick though...."
"...maybe... but he was magus-born...
some don't like that...." Lorn takes in the low words most would not have
believed he has heard, then nods to several others as he passes, walking back
to the small cubicle that contains his uniforms, his weapons, and his handful
of personal items.
The firewagon to the north will not depart
until the following morning, assuming it is on schedule, and that will leave
him time to write scrolls to his parents, to Myryan... and to Ryalth... before
he follows the majer's advice and talks a last time with the other new
undercaptains.
And, as he promised, he will read from
Ryalth's book, though he does not know if he understands the Firstborn any
better for all the words he has read in the green-silver covered volume.
XIX
As the
low orange light of dawn fills the front compartment of the fire-wagon, Lorn
yawns and rubs his eyes. Although he had garnered a short night's sleep on a
hard cot at the highway transfer station located in Ilypsya-a town beside the
Great North Highway that Lorn had never heard of-after more than two days of
near-continuous travel from Ilypsya, except for short comfort stops, Lorn is
tired. The flickering chaos that envelops the vehicle bothers none of the other
passengers, it seems, but Lorn finds himself still studying it. Even though he
is no longer a student magus, in a strange fashion the flickering almost seems
to nag at him, more so than when he had studied chaos.
The six wheels rumble more loudly than
those of the lancer firewagon that had brought him to Ilypsya, but that might
well have been because the regular coach carries a good fifty-score stone of
goods in the hold between the small front compartment and the larger rear
compartment, where a good half-score passengers are squeezed together.
A slight snoring comes from the merchanter
in blue shimmercloth slumped in the bench facing Lorn. The trader is a young
man no more than a handful of years older than Lorn, if that, but who sports a
short brush mustache in a clear effort to appear older. Beside the young
merchanter is an older man in deep brown-a wealthy miller returning to Syadtar,
Lorn has gathered, and on the far left sleeps another mid-aged man also in
brown who has spoken but little since Lorn joined the others at Ilypsya. The
last man in the front compartment, to Lorn's left, also sleeping, wears the
crimson-trimmed brown of a regional guard, but the silver stars in his collar
signify that he is a district commander. As Lorn's eyes light on him, his head
turns, and he emits a grunt.
Ignoring the ripe odor of male bodies
confined in too warm a space for too long, Lorn stifles another yawn and shifts
his weight on the curved and lightly padded white oak of the seat he has to
share only with the district guard commander, at least until the next stop,
unless that stop is Syadtar. Each firewagon, Lorn knows, can make but one run
to Syadtar and back before the chaos in the cells in the back of the vehicle
must be replenished, and the vehicle makes but two round trips every eightday.
Were he not a lancer officer, Lorn's passage-fare would have been at least a
gold-and in the crowded rear compartment.
Abruptly, the merchanter sits up and
glances out the window. "Getting close to Syadtar, I see."
Lorn follows the other's eyes, but the
hills to the north look no different to him from the ones he had seen the night
before-or not enough different to indicate anything. But he is used to the
forests and irregular hills north of Cyad itself-not the scattered farms and
the grasslands of the east that are north of the Accursed Forest and the Great
Canal that links the fertile lands between the rivers with Fyrad. "Because
the farms are closer together?"
The merchanter shakes his head. "The
hills. They're longer here-like they've been stretched out. They get shorter
and steeper as you go west. Much more rugged, they are."
Lorn nods.
"You'll see. Are you going to Isahl or
Pemedra?"
"Are those the only two choices?"
Lorn counters.
"For a new undercaptain, they are.
You're probably pretty good with a blade and a firelance, I'd wager. No?"
"Better than many," Lorn admits.
"That's why you're there. Glad you
are. Wouldn't travel this route weren't for the lancers. Barbarians be through
Syadtar like grease through a goose." The merchanter laughs. "Grease
through a goose. Faster than coin spent by a pleasure girl."
The miller sits up. "Begging your
pardon, trader, but it be early, and Syadtar is not here yet. Some of us lack
the endurance we once had."
"My apologies," offers the young
merchanter. "My apologies, ser."
The miller grunts and closes his eyes.
"You'll see," murmurs the trader
to Lorn, leaning back with a wry look at the miller before closing his own
eyes.
Lorn closes his eyes for a time, but he can
no longer sleep to the rumbling of the wheels, and his eyes stray back to the
window.
The first sign that the firewagon is
approaching Syadtar is the appearance of scattered farmhouses-similar in their
green tile roofs, green ceramic privacy screens before the front doors, and the
green shutters open but ready to be closed against night or weather. Yet each
is subtly different, with a lighter or darker shade of cream or off-white
plaster on its walls and with different types of bushes and trees planted to
create privacy areas behind the dwellings where the girls and the women may
appear without being revealed to passers-by.
Then comes something Lorn has not seen
before in Cyador-a white sunstone city wall-one nearly ten cubits high. There
are no guards, but the firewagon passes through the open heavy oak gates and
well-kept ramparts and twin guard towers.
Past the gates are the wide white-granite
streets of the small city, with the scattered green and white awnings, although
those are furled in the early light of day, except for one, which signifies a
coffee house. Lorn frowns momentarily.
"You're right," says the
merchanter, stretching. "Won't be many coffee houses afore long, not with
the blight."
"Blight?" Lorn asks
involuntarily.
"Order blight-blacks spots on the
underside of the leaves, then, poof! No more coffee plants."
"Magi'i will find something to stop
it, or the healers," rumbles the district guard commander, slowly
straightening on his part of the bench he shares with Lorn.
The firewagon is slowing, and Lorn's eyes
go back to the buildings they pass. Syadtar is a miniature of Cyad, at least in
that the buildings are all of white sunstone, but smaller than those of the
great City of Eternal Light-and there are far fewer of more than one level. The
light is more intense, even early, perhaps because there are no trees within
Syadtar. Lorn sees none, at least.
"Maybe they will, honored ser, but
shipments of the beans have dropped to nothing from the fields north of Fyrad,
and those from Geliendra are half what they were last year."
"Don't be underestimating the Magi'i,
trader," suggests the district guard commander. "Most of those that
have are ashes."
"Ah... yes, your honor. "The
merchanter's mustache bobs as he swallows.
"Bah... not that much honor in being a
district guard. The lancers have the honor." The older man's eyes twinkle
as he winks at Lorn.
Lorn hides a smile, but says, "Without
the guard, the lancers would be spread far thinner."
The merchanter looks from one armsman to
the other, bewildered, then looks to the window. "We are here, sers."
"Good." The commander winks once
more at Lorn.
The firewagon slows under a large covered
sunstone portico.
After a moment, one of the green-uniformed
drivers opens the door of the front compartment. "Syadtar, officers, kind
sers."
Lorn glances to the District Commander.
"Go ahead, Undercaptain. Let a stiff
commander take his time. You have much farther to go than do I."
"Thank you, ser." With that, Lorn
reaches under the curved and lightly padded bench seat and pulls out his kit,
then steps out into the sunlight, for it is far too early for the tile roof
above to shade passengers or the firewagon itself. After slipping the white
garrison cap from his belt and donning it, he glances at the firewagon driver,
or one of the two, standing beside the open glass cupola. "Do you know
which way to the Lancer headquarters?"
"Go one block east, to the Avenue of
the Square, then head toward the hills. It's about a kay north."
"Thank you."
Carrying his kit in his left hand, Lorn
begins to walk eastward, feeling a hint of dampness on his forehead where the
front of the garrison cap rests.
"Poor bastard..."
Lorn holds in a wince at the pity in the
driver's voice. He thinks he knows what he is facing, but more than a few
people seem to think his assignment is a death sentence.
Two youths in faded blue undertunics and
trousers careen down the street, then, seeing Lorn, abruptly dash down a side
alley. An older man in a brown tunic so faded it is closer to tan leans on a
walking stick and shuffles down the other side of the white-paved street, his
eyes fixed on the paving stones. The creaking of a cart echoes from somewhere
up the alley Lorn passed, but he sees neither cart nor whatever pulls it.
One block east, as the driver had said, is
a small square. In the center is a statue, the figure purportedly of
Keif'elth'alt, the first Emperor of Light. Lorn doubts that the original
emperor had possessed such heroic proportions. On the south side of the square
is an inn, its side porch shaded by a green and white awning. The scent of
roasted fowl drifts toward Lorn, and he stops, then shakes his head, before
turning northward. He does take the shaded eastern side of the street.
He passes a coppersmith's shop, then a
cooper's, but both doors are closed. The door to the chandlery a block later is
open. Lorn pauses, then steps inside. After his eyes adjust to the dimness, he
moves toward the side counter, trying to keep both his kit and his scabbarded
sabre from banging into the table that holds various leather goods. He pauses
to study the travel foods on the counter, looking over the differing shapes,
all covered in wax.
"Those not be what you'd be wanting,
ser, I'd wager," offers a cheerful voice. A woman stands behind another
counter, to Lorn's left. She points at a tray before her. "Fresh
honey-rolls... well... not that fresh... baked late yesterday." .
Lorn takes in her smiling face, and the
short-cut but tight-curled black hair and the clear but dark skin. "They
look better than the travel fare."
"For eating now, they are." With
her words, surprisingly, comes the hint of erhenflower scent, a fragrance Lorn
would have thought too dear for most in Syadtar. "How much?"
"A copper each for the small ones.
Three coppers for two of the large." Three coppers find their way from
Lorn's belt wallet to the woman. "Thank you." He takes two of the
larger honey rolls. Before he is fully aware of it, he is licking the crumbs of
the second off his fingers. She extends a wooden cup of water. "You'll
need this."
"Thank you." Lorn forces himself
to drink the water more slowly than he had gulped down the honey rolls.
"Thank you very much."
"You're most welcome. If you would
wait a moment..." She slips away from the counter, only to reappear with a
bucket and a small towel. "You could use this, ser."
"Ah... I wouldn't wish to
impose."
"My brother was a lancer." Her
smile is strained. "I'm sorry."
"That's all right."
Lorn takes the towel and bucket, and washes
his face and hands. He has to admit that he feels less grimy, and probably
looks bit more like an officer. "Thank you, lady." He hands back the
bucket and the towel.
"You know, I've seen a score of young
officers walk by here in the last year or so, and not a one has stopped. Why
did you... if I might ask?" She drops her eyes.
"I was hungry." Lorn grins.
"I don't think well when I'm hungry, and... I stopped." He pauses.
"I don't mean I stopped because I wasn't thinking..."
The woman grins back. "You sound like
Cailynt." Lorn shrugs helplessly.
"I'm glad you stopped," she says,
"but you'd best be on your way." After the briefest of pauses, she
adds, "Cailynt would have made a good officer."
"He probably would have," Lorn
agrees.
"Calenena? We got a customer? You be
ringing me... you hear!"
Lorn puts another pair of coppers on the
counter, and says in a low voice, "Take care." Then he grins warmly,
and turns toward the door.
"I took care of it," Calenena
answers.
Lorn steps back into the bright sunlight,
blinking as his eyes readjust.
Another block northward, he passes a
potter's shop. The smell of wood burning tells him that a kiln is being fired.
His brows knit. Places like potters' and coppersmiths' shops aren't allowed in
the main section of Cyad, and some trades, like rendering and tanning, are not
allowed anywhere in the city. Yet he sees the potter and has smelled the
tannery. Is everything within the wall? Are the barbarians that much of a
threat? Or had they been at one time?
He keeps walking, realizing as he does that
there are few trees in Syadtar-no cylars or arymids, no straight or feathering
conifers, just a few scattered scrub cedars here and there.
The Mirror Lancer enclave is clear enough.
The street ends at another white granite wall and an archway with the two
lancer guards, each under a projecting roof to shield them from the sun. Lorn
shows the seal ring, and steps past them. Once inside the archway and past the
open gates that are swung back inside the compound, Lorn glances around, then
heads for the largest building.
After walking the hundred cubits from the
gates, he slips through the open front archway into the coolness of a
stone-walled corridor.
"Ser?" A lancer ranker looks up
from behind a table a mere ten cubits inside the corridor His left sleeve holds
two green slashes a span or so above the cuff-showing he is a senior squad
leader.
"Yes, squad leader?"
"If you're reporting for duty, ser,
you need to go to the next building."
"I'm going to Isahl, but I'm supposed
to pick up a squad leader, replacement lancers, and mounts."
"They'll help you there, ser. This is
Commander Thiataphi's headquarters, ser. The support centers for the outposts
are in the next building."
"Thank you."
Lorn turns and makes his way to the next
building, considerably smaller, with a plain weathered white oak door, standing
ajar. He peers inside, at the two lancers who sit at opposite sides of a large
table on which are stacked scrolls of various sizes and sorts.
"...need three more for the
replacement company..."
"...good thing you got the
mounts..."
Lorn steps inside, and, at the slight
whisper of his boots, the older and bearded squad leader stands, followed by
the younger.
"Ser? Can we help you?" The
senior squad leader pauses, studying the weary junior officer. "Would you
be the new undercaptain for Isahl?"
"That I am," Lorn admits.
"Undercaptain Lorn'alt." He shows the seal ring. "I'm supposed
to find a squad leader named Nytral. I have his orders." Lorn extracts the
somewhat battered smaller scroll from his tunic.
"I'm Byrten, ser. Senior lancer clerk
for the outposts." As the man shifts his weight, Lorn can sense the
stiffness and the pain in his motions.
"It's good to meet you, Byrten."
Lorn shrugs. "I'm supposed to report here, but I wasn't given much in the
way of details."
Byrten hides a smile. "Chorin... go
find Nytral. Tell him his undercaptain's here."
"Ser? By your leave?"
Lorn nods and steps aside to let Chorin by
him.
"Be the day after tomorrow afore all
the supplies and replacement lancers be ready, ser. Till then, you'll have a
room in the officers' building-that's second back, and I'll show you after
you're set with Nytral. Or he can show you."
"How many replacement lancers are
there?"
"Two score," replies Byrten.
"And how often do they need
replacements?"
"When Sub-Majer Brevyl needs
them-sometimes once, sometimes twice a season." Byrten's smile is thin.
Two score lancers six times a year? From
one outpost on the edge of the Grass Hills? Lorn nods thoughtfully, deciding
not to ask how many undercaptains are needed as replacements.
"How long a ride is it to Isahl?"
"Three days, more or less."
"And what sort of supplies will we be
taking?"
"You'll be escorting five wagons-four
horse team on each." Byrten glances toward the door, where the rail-thin
Chorin reappears, followed by a ranker with a single green slash on his sleeve.
Both halt just inside the door. Nytral is short and stocky, and his right cheek
bears a faded purple starburst scar. His thick black hair is cut short, and his
thick black eyebrows are bushy. The deep brown of his eyes conveys a flatness,
as if Nytral has seen too much for his eyes to reveal. The flat eyes look at
Lorn, eyes that are wary, waiting.
Lorn extends the set of smaller scrolls.
"Undercaptain Lorn'alt. These are your orders."
"Yes, ser." Nytral takes the
scrolls, then looks at Lorn'alt.
The two other lancer rankers watch, eyes
flicking from Nytral to Lorn.
"You can unroll them," Lorn says.
"They're yours, but one copy has to go to Commander Thiataphi's
clerk."
"Ah..." suggests Byrten.
"You take it first?" asks Lorn.
"Works better that way, ser."
suggests Nytral. "Byrten draws us supplies, and he can't draw for more
than we got on roster."
Lorn nods, wondering how much more he needs
to learn, and whether he can-in time. "If there's nothing else Byrten
needs to tell me... ?" He looks at the senior clerk.
"No, ser. Just check every morning.
Tomorrow we should have the replacement roster done, and the supply list."
"I'd like Nytral to look at those with
me," Lorn says.
"Yes, ser."
The undercaptain looks at his squad leader.
"Let's go on outside, Nytral."
"Yes, ser." Nytral's voice is
deferential, but level.
After leaving the support building, Lorn
crosses the small courtyard until he stands in the shadowed corner on the
southeast side. Then he turns to Nytral. "I understand you'll be able to
let me know what I should know and don't on the way to Isahl." Lorn offers
a smile, one simultaneously open and yet professional.
Nytral does not return the smile.
"Could be, ser."
Lorn laughs, gently. "I know chaos,
firelances, and blades. I don't know lancers and barbarians, and you do, or you
wouldn't be a squad leader assigned to a green officer. I also don't know what
supplies we should have, and what we might get shorted. You do."
Nytral's lips crinkle slightly. "There
be that, ser."
"More than that, I'm sure." Lorn
laughs self-deprecatingly. "Do you know where I draw a mount? And how we
can find out about just what our replacement lancers are like?"
"Wouldn't be much good to you, if'n I
didn't, ser."
"Let's start with finding my room so I
can drop off this kit, and then look for the kind of mount that will be best
for Isahl." Lorn smiles. "Lead on."
Nytral gestures toward the three-story,
narrow, barrack-like building in the northeast corner of the compound.
"There." He walks out of the shade across the white paving stones of
the courtyard. "Front entrance there is to the officer's rooms. You can
take whatever one you want on the top level. Stables are out back, beyond the
wall...."
Lorn matches steps with the squad leader,
listening, and yet studying the compound, trying to memorize where everything
is.
XX
After
having selected a mount, and getting a tour of the rest of the Mirror Lancer
compound from Nytral, Lorn finds himself yawning more and more as they walk
back from the armory, a heavy-walled and squat building located inside another
set of walls in the northwest corner of the compound. Lorn's boots are scuffing
the stone as well.
"Ser... begging your pardon, but best
you get some sleep afore you eat with the senior officers tonight." Nytral
glances at Lorn.
"Because they'll be sizing up the new
undercaptain? You're probably right, and there's not too much more I can do
until tomorrow anyway." Lorn yawns again. "I'll see you in the
morning, and we can go over the supplies and everything."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn turns and walks back to the quarters
building, and up two long flights of steps. His room is stark-one narrow pallet
bed, a small table by the bed with an oil lamp, a single armless wooden chair,
and a set of wooden pegs on the wall for hanging uniforms. The single window
bears ancient glass, and the shutters are inside the casement.
After slipping the latch bar in place
behind him, Lorn levers off his boots and strips to his small clothes. By then
he is struggling to keep his eyes open.
Despite his fatigue, Lorn wakes in
mid-afternoon, in a chill. As he was sleeping, someone had been screeing him,
and it had not been his father. But why? To see that he was indeed where he had
been sent?
He rolls upright and rubs his eyes. Since
he is awake, he rises and then uses the cold shower in the semi-communal
bathing chamber in the middle of the uppermost floor. After drying and dressing
in a clean set of lancer whites, he heads back to the outpost support building
where some discreet inquiries of Chorin locate the officer's laundry service,
set, obviously, in the rear of the ground floor level of the quarters building.
Lorn returns to his room and carries his
soiled whites down to the small room where a gray-haired and bare-footed woman
in gray stands over a wash tub, swirling the wash with a wooden paddle. A
second thigh-high tub stands to her right. The odors of warmish water and soap
fill the bare-walled space.
Lorn waits, but the woman does not turn in
his direction. Finally, he clears his throat.
She looks up, then steps toward him.
"Ser... ser... those I cannot wash until tomorrow."
"That's fine."
"A copper for each uniform, you
know."
Lorn nods. "There is just one."
She bobs her head and takes the uniform.
"Tomorrow night."
"Thank you." Even before he
finishes his words, the washerwoman has set his whites on a table by the tub
and is back at work with the wooden paddle. He steps outside, into a gentle,
but unseasonably warm breeze for winter in Syadtar-that is what he feels. He
checks the white garrison cap, although the breeze is scarcely strong enough to
worry about.
There is time before dinner. So he walks
around the compound, studying more carefully what Nytral had shown him earlier.
Under grayish-green tiled roofs, the buildings are of clean-lined granite and
sunstone, the granite for the main walls, and the sunstone for the minimal trim
and arches. Both types of stone have been bleached out by time and the residual
impact of the chaos-chisel cutting used to shape the stone blocks. With the
late afternoon sun glinting on the windows of Thiataphi's headquarters, Lorn
can see that some of the window panes are clearer than others, by the
reflection of both light and the chaos within the sunlight. The window
casements are all of stained and weathered white oak, but barely visible, since
all the shutters in the compound are inside the windows.
The outpost building, although old, has
been added to the compound later.
Lorn smiles as Chorin hurries out the door
and scurries toward Thiataphi's headquarters.
"...two, three..."
At the sound of cadence-calling, Lorn turns
to watch a line of men in white marching along the west wall of the compound,
just outside the shade.
"...have to march before you ride...
two, three... keep the chaos on your side... two, three..." calls a burly
squad leader, breaking the cadence to add, "You're not tough, and the
barbarians will eat you like honeycakes... pick it up in the rear!"
Hoofs clatter on the stones, and a Mirror
Lancer in white, wearing the red sash of a messenger, rides up to the hitching
post outside Thiataphi's headquarters, dismounts, hurriedly ties his mount, and
rushes inside carrying a white leather dispatch pouch.
As
Chorin eases out through the stone archway, the Lancer clerk's head turns as if
he is trying to hear what the messenger might be saying or what he brought.
Lorn smiles, watching.
When Chorin sees Lorn, he begins to walk
quickly back to the outpost building, without looking back at the junior
officer.
At the sound of the fifth bell of
afternoon, Lorn turns back toward the quarters building. By the time he reaches
the dining area, a small hall with a table long enough for a score and a half,
and folds his garrison cap and tucks it in his belt, there are already a number
of officers gathering within the sunstone finished room. The fireplace behind
the head of the table is dark, and the walls are bare, except for a series of
miniature mirror shields on the north wall, each with a design color-etched
into the polished cupridium. The cupridium catches the indirect early evening
light coming through the windows on the south wall, enough so that light plays
across the shields.
From the rank insignia he can see, he is
the only undercaptain, with six captains, two overcaptains, one sub-majer, and
one majer standing at places around the table, and with the gray-haired
Commander Thiataphi himself at the head of the table.
As the other officers seat themselves, Lorn
watches, then moves so that he is at the very foot of the table on the left
side.
Each place has a brown platter and a heavy
glass wine goblet-glass, not crystal nor metal. The servers are lancers, but
each wears a green overtunic. On the serving platter first presented to the
commander are slices of beef, covered with a brown sauce. The second platter is
heaped with yellow noodles, and four large baskets of dark bread are set at
intervals along the table. Then comes a deeper dish filled with something
green.
Lorn waits and takes as much as he dares of
the beef, noodles, bread, and ackar, a bitter leafy vegetable he had seen far
too much of as a boy. The server fills his goblet with a maroon wine.
Commander Thiataphi lifts his goblet, and
the other officers begin to eat. Lorn follows their example, listening to their
conversation as he does.
"White mounts handle the sun better...
chaos-colored, you know, and the white reflects better...."
"...darker coats shield them better..."
"...so why do the chestnuts breathe
harder and lather earlier?"
"...got you there, Helkar..."
"...doesn't matter now... not in
winter..."
Lorn takes a bite of the overcooked beef,
following it with a mouthful of equally overcooked noodles. The wine, while a
plain red, is far better than either the beef or the noodles, but Lorn eats
everything on the chipped brown platter before him, then waits for the senior
officers to finish and take any second helpings.
"...scouts say the Jeranyi are
gathering the eastern tribes, the ones north of the cupric mines."
"Some of them have started carrying
polished iron shields-work almost as well as a mirror shield against the fire
lances... with those iron-headed arrows..."
"Their bows aren't that good, not from
the saddle."
"Yet..."
"Ought to go in and take the iron
mines..."
"You want to get ferric poisoning...
be my guest, Helkar. Besides, none of the barbarians work metal that
well."
"You don't get it from the ore... only
after it's smelted and turned into weapons... Rather take out the mines than
risk getting ferric poisoning and order death."
Lorn keeps a polite smile on his face when
he isn't earing, taking in the attitudes of the lancers, partly amazed at some
of the misconceptions that seem common, even among officers.
The serving dishes, after being refilled by
the lancer servers, make their way down to Lorn, who takes additional slices of
beef and a pile of the gravied noodles. He has eaten two mouthfuls of his
seconds, then stops to break off a chunk of the moist brown bread.
"Undercaptain? Lorn'alt, is it
not?" calls Commander Thiataphi.
Lorn swallows quickly. "Yes,
ser."
"You're from Cyad, are you not?"
"Yes, ser."
"How do you find the north?" asks
the commander.
"Warmer than I would have thought in
winter, ser." Lorn offers a polite smile.
"That's why the barbarians want our
lands. One reason, anyway. On the other side of the Grass Hills, there's snow.
Or there was last eightday, according to the report from Sub-Majer Brevyl.
Don't forget to draw a winter jacket, and winter boots."
"No, ser. I won't." Lorn hasn't
thought about either, and hopes his face does not show his ignorance.
"You from a lancer family?"
"No, ser." Lorn decides against
volunteering his background.
"That's right," Thiataphi says
with a guffaw. "You're one of the magus-born who's good with a
blade." He shakes his head. "Do some of the Magi'i good to get out on
the borderlands, see what the barbarians are doing."
Not knowing how to respond to that, Lorn
nods politely.
"You'll see. Sub-Majer Brevyl will
ensure you do. Just like he did with all the others here. Except me, and I made
sure he saw just what they were." The darkness in the commander's words is
scarcely concealed.
Lorn manages to finish the second helping
on his chipped platter just before the servers clear the platters, and replace
them with smaller plates, each bearing a rolled and fried paelunka that has
been dipped in condensed sweetsap. He continues to listen as the conversation
drifts away from him.
"...all that snow to the north...
grass'll be green early, and that means more raids."
"If it ever melts..."
"...doesn't melt early, stay green
longer, and the raids'll start later and last longer, either way, we need to
draw more trainees."
"...could be right about that... need
more undercaptains, too..."
Lorn finishes his paelunka and sips the
wine, very slowly, listening.
Abruptly, Thiataphi rises, and so do the
other officers. Even though caught unaware, Lorn rises with them.
One of the captains draws up to Lorn as
they leave the officer's dining hall.
"I'm Helkar, the one they're always
telling that I'm wrong."
"Lorn."
"I noticed you didn't say much about
ferric poisoning, but you have to know something about it, don't you, if you
were a magus."
"I know something about it," Lorn
admits.
"Was I right about it? That it's got
to be used in a weapon?
"Mostly." Lorn pauses. "And you
have to have been using firelances, and directing them for a long time.
Otherwise, you'll probably only get a burn in addition to a slash or a
cut."
"Why do the Magi'i warn us so much?
Burns, those I can handle."
"The Magi'i handle more chaos than
firelances, much more."
"Ah..." Helkar frowns.
"You'll have to worry more about iron then?"
"I shouldn't."
"Good." Helkar laughs.
"You'll have enough to worry about with Brevyl anyway."
"Is he that hard?"
"Is cupridium tough? Does a firelance
burn?" The captain shakes his head. "He's fair, but best you do as he
orders, or you'll find yourself leading a half-score of troublemakers who don't
know one end of a lance from the other against four score raiders." Helkar
laughs. "And if you make it through that, he'll decide you're the one to
train and lash all the troublemakers in the whole outfit into formation."
Lorn nods, stifling a yawn. He is still
tired from three days' travel in firewagons and wonders if one good night's
sleep will be enough to recover. "Is this your duty assignment now?"
"Me? Working for Commander Thiataphi?
Not likely. I'm here like you, picking up replacement lancers, except I'm
headed back to Pemedra tomorrow. A few less barbarians there, and a lot more
snow. You can see the Westhorns from there, and that wind comes off them in
winter, and it'll cut right through you."
"How many lancers are you taking
back?"
"Four score, with two squad
leaders." Helkar shrugs. "Takes near-on four days, and there's always
a chance of a raiding party, but it's less early in the winter. The barbarians
get bored or run out of food before spring, and they'll start raiding while
there's still snow everywhere." Another laugh follows. "Trailing them
through snow and mud, we all enjoy that."
Lorn nods.
"You look order-dead." Helkar
half-thumps Lorn's shoulders and turns. "Good luck with Sub-Majer
Brevyl."
"Thank you." Lorn walks slowly up
the two flights of stone steps, concentrating so that his white boots do not scuff
and so that he does not trip. A night's sleep will be good. Very good.
XXI
Lorn
bends forward in the saddle and pats the shoulder of the big white mare, then
straightens and looks ahead along the road that curves its way between yet
another set of hills. The grass that covers the hills is brown, but it does
seem endless, with each hill that the detachment rides over giving way to yet
another, and then another. After the first morning, for two days all Lorn and
the lancers have seen are grass hills. Part of that sense of endlessness is
because they are not crossing the hills directly, but angling northwest from
Syadtar.
Every so often there are small copses of
bushes or low trees bearing their gray winter leaves, generally along streams
so small as to be almost invisible from more than a hundred cubits away. The
wind is cold, but not bitter, and blows out of the northwest, almost into
Lorn's face, carrying a clear odor of wet grass and the hint of mold.
At the top of the hill on the north side of
the road are two lancers Nytral has sent out as scouts. One remains reined up,
watching the column of riders, while the second vanishes beyond the hill crest,
shadowing and following the road from the heights as it winds generally
northwest.
Lorn glances over his shoulder at the
forty-odd new lancers riding behind them. Most appear painfully young, even to
Lorn, and some struggle managing the firelances in the holders, even though the
lances are little more than three cubits long. Lorn scarcely notices his any
more.
"You ride pretty well, ser. You come
from a lancer family?" asks Nytral.
Lorn turn in the saddle and looks at his
squad leader. "I had to learn it on my own, Nytral. Spent a lot of extra
time in officer training working with mounts. Seemed a good idea."
Nytral frowns.
"I came from a Magi'i family. I didn't
take to being kept in a granite tower playing with chaos. The Magi'i didn't
want me dabbling in trade. So it was strongly suggested that I become a
lancer."
"Ah... being a magus family, ser...
?"
"When the head of the Magi'i, who sits
at the right hand of the Emperor, suggests that a young man become a lancer
officer, it's generally a good idea to agree. Besides, it got me out of the
towers," Lorn points out.
Nytral glances at Lorn. "That be
making more sense, ser."
"Because Isahl is one of the places
that the barbarians always raid, and we lose a lot of lancers and officers
here?"
"They tell you that, ser?"
"No." Lorn laughs cheerfully.
"They sent me here."
Nytral shivers and looks away.
Lorn shrugs. Best that Nytral knows Lorn's
background early on, and understands that Lorn doesn't intend for it to bother
him, or adversely affect him. He turns and studies the riders behind him again.
Then he turns his mount and rides back along the column, looking at each lancer
as he passes.
Only a handful meet his amber eyes.
Near the end of the column, where the
wagons rumble along, he turns the mare again, and lets her keep pace so that he
rides beside the lead teamster.
"How are the wagons going?" he
calls.
"Be fine, ser," answers the
gray-bearded lancer with the crossed green sheaves on his sleeves, his right
hand on the leather leads for the four-horse team. "A mite heavier than
I'd like, but the roads stay dry, for another day, and all be well."
Lorn nods, raises his hand, and urges the
mare back toward the front of the column, riding almost on the shoulder of the
road and letting her move just slightly faster than the lancers, so that he can
study each as he rides past, without seeming to do so.
When he reaches the front of the column,
the road has begun to curve between yet another set of hills, and Lorn can see
that it slopes gently upward at an angle along a ridge that extends a kay or
more both east and west.
"Have to climb this one, ser."
Lorn nods as he eases the mare closer to
the squad leader's mount.
"Sent out another pair of
scouts," Nytral says quietly. "Been a few attacks here, 'cause you
can't see the road."
Lorn follows Nytral's gesture. A pair of
scouts has reined up at the ridge crest, where they pause before one turns his
mount and rides down the road at a quick trot.
"Trouble..." mumbles Nytral.
"Knew it!"
The scout has barely reined up before the
words of his report tumble out. "Barbarians, ser. On the rise a kay
northeast of the top there."
Lorn glances past the scout at the half-kay
of road that remains before the first of the column reaches the crest.
"How fast are they moving?"
"They're not riding, ser. They're
waiting."
"A kay away and they'd have to ride
down and then up?" asks Nytral.
"Yes, ser."
"We'd be better to get to the
top," suggests the squad leader.
"Order it," Lorn says.
"Quick trot! Quick trot!"
Lorn keeps the mare abreast of Nytral,
letting the squad leader set the pace as the column hurries toward the ridge
top, raising heavy dust that the teamsters and the trailing riders will have to
breathe. After reining in the mare at the crest of the hill, beside Nytral and
the two scouts, Lorn looks out, squinting against the sun that barely warms the
mid-afternoon.
"Barbarians..." Nytral says.
"Don't look like raiders, but you can't ever tell, crazy as they
are."
The score of mounted figures on the
opposite hilltop are less than a kay away. The riders are bearded, with large
blades in shoulder harnesses. Several have shields fastened somehow to their
saddle in front of their left knees, and some have shields strapped over the
bags behind their saddles.
"They won't attack... not now,"
Lorn observes.
Nytral raised his eyebrows. "With
them... you never know."
"Do they use those shields?"
"Yes, ser." Nytral looks toward
the barbarians. "They could have those out in a moment."
"Let's just wait and see if they do."
Nytral turns his mount. "Form up-eight
abreast. Lances ready! Four abreast. Lances ready!"
Lorn watches the barbarians as Nytral
chevies the raw lancers into formation. Abruptly, the barbarians turn their mounts
and begin to ride back northward along the ridge line.
"They won't do that in the
spring," Nytral prophesies as he turns his mount and eased up beside Lorn.
"And they'll have more."
Lorn has few doubts about that.
"We should wait, ser. Make sure
they're well along."
"Good idea. That will let the wagons
catch up, too."
"Wagons... wish the firewagons and the
paved roads came out this far," murmurs the squad leader. "We'd get
more supplies faster."
Lorn laughs. "No, we wouldn't. They'd
just move us farther north, then."
"Probably right about that."
Nytral shakes his head, his eyes still on the riders headed northward.
After a moment, Lorn says, "Oh...
Nytral. There's a lancer back there, about the third back on the left. Tall
fellow, but he's swaying in the saddle. Might be sick... or something
worse."
Nytral looks at Lorn. "That be Beryt.
Used to be a squad leader. He likes the malt too much, ser."
"But he fights well out where there
isn't any ale or brew?"
Nytral smiles. "Yes, ser. One of the
best."
Lorn nods, then readjusts the white
garrison cap, still watching the barbarians as they dwindle from sight.
XXII
The
road climbs over a low rise between two hills, running westward. From the
saddle of the white mare, Lorn can see a long and shallow valley ahead, one
with more than a handful of Cyadoran-style brick dwellings dotting the eastern
end of the valley, all with thin plumes of smoke rising through the cold air
toward the cloudless green-blue sky overhead. The only trees are the infrequent
and scraggly scrub cedars.
"There you are, ser," said
Nytral. "Isahl's at the far west end. Be a bit afore we can see the
outpost."
"We haven't seen that many farms until
now," Lorn says, hoping Nytral will offer more information or opinion.
"Ha! Wouldn't see any here, except
that they're all welcome in the walls if the raiders did come. They won't
though. Not while Sub-Majer Brevyl's here."
"How many lancers are assigned
here?"
"Don't tell me that, ser, not in
figures, but we got five companies, and that's ten squads. When we're all lined
up in formation-happens once in a while-I counted near-on tenscore, and that
didn't take in the cooks and such."
"That should allow plenty of
patrols."
"Not that many. Figure you need a
company for a recon patrol; and a company to deal with a small raider band, and
near-on everyone if all the barbarians in a tribe join a raid."
"Does that happen often?" Lorn
leans forward and pats the mare on the neck.
"A full-tribe raid? Nah... not more
than once every few years, if that. Once three summers afore last, but it was
dry in the north. Figure they were hungry... or something."
"The raids, have they been happening
for years? Or just in recent times?"
"Long time. Once heard Commander
Thiataphi say he'd been an undercaptain out here. You tell me how many years
that is, ser." Nytral laughs.
"More than a few." About fifty
cubits back from the road, on both sides, Lorn notes the even irrigation ditches,
brick-lined, and the miniature dams and sluice gates designed to channel the
water to the fields, though the ditches are empty under the winter sun.
"The barbarians try to tear the irrigation systems?"
"No. Mostly, they're after women and
weapons, and horses-and whatever lancers they can kill while they're at
it." Nytral lapses into silence.
Lorn looks northward as they pass a
homestead, one with a house that could have been dropped into the outskirts of
Cyad or Syadtar, with its green ceramic privacy screen before the front door,
privacy hedges in the rear of the dwelling, and green shutters. The two
outbuildings are of brick, but larger than those Lorn has seen elsewhere in
Cyador. The one barn is nearly a hundred cubits long and twenty high-at the top
of its tiled roof.
Even after riding two kays into the valley,
Lorn has to squint against the glare of the late afternoon sun for a time
before he can make out the general outline of the outpost, far larger in the
ground it covers than the compound in Syadtar or the officers' training base in
Kynstaar.
After another kay or so, Nytral offers,
"There, ser, you can see it better."
The outpost has been built around a hillock
at the west end of the long and shallow valley. The outer sunstone walls are a
good eight cubits high and enclose corrals, barns, and an inner wall that holds
an armory, and several long barracks-all built of stone and roofed in tile. On
the lower part of the hillside, Lorn can see both a raised water cistern and
what appears to be a spring with protective walls running from the spring to
the armory.
"Have the barbarians ever breached the
walls?" asks the undercaptain.
"Stories are that they killed most of
the first garrison, generations back. Emperor said it wouldn't happen again...
so they built Isahl to stop any attack. Patterned after Assyadt, except the
west Jeranyi haven't caused as much trouble in a few years. Anyway... no
attacks... leastwise, haven't happened since."
Lorn nods.
A kay from the outpost, they turn northward
onto a short road leading to the gates in the approximate center of the
southernmost east-west wall. There are four guards stationed at the closed
gates at the end of the road. Two stand outside the closed gates and two above
them on the low parapets. All four watch as the Lorn and the replacement
lancers approach.
Nytral glances at Lorn.
Lorn rides toward the gate alone, offers
the seal ring for inspection to the square-faced and older guard who steps
forward. "Undercaptain Lorn'alt... reporting to Sub-Majer Brevyl with
supplies and replacement lancers."
"Good to see you, ser." The
sentry steps back, and the gates swing open.
Once inside the extensive outer walls,
which could only stop a small raiding party or discourage a larger band of
barbarians, Lorn can see more clearly the second inner wall that surrounds the
main compound, set at the base of the low hill perhaps a third of a kay
northward.
The inner gates, while guarded by a
halfscore of lancers, are open. One steps forward.
"Ser?"
"Yes?" answers Lorn politely.
"Being as you're new, the sub-majer'd
be seeing you afore you go to quarters." The young orderly's voice is
firm, if high.
"Where do I go?" asks Lorn
politely.
"The corner tower in the right...
where there's a guard at the door. There's a hitching post there."
"Thank you." Lorn nods his head,
then urges the mare forward.
A lancer with the double slashes of a
senior squad leader on his sleeves appears from the barracks building closest
to the gate, his eyes lighting on Nytral. "Nytral's back! Even brought
some wagons."
Lorn glances at Nytral. "You can
settle things while I report to the sub-majer?"
"Yes, ser. They'll be fine."
"Thank you."
"My job, ser."
Lorn guides the mare to the right, toward
the tower that indeed has a single guard standing by the square-arched doorway.
There, he dismounts and ties the mare to the unused hitching post, then steps
forward toward the lancer.
"Through the door, ser. Kielt will see
to you, ser."
"Thank you." Lorn steps out of
the mild but chilly wind and into the narrow corridor. A dozen cubits down the
corridor yet another lancer sits at a small table beside a closed door.
Lorn steps forward and offers the seal ring
to the lancer. "Undercaptain Lorn'alt reporting for duty." The
formality of the words sounds almost pompous to Lorn, but he waits.
"One moment, ser." The bearded
older lancer slips through the door and closes it.
He returns almost immediately.
"Sub-Majer Brevyl will see you now, ser." The lancer holds the
ancient but spotless white oak door for Lorn to enter the sub-majer's study.
"Thank you, Kielt." Lorn ignores
the slight flicker of the lancer's eyes and steps through the door.
The study is not large for an officer who
commands an outpost as large as Isahl, for the room is less than fifteen cubits
by ten, and contains but a table-desk, a single scroll case, the wooden
armchair from which Brevyl rises, and four armless straight-backed wooden
chairs that face the desk. There are two other chairs in the corners. High
windows on the wall behind the desk offer the sole source of outside light,
although two wall sconces contain unlit oil lamps.
Sub-Majer Brevyl is a short and slender
man, half a head shorter than Lorn, with a thin white brush mustache. His
short-cut white hair is thick, and his green eyes dominate fine features and an
even nose.
"Ser, Undercaptain Lorn'alt."
Lorn offers the order scroll to the sub-majer.
Brevyl lays the scroll on the corner of the
desk, unopened. "Please sit down, Undercaptain. It is a long ride from
Syadtar." He pauses, then asks, as Lorn seats himself. "Did you see
any barbarians along the road?"
"One group, ser. They were about a kay
away, and they turned north when they saw us."
"Too bad they didn't get closer."
A wry smile crosses the sub-majer's face as he picks up the scroll, unrolls it,
and sits down to read through it. After a moment, he looks at Lorn, all traces
of a smile vanishing from his face. "Do you know why you're here,
Undercaptain Lorn'alt?"
"Because there's nowhere else I can
be," Lorn says evenly. "Except perhaps Pemedra or the Accursed
Forest."
"Or Inividra in the spring or
fall," adds the sub-majer. "And you'll see all four before you make
majer. Without returning to Cyad except on leave between assignments." He
pauses. "Doesn't seem exactly fair, does it?"
Lorn waits, attentively.
"I'd like an answer,
Undercaptain."
"What's considered 'fair' has to defer
to what is necessary for the well-being of Cyad, ser."
A frown replaces the bluff humoring look on
the sub-majer's face. "I didn't ask for a student answer,
Undercaptain."
"Absolute loyalty is required of both
lancers and the Magi'i, ser. Any lancer seeking to become a magus or any
student magus seeking to become a lancer comes from outside and has to
demonstrate both ability and absolute loyalty."
"You're testing my patience."
Lorn represses a sigh. "Ser, it's not
fair. It can't be fair, and you know that, and I know that. Ser... what do you
want from me?"
Brevyl smiles, crookedly. "Just that.
The reasons don't matter. The politics don't matter. Your background and
obvious education don't matter. All that matters is that you know that you'll
get the nastiest assignments you can handle. They won't be more than you can
handle because that wastes lancers and endangers other officers. Are you up to
that, Undercaptain?"
"I don't know, ser. I think I am, but
what I do is what counts."
"You're honest, Undercaptain Lorn.
Let's hope you're as good as you think you are. You'll ride patrols for the
first four eightdays with Zandrey. You'll be the second-in-command, and that
means you do exactly what he says-unless the barbarians get him. You'd better
make sure they don't, because you don't know dung about the way they
operate."
"Yes, ser."
"You listen and you ask questions,
quietly and when there aren't any rankers around. You carry out Zandrey's
orders and learn all you can. It won't be as much as you should know, but it
might be enough if you work hard and learn fast. Do you understand?"
"Yes, ser."
"No..." Brevyl shakes his head.
"All undercaptains just think they understand. On your way out, tell Kielt
to set you up on the officers' level of the barracks, and then go find Zandrey.
He's not on patrol today. He'll be here somewhere."
"Yes, ser."
"Formality is fine, Undercaptain.
Ability and luck count more."
Lorn waits, deciding against another polite
response.
"At least you listen." Brevyl
snorts. "Go get yourself settled. Zandrey's next patrol is the day after
tomorrow."
"Yes, ser. By your leave, ser."
Brevyl gives a dismissive nod, and Lorn
stands, offers a slight bow, and turns. He closes the door behind him.
Outside, Kielt waits, standing beside his
table.
"The sub-majer said that I was to ask
you about being set up on the officers' level of the barracks."
"Very good, ser." Kielt rings the
handbell on the table, turning as another lancer appears. "If you would
take over, Rueggr?"
Rueggr nods once.
Lorn follows Kielt out of the brick-walled
tower. Now that the sun has dropped behind the hills, the wind sweeping out of
the north is chill, and he is glad of the winter jacket.
XXIII
The
officers' study at Isahl contains several flat tables that can serve as desks,
as well as a good half score of battered armless oak chairs. The polished stone
floors are largely covered with worn green wool rugs that take the chill from
the stone and muffle the sound of boots. The south windows are high, but large,
and on a long table against the smooth stones of the north wall are eight large
strongboxes, each with a cupridium lock. Each has a bronze plate on it with the
name of a company. Lorn's company is Fifth Company, and the bronze key to his
lock is fastened inside his green web officer's belt.
He sits on the opposite side of a table
from Captain Zandrey. Zandrey is black-haired, brown-eyed and stocky. Like most
lancer officers, he is clean-shaven, but in the afternoon light, his dark beard
is beginning to show. "Sub-Majer Brevyl has decided that Nytral will be
your company squad leader. Each squad is a score, and there's a squad leader
for each."
Lorn nods, wondering if it had taken a
promotion for Nytral to agree to serve under Lorn. He almost shook his head.
Nytral could have been ordered to serve. Was the promotion to encourage Nytral?
"You look skeptical, Lorn."
"No, ser. I just wondered about
Nytral's promotion." Lorn tries to make his voice as guileless as
possible.
"He was overdue, actually."
Zandrey snort. "Rumor has it that he asked to serve under you, and Brevyl
was so surprised that the man volunteered for anything that he promoted him on
the spot."
"He seems to know a lot," Lorn
ventures.
"He does, more than most of the senior
squad leaders, but he says what he believes, and some officers and other squad
leaders are less than pleased with his attitude."
"Right now, that's fine with me."
Lorn nods. "What about the patrol tomorrow? What exactly do we do?"
"Patrol." The captain laughs.
"We'll ride northward, looking for barbarians or signs that they've been
around. We might see some, and we might not, but they'll know we've been
looking. The one thing that is certain is that when we don't patrol, there are
more raids."
"Nytral said that the barbarians were
mostly after women, weapons, and mounts."
"He's mostly right, but they'll
sometimes take children, and sometimes silvers and golds, if a homesteader has
any."
Lorn frowns.
"You wonder why anyone lives out here?
Simple. They don't have any choice. Thieves, swindlers, and people who've
failed the Empire-if they haven't killed anyone, they can choose to homestead
beyond the great highways for a score of years. Some like it and stay. Others
leave, but sometimes they work a deal with someone in Syadtar-turn it over to a
younger son or a troublemaker who's headed for worse. Anyway, we're here to
protect them as well as the towns and cities farther south. Strange, when you
think about it... protecting folks who've forfeited the Emperor's
justice." Zandrey shrugs. "Can't question too much here, or you'll
end up questioning your own mind."
"Is there anything about the barbarian
tactics?"
"Tactics? Most wouldn't know a tactic
if it walked up with a cuprid-ium blade and cut them out of the saddle."
"That would seem to make them
unpredictable."
"I wouldn't say that," replies
the captain. "They're direct-like a big iron hammer. And there is one
thing you can count on with the barbarians. They don't believe in doing
anything that's not honorable." Zandrey's word were dry. "In two
years here, I've never seen an ambush. They don't attack at night, or in the
rain or snow. They ride at you, but they don't cluster, and they don't try to
pick off officers. They also don't back off attacking officers. Any Cyadoran is
like any other, and they hate us all."
Lorn wonders why. From what he knows of
history, the hatred makes no sense, and that means he doesn't know enough of
history or that the barbarians are irrational. Somehow, he thinks that the
history is more suspect than the barbarians' rationality.
Zandrey stands and stretches. "Go over
your squad rosters until you know the names. Last thing you need to be doing on
patrol is trying to remember names. It's hard enough to match names to faces at
first."
Lorn stands and replies. "Yes,
ser."
"And you'll need to check the
firelances in the morning, each one as it's issued."
Lorn nods.
"See you at dinner."
Lorn waits until Zandrey turns before
letting an ironic smile cross his face. Are all the outcasts on the northern
border? He shakes his head before turning to head toward the stable to check on
both his mare and his company's mounts.
XXIV
Under
thick gray clouds, the mist seems to billow out of the north and across the
brown grass of the endless hills. Although it is near mid-day, the clouds and
mist give the impression of twilight. The mist droplets congeal on the back of
Lorn's neck and then roll in tiny rivulets down his back under the white oiled
leather of his winter jacket.
Lorn shifts from one leg to the other,
putting his weight on one stirrup, then the other. He half-stands in the
stirrups, just trying to stretch his legs.
They are less than twenty kays north of
Isahl, and in another world. The patrol travels a narrow clay path on the north
side of a valley that holds little besides a small brackish lake they had
passed earlier, and a handful of scattered earth-brick dwellings and barns. The
dwellings are scarcely that, without privacy screens or glass in the windows.
Rough cut and oiled shutters, often pieced together from old boards, are swung
closed against the damp and chill. The thin lines of smoke from the chimneys
are lost in the gray of the clouds and mist.
The only living creatures visible besides
the lancers and their mounts are the sheep of a single small herd-grayish lumps
against the brown grass-beyond the last barn on the south side of the road.
So far, the only tracks in the road are
those of the patrol and of a single cart that has left span-deep ruts in the
clay-like mud that has almost frozen.
Lorn glances a half-kay or so ahead, where
Zandrey leads the Third Company, then back along his company's two squads. For
the moment, Nytral rides with Shofirg-the Second squad's leader. Beside Lorn is
another older lancer, Dubrez, whose bearded face holds a dourness that has been
unchanged since the patrol began the day before.
The
road slowly curves northward at the west end of the valley, rising to pass
between two slightly lower hills, where they are a handful of scrub cedars, a
few bushes and mostly taller grass.
"This place have a name?" Lorn
finally asks Dubrez.
"This valley? Not that I know, ser.
Most don't, not proper-like. This one's the valley with the sour lake. Next is
the one with the burned-out house. That sort of thing..." Dubrez lapses
into silence.
Lorn shifts the reins from his right hand
to his left, flexing his fingers, trying to warm them inside thick white gloves
that keep out the worst of the chill-but not all of it.
Cold and fat droplets of rain splat against
lancers and their mounts, just enough to cover both with a thin sheet of water,
before the cold rain ceases, and is in turn replaced by the finer droplets of
the seemingly endless mist.
"How often are we likely to run across
barbarians?" Lorn asks the squad leader quietly.
"Don't, ser. Not in winter."
Durbrez to the hills to their right. "Up there, probably a few now. Or
could be. We don't patrol, and in an eight-day, there'll be raiders in most of
these valleys. Wintertime... they don't want to fight, and it be too cold for
them to stay out too long and guess where we'll be. We patrol... they watch
some. We don't patrol-they raid. Dung-eaters... every last one of 'em."
The squad leader grunts and is silent.
Lorn studies the column ahead, and the
faint puffs of white coming from the lancers' mounts, wondering if any raids
take place during the winter, or if the patrols are just to keep the lancers in
shape.
"Be some raids," Dubrez adds, as
if he has thought about his earlier words. "Some raiders desperate...
maybe two or three every winter... not like the spring and summer and fall,
though."
Three or four raids-and those are
considered as insignificant? Lorn looks northward at the darkening clouds.
XXV
As he
half-listens to Nytral, on yet another patrol, Lorn studies the road and the
west end of the valley they are about to leave. The road curves northward,
again rising into the lowest point between two hills. Directly to Lorn's right,
there is a sheep path or trail that angles eastward through two switchbacks and
over the hill, probably into the next valley in what seems an endless series of
hills and interlocked valleys. The cold wind is scarcely more than a breeze,
but it still chills Lorn's ears, despite the winter garrison cap with the
ear-flaps.
"...just can't ever tell, ser... might
be a raid now... might not be one for eightdays," declares Nytral, as he
rides beside Lorn in the chill, gray, and sunless afternoon. With the last of
his words, the senior squad leader offers a shrug.
Lorn nods faintly at the phrases he has
heard more than a few times over the past three eightdays, then glances
northward at the sound of hoofs thudding on the frozen clay of the road. A
lancer gallops southeast from the Third Company toward Lorn and Nytral, steam
puffing from his mount's nostrils.
"Never can tell, ser, but that'd be
looking like a raid the scouts found."
Not about to second-guess his senior squad
leader, Lorn just keeps riding until the lancer reins up.
"Ser... there's raiders over the hill,
spoiling a herder's place. Captain Zandrey's orders be for your company to ride
the path there, along the ridge, and then start down toward the herder's place.
Says you be making noise so as to spook 'em out along the road, and that's
where he'll be."
"Tell Captain Zandrey that we'll be
following his orders."
"Yes, ser." The lancer offers a
head bow, then turns his mount.
Lorn glances at Nytral, who smiles
crookedly.
"Fifth Company! We're taking that
sheep trail-two abreast!" Lorn orders.
"Yes, ser!" answers Dubrez, the
squad leader riding directly behind Lorn.
"I'll ride back and tell Shofirg,
ser," offers Nytral.
Lorn nods as he guides his mount northward
across the brown grass toward the trail that begins perhaps a half-kay
northward of the road. The frozen brown grass crackles under the mare's hoofs,
and a few murmurs drift to Lorn on the light cold wind.
"...they get the road... we climb goat
paths..."
"...leastwise... undercaptain's up
front..."
"...supposed to be there..."
The trail is steeper and narrower than it had
appeared from the road, so that the lancers ride single file. The sound of
hoofs scrabbling on the frozen clay mixes with the mumbles of lancers, pitched
low enough that Lorn can no longer distinguish anything but the general tone of
dissatisfaction. He glances back, but the Third Company has vanished into the
pass between the two hills.
The wind is stronger nearer the crest of
the hill, and when Lorn finally reaches the top and is about to look down on
the next valley, the chill gusts almost take his breath away. Below them the
sheep path meanders downhill through a series of switchbacks to a small valley,
an oval no more than two kays across at the widest point and less than four
kays along its east-west length. A single clump of buildings set beside a long
pond are the only sign of settlement-except for the dozen or so horsemen reined
up outside the largest building, while other figures scurry around a long and
narrow sod barn.
Lorn urges the mare into a slightly faster
walk, the best he dares on the steep and hard ground of the path. His eyes
flick from the path to the holding, and then to the line of lancers that
follows him down the slope.
Nytral and Lorn have reached the second
switchback on the way down the northern side of the hill when screams reach
them-carried on the light wind. Lorn looks westward toward where the road
enters the valley, but the undercaptain cannot see Zandrey's company, and he
wonders where the Third Company might be, since taking the road surely had to
have been quicker than crossing a frozen field and then climbing and descending
the hill.
One of the raiders gestures, as if to note
Lorn's company of lancers, but none of the raiders seem to stop their
depredations-and another scream wavers through the chill air.
"Bastards, they are. Every last one of
'em," mumbles Nytral.
"They know we can't reach them
quickly." Lorn still looks for Zandrey, but cannot see the Third Company
anywhere. Is there a bridge down... or another group of raiders? Or is Zandrey
going to let Lorn make the first attack?
As the last of the Fifth Company descends
the path, finally lining up in formation, and begins its advance, the
barbarians suddenly mount and begin to ride westward-away from Lorn.
"They're running!" comes a yell
from behind Lorn.
"For now," counters Nytral.
"Hold formation!"
"Hold formation!" Lorn orders as
well.
As the Fifth Company reaches a flatter area
of brown grass perhaps five hundred cubits south of the midpoint of the long
pond, a series of flashes appears to the west-flashes of firelances.
Lorn conceals a frown. Has Zandrey been
waiting beyond the low rise all along-letting the holders be killed and
tortured-until Lorn charged the raiders into ambush?
"Third Company's got 'em!"
"Hold formation!" Nytral orders again.
As his Mirror Lancers near the holding
itself, Lorn studies the ground, noting the closeness of the earthen dike that
holds back the waters of the shallow pond, and the narrow space between the
northern end of the pond, and the steeper hills that define the northern side
of the valley.
The firelances of the Third Company flash
again, and amid the flashes come the screams-of mounts-not of men.
Close to half a score of the raiders wheel
their mounts and turn away from Zandrey's firelances, heading toward the
northeast, as if to circle the frozen and narrow pond that extends almost a
half-kay to the north, even though it was created by an earthen dike no more
than four cubits high.
Lorn glances at the raiders' course, and
then at the pond, and the orders seem obvious, so obvious that his words seem
ponderous and slow. "Dubrez! Take your squad around that pond! On the far
side!"
"Yes, ser!" Dubrez offers Lorn
the first smile the undercaptain has seen from the dour veteran.
"We'll take this side in case they
turn," Lorn tells Nytral.
"Best send a half-score along the edge
of the pond on this side," suggests Nytral.
"It's that shallow?"
"Yes, ser."
"Do it!"
"Shofirg!" bellows Nytral.
"Take a half-score on this side of the pond, up toward the north
end."
"Yes, ser!"
"We'll take the rest down this
side."
Lorn, Nytral, and the remaining half-score
of Shofirg's squad quick-trot southward along the southern and western edge of the
long pond. They near the holding buildings and ride toward the melee that now
seems to involve all of Zandrey's company and all the raiders except the
handful that had already fled.
Suddenly, two more riders in leathers turn
their mounts from the melee and begin to gallop toward the pond, heading
eastward and almost directly in front of Lorn and the half squad that rides
behind him. As the pair sees the small squad, they veer more toward Lorn's
right, trying to ride between the lancers and the frozen pond.
Lorn turns the mare nearly due north and
urges her into a gallop, half aware that Nytral and the other ten riders have
fallen back momentarily.
As they race eastward, the two raiders lean
forward in their saddles, yet manage to draw long blades that glisten like
order death, even while spurring their mounts toward the low embankment that
forms the south side of the pond. Lorn leans forward, giving the mare her head.
Both raiders rein up, and seeing the single
lancer officer, turn and charge Lorn.
With a cold smile, Lorn reins up the mare.
By the time she has halted, the raiders are less than a hundred cubits from
him, and closing rapidly. He pulls his own firelance from the holder and levels
it at the left rider of the pair.
Hssst! The reddish-white chaos-bolt bisects
the barbarian chest-high.
Hssst! The second bolt takes the right
shoulder and the head of the second raider.
The two raider mounts slow to a walk, as if
hampered by the limp figures slumping in their saddles.
"...order dung!"
"...never seen an officer do
that..."
Lorn hears the comments, but keeps the
lance leveled for a few moments longer before flicking the fire stud to the
safety position and replacing the weapon in its holder. The acrid and metallic
scent of chaos fills his nostrils for a moment, then is carried off by a gust
of cold wind. He turns the mare slowly as Nytral and the rest of the squad rein
up. "Have someone get those mounts."
"Ah... yes, ser." The senior
squad leader gestures. "Get the mounts!"
"Yes, ser!"
Nytral's face is stiff, not quite pale, as
he looks at his undercaptain. "Ser... that must 'a been a good hundred
cubits."
"More like seventy." Lorn knows
his smile is lopsided, knows that he should have waited until the riders were
closer. "Might have been a bit lucky."
"...once... luck... not twice..."
Nytral's eyes go to the lancer whose voice
had carried, and the eight lancers all close their mouths. The remaining two
farther east, leading back two riderless mounts.
Lorn looks to the northeast, where the
flashes of firelances have died away. He gestures toward Nytral. "Let's
make sure everything's right with Dubrez and Shofirg."
"Follow the undercaptain!" Nytral
orders.
Lorn lets the mare walk evenly back
eastward along the southern side of the pond.
Dubrez and his squad are formed up at the
northeast end of the iced-over pond. Shofirg and the half squad he had taken
have already joined with Dubrez's squad, and Shofirg offers a head bow to Lorn
as the undercaptain nears. Lorn returns the gesture. After searching the dead
raiders, several lancers mount hurriedly, without looking in Lorn's direction.
One lancer's saddle is empty-or rather two
lancers are strapping a lancer's body across it. Two other lancers are tying
seven mounts into a tieline of sorts. Three other mounts are loping northward,
the steam of their breath lost against the frosted brown of the hills.
"Stopped 'em all, ser. Fought like
black angels, but did 'em no good." Dubrez gestures. "Got some
mounts, too. Leastwise, good for cart horses or the knackers."
"I imagine the sub-majer will decide
that," Lorn says. "You did a good job."
"What we're here to do, ser."
Dubrez pauses. "Any come your way, ser?"
"Just two," Lorn answers.
"We stopped them. You and your men did the hard work." He gestures
toward the southwest. "Let's head back to the homestead there and join up
with the Third Company."
"Yes, ser."
"Four abreast!" orders Nytral.
"Column by fours!" echo Shofirg
and Dubrez.
"Captured mounts to the rear,"
adds Nytral.
For a time, the only sounds are those of
the mounts' heavy breathing and their hoofs on the frozen ground.
"Are the raiders always like that in
the winter?" asks Lorn.
"Pretty much, ser." answers
Nytral. "They'll run if they can, and fight if they can't. In the spring
and summer, they fight. Don't ever seem to run then."
Lorn nods, his eyes searching the area to
the west, but the slight rise beyond the holding blocks any view of the Fifth
Company, and there are no flashes that would indicate the use of firelances.
As they ride westward, past the dike and
the end of the stock pond-if that is what it is-Lorn studies the buildings of
the holding. The door of the house hangs crookedly on one iron strap hinge, and
a single figure in gray lies beside the door. Lorn cannot tell whether the
corpse is a man or a woman. Another dark-haired figure lies on a bale of hay
beside the barn door. That figure is of a girl, one not yet a woman, all
clothes ripped off her. Lorn swallows as he sees the slash across her throat.
He swallows again.
As they reach the west side of the holding,
beyond the barn, Lorn can see over the rise where the Third Company has formed
up. Zandrey's lancers are walking their mounts toward the holding and Lorn's
company.
As the captain sees Lorn and his company,
Zandrey gestures for the Fifth Company to halt.
"Halt them," Lorn tiredly tells
Nytral.
"Company halt!" orders Nytral.
"Squad halt," echo Shofirg and
Dubrez.
Zandrey rides up toward Lorn, and Lorn
continues toward the captain. Both officers rein up with less than a score of
cubits between their mounts.
Lorn's eyes are flat, cold, as he waits for
the senior officer to speak.
"Good job!" booms Zandrey.
"Not a one got away. Most of the time, we can't do that with one company,
and some escape."
Lorn nods.
"You did just the right thing in
charging them toward us," Zandrey continues. "Too bad about the
peasant holders, but if we'd have charged before you got down the hill, most of
the raiders would have escaped."
The wind whines, and the chill drops around
Lorn. He glances up to see that, sometime during the fighting, the sun has
dropped behind the hills to the west, and the cold of winter in the Grass Hills
had returned.
"We'll overnight here," Zandrey
says. "Barn's big enough for the men, and the dwelling for us and the
squad leaders."
Lorn nods, unwilling to speak for the
moment, his thoughts on the dark-haired, dead herder girl not that much younger
than his own sister Myryan... and the charge that Zandrey had never considered
making.
XXVI
In the dimness of his cold quarters, under
the flame of a single lamp, Lorn sits on the edge of the narrow bed, holding a
green-silvered book, marvelling at the clarity of the angled characters that
date back to the founders. The cover remains pristine, unmarked, its silver
shifting from one faint shade of green to another as he turns it in his hands.
With all he has had to learn, and the tiredness that comes from that and
seemingly endless riding, he has read little. He looks at the back cover, but
it too is untouched by time.
Yet the slim volume is missing two pages,
and Lorn suspects that one would have been a title page and the other would
have born the name of the writer, for there are no inscriptions anywhere within
it that say when the book was written or for what purpose or by whom. There are
no numbers, no strange cursives or codes. There are just the poems, and no one
in Cyad writes poems, not publicly, not that Lorn knows. And no one has in
generations, at least not poems shared beyond a family or a lover, and not that
there is any restriction on writing them. It is just not done.
His lips curl. Just as it is not written
that a student mage who is not properly reverential shall not become a full
mage.
He fingers the pages of the book again. He
can scarcely see where the cuts had been made to remove the pages, and the
material of each page seems stronger than shimmercloth. No knife he knows would
cut such tough material so cleanly. But the pages have been removed.
He opens the volume, almost at random. He
has promised to read it, every page. He knows Ryalth must have had a reason, a
reason well beyond sentiment, for though she has feelings, those emotions will
not betray her.
He reads the words on the page before him
once. Somehow, unspoken, they are not satisfactory. He murmurs them softly as
he reads them again.
Although the old lands are in my heart,
in towers that anchored life with certain
art,
in eyes that will not again see bold
the hills of Angloria or surf at
Winterhold,
I greet the coming evening, and the night,
proud purple from the strange and setting
sun
and the towered ragged course that I have
run,
towers yet that hold the chaos of life,
and struggle with order's unending strife,
for endless may they hold our light
against the long and coming night.
Worlds change, I'm told,
mirror silver to heavy gold,
and the new becomes the old,
with the way the story's told.
Lorn shakes his head. The words, or most of
them, are familiar, but hint at a meaning beyond the obvious. Yet Ryalth had
asked a question when she had given him the book. What were the Firstborn like?
Will the volume in his hands tell Lorn
that?
The lancer undercaptain slowly closes the
ancient yet ageless volume. He will read more. In time. He has years at Isahl.
Years.
XXVII
Despite
the clear green-blue sky, and a bright sun nearly at its noon zenith, the
winter wind whistles out of the northeast, chilling Lorn's cheeks and ears,
driving through the light earflaps on his white winter garrison cap. A faint
dusting of snow lies scattered on bare patches of ground beyond the shoulder of
the road and on the brown grass that stretches toward the lonely single hut and
barn to the south of the road that is less than a narrow cart track.
The hoofs of the lancers' mounts clunk
faintly on the frozen clay of the road that stretches northeast past the single
stead toward a gap between two hills. Beyond those hills, according to Nytral
and the maps, lies another valley, one where three families raise black-wooled
sheep and some few field crops.
Using his chaos senses, Lorn practices listening to the comments
of the lancers in the first company behind him.
"...winter patrols..."
"...lot of riding... last eightday...
first raiders all winter..."
"...probably the last, too..."
"...like that last winter... two
bunches all winter... turned and rode away."
"...let the undercaptain hear that...
or the sub-majer... be riding every patrol till you hit the Steps."
"...lancers don't hit the Steps to
Paradise... get buried under 'em... Drext... even the officers."
"Specially the officers." A low
laugh follows.
Nytral, riding beside Lorn for the moment,
turns in the saddle, and the murmurs die away. The only sounds are the low
whistle of the wind, the whuffing of mounts, and the dull clumping of hoofs on
the frozen road.
Lorn smiles at Nytral. "Officers are
the ones who send them out on winter patrols."
"You hear more than most officers,
ser. That'd not be always good."
"So long as I know what they think,
and so long as I listen to you and my own judgment, knowing what they think is
better than not knowing."
Nytral frowns momentarily.
One of the lancers earlier sent forward as
a scout reappears on the road leading to the gap in the hills, but he rides
southeast toward the Fifth Company with the measured pace that indicates he has
found nothing disturbing ahead. Since the patrol is but Lorn's second alone,
the under-captain is perfectly willing not to be riding into trouble with
barbarian raiders.
"Looks good, ser," observes
Nytral.
"That's fine."
The scout turns his mount to ride beside
Lorn, and Nytral guides his mount to the scout's right.
"What did you find?" Lorn asks.
"Road's clear to the holding in the
next valley, sers," the lancer reports. "No hoofprints on the road or
the grass. Herders are out some, one or two, anyways."
"Good," grunts Nytral. "What
about fires... cookfires?"
"Fires from most of the chimneys,
maybe all. Could smell something cooking."
Both Lorn and Nytral nod, nearly
simultaneously.
Once the column, rising two abreast on the
frozen road, reaches the low crest that overlooks the next valley, Lorn again
studies the valley, trying to fix the details in his mind, hoping that he can,
and knowing that the more he can retain, the better the chances for his success
and survival over the years ahead. On a slight rise in the middle of the valley
are dwellings clustered together and surrounded by an earthen dike tall enough
to seem high from where the company rides nearly three kays away. The whitish
smoke from the chimneys is blown into a low line that stretches from the
northeast to the southwest.
"Cold as a trader's heart at tariff
time it be, ser," offers Dubrez, riding behind Lorn and to his left.
"Or a lancer's blade in winter?"
asks Lorn.
"Colder'n a good lancer's blade,
ser."
Nytral laughs once.
Lorn merely nods.
Below the crest, the road turns more
directly eastward, and they travel another kay before they begin to near the
earthworks in the center of the elongated oval valley. The earthworks are not
insubstantial for a small holding, rising a good six cubits above the level
ground, and close to nine above the base of the shallow ditch on the outer side
of the earthen wall.
"It wouldn't be easy for the
barbarians to get over that," Lorn observes.
"Easy enough to climb, but the old man
here was an archer for the Mirror Foot years back. Taught his kin."
"So the barbarians could climb over,
but they'd have to leave mounts behind, and a handful of men and women with
bows could pick off most of them?"
"Don't know as most, ser, but raiding
parties are not often more than two or three score, five maybe sometimes, and
they'd lose maybe a score, and get little enough... some sheep, a woman or two,
maybe a young girl, and some flour and maize, and fewer mounts than they'd lose
in a raid."
A single herder stands by the open gate on
the west end of the earthworks, apparently the sole means of entry to the
holding. The herder beckons toward the gate, and Lorn and Nytral guide their
mounts toward the man in the sheepskin jacket and leather trousers.
"Might as well bring your patrol
inside the dike, sers," calls the herder.
"Thank you," Lorn responds. As he
rides through the open, but narrow, timbered gate, Lorn notes the huge pile of
rocks on the top of the earthworks, and the chutes that would funnel those
rocks behind the gate. He shakes his head at the amount of effort behind the
herders' defenses.
The single visible herd of sheep is
clustered in a corral beside a long and low, sod-walled barn, and the corral is
well inside the earthen dike that protects the holding. The man who has
beckoned them also wears a bulky hat with heavy earflaps that Lorn momentarily
envies. The local lumbers toward them as Lorn and Nytral-and the Fifth
Company-rein up and wait.
"Greetings there, sers!" calls
the herder. "Leastwise, you picked a sunny day to visit Ram's End."
"Greetings," Lorn returns.
"Hear tell that there were raiders
west 'a here..." The white-bearded herder looks at Lorn but briefly, then
drops his eyes.
"There were," Lorn admits.
"They killed everyone in a holding. We caught and killed them all."
"All?"
"Every last one, and the undercaptain
killed two himself," snaps Nytral.
The herder shivers, a gesture visible
despite his heavy coat and hat. "Come spring, their kin'll ride for
blood."
"They ride for blood anyway,"
Nytral points out, a harsh laugh following his words. "This springtime,
there'll be fewer riding."
"Fewer raiders are always better for
us-specially for the herds."
"They pick off animals?"
"Last time they came into the dike,
they lost near-on a score. We lost not a soul." The herder shrugs.
"Be five years back or so. Figure they'll be forgetting afore too
long."
"Their memories aren't that
long," Nytral agrees.
Lorn glances at the lancers of his company,
sensing their cold and impatience, then looks directly at the herder, waiting.
As he receives the long searching glance of
the undercaptain, the white-bearded herder clears his throat, once, twice,
before finally speaking. "Sers... we be a poor folk not to offer... but...
we be not wealthy, either. But bread and some mutton stew we could spare for
you and your men."
Lorn glances at Nytral, catching the minute
nod. "We would welcome that, but only what you can spare." He pauses,
then adds, "and perhaps the use of your barn to let them warm themselves
before we ride on."
"Might as have to take turns, sers...
with two score mounts...." The herder offers a crooked grin. "But
seeing as we're glad to have a patrol now and again...."
"And you'd like us to come back a lot
more in the spring?" Lorn grins. The herder grins back. "Can't say as
any of us'd mind such."
"We'll accept your hospitality,
herder-but only for a bit." Lorn nods to Nytral.
"First squad... you'll eat and warm
first! Shofirg, have 'em follow the herder! Second squad..."
Lorn remains in the saddle, waiting to eat
and warm himself with Dubrez's squad. His eyes look to the frozen hills that
barely seem to rise above the earthworks of Ram's End, the Grass Hills that
shelter all too many barbarians, he fears.
XXVIII
Lorn
sits at the corner desk in the officers' study, the one in the northwest
corner-where the chill and the wind seep in around the high window overhead and
plummet down to make it the coldest spot in the room. Even the low fire, fed by
both dried dung and the peat dug by the lancers on disciplinary duty, fails to
lift all the chill out of the study.
The undercaptain reads over the words of
his last report, ignoring the drafty chill at his back and upon his neck,
wanting to ensure that Overcaptain Chyorst and Sub-Majer Brevyl will have
little to criticize-or at least as little as Lorn can manage.
...The
valleys to the west of Ram's End showed no sign of raiders, and the people
there had not reported seeing any barbarians in the past four eightdays...
...Two
mounts were lamed from being ridden and slipping on the icy surface of the road
beyond Eryutn...
Lorn looks down at the words again and
frowns, then glances at the notes he had jotted down at the end of each day of
patroling. There should be more to report, but he can think of nothing, nothing
to convey the chill and the empty kays that had followed one after another as
the Fifth Company has ridden patrol after patrol for the past four eightdays.
One raid more than five eightdays before, and empty roads and empty hills ever
since.
As the chill of a screeing glass sweeps
over him, Lorn freezes momentarily, then looks at the report he holds once
more, studying it until the unseen inner chill passes. That chill is clearly
not felt by any but him, and certainly not by the three captains clustered
around the next desk, sharing several bottles of wine that one has brought back
from his midwinter furlough-a luxury Lorn will not see until after his first
complete year at Isahl.
Lorn half-hears their words as he looks up
from the last words of the report that will go to Sub-Majer Brevyl in the
morning.
"...that double patrol put a stop to
their raids..."
"...can't do double patrols all the
time... too many areas don't get covered, and they'll know it...." The
squat and swarthy captain who replies to Zandrey's observation is Jostyn, an
officer Lorn knows only from the officers' dining hall.
"Barbarians know too much,"
suggests Eghyr, a blond and rail-thin captain who always has a smile on his
lips, but seldom in his eyes.
"They just watch, and when we go one
way, they go the other." Zandrey takes a small sip from the goblet, still
nearly half full for all that the three have been drinking ever since dinner.
"Lorn!" calls Jostyn, lifting a
hand and beckoning to the undercaptain. "You can't write reports all
night. Have a glass with us...."
"We'd like you to share some of this
Alafraan," adds Zandrey more temperately. "We don't get it that
often, and it'll spoil by the time I get back from patrol."
"You could leave it for us,"
counters Jostyn. "Warm us up with the coldest part of the winter yet to
come."
"Not the coldest," corrects
Eghyr. "The longest, but not the coldest."
Lorn sets the report face down on his desk
and pulls his chair over to the corner of the desk where the three are seated.
"Lorn will enjoy his first glass more
than you'll enjoy your fifth," says Zandrey with a laugh, pouring a goblet
he has produced from somewhere half-full and handing it to the undercaptain.
"Thank you." Lorn takes the
goblet with a smile, lifts it in salute to the three and takes a very small
swallow. The amber wine tastes warmer than it is, with a hint of both
pearapples and trilia... and something else that he cannot identify. "It's
good."
"Far better than what we usually
get," comments Eghyr, "thanks to Zandrey."
"My uncle's a vintner in Escadr."
"If this is his wine, he is very
good." Lorn has never heard of Escadr, and he had thought he knew nearly
every town in Cyador.
"He is good, even if no one's heard of
Escadr. It's a tiny little town south and east of Biehl-not all that far from
the rugged part of the Grass Hills way to the northwest," explains
Zandrey. "And I tell everyone that because no one's ever heard of
it."
"He said the same thing when he
offered the first bottle," interjects Eghyr.
Lorn nods and takes a second, smaller sip.
The Alafraan is indeed excellent, far too good for a Lancer outpost at the base
of the Grass Hills.
"City lancers never appreciate a
bottle of Alafraan," mumbles Jostyn, cradling his goblet. "Don't know
what it is to ride a Patrol through the Grass Hills-or watch the white walls of
the Accursed Forest for some giant stun lizard or cat big enough to cross the
wards and take cattle or sheep."
"You haven't patrolled the Accursed
Forest." Eghyr laughs gently, but coldly.
"Sasym did. Saw both."
"He probably did, but he wasn't much
good with a lance, and that's..." Zandrey breaks off his comment with a
shrug.
"You stay here for even a year, and
you'll never be a city lancer again," says Jostyn, nodding toward Lorn.
"All of 'em in Cyad... just city lancers."
"Not all," observes Eghyr.
"Captain-Commander Luss'alt and Majer-Commander Rynst'alt served in every
Grass Hills and Accursed Forest post."
Lorn does not ask how Eghyr knows, but
resolves to be most careful around the blond captain.
"Maybe that's why they're where they
are," suggests Zandrey.
Eghyr casts a quick glance at the stocky
Zandrey.
Zandrey's brown eyes reveal nothing as he
lifts his goblet for another sip of the Alafraan, a swallow that seems far
larger than it is.
"That's the big secret, you
know," adds Jostyn, his words even more slurred. "Most lancer
officers are city lancers... never spent any real time on the borders, never seen
a barbarian across the shimmer of a blade...."
Lorn nods, but his eyes and attention are
on Eghyr and Zandrey.
XXIX
The
Empress Ryenyel affixes the silver clips to her thick and dark red hair, hair
too coarse by the standards of Cyad had any one seen it closely or dared to
comment upon it. She studies her freckled visage in the shimmering cupridium
mirror set in its silver stand upon the glistening marble vanity before
straightening. The half-length mirror reveals a figure somewhat too full to be
called imperially slim.
She turns and walks from her robing chamber
into the salon where the Emperor waits, standing before the long white divan in
his silver audience robes.
His eyes flicker appreciatively from her to
the divan.
She laughs. "I doubt we have the
moments for that, my dear, but I thank you for an expression dearer than
words."
The slightest flush suffuses his face, then
fades. "Would that there were more such moments, Ryenyel."
"I would wish such, also." She
pauses. "You appear most impressive, dear one. As always. What audience
awaits you this afternoon?"
The light wind that brings the early and
warm spring air into the Palace of Light whispers through the half-open window,
bringing the renewed fragrances of trilia and aramyd, and the Emperor Toziel
glances past his consort toward the tinted panes of that eastern window, the
one overlooking the Quarter of the Magi'i. His eyes focus on the chaos- and
age-whitened granite buildings, and he shakes his head ever so slightly.
"I must-we must-again review the conditions of trade with Hamor and
Austra, and the pirate-traders of Hydlen and Lydiar. I have asked Chyenfel for
greater particulars about his... project... but particulars seem to turn to
smoke when I inquire." Toziel laughs ruefully.
"I take it that Rynst and Chyenfel
still maneuver over the firelance that never was, and attempt to discover who
might be the current Hand," the Empress murmurs as she steps forward and
kisses her consort softly on his left cheek.
"Or if the incident was caused by a
renegade magus unreported by the Magi'i." Toziel chuckles. "Come... I
need you to listen to the latest innuendos and veiled threats."
"After these years of my accompanying
you, one would think he would know my modest role or who the Hand might
be...." the Empress begins.
"He doubtless must, but it is best not
to mention the name, my dear. Chyenfel can use a chaos glass to see where he is
not, and he reads lips, and others may as well."
"I doubt he is that accurate, love. He
does not ever talk about the chaos glasses and their accuracy, and he would do
so if he dared." A quirky smile appears on Ryenyel's lips.
"It is to his benefit, and ours, not
to say aloud what his glass may show." Toziel steps toward the door that
leads to the private corridor that will take them to the audience chamber,
holding it for her.
"So gallant... yet." Her smile is
warm and affectionate.
"I am merely the Emperor. Chyenfel and
Rynst are the gallant ones, striving to save Cyador from enemies without and
within."
"And Chyenfel will present his facts
most carefully...." A smile crosses Ryenyel's generous mouth. "Then
Rynst will ask a few gentle but revealing questions, and Bluoyal will look at
each densely, as if their words make no sense."
Toziel smiles at his consort. "That is
why you accompany me, and why the Hand must remain in the shadows, for I need
you both."
Their feet barely seem to brush the
polished white stones of the corridor as they glide toward the audience
chamber, preceded by a pair of Palace Guards and followed by a second pair. All
four guards carry small firelances and, since they are not Mirror Lancers, wear
green uniforms edged in silver trim.
The door opens as the Emperor and his consort
approach the Lesser Audience Hall, then closes behind them. Toziel gracefully
takes the sculpted malachite and silver chair on the dais, while Ryenyel seats
herself in a silvered chair a pace back and to his right. The marble floor of
the audience hall glistens in the light that pours down from the high oval
windows.
The three advisors wait-the gray-haired
Rynst, Majer-Commander of the Mirror Lancers; the almost-delicate, but
steel-willed and sun-eyed Chyenfel, High Lector and First Magus; and the heavy-eyed
and ponderous Bluoyal, First Merchanter.
Toziel nods, then speaks. "Have each
of you finished your investigations surrounding last fall's murder of the
outland trader?" The Emperor looks at Chyenfel.
"An investigation cannot be termed complete
without a resolution," offers the High Lector. "The weapon and its
wielder have not been located. The loss to the Treasury from having to purchase
goods from the Austrans has amounted to more than a thousand golds in less than
a full season."
"That would be a significant loss over
time, it is true, were it to continue," muses the Emperor, his fingers
brushing his chin.
"Most significant," agrees
Chyenfel.
"What words might you add,
Majer-Commander?" Toziel tilts his head toward the head of the Mirror
Lancers.
"Every chaos weapon in the armory has
been accounted for-and so has every Lancer who has ever carried one in Cyad,
Your Mightiness." Rynst smiles. "Unlike every Magus."
Ignoring the faint emphasis on the word
"Lancer," the Emperor of Light straightens in the malachite and
silver chair.
"Ah..." Bluoyal clears his throat
gently.
"Yes, Merchanter Advisor
Bluoyal?" The Emperor's baritone is clear, mildly inquisitive.
"Ah..." Bluoyal extends a scroll.
"I have taken the liberty of making my own inquiries, and I trust that you
will find them helpful in considering the most sagacious advice of the First
Magus and the Majer-Commander of Mirror Lancers."
Neither Rynst nor Chyenfel looks at the
older merchanter. Toziel lets the guard at his left hand take the scroll, which
passes quietly to the Empress, then lets his eyes fix on each of his principal
advisors in turn before speaking. "It would seem that further
investigations are unlikely to result in farther progress." Toziel smiles
broadly. "Should any new facts appear, I will hear them gladly, but it
would appear that after all these seasons, the murder of the outland trader
should be laid at the hands of unknown assailants, perhaps smugglers or other
outland traders jealous of this Aljak's initial success in Cyad."
"Sire... that casts much disrepute
upon the merchanters and the harbor guards," suggests Bluoyal.
"Then let none say anything, and
should anything appear, why then, we will know who sharpens his blade." Toziel
lifts both hands theatrically. "Enough." He looks at the First Magus.
"High Lector Chyenfel... how goes the effort with the Accursed
Forest?"
"As we have informed you, we have
created a replica of the sleep barrier-a small forest far to the north where
the method has been tried and met with great success."
"Except you do not know how long those
wards will hold." Toziel frowns, then erases the expression as if it had
not been.
"That is true. But we have near-on a
half-score of years of observation, and the barrier yet holds. We dare not wait
until the other chaos towers begin to fail, not when so much is at stake, Your
Mightiness."
"That may be." Toziel offers a
nod that does not convey agreement.
Chyenfel does not speak, but replies with a
head bow.
"What of the shipyards, Rynst?"
Toziel's eyes turn to the sabre-slender Majer-Commander.
"We cannot replace the fireships, your
Mightiness, but we are about to build a sailing vessel, based on the material
from the archives, which is speedier than all others upon the Great Western
Ocean, and we feel that we can build similar vessels if you find the need
pressing, sire. The use of cammabark as a cannon propellant appears
promising...."
"You had mentioned these matters
before. Is there anything new? Or any unforeseen problem?"
"Ah... such vessels are not
inexpensive...."
"They will cost more than you had told
me, and armed versions will not protect our trading vessels as well as the
fireships do. Thus, we will need more ships, and the tariffs on the merchanter
clans will be greater, and the profits lower... and few are pleased with the
prospects. Is that what you meant, Rynst?" asks the Emperor.
"Yes, Your Mightiness."
Toziel glances at the heavy-set Bluoyal.
"Are my surmises about trade correct?"
"Ah... I would judge so, Your
Mightiness."
"More lancers will be needed as ship
marines," suggests Rynst.
"Requiring more golds," adds
Chyenfel.
"Perhaps each of you could provide
estimates in an eightday... or two," suggests the Emperor Toziel. "I
would prefer that you not discuss those estimates with each other."
"Yes, ser." Chyenfel agrees
quickly.
"As you command," adds Rynst.
"As you require," concludes
Bluoyal.
Toziel stands, and the three advisors bow.
Then the Emperor and his consort depart, Ryenyel remaining a half-pace behind
Toziel until they have left the audience chamber and until the door has closed
behind them. They return silently to the Empress's salon.
There, the two sit side by side on the
white divan. Toziel's hand caresses his consort's neck, and then her shoulders.
She turns. "Chyenfel believes what he
tells you, my dear."
"That is worrisome. I would rather
that he did not."
"You would have him lie?" she asks.
"No. I know he deceives, but when he
does not lie, I cannot tell where he deceives."
"That is true, and they will all start
rumors, except Rynst, and his truths will be taken as rumors."
He laughs sardonically. "Of course.
But it will be interesting to see exactly what kind of rumors each
creates."
Ryenyel offers a tired shrug, then massages
her forehead with her right hand.
"I am sorry. Audiences such as that
are hard for you," he offers.
"They are hard on you, too." She
leans her head against his shoulder. "Each knows something, and should
each know what the others do..."
"Hush..."
"That is why there is an Emperor, and
yet each would replace you, and each would fail, and why yet we search."
"You are kind, I fear."
She
shakes her head, even as it rests against his shoulder. "I am not kind,
for I help you to do what no other can do, and we both suffer."
He turns so that his arms enfold her...
gently.
XXX
Lorn
stands in his stirrups, trying to stretch his legs while the mare travels a
section of road that is damp but appears firm. The early spring or late winter
wind carries alternating gusts of chill and warmth past the undercaptain, but
everything is brown-the grass, the road itself, the hills to the south and
north. The puddles in the road are muddy brown.
The mare's forelegs are coated with brown
from the mud of the road, and even the lower parts of Lorn's once-cream-colored
trousers are splattered with the mud that remains cold and greasy despite the
clear and bright mid-morning sun.
"One time when riding the fields be
faster..." The words drift forward from one of the lancers in Shofirg's
company, carrying on a light gust of wind to Nytral and Lorn.
Nytral shakes his head. "The fields be
like the great swamps below the Accursed Forest. You take a mount there, and
he'd be in over his fetlocks, then hock deep afore you know it. The barbarians
know it, and we'll not be seeing them for another eightday."
"So we're the mud patrol? To see when the
ground firms up and when they're likely to begin their attacks?" Lorn's
eyebrows arch as he asks the question.
"Aye. That be why the Fifth Company
rides now."
"To save the others for the first
attacks... that makes a sense of sorts."
After all, Brevyl had told Lorn that he'd
be handed nasty jobs, but not more than he could handle, and a mud patrol
certainly fits the description of nasty and within his capabilities.
At Lorn's open and humorous laugh, Nytral
looks quizzically at his superior.
"It's about what Sub-Majer Brevyl
promised," Lorn says. "He does keep his word. You have to admit
that."
"Be times we all wish he'd not,
ser."
"Probably."
Lorn's eyes drop to single sprig of green
in a muddy patch a half-dozen cubits off the shoulder on the north side of the
road. There is but the faintest hint of red within the center of the
tight-curled wild-flower.
"Blood-drop," he murmurs to
himself, looking to the northern hills that conceal the barbarians beyond.
XXXI
In the
late afternoon, before dinner, Lorn sits at the corner table in the officers'
study, his fingers carefully clasping the bronze pen whose nib will bend too
easily should he exert too much pressure. He dips the pen into the inkstand and
continues the scroll to Ryalth, ignoring the chill in the room where the heat
from the always-inadequate but long dead fire has much earlier died away.
...have
not received a scroll from you lately, but I hope that is from either oversight
or the lack of interest in my stilted writing, and that you are well and
prospering in your trade. If you have any spare coins, a few might go to copper
futures on the exchange
...only
a few, though.
He half-smiles, half-frowns, his eyes going
to the folio of maps set by his left elbow. He should be studying those maps,
for he knows his understanding of the terrain he patrols is still not
instinctive-and it should be, for the time will come when he will not have the
luxury of looking at a map.
He purses his lips and continues with the
scroll.
...most
presumptuous of a lancer to offer mercantile advice to a merchanter, but you
know I have never lacked presumption.
...our
patrol schedule is being increased now that spring is about to arrive in the
Grass Hills... and I may be the one with little ability to write or to have my
missives sent southward to you.... You would be pleased to know that I have
heeded your advice about reading, and have taken care with that with which you
entrusted me.
After affixing the closing and his
signature, Lorn folds the letter flat, then glances around the still-empty
study. With no one near, he holds the stick of green seal wax over the paper
edges and focuses the slightest flare of chaos he has drawn from around him on
the tip of the wax. Almost as the droplet of green wax strikes the paper, Lorn
presses his seal ring to it.
"Much easier..." murmurs to
himself.
He still must write Myryan, a task he
always postpones because he is still unsure whether his words to his father
about Ciesrt will have made any lasting impact. Since he has received but a
single scroll from his younger sister, and that far too many eightdays ago, he
worries.
Finally, he takes a smaller section of
paper, then gently cleans the bronze nib of his pen. He looks at the blank
paper, then pauses.
Chyorst-the sole overcaptain at Isahl-walks
into the officers' study, surveying the entire room before his eyes come to
rest upon Lorn. The overcaptain turns towards the junior officer,
deliberatively.
Lorn slips the pen and paper under the
folio of maps and stands as the overcaptain walks toward him.
"Maps?" Chyorst's eyebrows lift.
"Yes, ser. I try to match them with
what I've patrolled and study where I may be assigned."
Chyorst nods. "Can't hurt. Might help
so long as you remember that maps are only an incomplete representation of
what's out there." The overcaptain looks around the study once more before
asking, "Have you seen Jostyn, undercaptain?"
"No, ser. Not since last night."
"Thank you." Without another
word, the overcaptain steps away from Lorn, and then leaves the officers'
study.
Lorn waits for a time before he returns to
his letters.
XXXII
After
entering the square tower that holds the sub-majer's study, removing his winter
jacket and brushing the dampness from the oiled white leather, Lorn hangs it on
one of the pegs on the wall rack set forward of Kielt's table.
"Go ahead, ser," says the senior
squad leader. "He's waiting."
"Thank you, Kielt." With a nod to
the lancer ranker, Lorn opens the white oak door and steps into the oblong room
on the first floor of the square tower. As usual, Sub-Majer Brevyl looks up
from the table desk with the hard green eyes that are half-bemused,
half-impatient. The submajer's thick white hair has been trimmed shorter than
normal, shorter even than that of a new lancer recruit. He motions for Lorn to
take one of the armless chairs facing him.
Although the late afternoon is cloudy, with
the indirect light from the high windows weak, only one of the lamps in the
pair of wall sconces is lit, and the single lamp does little to dispel the
gloom. Sleet patters on the glass of the windows, briefly.
Lorn eases himself into the proffered
chair, then waits for his whip-thin commanding officer to speak.
"Undercaptain," says the
sub-majer dryly, "your next patrols will be the most dangerous for some
time."
"Ser?" Lorn eases forward in the
chair, knowing that reaction is exactly the opposite of what Brevyl intends.
"It's simple. You've survived a raid
or two. You're beginning to know the land and your men and squad leaders, and
it's almost spring. You think you know something." The white-haired
officer barely pauses. "Don't you?"
"More than when I came, but I have
more to learn, ser." Lorn can sense that an answer of some sort is
required.
"So much more that you might as well
say you still know nothing. If you think the winter patrols were nasty, you
don't know what a tough patrol is. If you thought freezing to and from Ram's
End was disagreeable..." Brevyl shakes his head. "In another
eightday, the barbarians will begin their spring raids. Everyone has been
telling you how tough that will be, but I'd wager that no one has told you why.
Do you know why?"
"No, ser."
"Because a raider's life isn't worth
dung until he's killed three lancers-or more. He can't take a woman from his
own clan-they do know about inbreeding-and he can't take a woman from another
clan without those kills. So he has to kill lancers to get laid, because their
women are property, and playing around with a proven warrior's daughter could
cost him his personal jewels or his life. And if he takes a Cyadoran woman,
she's fair game to be stolen or raped by any blooded warrior. Same thing if he
takes a woman from one of those dirty hamlets or villages they call
towns."
Lorn nods slowly.
"Their women aren't any great prizes,
and the few good ones go to the proven warriors or the young ones crazy enough
to take on a Mirror Lancer company... or smart enough to get away with
it." Bervyl shakes his head. "All you are is an obstacle in the way
of some young barbarian buck's crotch-ambitions, a game counter to add to the
stack so he can stop having damp dreams and start in on the real thing."
"You make it sound like they don't
think life is worth much, ser." Lorn says quietly.
"Until a barbarian gets to be a
full-blooded warrior, it isn't," Brevyl replies dryly. "I tell this
to every young undercaptain who comes through. They all hear me out, and then
more than half of them die in their first spring or summer." A snort
follows a brief pause. "I don't care about the stupid ones dying. Better
that way than letting them grow up and getting entire outposts all killed off.
But stupid officers can kill good lancers, and good lancers are getting hard to
come by these days."
"Yes, ser."
Brevyl draws a deep breath.
The mannerism is deliberate. Lorn can't
imagine Brevyl being that dramatic naturally. The undercaptain waits for the
next verbal riposte.
"One other thing...
Undercaptain."
Despite his resolve, Lorn stiffens ever so
slightly within himself.
"No lancer officer with magus blood
leaves Isahl until I say he does, just like none leave the Geliendra outpost
until Maran says he does. No lancer with magus blood gets to be a majer until
we both let him go on, not that there have ever been many of you." Brevyl
smiles. "Tomorrow, you're headed east. The attacks are later there, and
the raider bands smaller. Plan on being out an eightday, and being attacked
twice. At least. So be careful how you use your firelances."
Lorn nods respectfully.
Brevyl stands to dismiss the undercaptain.
"Just try to remember half what I told you, and you'll live longer and
save more of your lancers. And they're the ones who will keep you alive."
Brevyl inclines his head toward the study door.
"Thank you, ser."
"Don't thank me, Undercaptain. Just
remember."
Lorn leaves the study, nodding to Kielt as
he closes the door behind him. He takes his jacket and dons it before walking
from the square tower out to the courtyard and into the sleet that has returned
to pelt roofs, stones, and lancers like.
XXXIII
In the
cold sun of late morning, the brown grass stretches unmarked for at least three
kays in every direction from the narrow road on which Lorn and Nytral ride
eastward. Nearly two kays ahead of them are two scouts, large black dots on the
brown line of the road that slowly climbs the long swell that is not steep
enough to be a ridge or hill. Behind Nytral and Lorn ride the two squads of the
Fifth Company.
"Still another ten kays to
Pregyn," Nytral says.
The senior squad leader's words are barely
audible above the impacts of hoofs on the road and the rising whistling of the wind
that sweeps southward across the fields that only hold last year's browned and
flattened grass. With the wind comes the odor of vegetation that has molded,
frozen, and thawed-an acrid scent, sour but slightly sweet.
"The maps show that the road's flat.
Is it?" asks Lorn. He has never been northeast of this unnamed valley, let
alone to Pregyn, a hamlet a good forty kays to the north of Isahl and the
northernmost and most isolated of the communities south of the Grass Hills to
claim allegiance to Cyad and the Emperor.
"Most ways. The climb out of
Four-Holders-next valley-is steeper than the way in, but it's flat after that,
bog-like until you get to the real hills that border the Westhorns."
At the crest of the hill, Lorn slows his
mount and studies the long and sinuous valley that holds four families-a clan
structure almost, Lorn suspects, from the layout of the holdings with their
multiple dwellings and community stock barns. Each holding has an earthen berm
around its buildings and stock pens-earthen because trees are far too scarce
and more valuable for shade or fruit or windbreaks than for timber.
In the depression on the northern side of
the valley, a kay from where the Fifth Company descends the hill, there are
long parallel trenches. Lorn nods-peatworks. The two scouts have now almost
ridden to a point on the road abreast of the peat diggings, although the road
is more than a kay south of the boggy depression, and little more than a thin
lane winds over the rolling grasslands from the main road to the bog.
Slightly flattened by the wind, trails of
smoke rise from the chimneys of all four holdings. A good sign, reflects the
undercaptain.
"Not real friendly-like here,"
cautions Nytral about the time when they reach the beginning of the valley
floor and the road turns more to the northeast, angling across the long and
curving valley.
"Any reason?"
"Say we don't come here enough, let
'em take the barbarian attacks by themselves."
Lorn nods, but does not comment.
As the Fifth Company nears the first
earthen berm, the wind gusts around Lorn, mixing warmer damp air with cooler
swirls. Lorn's nose wrinkles, then relaxes, as he sniffs the smoke-burning
peat-an odor far better than that of the dung burned in many holds.
There is a gate in the first earthen dike. Less than two hundred
cubits from the right side of the road, it stands half-open, with a bearded
figure in a sheepskin jacket waiting.
"Shofirg!" orders Nytral.
"Send up four lancers."
Lorn and Nytral follow the four lancers up
the rutted road toward the gate, where all six rein up twenty cubits back from
the holder.
"We'd be welcoming you, and your
company of lancers, ser," offers the holder. "Don't have much, ser,
but you'd be welcome to the water and to stand down and rest."
Nytral eases his mount past the holder and
partway through the gate. After a moment of studying the area, he turns in the
saddle and nods curtly to Lorn.
"We thank you," Lorn tells the
bearded man, who inclines his head briefly to the undercaptain.
"Two abreast!" Nytral orders.
"Straight to the troughs. In formation, by squads."
Lorn guides the white mare through the gate
and to the north side where he and Nytral watch as the lancers ride past them.
The ground inside the four-cubit-high
embankment is earth churned by sheep and cattle, dark frozen mud that will turn
into oozing slop within eightdays, if not sooner. The odor of manure permeates
the air, mixing with the sweet-smoky odor of burning peat. The doors to the
sod-walled stock barn beyond the water trough are closed and barred, although
Lorn can hear the lowing of cattle.
"Water by half-squads! You be
starting, Dubrez!" Nytral orders, his words ringing across the holding.
After the first squad has watered and
remounted, Lorn waters his mare before Shofirg's squad while Nytral watches.
The young officer then watches as Nytral rides his mount to the trough.
The holder now steps nearer to where Lorn
sits astride the mare.
"Have you seen any trace of the
barbarians lately?" Lorn asks the local.
"Little early for raiders," says
the redbearded figure. "Bogs on the north side still show ice...."
Lorn takes in the man's words, not
understanding the exact importance of when the ice might melt as a predictor,
but understanding fully the herder's feeling about its accuracy. "Have
they ever attacked before the ice melts?"
"One time I recall, ser... be the year
afore the last." Nytral remounts and guides his mount back beside Lorn's.
"Would that we'd be able to offer
more, ser...." The holder's voice is almost pleading.
Lorn understands the plea, but were he to
pay, even a few coppers, for every watering or every meal offered to his
company, his purse would be empty well before the end of each patrol. Worse,
the holders would come to expect it, and Lorn knows where that would lead.
"I would that you could, too, holder. I would that I could offer you some
poor recompense." He smiles. "Perhaps we will be able to remove some
barbarians."
"You do that... and you be doing more than most in these
days." The herder inclines his head, slightly.
The last of Shofirg's men remounts, and the
younger of the two squad leaders turns his mount toward Lorn and Nytral.
"All the mounts have been watered, sers."
Lorn leans forward in the saddle, toward
the herder. "Thank you." Then he nods to Nytral.
"Ride out, by squads, two
abreast." While Nytral does not yell or shout, his voice carries
throughout the holding-and well beyond the earthen dike, Lorn suspects.
Although it nears mid-day when the Fifth
Company is clear of the holding wall and fully on the road northeast, the light
wind is but fractionally warmer, still a mixture of warmer and cooler air. The
road itself remains frozen except for a few muddy spots where small bumps face
directly south and trickles of water ooze from the raised and thawing ground.
Neither Nytral nor Lorn speaks until the
company is well beyond the first of the four holdings in the valley.
"They don't think we've done
much," Lorn observes.
"The Lancers never do as much as
anyone wants, ser. Specially out here. Might be different if the Emperor... if
His Mightiness'd ever been a real lancer. Or if we had more lancers. Never
enough lancers, never have been, I been thinking...."
"No." Lorn frowns. Nytral's
speculations are not good for the subofficer's future, not with anyone besides
Lorn.
"Best not be thinking what can't
be."
"That's probably a good idea,"
Lorn agrees. "There are only so many firewagons and so many lancers, and
there's not much we can do about it."
For a time, they ride without speaking.
Herders from the other three holdings do
not appear as the Fifth Company nears, and passes, their earth dikes. Nor are
their gates opened.
By mid-afternoon, the Fifth Company nears
the eastern end of the winding valley, a valley empty of all herders and
herds-except those within the earthen dikes that they have since passed. The
scouts have ridden out of sight over the top of the hill, and the column of
riders, two abreast, starts up the gentle incline.
Lorn glances up at the sound of hoofs. Two
scouts spur their mounts down the road from the crest of the low pass that
leads out of the Four-Holders Valley and toward the next valley, that of the
Burned - Out - Stead.
"Frig!" mutters Nytral under his
breath. "Frigging raiders..."
"Halt!" Lorn raises his arm, then
gestures downward. Behind him, the riders of the company rein up.
Lorn and Nytral wait for the scouts, both
scanning the road behind the scouts, as well as the brown grass and the few
scattered bushes with their handfuls of gray winter leaves. Nothing moves
except the lancer scouts.
"Raiders, sers! They're riding up the
far side, almost halfway to the crest." The words burst forth from the
younger scout before he has even fully reined in.
"A good four score. Could be
more," adds the older scout.
Lorn turns in the saddle. Behind them, less
than a hundred cubits back, is a low depression, and west of that a slight
swell.
Nytral's eyes follow Lorn's. "Best we
can do, ser."
"We'd better do it, then."
"Column back to the rise,
Shofirg!" Nytral orders.
"Squad two back to the rise,
Dubrez!" Lorn's voice, seemingly less penetrating than Nytral's, carries
to the second squad.
Dubrez nods and replies. "Second squad
to the rise!"
Lorn turns the mare, and the others follow
his lead, until the Fifth Company has reformed on the highest ground nearby, in
a single long line, slightly convex, that for all its apparent length will
still be flanked on both ends by fourscore barbarian raiders.
"We'll let them come to us," Lorn
decides.
"Not reined up, ser?" Nytral's
voice holds a slight edge.
"No... but we won't charge until
they're hitting the dip in the ground there."
"Won't slow 'em much."
"Will anything?" Lorn raises his
eyebrows, then pushes back the once white garrison cap.
Nytral laughs, not quite hollowly.
In the colder afternoon wind, each moment
seems longer than the one that preceded it, and the hillside and road that lead
out of the valley remain empty.
"They were riding up, sers,"
insists the younger scout, although neither Nytral nor Lorn has even looked
toward the lancer. "They were."
"They'll be here," Nytral says.
"This time of year they don't turn back."
Lorn surveys the line of lancers once more,
then checks his own firelance. He can feel the chaos stored within it-red and
golden white. His eyes flick from the Fifth Company to the hill above and then
back to the lancers.
One moment, the hill is empty. The next
finds mounted figures riding down toward the Mirror Lancers.
"Lances ready!" Nytral orders.
Forty lancers pull their three-cubit-long
white firelances from holders and level them, waiting for the raiders to close,
for Lorn's command to charge, and for the inevitable order to discharge chaos.
Lorn looks at the sweep of riders-five
score, if not more, arrayed in a loose formation no more than three deep.
Unlike the mounts of the barbarian bands he has encountered earlier, these
horses bear no saddlebags or gear stowed behind the saddle-not that he can see.
The riders carry long blades, blades bared to the sun, each weapon a half blade
longer than Lorn's own sabre. Even across the half-kay that separates the two
groups, the raiders' bared iron blades shimmer with the ugliness of
death-ordered iron.
The undercaptain forces himself to wait, to
measure the closing distance. He moistens his lips, watching, as the riders
loom larger, bearded men bearing long blades, surrounded by another sort of
chaos-the chaos of blood-lust?
As the raiders near the uphill depression,
charging toward the Fifth Company, yells and unintelligible battle cries
suddenly burst forth and spill across the brown grass of the gentle slope that
has slowed them not at all.
"Now!" snaps Lorn.
"Forward! Forward and discharge at
will!" orders Nytral. "Discharge at will!"
The Mirror Lancers of the Fifth Company
move forward, ponderously, slowly at first, but when the two forces are less
than a hundred cubits from each other, the Lancers are moving almost as fast as
the barbarians.
"...Slay the white demons!"
"...Death to the demons!"
Other calls fill the air, but all are from
the barbarians.
Abruptly, the barbarian line changes-gaps
appearing here and there. But the gaps are not so much gaps as the result of
groups of three barbarians charging toward a single lancer.
Hssstt! Hssst!... With less than fifty
cubits between the leading barbarians and the lancers, golden-white chaos bolts
flare from the firelances.
Lorn holds back on using his lance, though
he rides forward toward the raiders, and finds himself leading the fray.
Five riders are swinging toward him as he
finally lifts his lance, and triggers it. Hssst! Hsstt! Hsstt!... Not all the
bursts strike barbarians, and he ducks and throws himself sideways and under
one of the swinging iron bars that promises death if it strikes him full.
Then, gasping, he finds the mare has
brought him through and beyond the barbarian line-practically alone. A good
forty cubits to his right, Nytral has emerged, and the squad leader charges
back toward the mixed of men tangled with each other.
Lorn wheels the mare and rides back-more
deliberately, his eyes flicking across the field. Less than twenty cubits
before him, a barbarian lifts, not a long and unwieldy hand - and - half blade,
but something like a sabre somewhat more curved than that of a lancer. The
barbarian ducks as he nears the melee, and starts to slash across the
unprotected left side of a lancer.
Hssstt.' Lorn flicks a short bolt of chaos
from the lance into the barbarian's back, then urges the mare toward the next
group of fighters, men hacking at each other, silvery cupridium blades against
the order-death-infused, edged iron bars of the attackers. Absently, Lorn
wishes he could use a sabre as well in his left hand as in his right.
Hsstt! The chaos transfixes another bearded
barbarian.
Two more barbarian riders turn their
mounts, then, inexplicably, ride toward a group skirmish to Lorn's left. Lorn
follows them, picking off the laggard with his lance. He wonders how long the
chaos charge will last, careful as he has been. He can sense that a goodly
fraction remains yet.
A single wavering yell echoes across the
afternoon, and a good three score riders ride across the hillside, not back the
way they had come but toward the hills on the northern edge of Four-Holders
Valley. Beside and around the road, the Fifth Company finds itself without
attackers, except those that have fallen.
Lorn takes a long deep breath, feeling
sweat cooling on his forehead and the back of his neck. He counts quickly.
There are six Mirror Lancers lying on the brown grass, and he can see blood on
the winter jackets of half a dozen more. He hopes some of that blood is not
that of the lancers. Close to a half-score barbarian mounts are without riders,
and more than a score of dead or dying raiders lie sprawled or crumpled in the
trampled brown grass.
The light, cold wind cannot carry away the
odors of blood and death, not all of them, nor the odor of damp dead grass
churned up by more than a hundred horses.
Lorn walks his mount back to where the
barbarian with the odd-looking sabre has fallen. His dismounts and reclaims the
blade and the scabbard, fastening them behind his saddle. Then he remounts and
rides back to where Nytral is reforming the company. No one has noticed his
efforts.
"Squad leaders. Report," Nytral
orders as Shofirg and Dubrez ease their mounts to a halt opposite Lorn.
Shofirg's winter jacket is slashed open
across his left shoulder, and blood smears the oiled white leather. "Lost
four lancers, five wounded. Eight lances with chaos charges left," replies
Shofirg.
"Two lancers gone, three wounded.
Eleven lances... most are low, though," adds Dubrez.
"Use the barbarian mounts for the
blades and any shields they left. You know what to do with our dead."
"Sers..." both squad leaders
incline their heads, then turn their mounts, heading back to their squads.
"Have they done that before?"
Lorn asks after a moment. "Sending three men after a single lancer?"
Nytral frowns. "Hadn't seen
that."
"They did," Lorn assures the
senior squad leader. "That's why there were gaps in their attack to begin
with. They figured out that a lancer has to concentrate on single attacker at a
time."
"Didn't look that different,"
replies Nytral. "Could be they've been doing it for a while." He
pauses, then adds. "Lot more raiders in that party than most. Lot
more."
"How many are there usually when they
attack?"
"Most times, maybe a few more than a
company."
"They had more than twice what we
did," Lorn observes, then adds, "We're headed back. We've got only
got about two-thirds of a company, and not many chaos charges."
"They'll be back... afore sunset
tomorrow," predicts Nytral. "Even if we head back. They'll
follow."
"With more horsemen?" asks Lorn.
"No... They can't go back to the clan
without wounds or trophies. The raiders rode off... they didn't get much."
"Will they try an ambush, you
think?"
Nytral pulls at his chin. "Not so as
you'd say that. Low light... some place where we'd not suspect... nor see...
but no sneaking round... usually don't pick off scouts... can't count on that,
though."
"We'll have to be careful, then."
Lorn has been getting the feeling that there is little predictable about the
barbarians except their desire to kill lancers-and their success in doing so despite
the effect of the firelances. The antique sabre, still solid, and Brystan, he
thinks, raises another set of questions, ones he will not voice, about how
better blades, if older ones, are reaching the barbarians, and why no senior
officers have mentioned the change.
Part
III - Lorn'Alt, Isahl, Captain, Mirror Lancers
XXXIV
In the
hot air of late summer, his third summer in Isahl, Lorn shifts his weight in
the saddle. Then he blots the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand
to keep it from running into his eyes. His hand comes away damp and slightly
reddish from the road dust, and he is careful to wipe it on the square of cloth
tied to his saddle. Even so, his cream uniform is streaked with pink from the
dust, as are those of all the lancers in the Fifth Company.
To the west of the road that hugs the east
side of the valley, the grasslands stretch almost four kays or more before
another set of hills. The tips of the blades of grass, some of which would
reach shoulder high on his mare, have already begun to brown.
Ahead to the north lies the Ram's End
Valley, and beyond that one of the valleys with an abandoned and burned-out
holding, one that had never been re-inhabited, Lorn suspects, because there are
no streams in the small valley and but one meager spring. He wonders, not for
the first time, why the Grass Hills are drier now than in distant years past
when the first holders were sent forth from Syadtar.
He cocks his head slightly to better catch
the murmurs drifting forward from lancers in the first squad.
"...better Captain 'n most..."
"...no great shakes... all we do is
ride and get attacked... ride and get attacked...."
"...you want to chase barbarians all
over the Grass Hills?"
Lorn represses a frown, then beckons to his
senior squad leader.
The square-bearded and craggy-faced Dubrez
eases his mount toward Lorn. He has been senior squad leader for over a year,
ever since Nytral lost a leg to a barbarian blade and hobbled back to his home
in Summerdock.
"I'm thinking we need a pair of scouts
to look two or three valleys ahead-way ahead." Lorn turns in the saddle,
as if to face Dubrez, and raises his voice so that it will carry back to the
complaining lancers. "They might be able to find some barbarians so we
don't have to ride quite so far."
"Yes, ser, Captain," Dubrez
replies, a slight twinkle in his eye.
Lorn unsheathes his cupridium sabre, lifts
it, and then studies the razorlike edge that can drive through best of the
barbarian blades. "I'm still thinking. I heard some of the men saying it
might be a good idea."
The murmurs from the riders behind die
away.
"Of course, we wouldn't be close
enough to support them, not unless they were very careful and could get a start
on the raiders." Lorn shrugs. "Wouldn't want them to get their
throats slit so some barbarian can claim a woman."
"No, ser." Dubrez nods.
Both turn in their saddles and ride
silently for perhaps half a kay before Dubrez speaks. "There's more
complaining now."
Lorn nods. "There will be more."
"Not good, ser."
"We both know that."
The company remains still-or the murmurs
low enough that Lorn cannot discern them even through his chaos senses-even
after the lancers ride over the low pass and along the gentle ridge.
As the Fifth Company descends into the
Ram's End valley, Lorn turns his attention to the holding, far closer to the
south end of the valley and the route back to Isahl than the majority of
holdings in the lower part of the Grass Hills. Most holders set their steads
somewhere close to the center of the valley. Not so Ram's End.
Something bothers Lorn, and he keeps
studying the holding as they near it. "What do you think, Dubrez?"
"Quiet... no one out, and it's near
mid-day."
Lorn
nods and keeps riding, watching.
Then, they reach the stream and the wide
and shallow ford, Lorn sees hoofprints-more than a mere handful, and as he
looks toward the sod walls of the holding, he can sense that all is less than
well. The gate is off its straps-that he can see from nearly a half-kay
away-and, though it is almost mid-day, the line of smoke from the cookhouse
chimney is but a thin gray line, as if from a dying cook fire.
The single small herd of black-faced sheep
to the southwest of the gate are unattended-something that Lorn has never seen
in three years- except in the aftermath of a barbarian attack. Lorn sees two
silent shapes sprawled in the grass-a herder... and a long-haired sharp-muzzled
black herding dog. Dark splotches stain the green and brown of the grass.
"Lances ready!" he snaps.
Dubrez turns in his saddle and echoes the
command, an echo amplified by the individual squad leaders.
"Spread formation! Forward!" Lorn
adds.
The Fifth Company reforms into a line
abreast and rides toward the open hanging gate of the hold. The lancers cover
but another hundred cubits before two sharp whistles pierce the noon air, and
the sound of hoofs rises from within the sod walls of the hold. Then riders
pour through the sundered gate, the first forming a rough wedge before the gate
as if to allow those who follow to escape.
"Charge! Discharge at will!" Lorn
orders. He spurs his mount, as do the Mirror Lancers behind him, trying to cut
off the barbarians, or keep them trapped, against the sod wall.
A half-score of rough-clad riders gallop
clear of the left flank of the Fifth Company, riding westward hard. The
remaining twoscore raiders squeeze their mounts into a tight wedge that gallops
toward the Fifth Company.
Hsst! Hssst! Two short bolts burst from
Lorn's lance. One strikes a barbarian, and then Lorn is using both firelance
and sabre to parry one heavy iron blade, and then another, before the mare
carries him past the edge of the barbarian wedge, and he turns his mount.
"First squad! Shofirg! Turn
about!" Lorn's orders rise above the flashing and hissing of the
firelances. He follows his own orders and wheels the mare, charging toward the
western flank of the barbarian wedge, guiding the mare past a grim-faced
lancer, and then slashing his sabre left-handed across the neck of an
unprepared barbarian who barely started to turn before the chaos-reinforced
blade separates his head and torso.
Lorn swings away, more westerly, as perhaps
a half score of the barbarians break through the Lancer's line, but the first
squad, following Lorn's command, has already reformed.
Hssst! Hssst! After a last few flashes of
chaos, the firelances are discharged and silent, and cupridium blades ring
against dark iron.
Lorn slows the mare, eyes studying the
swirl of bearded barbarians with dark blades, and cream-clad lancers with
bright sabres, ready to lend his blade, as necessary. A wide-eyed barbarian
breaks clear of the fray, and turns his mount westward, as if to escape.
Lorn raises the firelance, calmly. Hssst!
The barbarian slumps in the saddle, then
slides downward, one boot still caught in a stirrup, his weight and length
dragging the mount to a halt.
A second raider pulls clear of the fray,
and Lorn again aims his lance, letting a short burst of personally-raised chaos
burn through the man's back.
Lorn waits, but no other raiders try to
escape, and, as the last barbarian pitches out of his saddle, the clangor
fades.
"To the hold!" snaps Lorn, moving
the mare northward and through still-milling lancers. "The hold.
Now!"
"The hold!" echoes Dubrez, and
then Shofirg.
As Lorn rides in through the sagging gate,
a bearded giant darts from the open door of the house, then lunges sideways and
grabs a small figure-a dark-haired waif who, surprisingly, recalls Myryan to
Lorn.
Lorn turns his mount and pulls the
firelance from its holder, again- calling on the force beyond pure chaos, for
he knows there is little of the stored chaos left in the weapon. He lets the
mare walk slowly toward the barbarian.
There is blood on the trousers of the
bearded man who holds the struggling girl before him, as a shield against what
Lorn may do. "You lift that lance any more, demon, and I'll kill
her!"
A line of whiteness streaks from the
silvridium tip of the lance, a line so thin it is almost invisible.
The barbarian convulses as his face
blisters into charcoal, then vanishes. The knife wavers, then falls from dead
fingers, leaving a slash across the small girl's face, and the headless
barbarian corpse pitches sideways.
The girl, suddenly released, staggers
toward the still figure half-leaning, half-sprawled against the earth brick
wall of the house.
"...captain did it again..."
"...hush..."
Lorn's eyes flick across the area of the
holding inside the sod walls. One dark-haired, slightly heavy-set, young
woman-the one the girl clings to, sobbing-had been flung against the ceramic
screen that shields the front door of the farm house. Her neck is at an angle
that shows it has been broken. The second girl, scarcely ten, continues to sob
loudly, clutching the dead woman, perhaps an older sister.
Except for the lancers of the Fifth
Company, nothing moves.
Is there sobbing from within the house?
"Dubrez... have someone watch the
little girl... and check on anyone else here. No liberties with her! Or anyone
else. None!" Lorn's voice cuts like the sabre at his side, and he gestures
at the four nearest lancers. "You four! Follow me!"
He turns his mount westward, riding back
out through the gate and turning westward to follow the barbarians who have
ridden away from the road, and toward the nearest hill.
Two hundred cubits or so beyond the sod
wall, he glances at the lancers who follow. The leading rider, the youngest, is
white-faced.
Lorn smiles and returns his attention to
the faint track of chaos that he follows through the high and browning grass.
More sweat drips from under the brow of the lightweight and white summer
garrison cap, sweat that he blots away as they continue riding westward.
The lancers cover a kay through the
browning late summer grass, then two kays. Lorn can sense that, as they reach
the slightest of inclines leading toward a thin stream marked by young willows,
the barbarians are not that far away, and he lets the mare slow her walk.
The half score of barbarians have watered
their mounts and watch from their saddles as Lorn and the four Lancers ride
toward them.
"Blades ready," Lorn says
quietly. He knows the firelances of the four are without chaos charges. His
fingers touch his lance, but do not grasp it, as he continues to ride forward.
"You will die, white demon,"
announces the broad-shouldered giant in the center of the ten barbarians. The
man is doubtless two heads taller than Lorn, and four stones heavier, without a
finger's worth of fat anywhere.
"Why do you kill the holders? They
don't attack you." Lorn's voice is level, as he continues to let the mare
walk slowly toward the barbarians.
"These lands were our lands in the
time of our grandsires' grand-sires. They will be ours again." The
language is the guttural barbarian tongue only loosely related to Cyadoran or
the Anglorian from which it came.
"Why did you kill the girl?" asks
the captain.
"Women serve men. She would not serve
us. Besides, she was white-spawn." The man laughs, mockingly.
Lorn lazily raises the light lance,
seemingly without pointing it, then concentrates, as he sweeps it sideways. The
thin line of chaos bisects the six barbarians in the center of the group-and
their mounts-one after the other. The giant is still clutching for his immense
blade as his upper torso crashes into the tall grass.
"...dung-frig..." hisses a lancer
behind Lorn.
The pairs untouched-two men at each
end-look almost blankly as mounts scream and riders fall. Without pausing, Lorn
turns the lance to the two at the south side.
Hsst! Hsst! With two almost-delicate bolts
of chaos, two more barbarians fall.
After sheathing the firelance, almost
automatically, Lorn turns his head to the remaining two raiders.
"Go!" He forces the words out, fighting against dizziness, and a
headache that threatens to cleave his skull in twain. "Tell your clan what
happens to those who kill girls and women."
The two raiders glance at the slender
Mirror Lancer captain and the four lancers who flank him.
"Tell them!" Lorn forces a cold
laugh. "Brave warriors, tell them."
"Never!" The younger warrior
raises his blade, order-death edged iron, and charges toward Lorn.
Despite the dizziness, Lorn draws his own
shimmering cupridium blade, then spurs the mare, leaning forward, focusing into
the blade that chaos he can draw from the air and land around him, and from the
dead and dying.
Reddish white light flickers from the
cupridium, seemingly lengthening the blade, until it is almost a lance.
The young barbarian's eyes widen. He tries
to lever the bar-like great-sword toward Lorn more quickly, but he is too late,
and the light fades from his eyes as the chaos lance flicks past the
death-ordered iron. He spews from his saddle.
The older barbarian warrior has turned his
mount and gallops northward.
Lorn clutches his saddle with his knees,
barely hanging onto his sabre. His head rings as though it were a bell struck
with an iron mallet, and knives of white pain lance through his eyes.
Slowly, ever so slowly, he eases the
cupridium sabre back into its scabbard. Then his fingers close around the water
bottle. Each movement is slow, deliberate, as he lifts the bottle to his lips
and drinks.
Only then does he turn the mare back toward
the wide-eyed and silent lancers who have ridden with him.
"Darkness, ser! Never seen a light
lance do that," blurts the youngest.
Lorn offers a lazy smile over the anger
boiling inside him, a smile forced despite the dizziness and agony that he must
fight to stay mounted. "Do what?"
"...ah... what you did, ser."
The shrug is an effort, but Lorn makes it
seem effortless. "I killed some barbarians. That's what we're here for.
Gather the good mounts and follow me." Ignoring the moans from one bearded
figure lying on flattened grass, a man who will die shortly, Lorn turns his
mount back eastward, back toward the raided holding.
After a time, he can hear the mounts of his lancers as they hurry to
catch up with him. He does not look back until the youngest lancer draws nearly
abreast.
"Only got two mounts. One other
lame-you killed the others, ser."
"Two will be fine, Yubner."
Lorn's voice is professional, neither warm nor cold.
"Yes, ser."
Yubner drops back, and the murmurs begin,
voices low enough not to be heard, except by a lancer officer trained in chaos
use.
"...ever see that..."
"...more 'n once, Yubbie... more 'n
once, and you'd not be saying a thing outside the squad. Understand?"
"...just... killed 'em... doesn't
matter which hand holds sabre...."
"...they'd do that to you, boy... done
it to a lot of lancers... see those girls? Why you think we're out here?"
"But..."
"...not a word... See how many a' us
come back... look at the other companies... Captain Jostyn... 'member
that?"
The murmurs die away as Lorn and the four
near the gate to the holding.
From his saddle, Dubrez studies Lorn as the
five ride slowly through the broken holding gate. The last two lancers
following Lorn each lead a barbarian mount. The senior squad leader rides
toward the captain, then reins up as Lorn does.
Dubrez nods slowly, then announces,
"Lost seven lancers, ser. Took down near-on two score, maybe more."
"There were ten who tried to get away.
We killed nine," Lorn says flatly.
"Your lancers didn't have any chaos
charges left in their lances," Dubrez murmurs quietly. "None of us
did. They aren't charging the lances as much as they used to."
"That's why one got away," Lorn
lies. "I didn't want to risk our men, and we did get all but him."
"Nine out of ten... can't outwager
that." Dubrez laughs, once, harshly.
"Who survived among the holders?"
Lorn asks.
"Two older women, two boys, one woman,
and the girl. That's all, ser."
"They'll have to ride back with us, at
least to some other holding, if not to Isahl."
Dubrez glances at the dead raider by the
house, the one whose head Lorn had burned off. "We must have killed close
to three score... and they'll be back in an eightday or a season-who knows-and
we'll have to fight with less chaos in our lances."
"Maybe..." Lorn offers. "Can
you get a few of those barbarian mounts for the holders? They can't stay here,
and we might as well head back. Not much more that we can do here."
"True, ser." Dubrez's smile is
grim. "Should be able to find six good mounts." He turns his mount.
"Stynnet! You and Forlgyt get six gentle mounts. Holders'll ride out with
us. We're headed back to Isahl, captain says."
"Yes, ser."
Dubrez nods to Lorn, then rides toward the
stock barn, to let the animals out so that they will not starve until they can
be claimed-or slaughtered by another barbarian band.
"...three score, and he killed a score
of 'em hisself..."
Lorn can only remember killing slightly
more than a half score, but there is little point in protesting such. He has
long since lost count of the barbarians he has killed. He slowly studies the
holding, as if to note the details for the report he will have to write when he
returns.
The girl Lorn saved freezes as his eyes
sweep across her. Then she begins to tremble.
The Lancer captain maintains a cool smile
and lets his eyes travel past the girl and back toward Dubrez. "Let me
know when we're ready."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn unfastens his water bottle and takes a
deep and long swallow, still ignoring the headache, the intermittent double
vision, and the unseen hammer blows to his skull.
XXXV
Two men
stand on the shaded east balcony of the third level of the Palace of Light, the
balcony that is closest to the smaller audience hall preferred by the Emperor
Toziel. The shade and the bare hint of a cool ocean breeze are not enough to
keep a sheen of perspiration from their foreheads on one of the hottest of
summer afternoons in many eightdays. The breeze dies away, and the air is so
still that the harbor to the south and even the Great Western Ocean are shades
of flat shimmering blue that offers no hints of whitecaps. The stillness and
the heat keep any hint of the trilia blooms in the gardens below from rising to
perfume the upper levels of the Palace.
One of the double doors that offers access
to the balcony is slightly ajar, enough so that the two men can hear if the
calling bell is being rung. In the corridor just inside the Palace, but a good
ten cubits from the octagonal panes of the ten-paned doors, stand a pair of
Mirror Lancers, each armed with both a rapier and a short firelance.
"You have not shown great enthusiasm
for the plan of the First Magus to subdue the Accursed Forest," offers
Luss'alt, the Mirror Lancer Captain-Commander, second in Lancer authority only
to Rynst'alt.
"I have not, nor should you,"
replies Kharl'elth, the Second Magus, a red-haired figure in white
shimmercloth. His green eyes bear but a hint of gold. "The First Magus
plans for a future that may never be. He would turn the chaos towers that
surround the Accursed Forest into the mists of time... and then trust that the
three chaos towers of the Quarter will sustain us."
"They have for many generations,"
points out Luss evenly. "Rynst has said that the plan will imprison the
Accursed Forest. Then there would be more Mirror Lancers to fight the
barbarians."
"With fewer charges for their
firelances, and fewer firewagons to carry supplies." Kharl shakes his
head. "The Accursed Forest is the same as it has been always. Some of the
great beasts escape. They kill a few peasants and some livestock. To stop a few
such deaths over the generations ahead, Chyenfel would sacrifice years of
chaos-charges for firelances and firewagons." The Second Magus studies
Luss, then asks, "Have the barbarian attacks become fewer over the
years?"
Luss returns the question with a crooked
smile. "You well know that each year brings more attacks."
"The Mirror Engineers already send
chaos-cells powered by the Forest towers to the Mirror Lancer outposts of the
north. How will your lancers fare without such? Or if the firewagons can travel
less frequently?"
"I have asked such of Rynst, and he
but replies that eastern Cyador will fall, should the Accursed Forest slip its
wards."
"None know that," Kharl points
out. "Even in the first days of Cyad, the Accursed Forest did not even
reach Kynstaar. Better to lose some lands, if need be, than to lose all of
Cyador to the barbarians of the north, for they indeed would destroy all we and
our forbearers have wrought."
"The Majer-Commander believes that the
Mirror Lancers can hold the borders... even with few firelances." Luss
shrugs. "We always have."
"Perhaps they can. Perhaps they
can." Kharl smiles. "They might require a few more officers...
accomplished in other fashions."
Luss's face becomes impassive.
"Then it has been many generations...
since one such rose through the ranks," offers the Second Magus.
"That is not even an acceptable
jest," Luss replies coolly.
"There are rumors about the
Majer-Commander...."
"He is not, as well you know,"
Luss replies.
"Then... why does he encourage such as
Captain Eghyr, or that offspring of a merchanter-Dymytri-or Senior Lector
Kien'elth's son... ?"
"They are most useful in combat or in
dealing with the problems of the Accursed Forest. Eghyr is most successful in
killing barbarians, and young Lorn is also quite capable...."
"I did not know.... You have not
mentioned him in a over a year," observes the Second Magus and Senior
Lector. "I presume, then, he is still alive?"
"As you should know, Lorn'alt became a captain last year. He's in
his third year at Isahl. That is one of the main Jeranyi attack points.
Commander Thiataphi had orders to use him on the barbarian pursuit details."
"The mortality is... what... fifty percent?"
asks Kharl'elth, carelessly wiping perspiration from his narrow forehead and
angular and cleanshaven face with a white cloth.
"He is a young man of enormous skill
and intelligence. The Majer-Commander is most impressed with the reports of his
actions." Luss smiles. "He is rather good at killing barbarians, as
well, and there are many to kill."
"You have named three brilliant
lancers with possible elthage talents, and, if they survive, all could come
back to Cyad. I was not aware that the Mirror Lancers encouraged such."
Kharl'elth shakes his head ruefully. "The Majer-Commander might like that,
but it would not be good for Cyador. Not now."
"Do not worry. There have been many
such over the generations. If they survive their patrols against the
barbarians, they will get patrol post commands on the edge of the Accursed
Forest." Luss smiles. "And if they still show traces of elthage
talents, and the ability that might earn a promotion, then, well... our friend
Maran knows how to deal with a brilliant Lancer magus."
"I had thought so, but we of the
Magi'i do have some concerns." Kharl offers a wry smile. "You always
have matters so very well in hand, dear Luss."
The Captain-Commander frowns, then asks,
"Why did Captain Lorn's father not become more than a senior lector?"
"Kien'elth is a most respected senior
lector, and one of the most devoted of the Magi'i. He is a magus among Magi'i.
As such, it is unlikely that he will live long enough to advise Captain Lorn,
should the young captain avoid the fate you and Maran have planned. Most
unfortunate, I dare say." Kharl's warm smile does not reach to his green
eyes.
"None escape Maran," declares
Luss. He blots his forehead. "Few days are as warm as today. Perhaps we
should attend our superiors."
"Few escape Maran," corrects
Kharl. "Thiataphi did, but he understands. Is it not true that he has
requested that he receive a stipend before being considered for a position with
the Majer-Commander in Cyad?"
Luss nods.
"How feels Rynst about the policy
of... discouraging... lancer-magi'i?" inquires Kharl.
"Not strongly enough to oppose it. Not
when all the senior Mirror Lancer officers support it," replies Luss.
"What of the First Magus?"
"He is most opposed to any who might
handle chaos outside the Quarter and the discipline of the Magi'i, and on that
we are in full agreement. Full agreement." Kharl smiles. "Perhaps we
should stand ready to attend the results of the audience."
Luss nods, once more, evenly.
XXXVI
After a
dinner of heavy mutton, soft potatoes probably left from the harvest of almost
a year earlier, and bread harder than some barbarian blades, Lorn has repaired
to the officers' study, where, under the sunlight of a summer evening pouring
through the high windows, he rereads his patrol report, then nods, and sets it
aside to submit to Overcaptain Zandrey in the morning.
Then he lifts the first of the personal
scrolls that had been awaiting him on his return from patrol-the one from
Myryan. While he has hurried through it once, he needs to reread it. His eyes
fix on the graceful letters.
Dearest
Lorn,
It seems so long since I saw you, and it
is, more than three years....
...have
almost finished my training as a healer, and now I go to the lancers' infirmary
every fourth day, and to the Healers' Indwelling every other day.... Healing is
hard, but rewarding in its own way. Jerial said that a long time ago, but we
get different rewards. An eightday ago, I received a healer's pin, but I don't
know where it came from. I can't wear it yet, not until after the ceremony next
sixday. It's beautiful, green lacquer over gold. A messenger brought it from
Syang the goldsmith, but no one could say who had sent it, except that the
purchase was arranged through a small merchanter house. It is all very strange,
and I wish you could be here for the ceremony, but you won't even get this
until I am truly a healer....
Lorn pauses. His warm and waifish little
sister-a healer. And the golden pin... he has his ideas about that, too, but
they are but ideas without confirmation-yet.
Vernt is finally seeing someone. He won't
tell anyone, except father, and I think father is the one who arranged it all.
...would
have liked to have sent you a baked pearapple creamed tart, but they don't
travel. I remember how you sneaked them from the kitchen, and once you brought
me one. They tasted better that way....
After he finishes Myryan's scroll, Lorn
runs his hand through his short brown hair. What can he say? Finally, he picks
up the bronze-nibbed pen and dips it, then slowly begins to write.
Your scroll was waiting when I came off
patrol. I was glad to hear that you are finally a healer... like to tell you
that I had something to do with the healer pin. I can't. I would have liked to,
but I've never even seen a healer's pin.... Summer here is hot. It is hotter
than Cyad, but drier... also would have liked that pearapple tart... miss
things like that, but, mostly, I miss the family, and the way we talked, even
with Father's long lectures....
When he finishes his reply to Myryan, he
picks up the second scroll- the one he had received just before the last
patrol, the one from his father that he had not had time to answer before
riding out to Ram's End, and the barbarian raid.
Lorn slowly unrolls it and rereads
carefully, as if he had not seen it before.
...While
I did heed your advice about Myryan's need to mature more, in the end, I have
decided that her being consorted to Ciesrt is far better than any of the
alternatives, and they will be joined by the time this reaches you. I do know
of your concerns, and they are good ones, and I do not write this to mollify
you. All I ask is that you return to Cyad and see her before you judge too
harshly.... Vernt is well-respected and appreciated by the older Magi'i... am
comforted to know that you are now a captain. According to Luss'alt, the first
two years are the most dangerous, although he says that any lancer's life is
dangerous....
The scroll continues, with pleasantries,
and then concludes:
...I
can see the patterns of the Rational Stars, and some change and some do not,
and some always shine brighter, no matter where in the heavens they swing.
Lorn purses his lips. His father has seldom
talked of the Rational Stars, and never written of them, for the Rational Stars
are the emperor's heritage, and not that of magus or lancer. Then, there is the
timing. Myryan's scroll had been written later, yet it does not mention or even
hint at Ciesrt. Lorn had decided not to mention what she had not. Jerial has
not written at all. But that leaves the question of how should he respond to
his father? He takes another sheet and once more dips the pen.
Father,
I am sorry that it has taken a while to write
back, but I have been on patrol and have just returned....
...I
appreciate your waiting to formalize a consortship between Myryan and
Ciesrt'elth, and I will follow your suggestions in that regard...
"Especially since there's nothing else
I can do," Lorn murmurs under his breath, glancing around. "Not from
here."
The young and pale blond
undercaptain-Cyllt-enters the study and takes the desk-table farthest from Lorn
to seat himself and peruse a single scroll. Beside the scroll Cyllt sets a nearly
full bottle of the darker Byrdyn- not nearly so good as the amber Alafraan.
Lorn nods politely before dipping the pen
in the inkwell and continuing his response.
I have not mentioned consorting in my
messages to Myryan, since she has not brought that up....
Patrolling takes special skills, and I have
been lucky enough to serve with those who have been able to impart them to
me....
I have been told that after three full
years, I will have a half-season's home leave, whether I am to remain at Isahl
or be posted elsewhere. What may be my next duty will be decided in the early
fall, I would gather....
He finally closes.
...and
I look forward to seeing you this winter.
Lorn has saved the scroll from Ryalth for
last, for those are as infrequent as they are welcome, and he wishes to reread
it before replying. He notes again that the passage marks indicate it was sent
from Fyrad, as are all her scrolls, and hence their infrequency, and after his
earliest scrolls to her, has since dispatched his missives to the trading house
address in Fyrad as well-a far wiser course, he suspects.
My dear
lancer captain,
Your scrolls remain an unending surprise.
This poor merchanter can scarce reply to your elegant words. I will not try. I
will but say that the constancy which you never professed exceeds all that I
have heard professed elsewhere. The Ryalor Trading House-
Lorn still winces at the name she had
chosen, despite the fact that he knows he provided most of the coins to give her
the start.
-continues to flourish, and we now have
shares in three coasters and two long-haul ocean traders. Some of those shares
are great enough so that before long, we could well own one or more. The long
contracts in copper have prospered so much that I have resold one at enough of
a profit that we could lose all on the other and still come out with coins.
He laughs to himself. She writes as though
he knows truly what she has done.
The word has been spread that my consort
works the distant lands, and we know that is certainly true in some ways, if
but for my unacknowledged merchanter partner... although I have accomplished
some frivolities on his behalf.
Lorn's forehead wrinkles at the mention of
frivolities, for all Ryalth's words carry messages between the lines, and that
is probably wise. All he can do is wonder and shake his head. He is in Isahl,
and Ryalth is in Cyad, and furloughs have allowed him only so far as Syadtar.
He is a lancer officer, and she is a merchanter. He smiles. While a magus could
not consort with a merchanter... it would be but a mere scandal if a lancer
officer did.
At Lorn's self-mocking and ironic laugh,
Cyllt glances toward Lorn, then quickly down at his scroll for a moment, before
the undercaptain refills his heavy goblet with the Byrdyn.
Ryalor House is consulted now and again by
several Hamorian and Austran traders. It is almost as if it were one of the
smaller clan houses. We are not that large, yet who ever would have imagined
that oil and cotton would have led so far?
I have engaged an enumerator. He is nothing
to compare to the first. He is most polite, but he keeps calling me sire. He
says it is habit. There are but two other houses and no clans headed by
merchanter women....
"Here comes the overcaptain," Cyllt murmurs.
Lorn slips Ryalth's scroll under those from
his father and Myryan but does not move the report or the blank paper on which
he will reply to Ryalth.
The brown-haired and stocky Zandrey glances
at the heavy goblet beside Cyllt. "Wine can become too much of a friend
here in Isahl."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn keeps his nod to himself, recalling
Jostyn, who'd taken to carrying bottles in his saddlebags-first Alafraan and
then the cheapest fermented fruit dregs-until the barbarians had caught him
off-guard. For a time, Sub-Majer Brevyl had banned all wine in the study and at
Isahl, to punish the officers for not letting Brevyl know that Jostyn was a
danger.
"You knew," Brevyl had said to
the remaining officers when he'd gathered them together. "You knew, and no
one told me. Good lancers were killed, and that shouldn't have happened."
Besides the wine leaving Isahl-if but for a
season-so had Overcaptain Chyorst, as a mere captain. And they'd later heard he'd
died patroling the Accursed Forest, although his body had never been found.
"Ask Lorn there about what wine did to
other officers," Zandrey says. "Or not, as you choose." His
smile is mirthless, and he turns and walks toward Lorn.
Unlike Cyllt, Lorn stands, if easily.
"Ser."
"Sit down, Lorn." Zandrey pulls
out a chair.
Lorn re-seats himself.
"Nice patrol... Kielt talked to
Dubrez," the overcaptain says conversationally, although in a low voice.
"Over threescore barbarians... that's a lot for Ram's End. I checked the
old reports. There hasn't been a raiding party that large there in more than a
score of years. Assyadt out west, yes, but not this far east and north."
Lorn lifts the report. "Would you like
this? I just finished it."
The overcaptain shakes his head. "Drop
it in my box in the morning. Did you notice anything different?"
"They formed a wedge to charge us. It
wouldn't have worked as well if we had full lance charges."
"I got a scroll from Eghyr. He said
they were doing that at Abyfel." Zandrey's lips form a crooked smile.
"He's the overcaptain for the west
sector there, isn't he?"
"He is. He'll probably make sub-majer
in another two years."
"He's very sharp," Lorn says.
"Not so sharp as you. You could be an
overcaptain for one of Jeranyi sectors, Lorn," observes Zandrey.
"Another two years and you'd be ready." A short laugh follows.
"Two years after that, it might happen."
"That's what the younger sons of the
Magi'i do, isn't it? Most of them? Before they die, I mean?" Lorn's words
are gentle, almost flat.
"Those who aren't talented enough to
become Magi'i or stupid enough to get killed by the barbarians," ripostes
Zandrey. "Or who don't get too fresh with their overcaptains." The
hint of laughter beneath his last words undercuts their seriousness.
"I don't think I'll be an overcaptain
for a barbarian sector." Lorn's voice is languid, an ease of tone
unmatched by the coldness in his amber eyes.
"You're meant for something."
Zandrey shrugs as he stands. "Nothing ever seems to get to you." Then
he grins. "Just remember the rest of us poor struggling lancer officers
when it happens."
"If you'll do the same for me,
ser." Lorn stands and returns the grin.
Cyllt's eyes harden as he glances from
Zandrey to Lorn and then back at the departing overcaptain.
Lorn reseats himself to finish the scroll
to Ryalth, which will be sent to a trader in Fyrad, from there to make its way
to her through some indirect route of which he is totally unaware. His lips
curl in a slight smile. That is to protect her, except that she was the one to
arrange it, to protect him. As in this, as in everything in Cyador, little is
as it seems, even under an emperor of the Rational Stars.
At the other table, Cyllt takes a long
swallow of the Byrdyn.
XXXVII
The hot
wind blows out of the northwest, away from the raiders and directly into Lorn's
eyes. He squints slightly as he looks along the low rise, easing his white mare
along the side of the Fifth Company until he is barely forward of all the
lancers, if on the flank.
The barbarians have formed into two wedges,
almost a half a kay away. As Lorn watches, a series of yells echo through the
afternoon air, and the two wedges begin to move, then to hurl themselves across
the late summer grass at the Fifth and Second Companies. Dust rises over the
brown-tipped grass that is but knee-high on a mount.
"Cyllt! First squad on the right
wedge!" Lorn orders. "Dubrez, have Shofirg's squad support the Second
Company."
"Yes, ser!" Dubrez answers.
"Yes, ser." The undercaptain's
response lags Dubrez's.
Lorn slips his lance from the holder,
keeping it low, and aiming it with his chaos-senses, at the knees of the horse
that leads the left wedge of the raider attack.
Hssttt! The single line of chaos flame is
brief, going unseen and unheard beneath the thunder of the sixscore barbarians
who charge the Mirror Lancers. The horse goes down, and so close are those that
follow that another four horses are tangled in the mass, slowing the entire
left wedge. As the barbarians near, Lorn can make out clearly that most now
bear polished iron shields, small round ovals that they raise to deflect the
chaos bolts from firelances that no longer hold the power of years previous.
"Lances ready!" Dubrez orders.
"Lances ready."
Lorn uses his lance covertly once more, for
he draws chaos from where he can find it, not from the inadequate chaos charges
within the lance haft. A second well-chosen mount topples, and more physical
chaos snarls the left wedge of the charging barbarians.
"Now! Dubrez! Forward and discharge at
will! Short bursts!"
"Forward! Short bursts!" orders
the senior squad leader. "Short bursts!"
Hhsst! Hhsst! The short bolts of golden-white
chaos drop many of those barbarians at the front of the wedges, but the mass of
horses and riders strikes the advancing Mirror Lancer line, which slows and
bends.
A barbarian, unbalanced by the weight of
both shield and hand - and - a - half blade, slashes too wildly. Lorn's
cupridium sabre flashes like a short stroke of lightning, and he is past the
dying barbarian, driving the chaos-reinforced blade through another's shoulder.
Lorn senses another rider to his left, and
twists his body out of the way of the unwieldy big blade, using a backswing to
sever the attacker's neck from the back. He recovers in time to turn the mare
and take down another raider from behind, then spurs his mount out of the
center of the melee, using the sabre to weave a shimmering line of defense.
Once clear, he wheels the mare, then waits
for a moment, before engaging a raider about to blindside a lancer tied up with
one of the barbarian giants. Although the barbarian senses Lorn's approach, he
is too late-and takes a deep slash across the shoulder. His big blade spins
downward, and he tries to smash the iron shield across Lorn's sabre hand-his
left-but that too is slow and late. The sabre slashes across the struggling
barbarian's neck, and Lorn pulls clear of the swirl of barbarians and lancers,
a swirl that suddenly separates into two forces once more.
Almost as quickly as it has begun, the
skirmish is over, and Lorn watches as perhaps three score raiders ride
northward. Several sway in their saddles.
Around Lorn rises the chaos of death and
the stench of blood. He glances at his own sabre, smeared with blood. Dark
splotches also decorate his left forearm, and dapple his trousers. He wipes the
sabre clean with the cloth attached to his saddle, then sheaths it.
"Find the wounded first!" snaps
Dubrez. "Dispatch any of the barbarians. They'd do worse to you." His
words are directed at three of the newer lancers, for whom this has been the
first or second barbarian attack.
Their sabres out, the three men walk slowly
from fallen figure to fallen figure.
"One of ours, here."
Two other lancers appear with dressings,
and the three continue onward through the bodies. Once a sabre flashes, but
none of the three speak.
Ignoring the headache that comes with
drawing chaos from the grasslands, Lorn lets the mare carry him slowly to a
section of the trampled grass free of fallen mounts, or dead or dying lancers
and barbarians. He takes a slow, deep breath, his eyes on the northwest part of
the grassy ridge. The raiders are well out of sight beyond the first range of
hills to the north.
Lorn turns his mount.
Dielbyn, the senior squad leader of the
Second Company, rides slowly toward Lorn.
Lorn waits.
"The undercaptain... ser..."
"He fell," Lorn acknowledges.
"Bravely." All officers die bravely.
"Yes, ser." Dielbyn's eyes do not
look away from his captain's.
After a moment, Lorn nods, then asks,
"How many in the Second Company can fight?"
"The second squad took most of the
charge... six left there, ser. Ten from the first squad. Four of 'em won't be
much good in a fight."
Lorn considers. The Second Company had been
a half-score under strength before they had started the patrol. "Can the
wounded ride?"
"Yes, ser. Slowlike. Except for
Cymion. Won't last much longer, though."
Dubrez sits on his mount thirty cubits
away, waiting.
"Get them ready to move out,"
Lorn says.
"Yes, ser."
After Dielbyn returns to reform the Second
Company, Dubrez rides closer to Lorn before reining up. "Lost four, ser.
All in Shofirg's squad. Three with wounds in Gylar's squad."
"Thank you." Lorn considers.
After starting the patrol with thirty five lancers, the Fifth Company still
numbers nearly a score and a half, but the Second has less than a score of
lancers. Majer Brevyl will not be pleased with two companies returning, but two
raider bands as large as the one the Fifth and Second Companies had vanquished
would be unlikely, and if Lorn presses on, few if any of the wounded will survive.
Lorn also knows that neither company will be soon reinforced, nor are fully
recharged firelances likely to arrive to replace those discharged in fighting
the barbarians.
Lorn's smile is fixed as he prepares to
order the return to Isahl. Behind the smile, he wonders. How long can he
continue to hold back barbarians with fewer men and firelances less fully
charged? At times, he is already feeling that he can draw no more chaos for his
own use without risking his own life.
XXXVIII
Lorn
remains standing before the desk-table in the square tower, the late afternoon
light from the high windows cascading around him, illuminating the dust motes
that hang in the air, some of which seem to glitter with minuscule points of
chaos. His eyes watch the newly promoted Majer.
"...you destroy three score, but lost
more than a score yourself. Then you turned back without completing the
patrol." Brevyl's voice is flat. So are his green eyes.
"Yes, ser."
"You could have pressed on," the
Majer observes. "Others have. That is what lancers do, if you don't
recall, Captain."
"Yes, ser, I could have." Lorn
keeps his voice even, emotionless. "We would have lost all the wounded,
and we wouldn't have seen any raiders. If you wish, ser, we'll return to patrol
tomorrow."
"If any of your wounded survive,
Captain." Brevyl pauses. "I liked you better when you were a polite
and subservient undercaptain." The Majer snorts. "You're supposed to
kill barbarians, Captain, not offer me reasons why you aren't."
"Yes, ser."
"You'll return the day after tomorrow.
I'll transfer a half score from Zerl's company to yours. Not the Second.
Combine both squads under Dielbyn and use them as a third squad. You can have a
score of charged lances. That's all."
"Yes, ser." Lorn bows.
"We'll be ready, ser."
"And Captain..."
"Yes, ser?"
"The Majer-Commander likes lancer
officers who follow orders and die. He has little use for lancer officers who
impose their own priorities."
"Yes, ser." Lorn meets Brevyl's
eyes.
After a moment, Brevyl is the one to look
away. "You may go, Captain."
Lorn bows again. He also inclines his head
slightly to Kielt, the senior squad leader and the Majer's doorkeeper, on his
way out of the tower.
He crosses the courtyard and turns
northward toward the barracks.
Dubrez stands by the side of the barracks
building as Lorn approaches.
"Ser?"
Lorn smiles. "Tell the men they have
tonight and tomorrow off. I'll talk to Dielbyn. The Majer is restructuring the
Second as a third squad of the Fifth. That will probably be until we get
another officer and some reinforcements."
"That could be spring, ser,"
ventures the senior squad leader.
"It could be. It could be in a pair of
eightdays, too." Lorn pauses. "Don't tell the men about the Second
yet."
"No, ser. Best to let Dielbyn tell
'em." Dubrez's smile is ironic. "Won't hurt to have another squad, a
full one."
"No. It won't." Lorn glances
toward the stables, where he can see several lancers still grooming mounts,
then back to Dubrez. "I'm going to the infirmary. Then I'll find
Dielbyn."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn's boots barely whisper on the hard
stones of the courtyard as he walks along the north side of the barracks. He
steps through the untended and time-darkened white oak door. The infirmary
consists of a long bay at the north end of the barracks, with a dozen pallet
bunks on each side. In more than two years, Lorn has never seen more than a
half score lancers in the infirmary, and he has used his healing talents
secretly and sparingly, for the energy required is great, and he does not wish
that talent known. What he plans is a somewhat greater risk, but if all the
wounded die, he risks even greater displeasure from the Majer.
There are three lancers laid out in the
infirmary bunks, lying in the alternate bunks on the south side. Lorn's eyes
flick to the first man, almost sprawled on his back, his undertunic half ripped
away from his chest. With each intermittent breath, the lancer gurgles, then shudders.
His eyes are wide open, seeing nothing. The captain can sense the whitish red
of chaos that envelops the man, chaos so raw and pervasive that Lorn knows the
man will die within the day.
Slowly, Lorn walks past the dying man and
an empty pallet to the third bed, where a stocky blond lancer is propped up
with horsehair pillows, covered with a faded gray cotton cloth.
"Ser?" asks the lancer, who wears
a wood and leather brace around his lower left leg.
"I wanted to see how you're doing, Eltak."
Lorn offers a smile.
"Be all right, ser."
"I'm sure you will be." Lorn nods
and leans forward, his fingers touching the brace. "It's not causing a
sore, is it?"
"No, ser."
Lorn has to struggle to summon the smallest
bit of dark order, so opposed to the flow of chaos, to squeeze away the clump
of red chaos that lingers where the broken bones meet. He keeps smiling as he
straightens. While the bone is set, and healing, and Eltak will recover, he
will limp. "You'll be riding again in a season."
"Thought so, ser."
Lorn nods and moves past another empty
pallet to the third lancer, where he stops. An angular young man with wiry
black hair lies propped up with pillows, a dressing across his right shoulder.
Lorn has to search his memory for the man's name, although the lancer is in
Shofirg's squad. After a moment, Lorn asks, "How are you feeling,
Stynnet?"
"Felt better, ser, and I'd feel even
better iffn they'd let me go."
Lorn can sense the points of red chaos
beneath the stitches and the dressing. While they are small, without a healer,
they will grow until Stynnet will be dying like the older lancer in the first
bed.
"You're not as well as you feel,
lancer," Lorn says gently. "Close your eyes. Keep them closed until I
tell you to open them."
"Ser?" Stynnet's forehead
crinkles. His mouth opens as if to protest.
"If you want..." Lorn stops and
fixes his eyes on Stynnet. "Lancer... don't argue. Just do it."
Stynnet swallows. "Yes, ser." He
closes his eyes.
Lorn lets the tips of the fingers of his
left hand rest lightly on Stynnet's skin just above the top edge of the
dressing. Trying to call up what little he has learned from Myryan and Jerial,
Lorn tries to let the black mist of order-the order-death of chaos, but a
necessary one here-around the points of wound chaos he can sense, one point
after another, until they vanish. They may return, but Stynnet's own
chaos-order balance can cope by then-Lorn hopes. He straightens and takes a
slow breath, not showing the momentary dizziness that swirls around and through
him.
Stynnet's eyes are still closed.
"You can open your eyes, lancer."
"Ser... felt funny... what did you
do?"
"Just offered some good
thoughts...." Lorn feels as though his smile is lopsided. "We want
you back riding."
"Ser...?"
"Yes?" Lorn waits, a more easy
smile upon his lips.
"Nothing, ser." Stynnet does not
conceal a slight frown.
"You'll be fine, Stynnet." Lorn
nods and turns. He still has to break the news to Dielbyn about the lancers of
the Second Company being attached to the Fifth. Then, he will ensure that the
promised lances are indeed charged and ready-perhaps slightly more charged than
Brevyl anticipates. How much of that he can do he is far from certain, and it will
entail another splitting headache-in more ways than one.
Once more... he must balance what he can do
with what he would choose to do. And without overtly revealing any more than he
must to survive.
XXXIX
The
harvest sun is barely peering above the eastern wall of the outpost at Isahl
when Lorn slips silently through the time-stained white oak door and into the
north barracks for another one of his unannounced inspections before a patrol.
He can hear voices from the bunks past the
columns on his right which separate the marshalling area from the bunking
spaces of the company's two squads. A slender brown-haired lancer walks past
the columns barefooted, on his way to the jakes, Lorn suspects.
The lancer's head jerks up.
"Ser?"
"Quiet, Yubner," Lorn murmurs,
putting his index finger to his lips.
Yubner swallows.
Lorn smiles and motions for him to
continue.
With a look back over his shoulder, Yubner
hurries away, his bare feet slapping on the cool stone tiles of the barracks
floor.
Lorn eases toward the square granite
columns, listening as he does, recognizing the rough-edged voice.
"...don't know what he did... don't
care... they didn't think I was going to walk out of there. Gwinnt died. Eltak
and I didn't...."
"Maybe he's a black one...." The words choked off, as if they
had been stopped by Stynnet's angular hand around the other lancer's neck.
Lorn has to strain to make out the words
hissed by Stynnet. "You say one word... and you'll end up with a lance in
your back... I was dead... didn't know it... don't care if he's the head of the
Black Angels... first one in line and stands behind his men... angel-damned few
officers do... you hear me?"
"Ulp... hear you..."
Lorn steps back toward the barracks door,
where he turns and waits for Yubner to return, or for another lancer.
Yubner returns before another lancer
appears, walking far more cautiously, eyes surveying the open marshalling space
between the two ends of the barracks. The south end is empty, since the Fourth
Company had left on patrol the day before. Yubner glances apprehensively at his
captain, but does not speak.
Lorn steps toward Yubner. "You can
announce me, Yubner. Make it loud."
"Yes, ser." Yubner squares his
shoulders. "Captain in the barracks! Captain in the barracks."
Boots scuffle. Several wooden foot chests
shut, and the murmurs of various conversations die away as Lorn steps past the
pillars. His voice is not loud, but carries. "Let's take a look at the
gear you'll be using today."
Lancers stand beside their foot chests,
waiting.
The barracks are standard. Each lancer has
a pallet bunk, the head to the brick wall, the foot to the center, with the
wooden uniform chest flush against the food of the bed. On the wall beside each
bunk are three pegs- one for the winter jacket, one for the uniform of the day,
and one for the lancer's garrison cap. Each bunk set opposite another and is
separated from those that flank it by six cubits. A single narrow window also
separates each bunk from the next. The aisle between the foot chests is six
cubits. A single narrow window also separates each bunk from the next. The
aisle between the foot chests is six cubits. The first squad bunks on the east
wall, the second on the west wall.
At the third bunk on his left, Lorn pauses,
sensing as much as seeing a spot on the hilt of a sabre. "Westy... show me
the blade, if you would?"
"Yes, ser." The lancer swallows,
but complies and lays the bare sabre out for Lorn to check.
Lorn studies the cupridium blade.
"You're not getting it clean under the guard."
"Yes, ser."
The captain nods and continues down the
aisle. At times, he barely glances at a lancer's pallet or gear. At other
times, he stops.
"Would you open the foot chest,
Sherzak?"
"Ah... yes, ser." The muscular
lancer flushes, but lifts the top, to reveal uniform tunics neatly folded.
"And the tunics, too, if you
would."
Under the trousers beneath the tunics are
three bottles of Alafraan. Sherzak looks impassively at his captain.
"I could break them and have you clean
up the mess," Lorn says mildly. "Or I could make you scout alone on
patrol today." Lorn pauses, but not long enough for the lancer to speak.
"But anything like that would hurt the Company and waste good wine. Take
those to Kielt-right now- and tell him that I said they're to go in the strong
room, along with other personal valuables, until you have furlough. It is
valuable." Lorn's smile is wintry. "There won't be a next time,
Sherzak. Is that clear?"
"Yes, ser."
Lorn nods and continues down the center of
the barracks, then halts opposite a foot chest. "If you would open the
chest, Skyr?"
"Yes, ser."
A muffled snicker comes from somewhere at
the lancer's resigned tone, but Skyr lifts the lid.
"At the bottom... in the rear."
Skyr removes all the tunics and trousers
and smallclothes. A slightly more curved sabre, another antique Brystan sabre,
lies there in a worn dark brown scabbard.
Lorn lifts his eyebrows.
"Wanted a trophy, ser. I'm sorry, ser."
Lorn smiles, not unpleasantly. "Just
turn it in to Kielt. After patrol. Less questions that way." He still
wonders how the barbarians had obtained Brystan sabres, especially ones
relatively new, like his, although the style of Lorn's is antique, as is that
of the one picked up by Skyr.
"Yes, ser!"
Lorn stops one more time, at the
next-to-last bunk on the right side, where he addresses a stocky red-haired
lancer.
"Teikyl, have those boots resoled
after this patrol, and tell the bootmaker to use the thicker leather this time.
Tell him that I said that."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn nods and checks the last two bunks.
When he is finished, he turns and walks slowly back up the center space between
the bunks, his eyes meeting those of each lancer once more as he passes. He
stops and turns just short of the pillars that form the barrier separating
Fifth Company's space from the marshalling area. "You and your gear look
good. Carry on."
Then he continues past the pillars and
turns toward the door to the courtyard.
"...never know when he'll show
up..."
"...just knows..."
Lorn pauses, as if to check the pointing on
the bricks beside the doorway, letting his chaos senses try to pick up what
Stynnet is saying to Yubner.
"...he hear... ?"
"...don't know... got that smile...
told me to announce him...."
Lorn steps through the doorway and into the
faintly orange light of dawn.
Fifth Company has another patrol to ride,
one that Lorn hopes will be uneventful, even as he prepares for it to be
otherwise.
XL
Lorn
steps into the study in the square tower and glances toward the outpost
commander. The darkness under the Majer's eyes is obvious for the first time
Lorn can recall. Brevyl's face is almost gaunt, and his short bushy hair is
thinner. The faintest hint of raspiness edges his voice as he gestures.
"Take a seat, Captain." He lifts a scroll slightly, then sets it on
the table-desk.
Lorn nods and settles into the armless
wooden chair, his own eyes remaining on the white-haired majer.
"You're being ordered to the main
outpost at Geliendra, Captain Lorn. You will command a company whose duty is to
guard the ward-wall and to protect the Mirror Engineers. After home leave in
Cyad." Brevyl snorts, lifting the order scroll from the desk again, before
dropping it on the polished wood. His eyes flick to the doorway, as if to
ensure that the white oak door is securely closed. "Stupid orders. Waste
of training."
There is little Lorn can say. He says
nothing, waiting for the majer's next words.
"I didn't like you, Captain, when you
came here as a green undercaptain. Well... you're as good a captain as I've
got, better than most I'll ever get, and I still don't like you." The
majer leans forward. "That doesn't matter. I respect you. You work hard.
Lancers all want to serve under you, and they follow your orders to the word.
You kill more barbarians and lose fewer men than any officer I have. I have to
respect all that. I don't have to like you."
Lorn nods slightly.
"You know that most of the senior
officers in Cyad don't like Magi'i - trained lancer officers. Neither do the
Magi'i. And they like the good ones even less. In a word, they're afraid of
you. They have been afraid of men like you for the past four generations, ever
since Alyiakal made himself emperor. They don't want it to happen again."
Brevyl snorts. "It couldn't happen now, but they don't see that. If it
did, it wouldn't last because the chaos towers won't last that much longer.
What earthly good would a magus-born Emperor be without the chaos powers of the
towers?"
The majer studies Lorn, then continues.
"You didn't blink an eye at what I said. You knew all that before you came
here. You said it didn't matter that they were twisting a splintered staff up
your rectum. I've heard that before from others. All words." Brevyl leans
back. "You believed those words, and you went out to learn how to kill
barbarians and lead your men... and save them."
"Yes, ser. I tried."
Brevyl brushes away Lorn's words with his
left hand. "So... now they'll send you to Geliendra, and if you're not
careful, one night a stun lizard or a big cat will appear, and you'll
disappear. No one will see the creature of the Accursed Forest, but you'll be
gone." Brevyl's smile is harsh. "I don't like you, but sending you to
Geliendra is a waste of a good captain when I don't get many. They'd rather see
half of Cyador fall to the barbarians than risk another emperor like Alyiakal.
They forget he was the best emperor in a century. All they recall is that he
was a magus-born lancer." The majer laughs once more. "He was an
emperor who didn't bow and scrape to the Magi'i... or ask the price of
everything from his oh - so - dear - and - valued merchanter advisors."
Lorn has not heard more than offhand
references by his father to the origins of the mighty Alyiakal, references that
had prompted covert research in his sire's books. He waits, sensing that Brevyl
has indeed told the truth in all of what he has said. Lorn hopes the majer may
add more.
"That's all, Captain." Brevyl
stands and extends the scroll. "You can leave tomorrow, or the day after,
at your choice. You're off patrols, right now."
Lorn stands quickly, gracefully, and takes
the scroll. He bows his head. "Yes, ser. Thank you for everything,
ser."
"And, Captain?"
"Ser?"
"I never said anything except to give
you your orders and wish you well with Majer Maran. He's very good at what he
does."
"Yes, ser." Lorn bows again.
"Yes, ser."
Brevyl watches, unblinking, as Lorn turns,
then opens the aged white oak door that predates the emperor Alyiakal.
In the narrow corridor outside the majer's
study, with the order scroll in his hand, Lorn nods at Kielt.
"Be wishing you a good trip and
success, ser," offers the senior squad leader.
"Thank you, Kielt." Lorn walks
slowly out of the square tower and into the gray fall afternoon. A light mist
seeps down from the low-hanging clouds, leaving a glistening sheen of water on
the stones of the outpost courtyard.
"Maran." Lorn murmurs the name to
fix it in his mind. Brevyl had dropped the name advisedly, most advisedly. The
question wasn't why so much as what he expected of Lorn-and Brevyl definitely
expected something. Then, Brevyl had always been like that, never acknowledging
the slightest possibility that Lorn might have some magely abilities. The
Mirror Lancers were happy to benefit from those abilities, but would never
acknowledge them in any positive way. That Lorn understands all too well.
After standing for several moments in the
misty courtyard, Lorn begins to walk toward the officers' barracks.
XLI
Lorn
folds the heavy winter tunic and lays it on the bed next to the other uniforms
he has folded before he will pack them in his kit bags.
As he lifts an undertunic, he catches a
flash of greenish light and picks up the silver-covered volume. He flips
through the pages he has not read recently. Had the ancient writer written
aught about duty changes from a bad outpost to a worse one? His lips quirk as
another question surfaces. Why is there no poetry written in Cyad? Lorn frowns.
He cannot remember ever seeing a written poem before Ryalth-yet he had known
what the verse had been. He stops at the one verse that catches his eye and
reads softly, aloud, if barely.
Do not ask me which carillon has rung
or if the Forest's silent god has sung.
Best you watch white granite towers,
raised in pride, doze in the dusky sun
until the altered green-bloody rivers run
down to the coming night where chaos
cowers.
Wondering how and why chaos could cower,
Lorn still winces at the images, and riffles through the unmarked pages until
he comes to a short verse standing by itself-about smiles. Perhaps...
He reads.
Smiles are so fragile,
like images on the pond of being,
reflections only made possible
by the black depths beneath.
What had been written is not exactly a
poem, he reflects. Still... do not smiles hide depths no one wishes to see?
Poetry will not help with the Accursed
Forest, nor speed him to Cyad and Ryalth. He closes the book, and slips it into
the bag between his smallclothes.
XLII
In the
orange light of dawn at Syadtar, Lorn stands beside one of the fluted white
columns supporting the sunstone portico that shelters travelers waiting for the
firewagons which link the farflung cities of Cyador. The chaos-powered vehicles
roll along the polished stone highways from warm and western Summerdock to the
southern delta city of Fyrad, from Cyad to Syadtar, as they have for more than
two centuries.
With the threat of the chaos-towers
failing, Lorn had at first wondered why the use of firewagons was not
curtailed-except that such would make no difference until a tower actually
failed. He smiles, thinking about how Lector Abram'elth had let that slip.
In the cold morning breeze, Lorn stretches
as he waits for the firewagon that will carry him back along the Great Northern
Highway until it joins with the Great Eastern Highway, where he will transfer
to another firewagon to carry him back home to Cyad. The two green canvas bags
at his feet carry uniforms and little else, save the antique Brystan sabre,
wrapped in his undertunics, and Ryalth's silver-covered book, in his
smallclothes.
At the second set of columns, a good thirty
cubits to Lorn's left, stand a half score of passengers who will be travelling
in the rear compartment. Among the brown and gray tunics are the maroon cloak
of a mastercrafter and a yellow cloak trimmed in purple. The woman wearing the
yellow cloak is gray-haired and carries a leather instrument case, possibly a
sitarlyn. Lorn is not sure of that, having been raised in the household of a
magus where the order vibrations would skew the use of a chaos glass or even
shatter it.
Boots scuff on the clean white stones of
the platform. Lorn turns to his right and watches a heavy-set merchanter,
followed by a porter and a hand cart. On the hand cart are three roughly
cubical canvas-wrapped objects, each about two cubits on a side.
"Here." The merchanter points
down beside the column adjacent to the one flanking Lorn.
The porter silently tilts the two-wheeled
handcart into a upright position, then carefully checks the three containers to
ensure they rest securely on the cart's carrying ledge.
The clean-shaven and gray-haired merchanter
in blue nods brusquely and looks toward Lorn, taking in Lorn's cream and green
uniform and the double bars on the lancer officer's collar. "Furlough,
Captain?"
"Duty change," Lorn answers
pleasantly.
The merchanter laughs pleasantly.
"You're one of the good ones, then."
"Good enough."
"The poor ones never make captain
before they hit the Steps. The fair ones stay here until they get unlucky or
old." The merchanter nods. "Seen them come and go, one way or
another."
"Are you with a clan house?" Lorn
asks, noting the fine cut of the man's blue shimmercloth tunic and the polished
cupridium boss on the silver belt buckle.
"Stitheth. One of the oldest in
Syadtar."
"What kinds of goods..." Lorn
lets his voice trail off, as if he were uncertain as to whether he should even
inquire.
"Durables-clays, timbers from
Jakaafra, leathers, well, hides really... all kinds-from the finest in gaitered
stun lizards to bull leathers for the most durable boots. Dyes and polishes,
lacquers..."
"All very necessary goods." Lorn
nods. The merchanter has been careful in his house description-using the word
the "oldest" rather than "finest," although Lorn has few
doubts that the Stitheth clan is among the wealthier houses, since Syadtar is
far from the sources of all the goods traded by the house, and most would have
to come by horse-drawn wagons rather than by firewagon because their bulk would
make firewagon transport unprofitable. "Doubtless all most profitable in
Syadtar."
"We have been fortunate,"
acknowledges the merchanter. At the low rumbling of heavy wheels on stone, Lorn
glances to the west, where the morning sun glints on the white-lacquer-like
finish of the approaching firewagon as it nears the embarking portico.
Behind the curved glass canopy at the front
of the vehicle, the two drivers-one white-haired, the other gray-haired-wear
the green tunic of a transporter. All drivers are former senior squad leaders
in the Mirror Lancers, something Lorn had learned at Isahl.
Eight passengers emerge from the firewagon,
only one from the forward compartment, a magus of indeterminate age who nods
briefly to Lorn and continues past the lancer officer carrying but a small
duffel of white shimmercloth. The seven passengers from the rear compartment
all wear brown or gray, except for a woman in the yellow of an entertainer.
All the passengers vanish into the streets
of Syadtar.
As Lorn and the merchanter beside him wait,
the two drivers and two porters slowly unload crates and baskets, while a young
enumerator watches.
Then another pair of drivers appears-one
bald and the other with salt and pepper hair. The driver with the black and
gray hair begins to walk around the firewagon, checking each of the six wheels,
the fastenings, and the array of chaos cells behind the rear compartment.
"First compartment. Travelers
westward! Travelers westward!" announces the bald driver. "First
compartment."
Lorn bends and lifts the two duffels,
careful not to let sabre and scabbard strike the one in his right hand. As he
walks toward the open front compartment door, the wind carries voices from the
second platform to him.
"...don't see why they get to travel
first free..."
"Because half of them don't live long
enough to get pensioned off, Vorkin. They can't take consorts with them, if
they can find one, and they never are home. That's why. You want to live like
that?"
"Still... wasn't that bad for your
uncle."
"You weren't there."
"Saw enough, I did...."
"Hush!"
A faint smile crosses Lorn's lips and
vanishes.
Behind Lorn, the merchanter directs the
porter toward the cargo bay of the firewagon, the space separating the smaller
front compartment from the larger rear one.
Lorn has to bend forward to slide the
duffels under the thinly padded curved bench seat, and he pushes them to the
far side. Then he has to unclip his scabbarded sabre from his belt. After
setting it against the outside wall of the compartment, he takes the rear
window seat on the left side, so that he can see ahead.
Through the cupridium-braced white oak
behind his head, he feels the rest of the goods and crates being loaded, and then
the clunk of the cargo doors being closed.
The merchanter peers into the compartment,
smiling as if in relief. "A bit of space here, captain. Until Coermat for
certain, anyway." He takes the rear-facing seat on the right side, as if
to be seated as far from the Lancer officer as possible, then stretches out his
thick legs. "Might not be so bad this time." His words end with a
yawn.
"It's better not to be cramped,"
Lorn agrees pleasantly. "Closing up, sers." The bald driver peers
into the compartment, before withdrawing and closing the door.
"You'll pardon me, captain. I had to
do the accounts before I left, and there wasn't much lamp oil left." The
merchanter nods politely, leans his head back, and closes his eyes.
The firewagon rolls forward slowly and
smoothly picks up speed. Lorn watches the white sunstone buildings of Syadtar
pass and vanish behind him.
He will not return to Syadtar. That he
knows.
XLIII
The
firewagon rumbles through the twilight toward Chulbyn, the town that exists
only to serve as the station for transferring passengers and urgent freight
from the firewagons plying the Great Northern Highway to those using the Great
Eastern Highway. Even though the chaos cells that power the rear wheel motors
are behind the second compartment, Lorn can sense the waning of the cells'
power. This trip will be the vehicle's last, until those cells are replaced
with the recharged cells periodically carried from Cyad to the replenishment
waystations.
Across from him snores a thin senior
enumerator, while the Stitheth merchanter sleeps quietly in the far corner of
the firewagon's forward compartment.
The firewagon lurches ever so slightly, as
if the wheels had struck something, and then crushed it, before the faintly
rumbling sounds of normal travel resume. For a moment, the enumerator's snores
cease. But only for a moment, Lorn reflects.
The firewagons on the Great Northern
Highway are smaller than those on the Great Eastern Highway, for all that the
travel distance from Cyad to Chulbyn is less than a third the distance to
Syadtar. Has it always been that way? Leaning back in the seat that become
harder and harder, Lorn fingers a chin getting all too stubbly.
Will Cyad seem any different? Lorn smiles.
Different it will seem, but in what ways he does not know. He hopes he will be
able to recognize those differences and that he can spend some time with
Ryalth.
A frown replaces the smile. Has Myryan been
able to deal with being Ciesrt's consort? He takes a long and slow breath.
Should he have taken matters in hand there? Will he ever know? Does he want to
know?
Outside the forward compartment of the
firewagon, as chaos powers the vehicle along the gleaming white pavement of the
Great Northern Highway, the twilight deepens into night. Inside, the enumerator
snores; the merchanter sleeps, and Lorn ponders the days ahead.
Part IV
- Lorn'alt, Cyad
XLIV
The
firewagon passes between the two sets of angled whitened granite pillars that
symbolically mark the northern boundary of Cyad, the City of Eternal Light and
Prosperous Chaos, and at that moment those pillars are half in the late
afternoon sun, half in shadow.
Lorn sits in the middle of the rear-facing
seat in the first compartment. To his left is the silent Lancer majer who had
boarded the firewagon in Chulbyn and who has spoken to no one. To his right is
a black-haired and sharp-nosed merchanter, almost as silent as the majer.
Across from Lorn sits a painfully thin young woman in the pale green of an
apprentice healer, with her father by the door to her right. Her father - even
more spare than his daughter - wears the unadorned white of a magus, without
the lightning bolt pin of an upper level adept. The magus alternates between
studying the younger men in the compartment, although his observations of Lorn
are less intense, as if he has already decided Lorn is scarcely worthy of
attention.
Lorn leans back, waiting until the
firewagon completes its traverse of the city and arrives at the main firewagon
station to west of the Palace of Light. His thoughts are upon Ryalth and
Myryan... and upon Jerial and his parents. None have seen him as a Mirror
Lancer officer.
He does not look up as the chaos vehicle
takes the upper Way of Far Commerce and passes the three-story sunstone
residences of the merchanter clan principals, small palaces on the fourth
highest hill within Cyad. Nor do his eyes lift as the firewagon, moving
smoothly over the polished granite blocks that floor all thoroughfares in Cyad,
glides by the exchange halls that dwarf all but the Palace of Light and the
structures that comprise the Quarter of the Magi.
"You're from Cyad, then,
Captain?" asks the majer, addressing Lorn for the first time on the entire
journey of more than two hundred kays from Chulbyn.
"Yes, ser."
The majer nods. "I thought so. You've
seen it before, many times."
In the seat facing Lorn, the magus lifts
his eyebrows, and he tilts his head, as if viewing Lorn for the first time.
"Yes, ser." Lorn nods politely to
the majer, but the other officer relapses into silence.
A time later, when the firewagon slows to a
stop, Lorn eases himself erect. After the driver opens the door to the front
compartment, Lorn nods to the magus. "Good day, ser."
"And to you, Captain." The thin
man turns his head and murmurs, "Carefully, Kilenya." He slides out
the open door, then turns to offer his hand to his daughter. The young healer
apprentice looks neither at Lorn nor at her father as she takes a small green
bag from under the seat and slips from the compartment.
The lancer majer eases his sabre from
beside him, takes a single kit bag, and leaves as silently as he had entered so
long before, offering a brusque nod to Lorn. In turn, the sharp-faced
merchanter inclines his head to Lorn.
"Go ahead," Lorn says with a
smile. "I've a great deal under the seat."
"For your courtesy." The
merchanter nods once more, and slips from the firewagon.
Lorn reclaims his sabre and clips it in
place before sliding out the two bags that hold his kit. Once on the platform
under the granite pillars of the portico, he takes a slow breath of
sea-perfumed air, air far damper than he has felt in three long years. He steps
closer to the nearest pillar and sets down his gear, waiting for the others to
leave the pillared portico, watching as the provincial mage and his daughter
take the first waiting carriage, and the majer the second. The merchanter talks
with a white-haired enumerator, both standing by a wagon waiting on the far
side of the platform, presumably for some goods that will be unloaded from the
center compartment of the firewagon.
Lorn picks up his gear and crosses the
narrow way to the carriage-hire lane, where he addresses the first driver of
the pair of carriages remaining. "The Road of Perpetual Light, at the
crossing of the Tenth Way."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn opens the carriage door and sets the
two duffels that contain his kit on the floor, then adds, "Straight down
to the Third Harbor Way, and then out." He grins. "It's faster that
way."
"Yes, ser. As you wish, ser." The
driver bobs his head nervously with each word he utters.
Lorn slides into the uncovered carriage and
closes the half-door, settling back into the upholstered seat and taking another
long breath of the moist air of Cyad. For a moment, he glances up at the thin
white clouds seem to hang motionless.
As the two horses pull the carriage
southward, Lorn, studies the harbor, the white granite piers that hold near-on
a dozen vessels, more than two thirds long-haulers with stern ensigns of either
Hamor or Nordla. He sees but a single white-hulled fireship and two ships with
the blue of Cyadoran houses, and he wonders if one might be a ship in which
Ryalor House holds an interest. He laughs softly, telling himself he has no
claim on Ryalor House or its assets. None whatsoever.
Except... he shakes his head.
The chill of a chaos-glass screeing him
comes over him, as it has intermittently since he went to Isahl, although this
imaging is warmer. His father? The feel is similar. He shakes his head. He must
work that out- and somehow reconcile his father to Ryalth.
But can he even work matters out with
Ryalth? Without her suffering for his transgression of having been a student
magus? Will she even consider it? And what of Myryan? Is there anything he can
do to remedy her consorting with Ciesrt? Or did he have but one chance where he
has already failed?
His eyes do not truly see the City of Light
as the carriage conveys him toward the harbor and then eastward beneath and
past the Palace of Light, for he wrestles with all the questions seething
behind the composed expression upon his visage.
"Ser? This corner?" asks the
coachman for hire. "Is this where you wished to be?"
Lorn straightens, glances toward the
northwest corner, toward the four-story dwelling where he was raised. The house
is larger than he recalls, a dwelling that would be a merchanter palace in
Syadtar. "Yes."
"Three coppers, ser. It was half the
city."
Lorn
offers four, and opens the carriage half-door, easily lifting the two duffels,
and instinctively managing to keep the sabre from striking anything as he
alights. By the time he has carried his kit to the front and formal gate of the
house, Jerial is standing on the lower steps, well before the green ceramic
privacy screen that protects the main entrance overlooking the Road of
Perpetual Light.
His composure shatters into a broad smile.
As his boots touch the steps beyond the
gate, Jerial shakes her head. "I felt you were coming. Then I wasn't sure.
You look so... removed, so Lancer-like-I almost didn't recognize you."
Then she smiles, and for a moment, the formal facade of healer fades. "I
was hoping it wouldn't be long after your last scroll."
Lorn drops his kit and hugs her, amazed
once more at how small she truly is, for she has always seemed so much larger.
For but an instant, she clings to him
before deftly slipping out of his embrace. "You're stronger."
Lorn understands. "I hope so. I tried
to follow what you said." He pauses. "Where's Myryan?"
"She is consorted... father wrote you,
I know...."
He shakes his head. "I knew. I...
Myryan..." He shrugs. "What you don't see is sometimes hard to
picture."
"She and Ciesrt have a dwelling. You
can see her in the morning. She spends the afternoons at the infirmary."
Lorn holds back the frown. He understands
that message as well.
"Father used the chaos-glass, but he
and mother are still waiting upstairs."
"Decorum," Lorn says dryly.
"Always," responds Jerial, her
tone as dry as Lorn's has been.
Lorn picks up the duffels once more, and
the two walk up the lower steps and then around the decorative tiled bricks of
the privacy screen and into the lower entry. Side by side they ascend the
marble steps of the formal staircase. Only the servants' quarters are on the
lower level-where breezes are rare.
Lorn's mother-her once-mahogany hair now
almost entirely white- stands at the back of the second-level entrance hall.
Beside her is Lorn's father, in shimmercloth white, the bolts of chaos glowing
on the breast of his tunic.
"It's so good to see you."
Nyryah's smile is shy, if warm. She does not move toward her son.
"It's good to be here." Lorn sets
down his kit, steps forward, and hugs her firmly. Her embrace is firm, but
without the strength he has recalled.
When Lorn steps back, Kien'elth inclines
his head to his son the Mirror Lancer captain. "Welcome home."
"Thank you."
"It's good to see you, Lorn. You have
grown... in more ways than one." Kien'elth's smile is both welcoming and
strained.
"I've tried." Lorn's smile is
practiced and easy. "The Mirror Lancers make you work and think."
"Work, certainly. You have a few more
muscles," offers Nyryah.
"I'm as scrawny as ever," Lorn
protests.
"No, you're not," Jerial
counters. "Mother would know."
Lorn shrugs helplessly.
"I would like a few words with
Lorn." Kien'elth smiles, first at his son, and then at his elder daughter,
and then his consort. "But a few words, and you may have him back."
"I will check the dinner," Nyryah
says. "We may be able to find some tarts, or a pearapple pie."
"Mother..." Jerial smiles despite
the slight exasperation in her voice.
"Lancer captain or not, I doubt that
Lorn has lost his taste for sweets... of all kinds," Nyryah says firmly.
"He does take after his father."
Lorn can't help but grin at his mother.
Even Kien shakes his head ruefully, if
barely.
Lorn carries his bags up the second flight
of stairs, leaving them in the third level foyer. He unclips the sabre and lays
it across the green bags, then follows Kien'elth up the inner steps and to the
study on the uppermost level. With an inner sigh, Lorn notes the slight shuffle
in his father's walk and the thinning of his white hair.
The senior magus closes the study door
before making his way to the chair behind the polished white oak table-desk. He
sits carefully and not - quite - heavily.
Lorn takes the chair closest to the desk,
careful not to let his boots scuff the polished wood of the legs. He waits as
his father studies him in the comparative dimness of the paneled study. The
sun-gold eyes have lost none of the intensity Lorn recalls.
"I said you had grown in more ways
than one. I think you understand to what I refer," Kien states.
"Yes, ser."
"It is a dangerous course. Few
complete it."
Lorn shrugs, understanding all too well why
his father will not mention Lorn's growing power and control of chaos.
"I've followed what Myryan and Jerial have advised as well, for my health,
of course."
"They would know, but best you not
mention that again, even to me."
"Yes, ser." Lorn forces himself
to recall that he is back in the City of Light, where every statement may be
truthread, and every movement caught in a screeing glass like the one which
rests, covered, on his father's desk. He frowns, as his eyes study the light
amber of the wood which frames the glass.
Kien follows his eyes. "Yes, it's only
a year or so old. The old one vanished when I traveled to Fyrad last
year."
"That's odd," Lorn says.
"Most odd," reflects his father.
"I packed it when I left Fyrad, but when I unpacked here, it was
gone."
Lorn nods slowly. He is indeed back in
Cyad.
"With no sense of it in a year, I
doubt its fate will ever be known." Kien leans forward in the chair and
studies his son. "You may recall Alyiakal?"
"The lancer emperor?"
"The lancer-magus emperor. Any Mirror
Lancer who has such talents may well turn Cyador over to the barbarians."
Lorn waits.
"I'm aging, Lorn, and I am too fond of
pontificating. Yet I would ask that you bear with me and not ask any
questions." At those words, Kien'elth turns in his chair so that he does
not look at the lancer captain and cannot even see Lorn. "All who are of
the Magi'i are bound to serve chaos, and thus limited by chaos. Those who are
lancers are restricted because Cyador can but support limited companies of the
Mirror Lancers with firelances. A senior lancer officer who could muster chaos
would not be so bound or restricted, and both the senior commanders of the
Mirror Lancers and the most senior Lectors are bound to find and assure such
never become senior officers. None speak of this; none who are not first level
adepts or lectors know of such."
Lorn remains silent in the pause that
follows his father's words. Technically, Kien'elth has not addressed his son,
yet he has risked much even to speak as he has.
Kien turns back to face Lorn. "Some
from Cyador romanticize the freedom of the barbarians." His white eyebrows
lift. "Would you be one of those?"
"No. Once I asked myself about that
freedom." Lorn laughs harshly. "That was before I got to know
them."
Kien nods. "A man free of all
restraints is a slave to chance and order. The barbarians are slaves to chance,
even while they proclaim their freedom."
"They're dangerous, and there seem to
be more of them every year," Lorn points out.
"I suspect it has seemed that way for
many generations," Kien says. "Cyador endures, and the barbarians
dash themselves in vain against the lancers."
Lorn nods, but he recalls Jostyn and
Cyllt-and others who had shattered beneath such vain dashing.
"You'll be here for a season?"
"Five eightdays."
"Good. We'll get to see you."
Kien smiles. "So will a number of young women, I suspect."
Lorn shrugs, looking appropriately
sheepish.
The older man rises. "I will not keep
you from your sister and your mother. Otherwise we both will hear of it."
With a smile, Lorn stands.
"We will see you at dinner?"
"Of course. Where else could I get
pearapple cream tarts?" Lorn's smile expands into a broad grin.
Kien shakes his head as Lorn turns.
Outside the study, Lorn glances through the
portico columns that ring the open sides of the upper level, his eyes checking
the southwest and the harbor, though he cannot see the building that houses the
Clanless Traders... and Ryalor House. After a moment, he walks slowly down to
the second level, toward his own quarters, if they can truly be said to be such
after his three-year absence.
In the foyer, he looks for his bags, but
someone has moved them, and then continues toward the rear, slipping through
the open door. His bags have been set beside the wardrobe beyond the archway to
the sleeping alcove. The sabre lies across the desk. The chamber has not
changed, except in the feel of disuse and the lack of small items. There are no
spare coppers in the small tray in the corner of the desk, nor any paper in the
open-topped white oak box beside the empty inkwell.
He glances at the bags, then offers a
crooked smile to the emptiness of the room before turning and walking back
toward Jerial's door.
"It's open. You can come in, Lorn."
Jerial sits behind the desk. She replaces
the cupridium-tipped pen in the holder and stoppers the inkwell, her slender
fingers quick and deft. The piercing blue eyes turn on her brother, and both
narrow and finely defined black eyebrows arch into a question.
"A warning about not repeating the
mistakes of my past," Lorn answers.
"Were they really mistakes?"
"In father's eyes, I suspect."
"There was more, but I won't
press."
"Thank you." Lorn slides into the
armless chair at the corner of the table desk that could have been a match to
the one in his quarters. "How are matters with you?"
"For a healer without a consort... as
can be expected." Jerial shrugs. "I'm good enough, and I can always
be counted upon to be there. For that, all I receive is enormous condescension,
but the pressure to be consorted isn't as bad." She displays a crooked
smile. "I'm older now than most of the junior adepts who need consorts,
and those who are left don't wish a sharp-tongued healer."
"Especially one with brothers such as
yours?" Lorn's tone is idle.
"Vernt is most accepted."
"I would have thought so."
"And a lancer who fights the
barbarians is respected."
"In short, I'm expected to die young
and respectably, and Vernt will carry on." Lorn's tone is totally without
bitterness, as though he states a fact so obvious that there is not a doubt of
its veracity.
"No. You are expected to act
heroically and effectively." The eyebrows arch a second time. "Isn't
that what lancer captains do?"
"I'm only half what's expected,
then." Lorn shrugs. "I'm not terribly heroic."
"I imagine you are very
effective."
"The majer said something along those
lines," Lorn admits.
"Good." Jerial pauses. "I
presume you will offer some observations on the barbarians and the Grass Hills
at dinner."
"Yes. And how the lancers serve Cyador
and the Magi'i."
"That cream might be too heavy."
Lorn keeps the smile from his lips, but not
his eyes, though he could have done that as well.
Jerial laughs softly. "I forget how well you deliver the
outrageous."
"It's not outrageous. The Mirror
Lancers and the firelances provided by the Magi'i are all that keep the
barbarians of the north from turning Cyador into a wasteland." Looking
perfectly earnest, Lorn squares his shoulders.
"Well... Vernt might believe you. If
you began with the firelances."
Lorn's eyes catch Jerial's.
"He wants to be like Father,
Lorn." Her healer's voice carries a trace of sadness. "He does not
know Father."
"I'll be very careful... and very
cheerful."
"That would be best. Mother is still
most observant." Lorn nods. "What about Myryan?"
"She is handling Ciesrt as well as
possible. Your words to father gave her some more time."
"You're afraid it wasn't enough?"
Lorn studies Jerial without seeming to do so, almost leaning back in the
armless chair. "She doesn't talk to me. Not really."
"I'll see her tomorrow," he
promises.
"That would be good. Mother insisted,
quietly, that you not face Ciesrt as soon as you arrived."
"She is not happy with the
consorting."
"Neither she nor father saw any other
choices. Myryan could not follow my path." Jerial's smile is tight.
"I feared that."
"You did what you could."
"I need some time to unpack."
Lorn stands and stretches. "And to wash up before dinner. It was a long
ride from Syadtar."
"And think?"
"That, too." He turns toward the
door. "Lorn?"
"Yes."
"When you need them... there are blues
for a senior enumerator in your wardrobe, under the winter waterproof. I
thought your friend needed, shall we say, advancement."
"Thank you." Lorn nods to Jerial,
then steps out into the open corridor, walking slowly back to a chamber that is
his, and is not.
There he opens the first green bag and
begins to place his uniforms in the wardrobe, alongside the enumerator blues. A
faint smile curls his lips.
After the clothes are unpacked, and he has
slipped the silver volume into hiding with the smallclothes, he takes out the
Brystan sabre he has carried across Cyador, resharpened and worked into shape,
sensing the faint order-death sense of the worked and polished iron beneath the
scabbard. He has taken one liberty with the blade, a significant one, for now
the tip of the blade is edged on both sides, if only for a span on the
heavy-backed side. His senses tell him that much of a true point will not
weaken it, and for what he has in mind, he may need to thrust with it.
He can hold the iron without burning his
hands, but there is no reason to, not when Vernt or his father might sense it.
He smiles. He is, after all, entitled to a souvenir of his efforts against the
barbarians, although he has kept its presence hidden from all the lancers at
Isahl, and will from his family. Even should his father scree the iron,
Kien'elth will say nothing directly.
Once he has folded the green bags and put
them in the back of the wardrobe, he pulls off his boots, and then the uniform
he has worn for too many days. There is a robe on one of the wardrobe pegs,
which he slips on, before heading out the door toward the bathing chamber.
Once he is washed thoroughly and shaved, he
returns to his room and lies across the bed. What can he do about Myryan... and
Ryalth?
He does not ponder either long, for sleep
claims him.
A gentle rapping on the door frame brings
him awake, and he bolts upright.
"Dinner is almost ready," Jerial
says from the other side of the closed oak door. "I thought you'd like to
know."
Lorn has to clear his throat before he can
reply. "Thank you. I dozed off."
"I thought you might."
There is silence, and Lorn can sense that
she has slipped away to let him ready himself.
After hurriedly dressing, Lorn leaves his
chambers and walks down the steps to the smaller, and warmer, inner dining area
on the second level, his boots silent on the marble of the steps.
Even so, one of the servants nods to him as
he nears. He does not recognize the brunette with the round face and the
braided brown hair. "I'm sorry. I'm Lorn. I don't believe we've met."
"Sylirya, ser. I came here a season
after you left." Sylirya keeps her eyes properly downcast.
"How have you found it?"
"Your family is most kind, ser. A
better home I could not have found." She moistens her lips. "I must
help cook, ser...."
Lorn smiles cheerfully. "Do what you
must."
He waits until she turns, then waits again
as he hears his father's heavy steps on the stairs.
The magus whose hair has turned from
shimmering silver to a flatter white over almost four years nods to his son.
"You're still the first to the table." He looks around, then at Lorn.
"Is Jerial here? You were talking to someone."
"The new servant-Sylirya."
"She's scarcely new, Lorn. It's been
nearly three years for her, and for Kysia, and more than a year for Quyal-she's
the new cook."
"What happened to Elthya?"
"Her mother fell ill, and when she
went back to her town-I've forgotten the name-a widower she'd known when they
were children asked her to be his consort." Kien spread his hands.
"So we had to get a new cook. Quyal's as good as Elthya, but her cooking's
different, more... western, I'd say. More spice."
The two men walk through the foyer and
along the corridor to the dining area, where they stand by the door, waiting
for the others.
"Too spicy?" asks Lorn.
"I did ask for a little less
seasoning," his father admits.
They turn as Jerial approaches.
"Lorn was here, first, I'd
wager," Jerial observes.
"Before me," their father
confirms.
"Vernt should be here before
long," Jerial says. "I heard him come in, but he'll wait for
mother."
As she speaks, Lorn hears steps, and Vernt
and his mother appear. Like his father, Vernt wears the white shimmercloth of
an adept of the Magi'i, but without the lightning emblem. He has also added a
short-trimmed beard, sandy-colored like his hair.
"The lancer has returned," the
younger mage says. "Welcome back."
"Thank you." Lorn inclines his
head. "It's good to see everyone."
"Can we eat?" Kien rolls his
eyes.
"Of course, dear," responds
Nyryah. "Why don't you just go in and sit down?"
Lorn follows his father. While Kien sits at
the end of the table with his back to the window, Lorn takes the place to his
father's right. Jerial sits beside Lorn, and Nyryah seats herself at the end
opposite her consort. Vernt takes the place across from Jerial and Lorn.
Sylirya eases a large crock before Kien,
setting a ladle beside it. Another woman brings in two trays of bread-sun-nut
and a dark rye. "Thank you, Quyal." Nyryah nods at the second server.
"What-" begins Kien.
"Dinner is a beef stew. Quyal didn't
know Lorn was coming," interjects Nyryah quickly.
"None of us knew when he was
coming," adds Jerial. Lorn shrugs.
"Just serve yourself, dear," suggests Lorn's mother to
Kien.
"I will. I will." The older magus
shakes his head.
Vernt offers the tray of nut bread to his
mother, then takes two slices and sets them on his plate, before passing the
tray across to Jerial.
"You look good." Vernt smiles
happily at Lorn, then at the tray Jerial holds. "I still remember how you
sneaked extras on the sun-nut bread. You'd pass it up to begin with, and then
take three slices later."
Lorn grins easily. "Why not? You always
tried to grab two right at first, and you always got caught. Now you can do it,
and no one says anything."
"After all these years," Kien
grumbles good-naturedly, "you two are still at it."
Jerial laughs. "They're brothers. Did
you expect that to change?"
"I'm getting older. I could
hope." Kien slides the crock toward Lorn, who serves Jerial and them
himself, before passing it.
Vernt serves Nyryah and then himself, while
Lorn pours a maroon wine for everyone.
"Careful with that Fhynyco," Kien
tells Lorn. "It's better than Byrdyn."
"As good as Alafraan?"
"Alafraan? Now he's heard of wines we
don't know." Kien shakes his head. "Boy goes off, and now he's a
lancer who knows wines."
Both Jerial and Lorn laugh.
"I wouldn't," Lorn says,
"except that one of the officers came from a vintner's family in
Escadr."
"At least he admits it," adds
Nyryah. "Now... start eating before it all gets cold."
Lorn needs little urging, and stew or not,
the first mouthful tells him it is the best meal he has eaten since he left
three years earlier.
"What is Isahl really like?"
Jerial asks after Lorn has eaten several mouthfuls and half of the slice of nut
bread he had slipped onto his plate.
Lorn swallows. "It's hotter in the summer,
colder in the winter, and windier all the time. Outside of the outpost, there
are no more than a score of families in the valley, and fewer than that in the
adjoining valleys. The only trees are scrub cedars, and bushes..." Lorn's
description is as accurate as he can make it. "...and everything has
walls. Even the herders have sod walls around their holds."
"I wouldn't want to be there."
Vernt offers a twisted smile. "It's too bad he can't tell that to some of
the student mages."
"They wouldn't believe me." Lorn
shrugs. "I wouldn't have believed me."
A slight chill passes over the room, and
Lorn and his father exchange glances. Lorn takes another bite of stew, noting
the minute nods between his mother and Jerial. Someone is using a chaos glass.
To see if Lorn is indeed with family? Or to check up on Vernt or his father?
"What will you do while you're
here?" asks Nyryah quickly.
"See you, visit friends, enjoy good
food, and rest. All the things you can't do out in the Hills of Endless
Grass."
"And then... ?" Vernt inquires.
"I'm off to my next post. In
Geliendra. I've been told I'll have a company." Lorn shrugs. "In the
Mirror Lancers, you find out when you get there." He takes a small swallow
of the Fhynyco, stronger and smoother than Byrdyn, then helps himself to more
of the stew.
"And after that?" Vernt persists.
"Or do you know?"
"I could but guess." Lorn takes
another bite of the stew before continuing. "If I make overcaptain, or
sub-majer, I could be the second-in-command somewhere, or head a port
installation... or..." He lets the words trail off.
"Seasons enough to worry about
that," says Kien. "Best we enjoy the season at hand." He smiles
at Lorn, and then at Nyryah.
"And you," she replies to the
look of her consort, "are like your sorts, wanting to know what sweets
follow?"
"There is little wrong with
that," counters the older magus.
Nyryah inclines her head to Sylirya, who
slips away from the table, to return with a shallow bowl that she sets before
Kien. Then the serving girl slips smaller porcelain bowls, fringed in gold,
before each family member before retreating to the archway where she waits.
"You will have to do with dried
pearapples and sweet brown sauce," Nyryah tells Lorn.
"I can manage that." Lorn
chuckles. "I never saw pearapples in Isahl, or Syadtar, either."
"What is Syadtar like?" Jerial
asks. "Is it dirty with narrow streets, like a barbarian town?"
Lorn shakes his head. "It's like any
other town I've seen in Cyador. Granite and sunstone buildings, clean tile
roofs, wide paved streets, houses like the smaller ones here in Cyad." He
shrugs. "Except for the size of the buildings and how few there are
compared to Cyad, the towns I've seen all are pretty much alike. That's until
you get to the grasslands and the herders' holdings out in the Grass
Hills."
"I don't think I'd like that,"
ventures Jerial.
Lorn senses he is being watched, but as he
watches, never looking overtly, he can see no one. Nor is the feeling like that
of being watched in a glass, as he has felt with his father, and, occasionally,
at other times- as had happened earlier at dinner. Being watched, in his
parents' home? Being watched by other Magi'i, in a glass, that he can
understand. But who else would care?
He reaches for the pearapples, a smile
still upon his lips.
XLV
A raw
winter wind whips off the Great Western Ocean and across the city of Cyad,
bringing a chill that belies the bright mid-morning sun set in the cloudless
green-blue sky. Wearing but his winter white uniform, trimmed in green, and
white leather gloves, and without the sabre, Lorn walks quickly eastward on the
walkway of the Road of Perpetual Light, stepping past the First Score Way. The
carry-bag in his left hand is gray- something that could be carried by a
lancer, a tradesman, or a merchanter. In it is the set of blue shimmercloth
enumerator garments.
The dwelling where Jerial has directed Lorn
is still farther to the east, almost out of the city. Lorn hurries, because he
wishes to arrive at midmorning-when Ciesrt will be at his tasks in the Quarter
of the Magi'i.
When he reaches the Twenty-Third Way, Lorn
pauses, readjusting the white dress officer's cap, as he mentally reviews the
description provided by Jerial and compares it to the dwellings to his right.
The two-story dwelling is of green glazed brick, with a blue tile roof, set in
a slight hollow between two larger dwellings, blocked partly from the cooling
ocean breezes. The privacy screen is of blue and green tiles, with a time-faded
inset golden lily in its center.
He steps up to the ledge on the left side
of the privacy screen and pulls on the green silken cord to ring the bell.
After a long moment, he hears steps, and
the viewing shutter is unslit. "Lorn!" Myryan rushes out the door and
around the screen. She hugs her brother tightly and buries her head against his
chest. "You're here! You came!"
He has to drop the carry-bag to return the
embrace.
After the initial exclamation and hug,
almost as suddenly, Myryan steps back and looks down. "I suppose consorted
healers aren't supposed to do that." Her smile is partly sheepish, partly
something Lorn cannot identify. "But you were out fighting the barbarians,
and you came back safely, and you are my brother."
Lorn is conscious of just how thin and
frail she appears, tall as she is, even in the loose-fitting healer greens. He
can sense no chaos about her, no sickness... yet there is something. Around her
is the faint scent of trilia and erhenflower, a combination much gentler than
erhenflower alone, and not as overpoweringly sweet as trilia alone.
"You must come in." She bends as
if to pick up his bag. "I've got it." Lorn is quicker and has it in
hand before she half-starts the movement.
"Same old Lorn. Do you let anyone do
anything for you?"
"Sometimes."
"Ha! Tell me when." She doesn't
wait for an answer, but walks around the ceramic privacy screen and through the
still open front door. Lorn follows with his carry-bag.
Beyond the front door is a small
tile-floored foyer scarcely four cubits square with arches leading in three
directions. Myryan leads Lorn to the left, into a chamber perhaps ten cubits
long and six wide. The walls have been freshly plastered and painted in a
green-tinted, off-white color, and the floor tiles recently regrouted.
Three narrow and shuttered windows grace
the outside front wall, their lower sills two cubits above the polished but
worn green ceramic tile floor. A narrow set of shelves stands between the left
end of the windows and the corner, bare except for a single sculpted sunstone
statuette of a magus looking up at a single step. In the other window corner is
a waist-high circular table holding an oil lamp that had once been in Myryan's chambers.
Facing the window is a settee upholstered in faded blue. To its left stands
another table, of darker wood, holding a blue glass lamp. To its right, between
the settee and the window table, is a straight-backed oak chair. The last piece
of furniture in the room is a low padded stool set before the middle window.
Myryan steps to the windows, and one after
the other, opens the shutters to let in the light. She turns and gestures
around the small room. "This will have to do. We only have the one sitting
room, and no portico." She stands by the padded stool and faces the
settee.
Lorn sets down the bag and takes the
straight-backed white oak chair that, from its patina, is probably older than
either of them. Myryan settles onto the stool. "When did you get
back?"
"Last night." He smiles
crookedly. "Jerial suggested that my arriving late in the evening at your
door might not have been well-received. So I came this morning." He does
not mention that their parents had offered no guidance, except indirectly
through Jerial.
"Jerial never cared that much for
Ciesrt." Myryan smiles wanly.
"She didn't offer any judgments."
"Does she need to?" Myryan's tone
of voice is wry, much like their mother's can be.
"Jerial does things her own way,"
Lorn answers.
"She always has. I don't see that
changing."
"How are you doing?"
"I'm still working as a healer."
Her amber eyes sparkle for a moment. "And trying to turn this place into
something respectable. All the walls were dark blue."
"With large gold lilies painted on
them?"
"Small faded yellow lilies.
Everywhere." Myryan laughs. "It was the best we could do. Ciesrt
didn't want us to live with our parents, and I didn't want to live with his.
So..."
"Junior second level adepts don't make
that much."
"You're kind, Lorn. Third level. He
says he'll make lower second this summer when the Lectors review all the
thirds."
Lorn considers the dwelling-modest by the
standards of where they grew up, but far from modest even compared to Ryalth's
quarters... assuming Ryalth has not found larger accommodations suited to the
success of Ryalor House.
Myryan follows his eyes. "We had help.
Kharl'elth and father... and someone else."
"Someone else?" Lorn does frown.
Myryan shrugs, almost helplessly. "I
thought it might have been you. Like the healer pin. There was a deposit made
in an account at the Exchange in my name... as much as father and Kharl
promised. I told Ciesrt that it came from mother's family. He just nodded."
Lorn
could see Ciesrt nodding, accepting what he could not understand, and passing
through life without considering anything beyond the Quarter of the Magi'i.
"You have no idea?"
Myryan shakes her head. "I kept the
golds for almost a season, but there was never any hint of anything from
anyone. Finally... well... I found the house. Tyrsal helped me, posed as a
relative. We've only been here a season."
"You're happier here."
Myryan smiles. "Much happier. I've
done some work outside, but I can't wait to start on the garden. The soil's
good, and I can grow some of the better herbs, I think. And Jerial commissioned
a bed and armoire for us. I don't know how she did..."
Lorn raises his eyebrows.
"Well... she didn't have to..."
"She made you promise not to tell,
right?"
Myryan nods. "You won't, will
you?"
"Chaos-light, no. What does Ciesrt
think about all this?"
"He's pleased we have our own
dwelling. None of the other thirds do."
"I'm glad you do."
"What about you?" she asks.
"I have a little less than five
eightdays before I have to leave and report to Geliendra. You'll have time to
fill me in." He smiles. "On everything. Almost everything," he
quickly adds.
"Geliendra?" She frowns. "Be
careful. The Magi'i are doing something there. I overheard Kharl... but he
stopped when he saw Ciesrt and me."
"He is the Kharl'elth, and still the
Second Magus?"
"Very powerful, and he makes sure the
family knows it." Myryan's mouth crinkles into an ironic smile. "He
spends all his time in the Palace. That's the way Ciesrt talks about it."
"Did you hear any more about
Geliendra?"
"I didn't hear much. I wouldn't have
heard that, but I'm not that comfortable when we go there, and..." She
offers an embarrassed smile this time.
"You used your chaos-order
senses?"
She nods, then adds, "All I heard was
something about the importance of the trial period, and the interest of the
Emperor. It was at a gathering, and he was talking to another of the Magi'i. It
wasn't Chyenfel, but we were never introduced-I wasn't. Kharl took Ciesrt and
introduced him." Myryan's face hardens slightly. "Since I wasn't
introduced, I didn't ask who he was. I wish I had."
"It doesn't matter." Lorn means
it. The information's value is in the content and the speaker, not the
listener.
Myryan brushes back a strand of curly black
hair and shifts her weight on the padded stool. "Sometimes, when I'm
there, I feel more like a settee or a table than a person."
"At Ciesrt's parents' dwelling?"
"They want us to have children, and
she's always asking me when she can expect a grandchild." Myryan's lips
twist. "I tell her that it's in the hands of chaos. It is, but not the way
she thinks."
"Jerial?"
Myryan nods. "She knows a lot. Sometimes
that's helpful, and she didn't even ask why."
"Does Ciesrt suspect?"
Myryan laughs gently. "He's
order-blind, like Vernt. Maybe that's why they get along so well."
"I didn't know they had become
friends," Lorn says easily. "Friends? I don't know. When they talk,
they understand each other, but they don't go out of their way." The
healer lifts her shoulders, then drops them. "That's with anyone-both of
them are like that."
"Vernt asked a question or two at
dinner last night," Lorn says.
"He probably had to force himself to
do that."
"Ciesrt... does he talk much? To you,
I mean?"
"He tells me everything he can about
his day, and about how many firewagon cells he charged, and why the cells on
the bigger firewagons are different, and how important what he and the others
do is for Cyad." She laughs softly. "I listen. He means well, and, in
his own way, he does want me to be happy."
"I'm glad for that." Lorn turns
in the chair.
"That chair is hard. You could sit on
the settee."
He grins and stands, stretching. "I'm
still a little stiff from the travel. Not used to sitting in a firewagon for
days."
"You... the man who could outwait
anyone?"
"Only if I have a reason," he
points out. "Otherwise, I have trouble sitting still."
"That I find hard to believe, my dear
brother."
Lorn rolls his eyes.
"I won't ask about other...
matters." Myryan stands. "The kitchen isn't much, but I need to eat
something, and so do you." She uncoils herself from the stool, standing as
tall as Lorn, and motions for him to follow.
The kitchen has also been replastered and
smells fresh and clean, despite the age of the dwelling. Somehow, the spare
setting suits Myryan, Lorn reflects, watching her extract a wedge of cheese from
the watercooler.
Deftly, his sister slices the hard cheese
into finger-sized wedges, yet Lorn can sense her reluctance with the knife, and
her relief when she wipes it clean and replaces it in the wooden holder
quickly.
"The knife bothers you."
"Most healers have trouble with
knives, even cupridium ones, but they're not as bad as the iron ones."
"The iron-"
"It's not the iron. I can hold iron,
any kind of iron, and it doesn't bother me."
Lorn frowns. "I'd think... this can't
be new."
Myryan laughs. "New? It's been a
problem since the firstborn. The Magi'i don't mention it because we're just
healers, not wielders of chaos." Lorn holds in the wince he feels.
"Take some of the cheese. You're pale.
I'm a healer, and I can sense it." Myryan breaks off a chunk of the
slightly stale bread and thrusts that at him as well.
"I didn't come to take food."
"I know. You came, and I'm glad."
Myryan chews the bread and cheese before speaking. "Is this all right? I
like bread and cheese. Ciesrt doesn't. He wants a hot breakfast and dinner. So
I have the cheese at mid-day."
"Bread and cheese like this are
fine," Lorn reassures her. "They're not at all like what lancers get,
even lancer officers. I didn't say much about food last night, but I think
anything in Cyad would taste wonderful. This is better cheese." He raises
his eyebrows. "What kind?"
"It's from the east, someplace called
Worrak, I think."
"And the eastern barbarians actually
make good cheese?"
"They're not all like those in the
north," Myryan counters.
"No matter what father says?"
Lorn smiles.
"Oh..." She pauses. "Father
is beginning to look old. Didn't you see it? Sometimes, I wonder."
"His hair is white, not silver. But it
will happen to us all," Lorn says.
"But it's so sudden. Last year, it was
silver."
Lorn frowns.
"There's nothing I can do. Mother's
doing what she can. I hope she doesn't try too hard."
"Too hard?"
"She's a healer, not just a mother. If
she puts too much into helping father, then..." Myryan looks at Lorn.
"It could hurt her."
"It could. It will." Myryan wraps
the cheese and replaces it in the cooler, then puts the bread in the keeper.
She looks at the sandglass on the pedestal. "I don't want to go... but I'd
better... they expect me."
"I'll keep stopping by."
"I hope so. You are my brother."
Her smile warms him, but it fades too quickly as she continues, "I won't
ask about other things, Lorn. I hope you work them out, but I shouldn't know.
We have dinner at least once a week with Ciesrt's parents."
He nods, understanding too well.
"Thank you. I hope so, too."
"I'm going to have to leave for the
infirmary. Is there anything I can do before I go?"
Lorn wants to laugh. Anything she can do?
He is the one who should have acted.
"Lorn..." Myryan's amber eyes
catch Lorn's. "You did what you could. It's better this way. I can accept
Ciesrt."
Accept. Lorn does not like the word.
"Would you mind if I just sat for a
while in the garden?" he finally asks. "I need some quiet. I'll leave
from there."
"You could stay here."
"I think I'd like the garden."
Lorn does not wish to risk being seen in a glass within her walls without her
present, for several reasons.
"If that's what you'd like." She
smiles once more. "You've always needed some time apart from others. I'm
glad that hasn't changed."
"I don't always want that distance,
Myryan." He steps forward and hugs her. "I just can't change things.
Not now."
She returns the hug, then steps back, and
he wonders if he has changed so much that she must hang onto a few old
mannerisms to assure herself that he remains the Lorn she knew.
After reclaiming the carry-bag and waving
from the garden gate as Myryan walks out to the Road of Perpetual Light, Lorn
steps back into the garden, finding the arbor.
Myryan may guess what he is doing, but she
does not know, and one arbor is much like another in a screeing glass.
Some time after he senses that she is far
enough eastward of the house that she cannot sense anything he may do, he steps
into the corner of the arbor where the gray winter leaves of the grape are
thick and will shield him from any eyes that may peer from the adjoining
dwellings that rise above the blocks of the gray stone walls that enclose the
rear garden of Myryan's dwelling.
Once he has changed into the blues and
boots that he had carried in the bag, he stretches, then readjusts the tunic.
The blues feel strange on him... as if he had outgrown them. He checks the fit,
and the tailoring is perfect. With a snort, he smiles.
He emerges from the arbor as a senior
enumerator, carry-bag in hand, and walks through the outside garden gate,
carefully latching it behind him, and then heads along the Road of Perpetual
Light, westward back toward the center of Cyad.
At the Fifteenth Way, long before he can be
seen from his parent's dwelling, he turns and walks southward to the Road of
Benevolent Commerce. Bag still in hand, he follows it toward and then into the
Merchanter section.
With the sun higher in the clear blue-green
sky, the wind has softened and warmed, and more folk fill the walkways that
flank the road. A wagon drawn by a single horse passes. Lorn notes the legend
painted in yellow upon the green wagon sideboard: Tarfak House, Spices.
Perhaps Ryalor House should investigate
spices. He smiles lopsidedly and continues walking, his steps quick and
precise. As he passes the Empty Quarter coffee house, he can see that it
appears more empty than three years earlier, and that the awning that once
sheltered outside tables has been removed. So have the tables. Is there that
little coffee left that it is too expensive for junior merchanters?
At the Third Harbor Way, he steps behind an
empty wagon drawn by a pair of mules and crosses to the white stone walkway on
the far side, where he turns harborward and walks down the gentle incline to
the lower merchanters' plaza. Three carts remain under their traditional green
and white striped awnings as Lorn strides around them to the northwest corner
of the plaza, his destination the squat-looking white building of the Clan-less
Traders, where Ryalth has continued to maintain the small office of Ryalor
House.
Once inside the squared open archway and
off the relatively uncrowded plaza, Lorn finds himself at the edge of a swirl
of figures in blue, as well as a few in red, white, or green. Seemingly without
much notice, Lorn eases through and around the small groups of traders and
hagglers and hangers-on and makes his way to the stairs at the rear of the
high-arched hall. He glances up at the three stories of balconies and hopes
that Ryalth has not moved her trading office too far.
She has not moved it at all-it remains the
same two-doored area at the back of the third level, well into the northeast
corner. Sitting at the small corner desk, she studies a ledger, her head down,
and as he slips toward her Lorn can see that she has cut her hair far shorter
than he recalls.
"Do you have a need of a senior enumerator,
Lady Merchanter?" Lorn smiles, but he finds his heart is beating faster
than it should.
"I have..." Ryalth looks up, and
her mouth drops open. "You came," she whispers. "You really
did."
Lorn can sense that no one is that near or
listening. "I arrived last night... my parents expected me to spend some
time there... so I came as soon as I could." He forces himself to cut off
the explanation of why he did not want them suspicious of his immediate
departure. "As soon as I could."
Ryalth quietly closes the ledger. "You
still are trying to protect me, aren't you?"
"You seem to be able to take care of
yourself." He smiles. "And you've protected me in so many ways. I
never would have thought about scrolls going through Fyrad, or been able to set
that up."
"That was easy." She pauses.
"It was not difficult."
"Your enumerator?"
"Eileyt is still at the harbor,
checking the accounts of the latest venture with the Jekseng clan. Dyes from
Brysta-their green is better than anything on this side of the Eastern
Ocean."
"Does Ryalor House have ventures with
everyone?" Lorn shakes his head.
"It's better that way. Each thinks
we're too small to stand alone, and that way I can spread the risks."
Ryalth stands.
Lorn wishes to hold her, but his hand
merely brushes hers. They both stiffen.
"I think I'd better close up,"
she smiles wryly. "I'm not going to finish reviewing these." She
lifts the ledger, then slips it into the leather case she has pulled from
beneath the desk.
Lorn watches as Ryalth extracts a wallet
from the desk, then slips a lock bar in place and padlocks the bar. "It
won't stop a Clan thief, but to break it will make enough noise that everyone
will know, and they frown on that." She lays the thin and long leather
wallet-almost a narrow pouch-on the desk top and fingers the golds inside into
a position to allow her to fold it in half. She slips the folded wallet into
the slots in the back of the heavy and overlarge blue leather belt she wears.
After Ryalth closes and locks the doors,
the two walk briskly down the steps and out though the covered hall. A few
heads turn at Ryalth's red hair, see the enumerator's garb, and turn back.
"Another enumerator... has three..."
"...trades everything... but not a
lot... doesn't lose much..."
"You should be so good, Tymyk."
"Everyone knows you," Lorn
observes.
"I've made it a point," she says.
"I've helped those I could, and cheated no one."
"The good and fair lady trader."
"Not always good."
The bleakness in her voice surprises Lorn,
and he says nothing as they cross the open plaza outside the hall.
"You were right, when we first dealt
with cotton and oil." She turns her head, and the deep blue eyes fix his
amber ones. "I learned that again, the hard way. I find I have to remember
that, but I don't like it." Lorn nods, though her words send a cold knife
down his spine. They walk silently eastward along the Road of Benevolent
Commerce, past a row of arymids with furled gray winter leaves, their trunks
pale gray in the afternoon light.
"How long will you be here?" she
asks quietly. "Almost five eightdays. I get six, but that has to include
travel from Isahl and then to Geliendra. That's my next post."
"And you sought me out within a day? Are
there not scores of healers and women from high lancer families vying for your
attention?"
"I wasn't interested." Lorn
cannot quite keep his tone disinterested. "I would have sought you last
night, but my family was watching. Someone has also been following me with a
screeing glass, not always my father. I didn't come from the house, directly. I
stopped to see Myryan and then changed in her garden arbor after she left for
the infirmary."
"I would have liked to have seen
that." Ryalth's lips quirk.
"I'm sure you would." Lorn laughs
gently.
They pass the Fourth Harbor Way-the east
one, although the ways are not distinguished on the placards by whether they
are east or west of the harbor center.
"How is Myryan?" Ryalth asks
after a time.
"I don't know. She seems healthy, but
she's... more resigned than happy. The only time she seemed joyful was when she
talked of the house and of her garden."
"Isn't that good?"
"I'm glad she has the house,"
Lorn says. "I can't imagine her living with Ciesrt's parents. He's the
second highest Magi'i. Kharl, Ciesrt's father, I mean."
"That must be quite an honor for
Myryan to be his consort." Ryalth's voice is even, hiding emotions.
"She didn't want it, and I tried to
talk father out of it before I left. He ' waited to consort her, but he didn't
change his mind." Lorn takes a deep breath. "I think Myryan would
have been better without the honor."
"You'd do almost anything for those
you love."
"Almost," Lorn temporizes, again
wondering if he should have killed Kharl before the Lector knew Lorn was a
threat.
"More than that, I think."
Ryalth's voice is calm, slightly distant. "Your father knows that."
After a barely imperceptible pause, she adds, "Don't you think?"
"Father? I think he doesn't know quite
what to think. I'm not the Magi'i son he wanted, and I'm not exactly the lancer
officer he suggested I could be."
"You survived and made captain,"
she points out.
"I'm... effective," Lorn says.
"Not glorious." His eyes flick to the next Way, where a tinker's cart
is tied before a smaller house, and where the maroon garbed tradesman pedals a
foot-grinder and sharpens knives, deftly handling one, then another.
She nods, her lips quirking momentarily.
"Maybe that's why you're a good trader."
"I'm not a trader. You're far better
than I could ever be."
"You can see what will change,"
she corrects him. "I know what to do when you tell me what will
happen."
"We make a good team." He smiles,
happy to be walking beside her, as they pass the tinker's cart.
"You've never said that before."
"I haven't? I've thought it
enough."
"There's much you think and don't
share, Lorn."
He cannot but catch the edge of wistfulness
behind the facade of the experienced merchanter, a wistfulness he doubts most
would perceive. "I'm sorry." And he is, yet he knows that every word
in many places they both frequent may carry to the wrong ears.
Ryalth points to the structure on the lower
side of the Road of Benevolent Commerce, although she points upward. "I
took chambers on the third level. The end stairs."
Lorn follows her through the archway in the
wall and then through the simple shared formal garden-little more than trimmed
dwarf cedar, two short flower beds turned under for the winter, and
time-polished stone benches placed in areas shaded by the handful of feathering
conifers.
"These came vacant. They only cost
three golds a season more, and the balcony is more private," Ryalth
explains, starting up the outside stone steps. "It seemed worth it.
They're larger, and the breeze is better in the summer."
"And colder in the winter?"
"I haven't noticed." She smiles
as she stops in front of the last door off the covered walkway on the third
level.
"Better view up here," Lorn says.
"It is."
The key clicks in the lock, and she opens
the door, waiting for Lorn to enter. He waits for her to enter. Both smile,
albeit nervously.
He finally shakes his head and steps
inside, past the narrow interior privacy screen. Then he turns, taking in her
face and the deep blue eyes that he has recalled on so many nights.
Ryalth closes the door. She steps past the
screen, and Lorn's arms go around her, but not so quickly as hers encircle him.
The key clanks on the floor. Neither
reaches for it as their lips meet.
XLVI
In his
undertunic, Lorn sits in the small eating area by the door to the balcony,
glancing over the empty plates that had earlier held a thrown - together omelet
and almost fresh dark bread to take in Ryalth, her creamy freckled skin and the
deep blue eyes that make even merchanter blue seem shallow by comparison, even
above the bulky white cotton robe she had donned before she had made the
omelet.
Lorn smiles, and Ryalth smiles back.
He sips the water from the goblet,
pondering the early morning drizzle beyond the small window, wondering if it is
the typical winter morning drizzle or whether it will lift as the sun rises
higher into the sky.
The lady merchanter looks at the goblet
Lorn holds. "I don't buy coffee any more."
"That's all right. It's too bitter for
me."
"I liked it, but you can't get it for
less than ten golds a tenth-stone."
"That much?" Lorn's mouth makes
an "o" as he sets the goblet down.
"The blight. All the coffee bushes are
dying, those that hadn't already. They're saying that the chaos strength of the
Firstborn has faded, and that since they brought the coffee bushes, none will
survive."
"I never heard that. It could be
true," he muses, considering what he knows about the impending failure of
the chaos towers.
"It is true. They're dying."
"No. I meant the reason." He
finds a smile still upon his lips as he looks at her once more.
"I need to get ready. I still have a
trading house to run." Ryalth's face clouds abruptly.
"You're worried." Lorn pauses,
then says, "And it's not about trading today."
Ryalth shivers. "I still don't know
why you're here."
"Because I met you one night when I
was a student, and nothing was quite the same after that."
She laughs, a forced sound. "You just
wanted me in bed."
"At first," he admits. Then he
grins. "And you just wanted to know what loving someone from the Magi'i
was like."
"Someone sweet," she corrects.
He shakes his head. "I'm not
sweet."
"You are inside, and to those you
love."
"You know why I'm here," he
points out.
"You never tell me, though. That's
something I hate about the Magi'i. You-maybe not you-but most Magi'i use words
as weapons, and none of you like to say anything beyond pleasantries because
you're afraid someone will weigh the truth of your words and use it against
you."
"They do," Lorn counters.
"All that bothers you, but that's not what's worrying you."
"I'm fine."
Lorn conceals a frown. He stands and walks
over to her, drawing her to her feet and nuzzling her ear.
Ryalth remains stiff, unyielding.
"I'd feel better explaining this
way," he whispers. "You don't know how closely the Magi'i watch and
how they use the chaos-glasses."
She nips his ear, slightly harder than
necessary. "That's for not telling me earlier. I knew, but I wanted you to
tell me."
"I'm sorry," he murmurs.
"Will you tell me what else is bothering you?"
"I said..."
"It's not true."
"I would love a man who still remains
Magi'i."
"He loves you." Lorn keeps his
voice low, and his left hand massages the tight muscles beside her right
shoulder blade. "Tell me."
"Shevelt has been pressing me... he
says I really don't have a consort," Ryalth says quietly, letting her arms
encircle him, but loosely.
"Who is he? A spoiled trader?"
Lorn's left hand continues to massage her tight shoulder muscles.
"The heir to the Yuryan Clan...
shimmercloth, Hamorian cotton, spices..."
"Does he want a consort?" Her
smothered laugh is bitter.
"Come to Geliendra for my first
furlough," he says. "A year after I get there."
Her eyebrows lift and she leans back to
look at him. "Why?" Lorn swallows, then bends to let his lips touch
her left ear. "So we can be consorted there."
"You mean it." She shakes her
head, pushing him away slightly before whispering back. "Why there?"
"Because it's not here."
She laughs at the dryness in his tone.
"And?"
"If I'm followed here, anyone would
think you're my mistress-" Lorn stops, not really sure how to voice what
he thinks.
"I'm not?" Her eyebrows arch.
"You're far more than that." He
hurries his next murmured words. "That anyone would think you are my
mistress protects you."
She nods. "I think I understand. I
don't like it."
"I'm trying...."
"I know." She tightens her
embrace for a moment. "I know."
Lorn holds her close, as she does him.
Ryalth will have to leave shortly, all too
soon.
And Lorn will still have to handle
Shevelt... before he leaves for Geliendra.
XLVII
Lorn
studies the city from the fourth-level portico of his parents' dwelling,
watching the morning winter sun create shimmers that dance across the harbor
and the Great Western Ocean farther to the south. Yet to Lorn's eyes, the white
city does not seem so vibrant as usual. Is it because of the winter-gray
leaves... or the absence of the green and white awnings, furled for the
winter... or because he sees it differently?
The air is still, cool but warming as the
sun climbs.
Sensing someone approaching, he turns to
see the round-faced servant-Sylirya-carrying a small basket. She inclines her
head to him.
"Good day, Sylirya."
"Good day, ser."
Lorn peers at the basket.
"Brushes and caustic, ser. To clean
the tiles on rear portico."
"That's a hard job. Mother used to
give it to us when we were children." Lorn half-smiles at the memory, then
adds, "Well... I won't keep you."
He steps back to let Sylirya pass and get
to her duties, then turns and begins to walk back toward the stairs down to his
chamber. The door to his father's study is open, and Kien stands there, a
polished white oak walking stick in his hand.
"Oh... I thought you would have been
in the Quarter," Lorn says.
"I was about to leave." The older
man gives a self-deprecating smile. "At my age, I have some small leeway.
Vernt left much earlier."
"Are you all right?" Lorn studies
his father, but can sense nothing overtly wrong-except that the core of
order-chaos that sustains each individual does not seem so strong as he has
recalled.
"I'm fine except that I'm not as young
I once was."
Lorn senses the shading of the truth, but
lets the words pass.
"You're still seeing that merchanter
woman, aren't you." Kien'elth's words are not a question.
"You know the answer to that, father.
Why do you ask?"
"I worry. All parents do, even when
their children are grown."
"She has been most helpful and
supportive." Lorn's lips twist. "As a lancer, I'm not exactly sought
after by those families with whose daughters I grew up."
"There are many honorable lancer
families," Kien points out. "More than a few women have talked to
your mother."
Lorn shrugs. "I think it best that any
such talk wait for a successful completion of my next duty assignment."
"Perhaps... a successful consorting
might prove useful."
Lorn's stomach twists, but he offers a
smile. "That might well be, but that would present merely another set of
dangers in years to come."
"Your... friend... has done well,
Lorn, but she's not from an established house, and all she has gathered could
be scattered in an instant. There is no house to back her."
"That is true."
Kien's eyes narrow before he speaks.
"You will break off the relation. After you return to duty, of
course."
"I can only do as I sense best,
father."
Kien'elth winces visibly. His arms move, as
if to raise the walking stick, but instead he but taps it on the floor tiles.
After a moment, he says, "Vernt is seeing a lovely young woman."
"I wish him well." Lorn smiles.
"He deserves a lovely young woman."
"You are treading a dangerous path,
Lorn."
The lancer captain offers a lazy smile.
"How dangerous is doing my duty as a lancer? Or seeing a woman who is a
talented merchanter?"
Kien clears his throat, once, twice. Then
he shakes his head. "Your mother and I have tried to follow the path of
prosperous chaos, following the Light, and setting an example."
Lorn holds a sigh. How can he explain
without giving away what he dares not put in words? "I appreciate that,
and all you have done for me, and all that you have done that you do not think
I know or understand. You gave me an extra year at the Academy for Magi'i, one
others would not have gotten. You allowed me to grow in ways that were
necessary and that you doubted. You respected my opinion about Myryan." He
pauses. "Please do not think that I do not understand, nor that I do not
appreciate all that."
Kien looks at Lorn for a long time before
speaking, as if he, too, must consider his words most carefully. "I can
sense your appreciation, and for that I also am grateful. Yet, as a senior
Lector who has been privileged in my life to see and to hear much, and to serve
Cyador to the best of my poor abilities, I cannot but worry about your not
being able to use your talents where they will be most accepted and appreciated
in the years ahead."
Lorn nods. "I, too, would like that,
and in my own way, I will be striving for such. Perhaps I should be even more
judicious in my conduct over the seasons to come." He smiles. "But I
would hope, with the strain of the duties that face me, none would gainsay my
poor efforts to take some comfort while on my home leave."
A wry smile crosses Kien's face. "I
will suggest to any who inquire that after three years fighting barbarians, you
do indeed merit some comfort. You are young for a lancer captain, and many will
appreciate your words when that is pointed out. On your next leave, then, we
will look forward to seeing a consort in keeping with your achievements and
honor."
Lorn returns the smile. "That would be
most acceptable, father, most acceptable."
Kien frowns, then shakes his head. Finally,
he laughs. "Your lack of reservation is so honest that it takes me by
surprise."
Lorn spreads his hands helplessly. "I
do listen."
"When you wish." Another
headshake follows. "I must go, but I am relieved that we have
talked."
"So am I."
Lorn walks down the steps with his father.
Then standing on the steps outside the privacy screen, he watches as the older
magus walks briskly westward toward the Quarter. A faint smile plays across
Lorn's lips as he thinks about the consort who he knows is appropriate to his
needs and accomplishments.
XLVIII
In the
warm air of the sparring room, Lorn lowers the exercise sabre, blots his
forehead, and glances at the red-headed Tyrsal.
Tyrsal's exercise tunic is dark with sweat.
He lowers his own blunted exercise sabre and shakes his head. "You're
barely sweating, and I'm dying. I haven't sparred this hard in years. Not since
you left. You could have killed me three or four times."
"Once maybe." Lorn grins.
"And... you were doing it left-handed.
Don't think I don't remember which side you used before."
Lorn shrugs. "I've been working on it
for a time." He grins. "For three years. Against the barbarians you
have to be able to use whatever hand's free."
"Knowing you, you did more than that.
You work on everything. That's why I never understood..." Tyrsal frowns
and lets his words die away.
The two walk toward the open door, through
which a cooling breeze blows, but stop perhaps ten cubits from it.
"I don't want to get too
chilled." Tyrsal looks at Lorn. "There's really no one to spar with
any more. Even Vernt..."
"I know." Lorn laughs. "All
he thinks about is chaos transfers and the way of the Magi'i... and finding the
right consort."
"You haven't found one," Tyrsal
points out, again blotting his forehead.
"Lancer captains aren't supposed to consort. Not until after their
second tour of duty, anyway, and preferably not until they're overcaptains or
even sub-majers. Now you..." Lorn raises his eyebrows. "What excuse
do you have?"
"Me? I'm not a second-level adept with
a generous stipend, and I don't come from a prosperous old-time Magi'i family.
Remember, my father was the first Magi'i ever in my lineage, and he was the
grandson of a clanless trader." Tyrsal rolls his eyes.
"There are Magi'i daughters who would
have you. You're talented, and good-looking, and cheerful." Lorn pauses,
and adds, "And loyal." He grins before going on. "And don't give
me those words about poverty. You may have come from merchanters, but they were
most successful ones. There are many young women who would like a young magus
who would inherit what you will."
"You have someone in mind?"
Lorn shrugs, then pulls a scrap of gray
cloth from his belt to wipe the sabre before replacing it in the battered
exercise room sheathe. "Not particularly. I remember my father parading
names past me." He frowns. "There was one... Aleyar, Liataphi's
daughter. Blonde, very pretty. Well-spoken, and 'it certainly wouldn't hurt,
Lorn, that she is the daughter of the Third Magus.'"
Tyrsal laughs at Lorn's imitation of
Kien'elth's pedantic tone. Then the red-haired mage shakes his head.
"There were two, you know. Syreal is blonde and sweet. She was older.
Dett's age, at least. And she wouldn't consort with anyone, Lorn. Not anyone her
family liked.... There was something there, rumors about a merchanter... but I
didn't know what. If their father had sons, no one would care."
"What of the other daughters? Doesn't
he have a bunch?"
"Salsyha-she's the oldest... she
consorted with a Lancer commander. His first consort died of the flux when he
was the port commander in Biehl years ago. Gives him some status, but she's got
a tongue like a sabre, or so I've heard tell. The second daughter... she was to
be consorted to a second-level adept-but she died suddenly. No one ever said
why, but there were rumors that his rivals..."
"Too much influence from
Liataphi?"
Tyrsal grins wryly. "You see why I'm
not terribly interested in pressing a suit upon an unwilling lady?"
"What about the younger two?"
"Aleyar's sweet like Syreal, but she's
younger than she looks, if you know what I mean. The other's too young, nine, I
think." Tyrsal adds dryly, "Besides, being the consort of Liataphi's
daughter might do little for my desires to live a long and uneventful
life."
Lorn laughs.
"I have been looking, not urgently,
you understand, for a quiet girl from a modest Magi'i family without
ambitions."
"I wish you had been more interested
in Myryan."
"I was. She wasn't interested in me."
"I'm sorry. I had hoped."
"I know, Lorn. She's not really
interested in anyone. I could have, I suppose, and she would have been sweet to
me, because she is...."
"But you didn't want a consort merely
to be nice to you?" The lancer captain nods. "I understand
that."
"You know that. I don't know as my
mother does."
"Is she pressing you?"
"She's never said a word." Tyrsal
lifts his eyebrows and rolls his eyes.
"That's worse." After a pause,
Lorn asks, "Are you working on that project for the chaos towers?"
"Which one?" Tyrsal snorts.
"There's one for the Accursed Forest, some sort of new way to constrain
its black order, and one to try to strengthen the barriers on the fireships,
and a couple of others that no one even talks about."
"I presume you are continuing to
ensure that the firelances are charged and that the firewagons cross Cyador in
speed and comfort?"
"Absolutely! What else are unknown
third-level adepts good for?" Tyrsal frowns. "I'd better get back.
Exercise over a mid-day meal is approved, but excessive exercise..."
"Especially with a lancer?" Lorn
grins.
"Who else would give me a decent
workout?" The redhead walks toward the racks where the practice weapons
are kept and replaces the sabre.
Lorn does the same, then turn to his
friend. "Tomorrow, then?"
"Of course."
"And you're still coming to the house
for dinner on fiveday?"
"I wouldn't miss it."
After Tyrsal leaves, Lorn walks slowly back
along the Road of Perpetual Light toward his parents' dwelling, a pleasant
smile fixed upon his face, as he considers what he must yet accomplish.
XLIX
From
where he sits on the edge of the settee, Lorn takes in the main room of
Ryalth's quarters-the low ebony table before him, the straight-backed black oak
armchair where Ryalth sits, and beyond that the green ceramic brick privacy
screen that protects the door from the inside. Behind him and to his right is
the alcove that contains the circular eating table and two armless chairs, and
the door to the small balcony. To his left is the narrow archway to the
bedchamber, and beyond that, the small bathing chamber. Lorn finds it hard to
believe that two eightdays have already flown by.
His eyes light on the painting-the portrait
of Ryalth as a young girl- wearing a high-necked blue tunic, and a thin golden
chain. He has admired it every time he has come into her quarters, but never
said a word. "Your parents had that done?"
"Just before they died," she
affirms. "I was supposed to take the ship, too, but I got so sick that
mother insisted I stay with my aunt Elyset. She was really my great-aunt, but I
always called her 'aunt.' She died just before I met you." Ryalth gestured
around the room. "Most of this came from her house-the things Wynokk
didn't want. I did get to keep my bed, but everything else went to pay father's
debts. He lost everything when the ship went down."
"You don't like to spend coins on
yourself."
"Father did, and on us." Her
smile is mirthless. "There was nothing left."
Lorn nods, then asks gently, "Why did
you give Myryan the pin and the coins for the house?"
"I should have known you'd see
that." She barely shrugs. "You love her, and you couldn't do
anything. I didn't want you to be upset when you returned."
"And Kysia... you pay her to watch
what happens in the house?"
Ryalth shakes her head. "How did you
find that out? She's never laid eyes on you."
"Because someone has been watching me,
and it wasn't the cook or Sylirya. I never have seen Kysia, except from behind
or at a distance, and that means someone who knows about the Magi'i and doesn't
want to be discovered. Besides, there was no other way you could have known
what you needed to know to help Myryan." He lifts his hands helplessly.
"No one else would have cared."
"You helped me... when no one cared,
and you kept helping me. There wasn't much I could do to repay everything. I
helped Myryan." The redhead looks down at the ancient blue wool carpet
that displays a border of what appear to be interlocked ropes, surrounding a
trading ship under full sail.
"Your father's ship?" Lorn points
to the blue-hulled vessel portrayed in the carpet and partly obscured by the
low table before him.
"No one wanted a carpet showing a
sunken trader. I got to keep that, too."
"And that's why you invest in cargoes
carried on many ships?"
She nods. "The profits are lower, but
the houses will take our golds because it lowers their risks. I choose
carefully. So far, we have lost but one cargo."
"You're a careful woman."
"Except with you."
Lorn is not sure exactly how to respond.
"I suppose I am a risk."
"Not nearly so much as I'd thought,
and you have made us more than a few coins."
He raises his eyebrows.
"You were right about the
cuprite," Ryalth says. "What made you suggest that?"
"I couldn't say." Lorn smiles
crookedly. "It felt right."
"Do you have any more 'feelings' like
that?"
"Cider," he suggests. "Or
something like it. Or wine."
"Because coffee is getting
scarce?"
"More because there won't be any at
all in a few years, I feel." He shrugs. "People will drink something
else, but I don't know what."
"I'll have to think about that."
Another thought strikes him. "Iron...
not immediately, but in another few years."
"Scarcely anyone uses it here."
"Other lands will, though."
Ryalth frowns. "I do know some traders
who use the Hamorian Exchanges."
"I can't think of anything else. Not
now." He stretches, glancing out to where the sun hangs over the dwellings
higher on the hill to the west.
"You still haven't asked me to meet
your parents." Ryalth offers a half-humorous pout.
Lorn understands it is but half-humorous.
"You'd frighten them-badly."
That draws a deeper frown from her.
"I mean it. They'd see how much I
care. They couldn't avoid it. They'd also see how capable you are. Neither one
could hide knowing that-not from other Magi'i."
"You're aiming to become the
Majer-Commander, aren't you? Or trying?"
"It's been done before," Lorn
replies lightly.
"Except you want me as well. Or do you
want me because I can help you?"
"I've wanted you from the beginning. I
never thought about using you to become a Majer-Commander... or anything
else." He frowns. "I did want you to help me make some coins at
first. I have to admit that, but that bothered me."
"So you gave me the chest out of
guilt?"
"Guilt... and love."
"I don't think anyone knows you."
Ryalth shakes her head. "Every time I see you, and every scroll you
send... there's always something new, like a gem polished into so many facets
that the sparkle doesn't ever let you see the stone."
"Do you want to see the stone?"
The redhead nods slowly.
Lorn stands and steps around the low table
and takes her in his arms, kissing her, and then lifting her, carrying her to
the bedchamber, where he lays her on the deep blue quilt. He lies beside her,
holding her, and begins to whisper in her ear, half-nuzzling her as he does.
She listens, then stiffens, her eyes wide,
as he adds two more sentences. After a moment, Ryalth kisses him gently on the
cheek, leaning back away from him slightly, before she murmurs in his ear.
"Alyiakal must have been one of your ancestors."
"Not that I know."
"How could you?" She laughs and
rolls away from him. "You said you had to have dinner with Myryan and
Ciesrt. It's getting late, and I wasn't invited. I'm hungry, and you have to
go." She offers a mischievous smile. "Should I dab you with a little
scent?"
"I don't want to leave you." He
cocks his head to the side, taking in the deep blue eyes. "Actually the
scent is a good idea. Ciesrt will tell his sire."
"Devious-"
Lorn gives a quick headshake as he senses
the chill of a screeing glass. He draws her to him, as if passionately.
Her arms go around him, if not in passion,
at least in comfort, and they hold each other for a time-until he can sense the
chill fading. Slowly, he kisses her cheek, then leans back. "Thank you for
understanding."
"I could almost feel... someone watching...."
"They were... through a glass."
Ryalth shivers. "Do all Magi'i live like that? With the knowledge that
nothing is private? Nothing secret?"
"Most can't sense it except faintly.
Even my father has to be concentrating."
"You can sense that? And they wouldn't
let you stay as a magus?"
"Being of the Magi'i isn't just
ability," Lorn states flatly. "It also has to be the most important
aspect of your life. Father's pointed that out several times, indirectly, since
I've returned to Cyad."
In a fluid movement, she rolls away from
him and off the bed and to her feet, slipping to the low vanity under the high
north window. She opens the chest on the vanity and draws out a vial.
"After that, you definitely need some scent." Her lips quirk in a
smile Lorn knows is forced. "I don't like leaving you." Lorn slips to
his feet and walks up behind her, easing his arms around her waist. "I
know."
He can feel her sigh.
After a moment, she adds, "I know you're
opposing your family, and I know you asked me to... come to Geliendra...."
"But you want everything to be in the
open."
"Yes."
He laughs, softly, almost bitterly.
"All the senior Magi'i know about you and me. Were that were open
enough." The bed chamber is silent, and he adds, more softly, "I will
put our consortship in the open. Haven't I kept my word?"
"You have. You have more than kept
it." Ryalth turns out of his arms to face him, but still holds his left
hand. "We would not be here, had you not." Lorn traces her jaw line
with his fingers.
"I am not angry with you." Her
eyes harden. "I cannot say the same for your parents. Or the Magi'i."
Her fingers rise to touch his cheek, and she bends forward and whispers,
"But I will come to Geliendra at the end of your first year."
"I will be there, with everything
arranged."
"Good." A smile, bright and
simultaneously wistful, appears. "You'd better get ready to go." She
half-turns and reclaims the vial. "And you will wear some scent. Not so
much as last time. I want them to understand I also have some small amount of
taste." She dabs a fingertip of the fragrance on each of Lorn's cheeks,
then holds his face in her hands, and kisses him gently.
He returns the kiss, equally gently.
Slowly, they separate.
Lorn reclaims his tunic from one of the
wall pegs, then dons and fastens it.
"You are a handsome man."
He shakes his head.
"You are."
"I'm glad you think so. Very
glad."
They walk to the door of her quarters,
where he turns and kisses her cheek again.
"Be good to dear Ciesrt," she
says as she opens the door.
"Only for Myryan's sake." Lorn
offers a rueful smile and steps back.
Ryalth closes the door, and he turns and
walks slowly down the steps and out to the Road of Benevolent Commerce.
He eases into a brisk walk up the
Thirteenth Harbor Way East, and then turns eastward on the Road of Perpetual
Light. At the click of hoofs behind him, he glances over his left shoulder to
see a gig approaching. In it are a woman in healer green and a magus in white,
looking perhaps ten years older than Lorn. Neither looks at him as the gig
passes.
He walks almost another block before an
open carriage passes in the other direction. This time, the two passengers nod.
The man wears a lancer uniform with the simple starburst of a commander; the
woman wears a formal green tunic of shimmercloth, and a necklace of emeralds
set in silver that sparkles well beyond the carriage. Lorn nods back with a
smile.
The sun is beginning to drop behind the
trees on behind the dwellings set uphill of the Road by the time Lorn turns up
the walk to Myryan's dwelling. A light and cool breeze sweeps up from the
harbor, promising a cold evening. He smiles at the faded golden lily on the
exterior privacy screen before he rings the bell.
The viewing slit opens, and then the door.
"Come in, Lorn," Myryan says warmly, but she does not step from
behind the exterior privacy screen.
He steps around the screen and into the
house, where Ciesrt stands beside Myryan, a long-fingered hand on her left
shoulder. His long fingers seem strangely delicate compared to Ciesrt's tall
form and broad shoulders.
Myryan's nose wrinkles, just slightly, as
Lorn nears them, and, suddenly, she winks.
Laughing inside, Lorn keeps a polite smile
on his lips and inclines his head. "It's good to see you, Ciesrt."
His voice is warm and friendly.
"You, too, Lorn." Ciesrt's nose
twitches, and he rubs it inadvertently with his right hand. "It's been a
while." He gestures to the left archway from the foyer.
"Thank you." Lorn follows the
motion into the front sitting room.
There, Myryan and Ciesrt take the settee,
leaving the sole armchair for Lorn. He settles himself and turns toward the
couple. "I like the dwelling. You've have done much with it, Myryan."
"She has, indeed," Ciesrt
responds, proudly, putting his arm around her slender shoulders and squeezing
slightly. "She is a wonderful consort."
"She's always been a wonderful sister,"
Lorn replies, "and an excellent healer, from what I have heard."
"She cooks well also, but before long,
we will have a cook so that she can spend more time with her garden, and, some
time soon, we hope, with the children."
"From what I heard," Lorn
answers, looking at Myryan, "you've already done much with the
garden."
"The soil by the wall is just right
for brinn, and I started some astra plants in the fall. They feel
strong...." The healer's eyes brighten as she begins to detail her plans.
"...it's cool enough for winterseed, but I'll need more lime for that....
Ciesrt said he'd crush it for me...."
Lorn listens, enjoying the enthusiasm and
the warmth in his younger sister's voice, and the sparkle in her eyes as she
speaks of gardens to come.
Abruptly, Myryan stops and bolts upright.
"Oh... I have to finish dinner... a few things, and I've been meandering
on about gardening."
"I liked hearing about it," Lorn
says.
"She loves that we have our own
garden," adds Ciesrt.
"Just keep talking." Myryan
stands, patting Ciesrt on the shoulder. "I can hear from the next
room," she adds as she pauses by the archway, before disappearing.
Both men smile.
"She has so many talents to be a good
consort," Ciesrt muses. "My parents were so pleased. Father,
especially, likes that she understands so much, and that he can talk to her
like he would me or any other of the Magi'i."
"Myryan's always been quick,"
Lorn admits. "She's very sensitive. She understands things without people
having to yell at her or tell her twice." He hopes Ciesrt will understand
exactly what he says.
"That's what I like about her,"
answers the young mage. "She knows what I need, without my having to
explain everything."
Lorn nods. "She likes things calm and
peaceful."
"It's so restful when I come home from
the Quarter at night." Ciesrt smiles. "So much better than I'd ever
thought being consorted could be."
"Lancers aren't expected to become
consorted until they've been captains for at least several years," Lorn
says conversationally. "What are you doing now... I mean the kind of
work?"
"Third level adepts do mostly support
work... transfer chaos, clean up after projects, that sort of thing. I do some
of the chaos cell transfer, and whatever else I'm called to do."
"It's an exciting time for a magus,
Vernt tells me, with everything going on." Lorn leans forward, conveying
an interest in what Ciesrt may offer.
"It is. All the projects..."
Ciesrt shrugs.
"I understand. I'm going to be headed
to the Accursed Forest. They say thai: what you're doing may be of some benefit
to us poor lancer types there."
"Father is enthusiastic about
it," Ciesrt responds. "I can't say anything, you understand, but
they're working on a new kind of barrier." He shrugs. "I don't know
much about how it works, but... it should help the Mirror Lancers
greatly."
"If it does, we could move more
lancers to the north," Lorn points out.
"If it does, you may not need lancers
at the ward-walls, I hear."
Lorn nods. "There's much else that
could occupy the lancers."
"How have you found being a
lancer?" asks Ciesrt, after a moment of silence.
"I seem to have a talent for it,"
replies Lorn. "Or a talent for surviving while being one, anyway."
Lorn looks up to see Myryan standing in the
archway, waiting, listening.
Ciesrt leans forward on the settee, his
eyes on Lorn, apparently unaware of Myryan's return.
"You still do not talk of duty and
commitment," points out Ciesrt.
Lorn fingers his cleanshaven chin before
replying, understanding Ciesrt's allusion, and understanding, too, that he has
been discussed by Ciesrt and his father, the Second Magus. "We all have a
duty to uphold Cyador and the Path of Light," he begins slowly. "That
is my commitment as well. You have found that way that best suits you, Ciesrt.
I have found a way at which I am good. I am still working to see how to make it
best suit me." Lorn offers an open smile. "It is harder when you are
not born into the way for which your talents fit you."
"I can see that," Ciesrt says, a
hint of patronage in his tone.
"What about you? How have you found
being an adept?" counters Lorn gently.
"My father is, and his father was
before him," Ciesrt says, "and his before him. So far as any know, we
have all been mages and healers back to the days of the Firstborn of chaos.
Father has a glass in his study... one so old..."
The familiar chill of a screeing glass
passes across the room. Myryan and Lorn exchange glances, but neither speaks,
letting Ciesrt, apparently oblivious to the chaos-glass scan, continue to
address Lorn.
"...goes back beyond the time of
Alyiakal, but it's too fragile to use anymore. With all that tradition, why
wouldn't I want to be a magus?" Ciesrt smiles. "I've found it
rewarding. I like being able to help provide power for the firewagons, and the
firelances you lancers use to halt the barbarians. It makes me feel worthy to
direct chaos into the making of cupridium." The lips of the magus curl
slightly. "I'd feel wrong saying these words to most lancers, but you were
a student magus, and you are of the Magi'i, and you are Myryan's brother."
"I understand," Lorn says.
"Most lancers wouldn't, not in the way you mean."
"That's it," Ciesrt says.
"Most wouldn't."
Myryan clears her throat.
"Yes?" Ciesrt looks up, a look of
annoyance passing swiftly across his face and vanishing as he realizes his
consort has been in the sitting room.
"If you do not wish to eat cold
emburhka..." Myryan ventures gently.
Lorn stands. "I am hungry... and it's
been a long time since I've had emburhka."
Ciesrt also rises. "I'd forgotten...
of course, you wouldn't. Not in the Hills of Endless Grass."
"I used mother's recipe-the way Elthya
used to fix it."
Lorn can't help but smile at her
half-mischievous, half-imploring tone. "I'm sure it's wonderful."
"It is. She's a wonderful
consort," Ciesrt says proudly.
Lorn ensures that the smile remains on his
face as he follows Myryan to the dining area. He will speak of small matters,
and little else, for the remainder of the evening.
L
In the
early morning, even before he has eaten, Lorn pauses outside Jerial's door. Is
she dressing... or already gone?
"Come on in," calls Jerial.
"I've got a moment before I head off to the Healer's Center."
Lorn pushes the door open. Jerial is
sitting on the straight-backed chair, pulling on her second black boot.
"You leave early," he says.
"I wanted to talk to you."
Jerial looks up, then stands, and lifts the
heavy green wool cloak off the back of the chair. "I leave early so I can
get off early. The senior healers are happy to have someone there early. That
way, the consorted healers, like mother and Myryan, can come in later."
Lorn nods.
"What favor do you need this time?" Jerial's smile is amused.
"Because I'm up early?" Lorn
laughs.
"Because you're home and because you
have that look on your face."
"I didn't realize I was that
transparent."
"You're not. When I can't tell what
you want is when you want something."
"Sisters..." He shakes his head.
"Lorn... I have to go soon."
"I'd like to find out anything you
might know about a merchanter called Shevelt. With your other... activities, I
thought..."
"I might know?" She wraps the
cloak around her. "I do. He throws cold dice and doesn't understand why he
loses. He bullies anyone he can, and he'll bed anything that has red hair. Why,
no one knows. He's the senior heir to the Yuryan Clan... if his sire decides not
to send him across the Great Western Ocean on an uncaulked scow."
"You've won more than a few coins from
him."
Jerial shrugs. "He can't count when he
gambles." She frowns. "That's not right. How often he wins is more
important than how much he wins. He gambles against Jeron'mer because he
usually wins-say eight or nine times out of ten. I win only once or twice, but
it's ten times what he loses, and I pick the times when it's safe to win."
Jeron'mer-that is the merchanter name under
which she gambles as a beardless and dissolute young trader. "What does he
look like?"
"Big... broad shoulders. He's not much
older than you, but he's already got a belly and jowls. He's strong. He picked
up one of Fragon's guards and tossed the fellow through a door. He has a square
brown beard, and he's going bald. He always wears scent, something like musk
and roses." Jerial frowns. "Not too many people would miss him, but
you ought to be careful. The Dyljani Clan hates him."
"That's a start."
"Here." Jerial rummages in the
single drawer to her desk, then passes a short dagger to him.
"What's this?"
"A Dyljan ceremonial dagger."
Lorn takes a deep breath.
"She helped Myryan, and she's helped
you, just by being there. I thought you'd find out. She could probably hire
someone to handle him, but it would be neater if you did. It would also leave
the impression that she has ways to remove people that can't be traced. You can
handle matters so that even the Hand would not know."
Lorn wonders at the reference to the Hand
of the Emperor and notes that Jerial is careful not to mention Ryalth by name,
even in her own chambers. He takes the dagger. "Wouldn't someone
suspect?"
"A lancer in a merchanter brawl? Or
over commerce?" Jerial raises her eyebrows. "Even father doesn't
understand it all...."
"Where would I find Shevelt? After
trading hours?"
"The Silver Chalice... most
nights." Jerial steps toward the door to signify that she is leaving.
Lorn opens the door and steps back into the
corridor.
Jerial steps closer and murmurs,
"Oh... you might as well change into the blues in your own chambers, and
take the back stairs. Just for outsiders, you understand," she observes.
"Mother and father both know. So do I. Sylirya and Quyal could care less,
and Kysia gets her wages supplemented by Ryalor House."
Lorn raises his eyebrows. "Nothing
like living in a dwelling of the Magi'i... who else knows?"
"Besides half the senior Magi'i? They
all think you're just bedding her to spite father, and unless something else
comes up, why would they care? Kharl won't tell the lancer types, not unless it
will gain him Chyenfel's position, and what would wearing blues to bed a
merchanter really mean except that you're hot-blooded. You certainly aren't the
first."
Lorn holds in the wince and the denial.
Her last low words chill him.
"...don't let anyone know more..." She smiles brightly and says
loudly. "Have a good day, and make sure you keep enjoying your
leave."
"I'll try." He returns her smile
with an ironic grin.
She nods and is gone.
Lorn scrambles down to the kitchen, where,
standing in the corner, he gobbles down some cheese and bread, and a handful of
dried pearapples. Then, he scurries upstairs and, following Jerial's
suggestion, changes into the blues. He still does not head to the rear stairs
until he knows no one is nearby.
His steps are quick as he walks westward
along the Road of Perpetual Light, and then down Second Harbor Way east.
Although the early morning is chill, the lack of wind and the bright winter sun
make it feel warmer than it truly is.
As he nears Harbor Way, Lorn slips behind a
group of three traders, keeping far enough away to seem respectful, but
listening as he follows them.
"...cuprite's still too dear..."
"...be dear for years... risk in iron,
though..."
"...need an outland partner
there..."
"...dry winter in Hydlen they
say."
"...spring looks dry, and grain'll be
getting scarce."
Lorn's eyes flicker from the three before
him to the others in blue nearing the Plaza-mostly men, the majority bearded
and arriving at the Plaza in groups of two or three.
"Enumerator! You're late!"
Ryalth's voice snaps at him like a whip.
Lorn winces, and turns, bowing to Ryalth from
where she emerges from the morning shadows cast by the pillared entrance to the
Plaza. "I am most sorry, Lady Merchanter. Most sorry."
"Sorry does not matter. Once more, and
you'll be working in Jera... or bilge crew on a Hamorian scow."
At the scorn in her voice and the snickers
from the merchanters before and behind him, Lorn flushes. "Yes,
Lady." He bows again.
Ryalth ignores him, turning and striding
toward the harbor.
Lorn scrambles after her, another set of
snickers in his wake.
"...voice'll peel lead from a
fireship's hull..."
"See why you don't cross her...."
Obviously, Ryalth has a certain reputation.
For a time, he walks a half-pace behind
her, to her right. She turns down the First Harbor Way East, and he follows,
finally drawing up beside her once they are well out of sight of those who
might have witnessed her scolding of him.
"You were late," she murmurs, not
slacking her pace, as she turns onto the walkway beside the east seawall of the
harbor.
"I was. I supposed I deserved
that." He grins. "Did you enjoy it?"
"Actually, I did." A faint smile
crosses her face. "I don't get to order the upper classes around
much." The smile vanishes. "Eileyt is up in the office. This will
have to be quick."
"Why did you want me to come with
you?"
"You have a good sense about people,
and there's something about L'Igek that bothers me." She frowns.
"Your senses are as good as
mine."
"Better in some ways, but not in this
case."
The two turn and take the outermost of the
white stone piers toward the oiled wooden hull of the three-masted and
square-rigged ship tied at the seaward end. As they near the vessel, Lorn makes
out the name carved into the stern-Redwind Courser. The inset letters are
painted a brilliant light green that stands out against the wood. A Brystan
jack hangs limply from the stern staff.
Two armed guards, with iron-studded leather
vests worn over gray shirts, stand at the foot of the gangway. Each wears a
heavy leather belt from which hang both a truncheon and a slightly curved
scimitar. Their heavy boots are iron-toed.
Ryalth stops a good three cubits from the
pair. "Merchanter Ryalth and her enumerator, of Ryalor House," she
announces.
"Let them aboard," calls a voice
from the main deck.
Lorn glances past the guards to the
pale-faced and full-bearded man in a green tunic and a short golden vest, then
follows Ryalth up the gangway onto the polished wooden deck of the Redwind
Courser.
"Lady Merchanter." The thin trader,
a head taller than either Lorn or Ryalth, bows moderately. "We are most
glad to see you."
"And we, you." Ryalth's voice is
cool, assured, as she returns the bow.
Lorn follows her lead and bows as well, but
his senses are already scanning the vessel, trying to discover what it is that
had previously concerned Ryalth.
"Master L'Igek!" calls another
younger man in green, also wearing a short gold vest, but a simpler one.
The Brystan bows to Ryalth. "If you
will excuse me for a moment..."
"Not at all. Would you mind if I showed the enumerator around- just
the open decks? His experience has been more in the grasslands than here."
"Be our guest." L'Igek smiles
politely before turning.
"This way," Ryalth says coolly,
her voice harder than when she had spoken to L'Igek. Lorn follows as she climbs
the ladder-steps to the higher rear deck. They pass a raised platform that
holds the ship's wheel and a rack designed, presumably, to hold navigation gear
when at sea.
Lorn can understand Ryalth's feelings about
the ship. While the people hold the normal ranges of order and chaos within
their bodies, the ship itself is less than whole. He lets his senses range down
the rudder that dominates the stern, but the wood is solid.
They parallel the taffrail and then head
forward, descending the ladder on the seaward side of the Courser. Lorn
stiffens, then murmurs to Ryalth, "Bracing... the keel itself is
cracking... a weakness in the wood... something like that."
Ryalth nods politely, and murmurs.
"Say no more. Not now." She adds more loudly. "That's the main
hold cover there. Don't ask stupid questions."
Lorn bows his head and answers
obsequiously, "Yes, Lady Merchanter. As you wish."
Ryalth's eyes harden. "Remember
that."
L'Igek, turning from the junior officer or
mate, smothers a smile as he nears them. "I have the agreements in my
cabin." He gestures, then leads Ryalth through the open passageway on the
main deck into the rear deckhouse.
Lorn follows.
"This enumerator is more... muscular
than the last," says the Brystan in a low voice to Ryalth.
"They have differing talents,"
Ryalth replies off-handedly.
L'Igek laughs. "I like you, Lady
Ryalth. Like a dagger, you reach the point quickly." He stops in the
narrow passageway, steps past the doorway, and allows both Ryalth and Lorn to
enter.
The master's cabin is cramped, with a
narrow bunk flush against the rear bulkhead. Forward of the bunk is a circular
table, bolted to the deck, with four low-backed chairs around it. Several
scrolls and a pile of what appear to be bills of lading are stacked on one
side, a closed ledger beside them.
The Brystan seats himself by the papers and
waits for Ryalth to sit.
"You have a tenth of the oilseeds, and
a twentieth part of the dried fruit. Do you wish a tenth of the
gingerwood?"
"I would greatly like that,"
Ryalth admits, "but the House accounts will not cover that at
present."
L'Igek nods as if he had expected the
response.
"And how much do you wish to take of
the return spice cargo?" asks the Brystan. "You had mentioned an
interest there."
"As little as you will grant me the
favor of," Ryalth says almost pleadingly. "We are but a small house,
as well you know, and... you did hear of what befell the Western Hare?"
The pale-skinned Brystan nods. "I was
not aware...."
"Enough," Ryalth replies.
"More than enough. We have shares in others, but I cannot promise what has
not ported." She shrugs apologetically. "You will set out before we
see those coins, yet I would not lose your favor."
"Fifty golds... I cannot accept less,
not for the best in Hamorian peppercorns and cumin."
Ryalth winces. "For you, for your
friendship, it will be fifty." She pauses. "But the usual
arrangement."
"Of course. That will not
change."
Ryalth extracts a wallet from somewhere and
carefully counts out twenty-five golds, then eases them onto the polished wood
of the table before L'Igek. In turn, the Brystan counts them. Only after that
does he lift the pen and write out the exchange bill.
Once he has finished it, he extends the
parchment to her. She reads slowly and carefully. Then she nods. L'Igek slides
the inkstand across to her, and extends a quill pen. She signs, her cursive
clear and precise: Ryalth for Ryalor House.
Then L'Igek signs and returns the parchment
to her. "Always a pleasure doing business with Ryalor House, Lady
Merchanter." L'Igek pauses, then grins. "Will we ever see a true man
in your House?"
Ryalth returns the grin with a smile.
"I am most certain you will. Perhaps sooner than you think."
"You have said such before."
L'Igek rises. "And I will again," replies Ryalth as she stands. Lorn
follows their lead, and trails them out onto the main deck. "We sail with
the evening wind," L'Igek announces. "I wish you fair and following
winds," the woman merchanter responds, "and an early and profitable
return to Cyad."
At the head of the gangway, the Brystan
bows again. "The combine will be pleased to know of your continuing
support."
"I appreciate their forbearance."
Ryalth nods once more. Lorn waits until they are a hundred cubits from the ship
and past the sweating figures unloading the coastal schooner that is tied up
inshore of the Courser. "Why did you wait so long?" His tone is
curious.
"When they want to insure, you get a
better deal if you're late. They don't like holding the entire risk of a cargo.
If I can't get a share, I'll find another master who has something I think I
can factor for a profit. They keep my coins whether the cargo makes a profit or
not. On this end, I have more control, but you can't buy shares in just
incoming cargoes. Not and remain a merchanter for long."
Lorn nods, although he is far from sure he
fully understands. As he considers her words, the two walk slowly northward on
the walkway flanking the seawall, back toward the Trading Plaza for the
Clanless Houses.
"If the Courser gets caught in any
sort of storm, or rough seas, you'll lose fifty golds, plus your share of the
outbound cargo," Lorn says finally when he is certain that they are well
away from prying ears.
"That is true. If..." She draws
out the conditional word, before adding, "Some vessels have made two or
more passages with damaged keels, some even more. Some owners have knowingly
sent out vessels with cracked keels."
"Why?" Lorn frowns.
"Gambling on not having to replace a ship that's not worth it?"
"They didn't have the hundreds of
golds necessary to repair the ship- or to replace it. It's cheaper to get a new
captain and crew and offer him a fifty gold bonus to bring it back safely. Or
sell it to another trader who isn't so concerned." She shrugs. "For
all I know, L'Igek may know of the Courser's problems. That may be why his
buy-ins are cheaper."
Lorn pulls on his chin. Each moment with
Ryalth teaches him that there is so much he does not know about trade.
"You didn't think about telling him."
"No. I would have had to explain how I
knew, and then none would ever trade with us again. They detest the Magi'i.
That's also why I took the return cargo. It could come in, and if it does, or
especially if L'Igek discovers the problem and survives, none of them would
take another agreement from me." Her voice softens as she continues.
"You know, there weren't such things as merchanters in the time of the
Firstborn. The first merchanters-most of them-came from Spidlar-that's in
northern Candar, east of the Westhorns."
"I know."
"But they were the only ones the
Hamorians and Austrans would trade with, and in time, there were merchanters
from Cyad as well."
"But that's why the Lancers and Magi'i
frown on the Merchanters?"
"They also like to flaunt their
superiority." She smiles. "You don't think Bluoyal is every bit as
sharp as the Majer-Commander of the Mirror Lancers?"
"He's the Emperor's advisor on
trade?" Lorn laughs. "From what I've seen, he's probably
sharper."
"The Magi'i and the Lancers don't
think so. Your parents feel I'm below you."
"I don't."
"You aren't your parents."
At the shoreward end of the pier, Ryalth
stops, well back from the carters who roll pushwagons of supplies toward the
vessels moored along the piers. "I have to go back to the Plaza. I'm
expecting a response from Nylyth House to a bid on shares of peppercorns from
Atla. They're Hamorians."
"Do you-we-trade all over the
world?"
"Only where we can make golds,"
she replies. "Only where we can make golds." She gestures eastward.
"You'd best spend some time with your family. You've only another three
eightdays left."
"Tonight?"
"Of course." For the first time
during the morning, her smile is warm, radiant.
He shakes his head ruefully, smiling
broadly as well. "That's what I look forward to."
Her eyes dance. "As you should."
He watches as she walks briskly back toward
the Traders' Plaza. After a time, he turns and begins to walk northward toward
the Road of Perpetual Light.
LI
Long day?" Lorn asks from the third
floor landing of the formal staircase as Jerial walks slowly up one marble step
after another.
"You're still here?" Jerial
smiles up at Lorn as she nears the landing. "I thought you'd be
elsewhere."
"I will be... later. What about
you?"
"I'm too tired."
Lorn studies her face, clearly fatigued and
drawn. Even the order-chaos levels in her body were depressed. "What
happened?"
"You didn't hear?"
Lorn shakes his head. "I met Tyrsal,
and then we sparred."
"There was a chaos explosion on the
Ocean Flame...." Jerial slowly shakes her head. "It wasn't that big,
but it started a fire. There were many burned. I would have been home far
earlier."
"Could you save any?"
"We'll see. I did what I could. They
sent Myryan over to help, but we finally were dismissed."
"Because to do more would have injured
you?"
Jerial nods. "I'll need a good supper
and some rest."
The calling bell rings from the lower front
door.
From where they sit in chairs in the third
level sitting room, Lorn and Jerial frown.
"Feels like a lancer," she says.
"I'll get it." Lorn stands
quickly. "You can sense that far away?"
"You could, if you worked at it."
Jerial rises and straightens the green tunic, answering his unspoken question.
"Sensing takes little energy. It's trying to re-balance the order and
chaos that costs you."
"Just stay here." Lorn goes down
the stairs quickly, reaching the privacy screen before Sylirya. "I'll see
who it is." He steps around the inside screen, opens the door, and glances
through the outer screen's viewing slit.
The figure in the dress uniform of a lancer
is Dettaur'alt, taller, broader, and harder-faced, but still with the air of a
schoolyard bully.
Lorn steps from beside the screen.
"Dettaur, I didn't expect you."
The linked silver triple bars of a
sub-majer glitter on the collar of Dettaur's cream and green uniform, and he
inclines his head. "I was hoping to have a word with your sister Jerial,
the distinguished healer, and to thank her."
Lorn gestures. "She's upstairs. Please
come in." His eyes flicker toward the harbor where thin trails of smoke
still drift skyward before melding into the gray of the high clouds.
"Thank you." Dettaur'alt bows
again, before stepping into the house.
The two lancers head up the steps, Lorn
trailing Dettaur ever so slightly.
When Dettaur steps into the third floor
sitting room, he immediately bows to Jerial, who stands beside one of the
upholstered armchairs. "Honored healer, I wished to convey my thanks for
your efforts this afternoon. Several of the marine lancers may well survive
solely because of your efforts, and one of them is the brother of my cousin's
consort."
"Thank you." She motions for the
visiting lancer to sit, and does so herself.
Dettaur takes the straight-backed white oak
armchair across from her. Lorn sits on the other wooden armchair, to Dettaur's
right.
"I heard that you aided many,"
Dettaur continues.
"That is what healers are for, ser. To
heal. I am pleased that those efforts were of benefit to you and your
family."
"Of much benefit," Dettaur
insists, "and not just to my kin."
A faint smile plays across Lorn's lips,
then vanishes as the more senior lancer turns in the chair.
"I did not realize you were on home
leave, Lorn," Dettaur says smoothly in a deep and cultivated baritone from
the back of his throat.
Lorn responds to the lie with a smile.
"Even captains assigned to Isahl are privileged to get home leave every
few years." He pauses, before asking, "Are you assigned here? Or are
you on leave as well?"
Dettaur frowns at Lorn's familiar tone, and
his eyes flick to the captain's bars on the junior officer's collar. "I've
been fortunate enough to be promoted, and that requires a change of duty. The
benefit of some leave goes with that." A false smile appears. "And you?"
"Merely a change of duty. The
promotion came a few years back."
"We have not seen you in some
time," Jerial offers an apparently sincere smile. "There must have
been a reason why you came today."
"Actually, I came for two reasons,
first, because of your efforts in the Lancer infirmary, and also because of
your brother. I saw his... efforts in the exercise building, and his presence
recalled your charms."
"I must admit my sparring was an
effort," Lorn says easily. "I will be spending much of the few days
remaining of my leave resharpening skills. I noted your proficiency, much
improved from when we last sparred."
"I do regret that we will not have a
chance to test ourselves against each other... this time." Dettaur smiles.
"There may be other times," Lorn
smiles.
"Will we see you again soon?"
asks Jerial politely.
"Alas, lady healer," says
Dettaur, "had I not come today, reminded of your presence as I was by your
brother, I could not have called at all. I leave the day after tomorrow in the
morning for Assyadt as the second-in-command there." Dettaur's smile is
directed at Lorn as much as at Jerial.
"I wish you well," Lorn says.
"Assyadt takes many attacks from the Jeranyi."
"Fewer, once I am there,"
promises Dettaur.
"I am sure you will make your presence
felt," Jerial says agreeably. "You have in so many ways."
"For a long time," Lorn adds.
Dettaur flushes. "For a captain, Lorn,
you are..."
"Insubordinate?" Lorn snakes his
head. "You have always sought what you wanted, and achieved it. That has
gone on for years. It's hardly insubordinate to note what has occurred."
Lorn's mouth forms the slightest smile. "Unwise, perhaps, but hardly
insubordinate, Majer Dettaur."
"Unwise. I like that." Dettaur
inclines his head to Jerial, then rises. "At your pleasure, healer, I will
call again, although it will be a season or more."
"I'm sure I will be here for some
time, Majer." Jerial's smile is that of the professional warmth of a
healer with a difficult patient. She inclines her head. "Until then."
"I look forward to that day, honored
healer." Dettaur's smile contains a hint of triumph, but his voice remains
perfectly polished as he bows, more deeply than necessary, to Jerial.
Lorn accompanies his former schoolmate down
to the front door, then steps outside with the more senior lancer.
There Dettaur inclines his head, if barely.
"Your sister is polite, attractive, and talented. It would be a shame for
her never to consort."
"That is her choice."
"Perhaps I will change her mind."
"Perhaps you will."
"Or yours, Captain Lorn. Geliendra is
far more challenging than mere barbarians."
"I appreciate the advice, Sub-Majer
Dettaur." Lorn bows his head respectfully.
Dettaur's eyes glitter, but he returns the
bow. "Convey my continuing regards to your sister."
"I will indeed."
Dettaur turns stiffly.
Lorn waits until the sub-majer has
descended the steps to the Road of Perpetual Light before he re-enters the
house. Then he hurries back upstairs.
"Dettaur asked me to convey his
continuing regards."
"You know what he's suggesting, don't
you?" Jerial notes from the armchair where she has remained as Lorn
returns to the sitting room.
Lorn nods. The implication is clear-that
Jerial will remain of the Magi'i only so long as Kien'elth remains alive, since
Lorn is the eldest male, and he is of the lancers. Unless, of course, he dies
before his father does, which would make Vernt the heir.
"He insulted your skills, and yet you
were rather mild."
"I was using the sabre with my left
hand, and he did not notice." Lorn laughs. "I trust he will remain as
unobservant in the future."
"Your left hand? Why?"
"I may need it some day. In the
lancers, not always do barbarians, or others, attack from where one can best
defend himself."
"How long have you been using both
hands?"
"Two years perhaps." Lorn pauses
as their mother appears in the third floor foyer.
"That was young Dettaur, was it
not?"
"It was," Jerial replies.
Nyryah glances from Jerial to Lorn. "I
am surprised he would call...."
"I'm not," Jerial says.
"You are a healer. He might hope, but
you're certainly above him. He is a lancer, after all," suggests their
mother.
"So am I," Lorn points out.
"By necessity, not by limitation of
intellect or ability." Nyryah shakes her head. "I suppose I shouldn't
say such, but these days there's scarcely much point in being too
circumspect."
Lorn holds in a frown, and focuses what
senses he can upon his mother. Yet he can sense neither the chaos of illness
nor the darkness of death-order-or even a hint of either, although there is...
something about his mother... something he cannot describe or even identify.
"...never liked that young man, even
when he was in school with you, Lorn. He wasn't on your level."
"He's two years older, and was a level
ahead," Lorn replies.
"There was quite some talk when he
broke his fingers in a korfal game. Among the healers, I mean." A faint
twinkle flickers in Nyryah's eyes. "No one at the school ever figured it
out, but then they didn't realize, as healers do, that the chaos of each person
is as individual as eyes or the whorls on fingers. Sometimes, it lingers when
men fight. A mage can change his chaos pattern, but most wouldn't think of
that." She smiles wryly at her children. "Silly of me, I suppose, to
remember something from years back."
Again, Lorn can only nod, accepting what
cannot be acknowledged, not in Cyad, not when anywhere can fall within the
ambit of a chaos glass.
Below them, two flights down, the front
door opens, and Kien'elth steps into the foyer. He walks up the stairs with
forced and deliberate energy. His breathing is labored. The three wait for him
to join them.
Like
Jerial, he moves slowly, his face pale and drawn, and he is breathing heavily
when he reaches the third level. "Where have you been today?" Kien's
eyes fix upon his elder son.
"I visited Tyrsal at the Quarter; we
went to the little cafe off the Quarter for something to eat. Then I went over
to the exercise building in the Lancers' Quarter and spent the afternoon
sparing."
Kien nods. "I had not thought
otherwise, but best I determine first."
"The chaos explosion?"
"You knew?"
"Not until Jerial told me." Lorn
frowns. "It couldn't have been that large. I didn't sense anything."
"It wasn't large. A single cell failed
in one of the fire cannons. But they were taking on oil for the lamps and other
equipment, and a fragment of hot metal shredded one of the barrels." Kien
gestures vaguely toward the harbor. "You should have seen the smoke."
"I might have, except that-" Lorn
flushes "-I was worried about my sparring and thinking that I needed more
practice."
Jerial raises her eyebrows, but does not
comment on the nature of his practice, instead saying, "Dettaur just left,
and he happened to notice Lorn at the exercise building. After that, of course,
he found out about how I had saved a distant relative of his."
"Dettaur'alt is an honored protege of
Captain-Commander Luss'alt, Jerial, and much to be respected."
"I was very respectful, father, and
even suggested that he would be welcome in the future, when he returns on
furlough."
"Wise of you." Kien takes a deep
breath, then sits down heavily in the chair where Dettaur had been sitting.
"Are you all right, dear?" Nyryah
bustles over to her consort, touching his forehead lightly, frowning. A
relieved smile crosses her face.
Jerial and Lorn exchange glances, as Lorn
senses the slightest transfer of something between his parents. An almost
imperceptible headshake from the younger healer to her brother is caution
enough for Lorn to leave well enough alone.
"I'm better," Kien insists.
"I just needed to sit down. We had to send replacement cells to the Ocean
Flame, and there weren't enough younger mages there at the moment."
"So you pitched in as though you were
twenty years younger?" Nyryah raises her eyebrows.
"What else could I do? If all the
cells discharged... they could have thrown off the ship's tower... and we'd
have lost another fireship." Kien half-throws his hands into the air.
"What was I supposed to do?"
"Just as you did, dear," suggests
Nyryah. "Except you shouldn't have charged up the stairs like a bull when
you got home."
"Women..." mutters Kien.
Lorn and Jerial both laugh. Nyryah smiles
indulgently.
LII
Wearing
the blues of an enumerator under a grayed waterproof, Lorn walks along the
narrow way a good half-kay to the west and south of the harbor seawall. A mist
verging on rain sweeps across the white city of Cyad, turning it gray. As with
all storms, this one bestows a slight and nagging headache upon Lorn. In the
long package also wrapped in gray cloth and then within oil-protected leather
is a sabre, but not a Mirror Lancer's sabre.
Lorn's eyes finally make out the shimmering
oval above the cupritor's shop, an oval that shines through the misting rain.
Once he is under the overhanging eaves that form a narrow porch, he wipes his
boots on the horsehair mat, and then opens the door, stepping inside and
closing it behind him. Inside, there is a foyer of sorts, with a half-door
blocking entrance to the rear of the shop, where Lorn can see the chaos cells
and the dipping vats, and even the special forges. A hammer rings through the
building.
The very air bites at Lorn's nostrils, with
a bitter taste that sears his palate as well. His eyes water, but he opens the
waterproof enough to show his blues, before he steps up to the half door, on
which has been fixed a polished plank the width of the door itself to form a
narrow counter. How long he waits, he cannot tell precisely, but it is not an
insignificant wait before a burly man, barely beyond youth, leaves his position
by one of the dipping tanks and comes to the half-door.
Lorn bows his head slightly to the
journeyman who steps forward to the door-counter.
"Yes, senior enumerator?" The
journeyman waits for Lorn's response.
In turn, Lorn extends the stolen plaque of
Dyjani House. Ryalth had not asked why he needed it, but it had taken her
sources nearly two eight-days to obtain it, longer than he would have liked,
but early enough, he hopes. "We have a... special need... for an outland
trader."
The journeyman takes in the plaque, then
raises his eyebrows as Lorn unwraps the scabbarded sabre, curved but slightly
more than a lancer blade-clearly not a weapon of Cyad. He does not remark on
the sharpened tip. "Yes?"
"The senior trademaster was told that
you could coat this sword with a thin layer of the best cupridium, so that it
would be acceptable for a master trader of Brysta to wear within Cyad, but
enough so that it will fulfill its purpose." Lorn lets his voice edge
slightly beyond concern, but not quite toward pleading.
The journeyman frowns. "That... that
is something that master Wanyi will decide."
"As he should. We can but
request," Lorn says in the polite voice of an enumerator.
Lorn waits as the journeyman dons a pair of
heavy leather gloves before the younger man lifts the dark ordered-iron blade
and carries it into the rear of the shop, and the white-haired man who finally
looks up from the chaos-glistening forge. The journeyman also has taken the
plaque, which he displays to the shop master even before he presents the sabre.
After a time, the younger cuprite-worker
turns and heads back to Lorn-without the blade. When he reaches the half-door,
he returns the plaque to Lorn. "For Dyjani House, he will do it, but only
for five golds. And a good faith fee of five more."
"For the senior trademaster, it is
worth such." Lorn has expected such, although the amount will leave him
with but a few golds in his wallet. Both the plaque and the fee-a year's wages
for a Lancer captain-are required to discourage almost all uses of cupridium
except for the Mirror Lancers and the most wealthy. "He said I should
provide half now, and half when the weapon is ready."
"That is acceptable."
Lorn lays the golds on the counter and
receives a token in return.
"On threeday, it will be ready."
"Thank you." Lorn inclines his
head. "I will so tell the senior trade-master, and I will return
then." He turns and refastens the waterproof before stepping out of the
shop.
Outside, the mist has turned to a freezing
rain, driven off the Great Western Ocean so hard that it stings where it
strikes Lorn's unprotected skin. Yet, after the air and the chaos mist in the
cupridium-forming shop, the ice rain is more than welcome as Lorn walks
carefully eastward. The rain should limit anyone screeing his actions, although
there is nothing strictly forbidden about plating an ordered-iron sabre.
Expensive and frowned upon, yes... but Lorn will need the weapon for more than
one reason.
Lorn shakes his head and continues back
toward the harbor, and eventually toward Myryan's dwelling. He stops by his
parents' dwelling only long enough to change from the blues to a working lancer
uniform before continuing on to see Myryan. By the time he has reached the
Fourteenth Harbor Way East, the ice rain has become sleet that bounces off his
waterproof and his face. His lancer cap is soaked, as is his hair, and cold
water drips down his neck.
Myryan has been watching, for she opens the
door quickly and beckons him to enter. "You're soaked, Lorn. How early
were you out? Ciesrt left but a while ago. You didn't have to come, you
know?" Absently, she smooths back her thick and wavy black hair.
Lorn eases the waterproof off, trying to
limit the dripping to one point on the polished tiles of the entry foyer.
"I didn't? How many days are left before I must return to duty?"
"Less than three-quarters of a
score," she admits. "If I've counted correctly."
He grins. "So I had to come."
Her nose wrinkles. "There's something."
"I've been in the freezing rain and
the sleet...."
Her frown fades. "Probably nothing.
Come into the kitchen. I actually made hot bread this morning-with cheese in
it." She turns.
"That would be good." Lorn feels
his mouth water as he follows Myryan.
LIII
The
Silver Chalice is a two-story structure hidden in the shadows of the second
auxiliary warehouse of the Spuryl Clan, and stands a hundred cubits off Second
Harbor Way West on a unnamed narrow way set between the Road of Perpetual Light
and the Road of Benevolent Commerce. Behind the two archways that form a small
portico are the age-vanished double doors to the Silver Chalice.
Lorn slides inside the right-hand double
door, trying not to move too stiffly with the sabre inside his trousers and
boot top. He wishes that he had the Brystan sabre, but it will not be ready for
another two days, and if he is careful, no one will notice the difference. The
Dyjani dagger remains behind the heavy blue leather of his belt.
The tile foyer offers three arches, and
behind the center arch are most of those in the Silver Chalice-traders and full
merchanters in blue, all men. To the left is a near empty small room with but a
single bearded merchanter of indeterminate age with a woman also in blue,
perhaps his consort or a cousin.
The muscular guard with the truncheon in
hand nods to the right, immediately dismissing Lorn. Lorn takes in the
near-empty side section where three young enumerators share one table, and a
gray-haired enumerator and a woman in yellow sit in the corner. Then he moves
slowly toward a table for two just beyond the arch, set so that the light from
dim oil lamps will leave his face in shadow, yet from where he can watch both
the traders in the larger center room, and those who enter.
The serving girl-in gray, not yellow, and
not even so old as Myryan- looks down at him. "Same as last night?"
Lorn nods, and she turns toward the back.
No one even close to Shevelt's description is in the tavern, nor has anyone
been on the half-score occasions over the past two eightdays when he has
frequented the Chalice. His other investigations and observations have been
more fruitful, for which he is grateful.
A woman in entertainer's yellow staggers
away from a merchanter, pulling her ripped gown up across her chest, then
throws the contents of a mug in the man's face. The man lurches to his feet,
only to sit down as the bravo with the truncheon-nearly five cubits of silent
muscle-appears before him.
Loud laughter rolls out of the center room
as the merchanter sits down abruptly.
"...got you, Fysl, she did... and
Wosyl'll have a silver for her gown, too, and more if you're not watching your
purse."
The serving girl in gray appears from the
back, angling toward Lorn, who leans back slightly, watching as she sets the
mug on the table with a slight thump. He eases three coppers into her hand.
With a smile she steps away.
Lorn lifts the mug, but barely tastes the
cheap red swill that passes for table wine. His eyes flick across the foyer as
another merchanter steps inside, but the man is slender, and bent, and turns to
the left, where he joins the couple waiting there.
"Fellow... seen you around... you the
other enumerator for the red bitch?" calls the brown-haired and
round-faced enumerator from the table of three.
"Ryalor, you mean?"
"Ryalor-you really think there's
anyone but her?" The round-faced man laughs. "Her and two
enumerators-that's all anyone sees."
"What about all the traders,
Bercatl?" asks the man to the inquirer's left. "Lots of 'em, and they
don't trade 'less there's coins."
Lorn shrugs and waits for a moment, until
the men at the other table are silent. "Met her partner once. He's quiet.
She listens to him. Don't know much about him."
The round-faced enumerator asks, "You
serious?"
Lorn nods. "Told me not to say much,
but I figure it doesn't matter if folks know he's real. He travels a lot."
The other two nod at their companion.
"See. Told you, Bercatl. That's why they get contracts. She's safe here,
and he's greasing the wheels in the outports. That's what they do in Tuylyn
House, too, but they got teams that do the outports."
"...can't..."
"...Eileyt bets the House is bigger
than anyone knows..."
"...cause he works for 'em..."
"And who else'd know?"
Lorn looks past the three, politely, and
the words die away. His eyes center on the archway, and the full merchants
beyond.
Following an uneasy and lingering silence,
the enumerators resume their conversation.
"...Hamorians wouldn't trade fair
without the fireships..."
"...pretty fair... coins talk,
too."
After a rime, Lorn stands, leaves a copper
by the goblet, and nods to the enumerators as he starts to leave the Silver
Chalice. A few whispered words follow him.
"...more than an enumerator. Walks
like a bravo...."
"Looking for someone, he is...."
"...wouldn't want to be the one he
finds."
"Wouldn't want to be him if he finds
what he's looking for, either...."
"For a little house... got some scary
folk there..."
Lorn hopes they continue to think so as he
slips out.
He stops by his parents' dwelling, the
lower garden only, to cache the sabre and the golden dagger, before hurrying
back along the Road of Perpetual Light and thence downhill toward Ryalth's. The
western sky is still partly greenish purple when he reaches Ryalth's quarters
and rings the small trade bell.
Ryalth doesn't bother with the privacy
screen, but opens the door and takes his hand. "You're later tonight."
Lorn offers an embarrassed smile.
"Father hasn't been the same since the Ocean Flame explosion. I stayed and
talked to him for a bit. He protested that I wasn't spending much time with the
family." All of what he says is true, but he is aware of how close to his
fingers he sharpens his blade, particularly given that Ryalth is far more
sensitive than most merchanters.
She closes the door, and they walk toward
the table. "I fixed some emburhka. It's warm, still."
"Thank you. It will be good." He
smiles as he seats himself. "I wish I could have come earlier. I really
do."
"I can tell that." She returns
the smile. "Sometimes, I can sense how you feel." She pauses, and the
smile fades. "Sometimes, it's as if you put up a screen to keep me from
knowing anything." She fills the goblet before him with an amber vintage.
"Try this."
"Habit... when you grow up in the
Quarter of the Magi'i... you try not to reveal much. There's too much that
people know or can find out anyway." He takes the goblet, sniffs, and
breaks into a grin. "Alafraan! How did you get this?" The smile
breaks. "You didn't pay a fortune for it, did you?"
She shakes her head, and her eyes dance.
"Enjoy it. There's not as much market for it here as you might
think."
Lorn takes a small sip, enjoying the
mixture of fragrances, and the clean taste that calls up both spring and
autumn.
Ryalth follows his example. "I
wouldn't have known about it, except for you. I "think we can also make
some coins from it."
"Oh? How?"
"It's too delicate for the
Magi'i..."
Lorn frowns.
"...and too dear for the lancers, and
too refined for most of the merchanters."
"It sounds like there's no one who can
afford it who wants it," Lorn says. "I'm not sure I understand."
"Too much chaos surrounds the senior
mages, and they're the ones who have the golds, and chaos off-puts the bouquet.
That was what Esydet told me."
"So... what idea do you have in
mind?"
"Send it by coaster to Lydiar. The
Lydians will pay; we'll probably get three good cargos, two if we're unlucky
before one of the big houses discovers the profit."
"So... after two, go to them and ask
if they want shares, large shares, for their investment."
"I haven't wanted to let them know
much about us...."
"There's already talk," Lorn
temporizes. "Let them think you're a facade for someone else."
"That's dangerous... especially with
Shevelt pressuring me."
"I know." Lorn sighs. "I
know. Maybe we can think of something else in the next few days. Either way,
you can make some more golds from the Alafraan before... whatever...." He
laughs. "Is that life? Making of it what you can before... whatever?"
His thoughts drift back to Jerial, Myryan, and his parents.
"You look so sad." Jerial ladles
the emburhka onto his platter, then sets the small basket of bread between
them.
"I was thinking about my
parents."
"You can't make everyone happy, Lorn.
You can't live for them."
He sighs again, and feels every emotion in
the sound. "I know. I won't. You know that. But... I'm not too sure how
long father will live. Mother's keeping the chaos of age at bay. She is a
healer, but..."
"They'll die at close to the same
time?"
"I really don't know. So long as your
body stays in balance, you can give a lot of balanced order-chaos force."
"But does she want to?" asks
Ryalth, her voice softening.
"I don't know that, either." He
snorts. "There's so much I don't know."
"That's true of everyone."
Lorn nods, then smiles at the warmth in her
eyes, lifting the goblet to her.
She lifts hers as well.
LIV
The
magus in the shimmering white, with the silvered cupridium pin worn by only the
three highest Senior Lectors on his collar, stands beside the Captain-Commander
of the Mirror Lancers in an alcove twenty cubits from the three-story-high
doors to the Great Hall-the main audience chamber of the Palace of Light. The
polished white floor tiles reflect their images with but the slightest waver,
portraying Luss'alt and Kharl'elth almost as clearly as might a glass.
Even Kharl's red hair and Luss's bushy
black eyebrows hold their tints in their reflected images. The walls of the
Palace shield them from the cold breeze that blows out of the north, creating
small whitecaps on the harbor to the south, and far larger ones on the Great
Western Ocean beyond.
"I suppose," Kharl says easily,
"that you and the Majer-Commander have discussed increasing the number of
companies of the Mirror Foot?"
"Why would the Mirror Lancers consider
such?" Luss'alt frowns. "What is the need beyond duties as ship
marines and guards?"
"No need, I suppose," Kharl
replies. "Although..." He shakes his head, then smiles
apologetically.
"When you beg me to ask a question,
devious Second Magus, you have something to say of the nature you would have me
guess. Guess I will not."
"I am sorry." Kharl smiles
apologetically. "Some habits die with difficulty." He shrugs.
"One dare not speak too directly in the Quarter of the Magi'i."
"You never speak that directly,
honored Second Magus." Luss's bluff voice carries a hint of amusement.
"But, if you would, a slight effort in that direction would be
appreciated."
"Ah, yes, a slight effort." Kharl
purses his lips dramatically, and his green eyes carry a sparkle of amusement,
conveying an impression of youth.
Luss nods to encourage him.
"Was there not a fire upon the Ocean
Flame an eightday past?"
"There was." Luss waits, as if to
indicate that he has no intention of guessing.
"And it was caused, as you may have
overheard, by the weakening of the barriers of one of the chaos cells that
power the fire cannon."
"So it is said."
"You know that salt water weakens
metals, and the basic order of the oceans wars against chaos reinforcement.
Then... suppose... just suppose... that more cells are found to be weakened...
or that the chaos towers in each ship suffer a similar degradation...."
"Hmmm," muses Luss. "If that
be the future, then we would have to build our warships as do the Hamorians. As
Rynst has already planned."
"Cannon of the old style might be
possible," continues Kharl, "but without the threat of the fire
cannon, other warships might well attempt to board ours... if you understand
what that might entail."
"Devious mage..."
"You are the officer responsible for
the Mirror Foot. They are trained near Cyad, as I recall. They could be
stationed in the empty barracks by the eastern seawall. If times should
become... unsettled... well... I trust you understand."
Luss's lips curl. "I will think upon
your... suppositions."
"Of course, my friend. Of
course." Kharl spreads his hands. "That is all I wished from
you."
"Whatever it be, that is never all
that you wish." Luss snorts loudly. "Never."
Kharl shrugs gracefully, as lithely as if
he were still but a youth.
LV
In the
blues of a senior enumerator, Lorn sits at the side table in the Silver
Chalice, nursing a goblet of bitter red table wine and watching through the
archway the bulging figure who has to be Shevelt-watching and listening.
The enumerators' section of the Silver
Chalice is all but empty, except for a pair in the corner, a very junior blond
enumerator far younger than Lorn with a dark-haired girl who giggles annoyingly
and all too often.
"...Isyt... don't say things like
that...."
"...you are pretty... I wouldn't say
so otherwise...."
"...you tell all the girls
that..."
"...none of them are like you."
Lorn glances toward the center section of
the building, through the archway, to where Shevelt stands.
"Last one! Have to go and be nice to
my dear brother!" bellows the big merchanter. "Last one!"
Lorn shakes his head, and rises, leaving
three coppers on the table for the serving girl. He can only hope that Shevelt
will not be all that long in leaving the Silver Chalice.
Without looking behind him, Lorn-a lancer
attired as an enumerator-nods politely as he passes the bravo in the entry
foyer. The bravo does not even return the gesture, but looks past Lorn toward
the louder merchanters in the central room.
"It's always a last one, Shevelt? Is
it really?"
"You'd be hurrying if your brother's
consort had red hair...."
A gust of laughter fills the room.
Lorn steps into the darkness outside the
Silver Chalice, turning eastward, when a cold chill settles over him. He almost
halts, so strong is the sense of being observed in a chaos-glass. But, instead
of halting immediately, or stopping by the straggly tree barely twice his
height, which he had picked out earlier for its concealing shadows, he
continues walking, back in the direction of Ryalth's quarters.
"Chaos-light," he murmurs under
his breath.
After finally managing to be at the Silver
Chalice when Shevelt is, and when the man plans to leave and not drink all
night, Lorn must pass up the opportunity-all because some magus is curious. And
why? Lorn has done nothing-yet-besides his duty as a lancer, and besides
showing an interest in an attractive merchanter lady.
He offers a wry smile to the night and
keeps walking.
While his lady trader will be pleased to
see him earlier than it has been, finding Shevelt has taken more time than Lorn
would like. Yet he cannot undertake what he plans with an unknown magus
watching him through a chaos-glass. If Jerial is right, all the senior Magi'i
know he travels in merchanter blues... but that is all they should know.
He nears Second Harbor Way West, trying not
to limp or to disclose the sabre tucked into his boot-top.
At least... at least Ryalth will be pleased
to see him. Lorn just hopes the next time he finds Shevelt that the same magus
does not choose that time to observe him.
The chill does not lift until Lorn is well
past Fourth Harbor Way East.
LVI
Three
nights after his first observation of Shevelt, once more in the blues of a
senior enumerator, Lorn sits at the same side table in the Silver Chalice. He
takes a sip from the goblet, half-filled with a vinegary red wine, and watches
the burly Shevelt. He has little time left in Cyad, and can but hope the
unknown magus does not decide to scree him this night.
At the table to his right are a pair of
gray-haired enumerators, talking in phrases that rise and fall, sometimes
audible over the louder merchanters in the main room, and sometimes not.
"...no winter rain in Hydlen... snow's
light..."
"Aye... both Easthorns and
Westhorns..."
"...know the lancers asked Ekyon for
another five-score ranker sabres..."
"...loved that, he did..."
The bravo in the entry foyer ignores the
noise in the central room, though his fingers occasionally tighten around the
golden oak truncheon.
Lorn takes another minute sip of the wine,
shaking his head at the serving girl as she approaches. With her, from the back
room, comes the odor of overcooked grease. At the young woman's frown, Lorn
extracts a copper and lays it on the table, offering a brief smile to her.
She nods, and turns to the two enumerators.
"One more? And why not?" asks the
older enumerator.
Lorn smiles, absently, as the server slips
out of the smaller enumerators' section without looking back him.
"...and he had to pay Wosyl? He should
have paid her!"
Shevelt's laugh is loud, bluff, and
annoying to Lorn, but he takes another sip of the bitter red wine-only a sip.
"You don't come here often enough,
Shevelt! Don't be leaving so soon...."
"I should come here to be
insulted?" The big trader's overhearty laugh booms forth once more, riding
over the enumerators' conversation yet again.
"...give as good as you get..."
"Can't stay too late... have some
plans...." Shevelt announces.
"Who is she? Another redhead?"
"No... Shevelt's going to journey to a
strange land. She's blonde-all the way down." A bass laugh fills the room.
The laughter dies away as Shevelt lurches
erect and lumbers toward an adjoining table. "If I didn't happen to be
leaving, Vorgan... you would be. On the way to the Steps, mayhap by the long
voyage...."
Lorn leaves a pair of coppers on the table,
nods to the gray-clad serving girl who returns with two mugs, and points to the
three coppers on the wood.
The gesture earns him a fleeting smile.
"...just joshing, Shevelt..."
"Off to your redhead, Shevelt...
whichever one she is."
"When I finish my mug..."
Without looking back, Lorn departs the
Silver Chalice, walking quickly, as if he will be late somewhere. He continues
his pace all the way to Second Harbor Way West, where he slides into the late
twilight shadows, and eases back perhaps fifty cubits and melds into the deeper
shade that shrouds a straggly feathering conifer. He eases the left trouser leg
out over the sabre in his boot-still the Lancer sabre, which means he will need
a few other touches. Then he stands and waits beside the straggly tree barely
twice his height, and but a score of cubits away from the arches that shield
the double doors of the Silver Chalice.
The odor of overcooked grease melds with
the salt air and other odors from the harbor. Only a trace of purple hangs
above the low hills to the north and west, and the early night air is warmer
than it has been in more than an eightday, with a trace of dampness that
recalls fall not winter. Lorn remains silent as another man in blue walks
slowly from the west end of the way and enters the Silver Chalice.
The right hand double-door opens, and then
closes.
Lorn waits, but Shevelt does not emerge.
The sound of voices from the way behind
Lorn drifts past him, subsiding as the pair continues toward the harbor.
At last, the door opens and the tall and
bulky figure in blue that is Shevelt steps out into the night, stretching
slightly, before turning toward Lorn. Lorn waits until the trader is within a
handful of cubits before he moves.
"Trader, ser..." Lorn cringes,
almost cowers as he scuttles toward Shevelt. "Trader, ser... a word. A
word, please."
Shevelt turns, his face twisting.
Lorn backs away, but only slightly.
"Ser... a good enumerator. I am. Good for all manner of goods and
trades...."
"Good? Begging in the streets? You
disgust me, fellow."
"I'm better than any you
have...." Lorn whines, stepping back another pace. "I can show
you...."
The bulky merchanter takes two surprisingly
quick steps and grabs the far smaller enumerator by the shoulder. "Who do
you think you are? I want an enumerator... I hire you. You come beg at the
hiring door." He starts to shake the smaller man in blue, but the younger
man slips from his fingers and bends as if struck.
"Trash..." mumbles Shevelt.
"Worthless scum... off with you."
"Like you."
The coldness of Lorn's words, so at odds
with the cringing personality displayed a moment before, freezes the huge man
for the instant it takes for Lorn to whip the chaos-reinforced sabre across and
toward Shevelt's neck.
The merchanter gapes, but cannot even blink
or form words as the glitter of cupridium and the sparkle of chaos cut through
him. Both head and torso fall, a pair of dull thumps on the white stones
echoing faintly into the evening, blood pooling around the momentarily
twitching torso.
Lorn quickly takes out the golden scabbard
and extracts the dagger, driving it into the dead man's back, rather than turn
the body. He dusts the dagger's scabbard with chaos and leaves it by the head, then
walks quickly along the shadowed edge of the warehouse, pausing in the deeper
shadows to clean the sabre and replace it. The cleaning rag vanishes in a puff
of chaos fire, and Lorn walks out onto Second Harbor Way.
Lorn has walked a good two hundred cubits
when he nods politely as he passes two Mirror Lancer captains. He continues
downhill for another three blocks before turning eastward onto the Road of
Benevolent Commerce.
The stars are out full, and all hint of
twilight has vanished from the western sky by the time he has reached Ryalth's
quarters.
She has heard or sensed his approach and
opens the door as he nears. She frowns briefly as she opens the door. "I'd
hoped you would be earlier."
Lorn smiles wryly. "My parents wanted
to talk, and then I was delayed by an obnoxious merchanter who didn't like
enumerators on the same walkway. Extracting myself quietly took some
time."
"You always do things quietly."
After closing the door, she walks to the table.
"When I can." He offers a laugh
that is not quite forced as he follows her. "I can recall a few times when
it didn't work that way, and the results weren't quiet."
She smiles, an expression that combines
humor, recollection, and wistfulness. "I recall one of those times. Some
day you'll have to tell me about the others."
Lorn shrugs, almost sheepishly. "I
broke a boy's fingers when we were in school, in a bruggage...."
"A what?"
"A pile-up in a game-korfal. He
suspected, but couldn't prove it." Lorn laughs. "A few days ago, he
came to call on Jerial. He's a Lancer sub-majer. He deftly pointed out that she
couldn't consider herself above him now, or at least not for any longer than my
father lives."
Ryalth shakes her head. "In some way
or another, the past comes back."
"Let's hope the good things do as
well." Lorn pauses. "That does mean that he doesn't want me dead too
soon."
"Oh... because your younger brother's
a magus?"
"Exactly."
"Have you eaten?"
"Not since... this morning, I think. I
had some dried pearapples early this afternoon, but not very many." He
grins. "Kysia still has avoided meeting me." The grin fades.
"It's probably better that way."
"Why don't you sit down? I waited, and
I'm hungry."
Lorn holds back a wince at the sharpness of
her tone. "I'm sorry." He glances at the covered dish in the middle
of the small circular table.
"It's armenak-Austran creamed beef
strips and noodles."
Lorn takes the ladle and serves Ryalth,
then himself, offering her the bread first, as well. The armenak is strongly
seasoned, but with a trilialike tang, rather than with a chilled or pepper-like
spiciness, and Lorn finds he has finished all he has served himself, when half
of Ryalth's portion remains on her blue crockery platter.
"I was hungry."
"You usually are." She puts down
the goblet from which she has hardly drunk and looks across the table at him.
"You have to leave soon, don't you?"
"Before the end of the eightday. I
can't risk being late in reporting for duty. Not as a Lancer captain with magus
blood." His lips twist. "And not with senior officers waiting for
mistakes."
Ryalth tilts her head quizzically.
Lorn nods ruefully. "I know. I know.
But you're not a mistake. That's why I need a season or so to set things
up."
Ryalth waits.
"I keep my word, lady trader, and
that's one promise I want to keep. More than you know." He looks into her
eyes and repeats the words. "More than you know."
"I'm glad."
They both smile.
LVII
Cyad is
swathed in gray, the sun sending but a dim light across the city. The fog
outside the master cupritor's shop carries not only the scents of salt and the
claminess of the fog itself, but the acrid odors of acids and chaos-forming.
The sounds of hammers and forges echo more loudly as Lorn, wearing the grayed
waterproof, climbs the step to the narrow porch, where he wipes his boots.
After opening the door and stepping inside,
Lorn closes it firmly behind him, walks forward, and waits at the countered
half-door. When the young journeyman finally acknowledges him and approaches,
Lorn shows the token he had received earlier and the Dyjani plaque. "I
have come for the Brystan sword."
The journeyman inclines his head but
slightly. "The modified sabre is ready, and the master would have it out
of his place, masterful though the work is."
Lorn places the token and the five golds on
the narrow counter-and two silvers.
The younger man takes the token, but leaves
the coins on the polished wood and steps to the side and a rack that Lorn
cannot fully see, returning with the sabre and the scabbard. He eases the
weapon out of the scabbard for Lorn to see.
Lorn glances at it, in the manner of an
enumerator unaware of and unconcerned with the intricacies of blades. "It
looks as it should."
"The master also rebalanced the blade
and adjusted the scabbard for the additional thickness and the point. That
meant some additional rivets."
Lorn smiles, keeping the resignation from
his lips, and adds another gold to the pile.
"We thank the house of Dyjani,"
responds the journeyman.
"The house of Dyjani thanks you and
master Wanyi." Lorn bows, then wraps the weapon in the gray cotton and the
oilcloth before leaving the shop.
As he walks eastward through the heavy fog
toward the harbor, swathed in his gray waterproof, Lorn hopes that his
investment of more than a year's pay will provide what he needs.
LVIII
Lorn
stands in the afternoon shadows on the upper level portico of his parents'
dwelling, the wind from the Great Western Ocean in his face as he looks out
across the harbor, taking in the scaffolds erected around the Ocean Flame, and
the other fireship tied along the same pier farther seaward. From what he can
tell, the two square-rigged ocean vessels on the adjacent pier are both
Brystan, while the three schooners on the coastal pier are from Lydiar, Hydlen,
and Gallos, if the colors of the ensigns flying from on their sterns are any
indication. Another vessel, with wind-billowed sails, cuts diagonally out of
the southwest toward the harbor.
The wind has shifted and strengthened
enough to clear out the heavy fog of the morning. Whitecaps fill the water that
is as much gray as blue under the dark clouds that swirl in from the west, and
the wind hints at colder weather approaching. Lorn can sense someone behind
him, but he does not turn for a while.
When he does, his mother is still waiting,
wearing a heavy green woollen cloak.
"I don't go to the healing center
except on twoday and fourday. A small benefit of age and experience," she
says. "I had hoped we could have some moments together before you
left."
"Would you like to go down to the
sitting room?" he asks as his eyes shift to her cloak. "It would be
warmer."
"No. I like the wind. That is... if
I'm properly attired." Her fine white eyebrows arch, under short-cut hair
that has none of the mahogany Lorn recalls remaining. "The cloak is most
warm." She walks toward the southwest corner of the portico.
Lorn follows and arranges two chairs so
that they sit in a sheltered corner of the area where the family has often
dined in warmer weather, the wind rustling and murmuring around them.
Nyryah arranges her cloak and fixes her
eyes on her older son.
Lorn waits, knowing his mother will say
what she desires as she wishes.
"I never have cared for young
Dettaur," Nyryah finally says, "even when you were but waist-high and
friends with him. He was bigger, and he hit you, sometimes when he thought no
one was looking, but you never cried. His mother was my best friend when we
were young. She was of the Magi'i, but her father was only a third level adept,
and he died very young. She foolishly accepted Pyeal, but we all can do foolish
things when we're upset."
"You never mentioned any of
that."
"There was no reason to, not when you
were young. We were more idealistic, then, I fear." She smiles, as if
recalling a memory that gives her pleasure. "It is difficult to remain
young and idealistic in Cyad. It is near-impossible to reach my age and retain
all one's ideals." She frowns. "Perhaps it is better said that it is
impossible to live up to those ideals."
"You and father have certainly
tried," Lorn says gently.
"It may be...." She stops and
shakes her head. After a moment, she readjusts the cloak. "I feel old and
foolish spouting grand ideas...."
"What?" Lorn asks gently.
Nyryah purses her lips.
Lorn waits.
"Your father would disagree. Seldom do
we disagree, you know? Still..." She pauses once more before continuing.
"Cyad rests on the power of the chaos towers. All lands rest on some form
of power. The towers are few compared to the size of Cyador...." Her words
trail off into the wind, yet again.
"There are a half-score fireships,
each powered by a tower, and the half-score or so around the Accursed Forest,
and those here in Cyad," Lorn says. "Few for a land that stretches
more than fifteen hundred kays east to west."
"A quarter score in Cyad," Nyryah
confirms. "At the beginning. You know, Lorn, that is a very narrow base of
power. A handful of men control that power. Such creates the possibility for
corruption, and that is why the Magi'i remove those from their ranks who will
not put the service of chaos above self. That is why none know the Hand, and all
meet him in darkness, except the Emperor. It has always been a struggle."
Another quirky smile appears on her lips. "Your father reminds me of that
constantly."
"He's reminded me," Lorn replies.
"More than infrequently."
"There is one other thing, my
son," she says slowly. "It is something so obvious that I doubt you
have considered it."
Again, Lorn waits.
"You and Vernt, and even Myryan and
Jerial, tend to look down on the lancer families, perhaps because there are
three times as many lancer officers as Magi'i." Nyryah smiles sadly.
"The number of lancer officers who are majers and commanders is less than
the total number of Magi'i, and neither are numerous compared to all the folk
of Cyad. You were raised among both, but how many lancer or Magi'i families are
there here?"
"Two hundred Magi'i families?"
Lorn hazards.
"Closer to three hundred, and the same
number scattered throughout all the rest of Cyador, with most in Fyrad and
Summerdock. Now... how many folk are there in Cyad?"
Lorn shrugs. "The Emperor's census is
not made public. I would guess there are more than a thousand score."
"More than twice that." She
coughs once. "Remember, a lancer officer is almost as exalted to the folk
of Cyador as is a magus, even though it may not seem so among those with whom
you were raised. Power is held by very few, and it has always been so, and,
given the nature of the world, I fear it will always be so." She shakes
her head. "What if the basis of power were in something accessible to all
people? Would that make governing easier and less of a temptation for the
corrupt? I don't know. I used to think so." She smiles. "I wander. I
cannot ponder that forever. You may, perchance."
"Me? I don't think I'm the idealist
you and father are."
"You?" A headshake follows the
rueful single word question. "You have protected your idealism in a
terrible way, my son. You believe those in Cyad are somehow better because the
city itself is more magnificent."
Lorn does not know how best to answer such
a statement.
"People will be who they are, you
know. Some you can ignore. Some you can persuade, and some you can manipulate.
That is where most, even in Cyad, scratch the line in sunstone."
Lorn nods.
"If you would do more..." Nyryah
coughs, several times.
Lorn starts to rise, and she gestures for
him to sit.
"Nothing of flux-chaos there,"
she finally says. "You can sense that for yourself."
He senses no flux-chaos within her, but the
levels of order and chaos are far lower than he recalls. "You need more
rest," he says.
"I do my best, dear. Holding on to
your rest can sometimes be harder than we think." An enigmatic smile plays
on her lips for a moment, then fades. "As I was saying, you have
difficulty scratching lines. Some will attempt to do it for you. Others will
act as you have."
"Yes?"
"You will soon reach that time when
only one path lies before you. We all do. Your father did. I fear that holds
for Jerial already. Straying from that course brings earlier death than holding
to it." Her eyes harden. "Do you understand?"
Lorn nods slowly.
"I thought you might. Now... you have
few enough evenings left here, and they are better spent with your friend than
with us."
"You don't approve?"
Nyryah smiles. "You worry far too much
about our approval. You must live the life you create, and you especially,
unlike your brother, know far better who will aid in your creations. Your
father can guide Vernt as a magus, as he could have you, but there is no one in
this world of ours who knows the path you have chosen." She shifts her
weight in the chair. "I am feeling the wind, and you need to do what you
must."
Lorn stands and extends his hand for her to
rise, feeling both the strength and the delicacy in her grip.
"She must be lovely, or Jerial would
have made her displeasure known."
"She is... but beyond mere
beauty."
"That is what I meant. You never did
stop at appearances, Lorn." Nyryah walks steadily along the edge of the
portico.
The clouds to the southwest have begun to
lower, and the wind is damper, bringing spits of moisture that herald a fuller
rain to come-and the storm headache for Lorn that is so common he can almost
ignore it.
After escorting his mother down to her
chambers, Lorn returns to his own rooms, where, for a time, he reflects...
except before long, his thoughts are circling back upon themselves. Finally, he
takes out the small silver book and selects a page, reading almost under his
breath.
RIPENING
Like a dusk without a cloud,
a leaf without a tree,
a shell without a sea...
the greening of the pear
slips by.
Sly tree,
you know how... where...
So could we
with reason,
to follow,
leaf by leaf by green,
each second of the season,
to hold the sun-hazed days,
and wait for pears and praise
...and wait for pears and praise.
Lorn frowns. Pears are rare in Cyad, and,
once more, there is more to the words than their angular characters.
He smiles. He has no choice but to see what
fruit will ripen in the years and seasons that lie before him. In the meantime,
he sits on the edge of his bed and reads through the marked and ancient pages.
When late afternoon approaches, he re-dons
the enumerator blues, and the waterproof and takes the rear stairs down to the
rear garden gate.
"Who will aid in your
creations..." he murmurs as he walks eastward along the northern walkway
flanking the Road of Perpetual Light. In the continuing rain, the wind ruffles
his hair and flaps the gray waterproof that covers the enumerator blues.
"...no one who knows the path you have chosen...." While those words
could have meant that no one knows his goals, which he hopes to be true, the
less obvious meaning is what his mother intended.
He hopes Ryalth has returned from the
Plaza, and is relieved when she opens the door. Her eyes are both deep and
opaque as she looks at him. She does not speak, but motions for him to enter.
Lorn does so, stepping around the interior privacy screen and keeping a
pleasant smile upon his face.
Ryalth closes the door gently, firmly, then
faces him, her back to the green ceramic screen. "They found Shevelt's
body last night-with a Dyjani dagger through his back. Everyone in the trading
quarter was talking about it." She studies Lorn.
"I heard that he'd angered the
Dyjani...." Lorn says carefully.
"The plaque?"
"It is safe. Do you want it
back?"
"No." Almost eye-to-eye, she
looks levelly at Lorn. "You know that Tasjan denies the bad blood.
Publicly, anyway. I suppose he has to. He's the Dyjani Clan Head. Shevelt's
father Fuyol threatened to dismember all of Tasjan's heirs." Ryalth shakes
her head. "Fuyol is as hot-tempered as his son was. Before he finished his
screaming, at least four other house heads went to see him. They all suggested
that such threats were unwise, and the rumor is that some of them suggested to
Fuyol privately that a score of merchanters were quietly rejoicing at Shevelt's
death. They also suggested that he name Veljan as his heir. Veljan's much more
levelheaded." The redhead looks at Lorn. "He's more dangerous, but
that is because his consort is very bright. She is the middle daughter of
Liataphi."
"The Third Magus?" Lorn's
eyebrows lift.
"Liataphi has four daughters, and no
sons. One daughter died years ago. Syreal was far too young when she threatened
to run off if she couldn't consort with Veljan. There was a
compromise...." Ryalth breaks off and looks hard at him. "You knew
this, didn't you?"
"I knew that Liataphi has no sons and
that he has been trying to find younger Magi'i as consorts for his daughters.
I'd heard Syreal consorted with a merchanter, but I didn't recall who that was,
and I didn't know that there was a large settlement for her." He pauses.
"It was large?"
Ryalth nods. "More than many."
"So the Magi'i would not be displeased
with Veljan."
"One of Veljan's and Syreal's sons has
the chaos talent and is being taught at the academy," Ryalth notes.
"There are rumors that he will be accepted as a student mage."
"So long as Liataphi and Fuyol hold
their power."
"They will." Ryalth steps forward
and hugs Lorn. "You won't be here that long, and you haven't even hugged
me."
"No... I haven't." His arms slip
around her.
"You didn't have to do it," she
whispers in his ear. "You didn't."
"I did," he murmurs back.
"You would have had to handle it, and you could, but this way... you can
use those skills for something else, when I'm not around."
"I worry...."
"I do also." Lorn steps back and
offers a crooked smile.
So does she. "We don't have much time
left, but you'll get something hot tonight."
They both find themselves flushing.
LIX
Lorn
lifts the two green bags that contain his clean uniforms, laundered by the
ever-unseen Kysia, and the ancient Brystan sabre that holds a shimmering
cupridium finish and an edge that is every bit as sharp as the lancer sabre in
the scabbard clipped to his green web belt. He has tested the Brystan weapon,
and it feels better than his own sabre-except both are his.
He takes a last look around the chambers,
checking to see that he has not forgotten anything, and then turns. With a wry
headshake, he steps into the gray light outside his door and starts toward the
formal stairs. He does not get far, because his parents appear from their
chamber at the end of the corridor. Both wear heavy white woolen robes-lined
with the finest Hamorian cotton, he knows.
"I know you don't like
good-byes," his mother offers, "but it will be more than a year
before you get back to Cyad." She steps forward to hug him.
"Two, at least," Lorn admits,
lowering the kit bags and returning the embrace. He can feel the wetness on her
cheeks, and he swallows. "I will be back."
"We know, dear." Nyryah gives him
one more embrace before stepping back.
Kien'elth grasps Lorn's forearm with both
hands. "It was good to see you, and to see how much you've changed in four
years." He smiles. "I didn't think it would turn out this way, but
you've done well, and I think you're happier doing what you do."
Even Vernt appears, standing behind his
parents, although he is fully clad in the shimmercloth of a third-level adept.
"Take care, Lorn."
"I will do that, but you be careful as
well." Lorn steps forward and claps Vernt's forearm, adding in a lower
voice, "The Quarter is just as unforgiving as the Accursed Forest."
He can sense the frown that their father does not express, but he does not
explain his words to either his brother or his father, who already understands
what he has said, nor his reasons for voicing what they know without his
advice.
Finally, he steps back, glancing around.
"You saw Myryan last night... didn't
you?" asks Nyryah.
"I did."
"Jerial asked if she could be the one
to see you off downstairs," Nyryah adds.
"We could all do that," insists
Kien. "She shouldn't..."
"She asked it as a favor, and she
never asks, dear." Nyryah looks blandly at her consort. "We should
let her have that small favor."
"If Lorn doesn't think ill of
us." Kien half-chuckles.
"That's fine. It doesn't matter
where," Lorn replies, even as he wonders why Jerial has made such a
request.
After another hug from his mother and
handclasps from Vernt and his father, Lorn finally walks down the marble
stairs, to find that Jerial, as the others have said, waits alone by the front
door. Her face is composed, almost drawn, and her eyes flicker to the empty
stairs behind Lorn.
"I didn't want to leave without...
but... I didn't want to intrude...." He sets down the green bags once
more.
"I know you have to go." Jerial
hugs him-a long and warm embrace, warmer than any Lorn can recall since
childhood. Then she steps back and lifts something wrapped in cream
shimmercloth-matching the fabric of the dress uniform he wears. She slips it
into his hands. The object is roughly two and a half spans square and hard.
Lorn can feel the polished wood beneath the cloth.
"It was father's," Jerial
murmurs. "He thought he misplaced it several years ago. I knew you would
need it sooner or later. It would be better if you didn't use it until you
return to duty-away from Cyad. Vernt has no use for it; he has his own, and
he'll never master it the way you will... the way you should... if you'd like
to return to Cyad someday." Her smile is somehow both professional and
warm-and disturbing. "If they hadn't let me see you off alone... you'd
still have it."
Lorn bows ever so slightly, understanding.
"Thank you. I can't tell you how much."
"Everyone has told you to be careful." Her eyes are bright,
but the unshed tears do not streak her cheeks. "I will, too, but...
believe in yourself, Lorn."
Still holding the screeing glass, he hugs
her once more before stepping back, then quickly slipping the glass into the
left hand bag, the one without the Brystan sabre.
"And I arranged a carriage for you.
The driver is waiting. You don't need to start a journey to the Accursed Forest
by carting those across Cyad on foot." She raises her dark eyebrows.
"That's a lesson, younger brother. Save yourself for what you alone can
do."
"Yes, elder sister."
They both smile.
Lorn lifts the bags and steps around the
privacy screens, then walks down the steps to the waiting carriage.
"Firewagon portico, ser?" asks
the driver.
"The one near the harbor," Lorn
confirms as he slides the kit bags into the carriage.
"Yes, ser."
As the carriage begins to roll westward
toward the harbor and the hint of filmy fog that irregularly shrouds the piers,
Lorn turns and watches the house, but his mental images are of Myryan, who had
cried the afternoon before when he had stopped to say that goodbye... and of a
red-haired trader and the tears she-and he-had shed the night before.
His lips tighten, and his eyes harden.
Part V
- Lorn'alt, Jakaafra
LX
At the
creaaking from the front wheels, the round-faced second level adept Magus who
sits across from Lorn shakes his head. "They need better
maintenance." His eyes show an occasional flash of the goldenness that may
in future years give him the sun-eyed appearance of more senior Magi'i. Fine
lines already radiate from the corners of those eyes, for all that he is but a
handful of years older than Lorn.
Lorn nods to the magus. Every few kays, a
creaaaaking has filled the front compartment of the firewagon that rolls along
the Great Eastern Highway toward Jakaafra. The sound seems to come from the
front wheels and lasts but a few moments before fading away.
"Firewagons should be silent,"
the magus continues. "Don't you think so, Captain?"
"They should be as well-maintained as
possible," Lorn responds.
With a definitive nod, the magus looks to
the undercaptain on Lorn's right. "Don't you agree, Undercaptain?"
"Yes, ser," replies the
dark-haired undercaptain. A faint sheen of perspiration covers his forehead,
but he makes no move to blot it away.
Sitting on the left side of the
compartment, facing forward, Lorn watches the magus seated directly across from
him, but the man in white shimmercloth closes his eyes. After a time, so does
the black-haired undercaptain.
Seemingly the only one even half-awake in
the late afternoon, Lorn rubs his chin, his fingers feeling the stubble and the
griminess of the long trip in the firewagon, and they are not scheduled to
reach Geliendra until late afternoon. He shifts his weight on the too-lightly
padded and contoured bench seat, then once again glances out through the
window, a window whose ancient glass creates the slightest of distortions,
rendering the fields and dwellings that they pass less substantial, as if they
were not quite as they should be.
Once the firewagon had traversed those few
kays of the Eastern Highway that bordered the northeast corner of the southern
grasslands- roughly halfway between Cyad and Geliendra-the land beside the
highway has become far more lush than that through which Lorn had passed on his
way to Syadtar-or even that of the fertile areas around the lancer training
base at Kynstaar. While he has expected to see the furled gray leaves of
winter, there is green everywhere, much more than he would have expected. Yet
Fyrad and the southeastern lands of Cyador are warmer, far warmer, than cool
Cyad, at least in winter.
Wrapped in his own silence, Lorn watches,
as outside the firewagon passes the towns, and then the well-tended holdings.
Yet, for all the prosperity of those glazed brick dwellings with their
intricate exterior green ceramic privacy screens, their immaculate brick
outbuildings, their woodlots with their borders as neat as if they had been
measured by a enumerator... Lorn feels vaguely uneasy. Is it because those
houses are more truly Cyador than the massive sunstone and granite structures
of Cyad itself? Or that such regularity is somehow at odds with the chaos that
supports it? Or something deeper?
He frowns, letting his order-chaos senses
reach beyond the firewagon, beyond the comforting warmth of the chaos cells at
the back of the vehicle.
From what he senses, the regularity of the
holdings that the firewagon carries him past is what it seems. Yet... something
does not feel right. Or is it that he does not feel in accord with those
regular holdings and what they represent? He can almost sense the chaos glass
in his bag, as if it burned to be released. Yet he knows that the glass holds
no chaos itself, and serves merely as a focus.
Lorn takes a long slow breath, and closes
his eyes, hoping that he can sleep for some of the remaining ride to Geliendra.
LXI
As the
carriage driver reins up the two horses, Lorn glances at the twin pillared
sunstone gates spaced wide enough for three carriages abreast, then at the
white oak gates themselves, oiled and polished, but clearly ancient from their
deep golden color. Two Mirror Lancer guards stand before each of the
ten-cubit-high pillars that hold the gates, and the gates themselves are swung
back into the compound, a sure indicator that they had not been built to
withstand a true siege.
"We stop at the gate, sers,"
announces the driver of the open-topped carriage. "Be four for the two of
you."
"Thank you." Lorn hands over five
coppers, then opens the half-door, careful to swing his sabre clear, and then
stepping down to and walking across the granite paving stones the open luggage
rack on the back where he pulls out his two green bags. He looks down, not
quite sure why. While the pacing stones are smooth and clean, as are all paving
stones in Cyador, these bear traceries of fine hairline cracks.
"Ser... I could pay my own-"
begins the undercaptain, reaching for his single bag.
"You could, Nythras, but consider it a
favor that you'll repay when you're a captain," replies Lorn with a smile.
"Thank you, ser."
Neither of the guards looks directly at the
two officers as they walk through the gates. Inside, Lorn pauses, glancing
northward at the proliferation of one- and two-storied white granite structures
inside the square of walls that stretch a good kay or more on a side. The
compound at Geliendra is twice the size of the one at Syadtar... if not more.
The undercaptain glances sideways at Lorn.
Lorn offers a wry smile. "This is a
new station for me, too, Nythras."
Although it is almost exactly midwinter,
the air is warm, as warm as late spring in Isahl, and damp, as damp as the sea
air coming off the harbor in Cyad. Lorn takes a slow breath, trying to identify
the muted fragrances and odors, a melange of scents that partakes of frysia,
the decomposition of stable straw, and other floral scents new to him.
Lorn studies the layout for but a moment,
then walks directly toward the large whitened granite building before them.
While he can see officers and Lancer rankers entering and leaving the buildings
farther to the north, there are none entering or leaving the nearest. He ducks
inside the archway of the first building, glancing toward the junior squad
leader who sits at a narrow table in the foyer at the end of a short corridor,
much as Kielt had done at Isahl.
The squad leader looks up. "Captain,
ser?"
"Captain Lorn. I'm reporting in. Is
this the Commander's headquarters?"
"Ah... yes, ser."
"Where should I report?"
"The third building back, ser, the
second archway."
"Thank you." Lorn smiles and
steps back outside. In the damp and warm air of Geliendra, especially in his
winter-weight uniform and under the direct sun, he is beginning to sweat.
"Third building," he tells the undercaptain.
"You didn't think it was that one, did
you?"
"No. But it's faster to ask than try
them all." Lorn grins. "You only look uninformed once that way."
Lorn leads the way to and then into the
front archway into the third building back, a low one-story granite-walled
structure that, for all its cleanliness and spare lines, still radiates age. A
heavy-set squad leader, one of the most rotund lancers Lorn has ever beheld,
bulges over the wide table that holds a dozen wooden boxes, each filled with
stacks of paper. He looks up as the two officers appear.
"This is where we report?" Lorn
asks.
"Yes, ser." The squad leader's voice is a mellow tenor.
"Captain Lorn, reporting, squad
leader." Lorn offers an easy smile along with the words.
"Undercaptain Nythras," the
black-haired junior officer adds.
Lorn shows his seal ring, then proffers his
orders. Nythras follows the captain's example.
"Squad Leader Kulurt, sers." The
heavy-set lancer nods politely and scans the two scrolls before speaking again.
"Captain Lorn..." The squad leader nods as he speaks, and his jowls
quiver. "Commander Meylyd has been expecting you, and asked me to let him
know as soon as you arrived. If you would wait for a moment..."
Lorn nods.
Kulurt heaves himself out of the white oak
chair, nods again to the two officers, lumbers down the corridor directly
behind his table.
Nythras glances at Lorn. "They know
who you are."
Lorn doubts that is for the best.
"They know who you are also. You'll see."
Kulurt returns almost immediately,
breathing slightly heavily. "Undercaptain Nythras, the Commander will see
you after he finishes with Captain Lorn," Kulurt explains to the more
junior officer before gesturing to the corridor. "The Commander's study is
the first door on the left, Captain Lorn."
"Thank you." Lorn leaves his gear
against the wall and slips around the squad leader. The study door is open, and
he steps inside. The study is roughly fifteen cubits square and contains little
beside the desk and the chair behind it, a single chest-high bookcase to the
right of the desk, and five armless chairs set out in a semicircle facing the
desk. On the wall facing the door, two large windows, their panes and shutters
open, admit both light and a pleasant breeze. All the furniture is of white
oak, burnished by time into a deep gold. On the desk are three boxes filled
with papers, an inkwell, and a pen holder. Fastened on the wall behind the
commander's desk is a green-bordered wall hanging. Inside the border are four
stylized golden towers set in a diamond pattern. Four narrow lightning bolts
connect the towers, and within the lightning-bolt-enclosed diamond is the black
outline of a single leafless tree-a tree with four gnarled branches twisting up
and out from the trunk. The tips of the branches curve back from the lightning
bolts.
Commander Meylyd is standing behind the
polished golden surface of his table desk as Lorn enters and bows.
"Captain Lorn, ser."
The tall and slender commander offers a
warm smile, with both his eyes and mouth. "Captain Lorn... it's good that
you're here."
"I'm glad to be here, ser."
"After spending all that time on a
firewagon, I'm sure you are." Meylyd responds, gesturing to the chairs
before his desk and reseating himself. "I take it that your trip from Cyad
was unremarkable."
"Just long." Lorn takes the chair
on the left end, the one closest to the window.
"That's the way the patrols are
here-most of the time." Meylyd nods, leaning back in the wooden armchair.
He tightens his lips for a moment. "What do you know about what we do...
or about the Accursed Forest?"
"Well, ser, I know that the Accursed
Forest is a remnant of the wild order that once spread across all of Candar
before the Firstborn. They pushed it back and confined it behind warded walls.
One hears reports that at times it breaks free of those wards and must be
pushed back within the boundaries." Lorn shrugs. "I understand that
the Lancers patrol the walls and support the Magi'i and Mirror Engineers in
bringing the wild order of the Forest back within the wards."
"That is in fact the basis of what we
do here. You understand better than many, as might be expected from an officer
raised in the City of Light." Meylyd purses his lips once more, leaning
forward in his chair. "You'll be in charge of the Second Company in Jakaafra,
Captain Lorn. There are two companies there on the north side. You and your
company will patrol the northeast wall to make sure that the Forest remains
within the wards. First Company patrols the towns outside the northwest
wall." The commander stands. "It's good to meet you." He nods
toward the door. "Majer Maran will brief you on the specifics. He's in
direct command of all the surveillance patrols. He's expecting you. The next
door down."
"Yes, ser." Lorn stands quickly.
"I hear you are most capable, and this
is a time when that experience will be valuable. If there is anything you need
or think I should know, please let Majer Maran or me know." The commander
smiles warmly a last time.
Lorn bows, then departs.
Majer Maran has clearly heard Lorn's
departure, because he, too, is standing, as the captain enters his study, a
chamber less than eight cubits square, and even more sparse than Commander
Meylyd's study.
"Majer." Lorn bows, then
straightens, studying the officer. Majer Brevyl had warned Lorn about Maran,
but without specifics.
Maran stands slightly over four cubits, a
good head taller than Lorn, with short, light-brown hair, mild brown eyes, and
a thin brush mustache. His broad shoulders and muscular chest taper to a narrow
waist and comparatively slender legs. "Greetings, Captain Lorn, and
welcome to Geliendra." Maran bestows a warm and friendly smile upon the
junior officer. "Please sit down."
"Thank you." Lorn takes the
leftmost of the two chairs before Maran's table desk.
"There are many tales about duty here," Maran begins,
sitting back in the chair behind the table desk. He sits up and rings the bell
on the corner of the table. "Oh... I almost forgot."
Lorn wonders what Maran almost forgot, but
leaves a faint smile upon his lips, although his concentration, and his
chaos-order senses, are upon the door, which opens.
"Ser." A junior squad leader,
thin-faced, appears with a tray, which he sets upon the corner of the desk.
"Thank you, Quenst." Maran's warm
voice conveys appreciation. A carafe and two mugs rest on the tray, as well as
a dozen clean slices of white cheese, and as many wedges of thick cracker
bread. A freshly sliced apple is laid out behind the cheese.
"Go ahead," Maran urges. "If
you're like most of us, you don't eat much on a firewagon trip."
"That's true." Lorn his chaos
senses flick across the carafe, and then the food, but can detect no flux that
might indicate poison or other unsavory substances. So he samples a slice of
cheese, an apple slice, and a wedge of the hard cracker bread, eating it
carefully. Maran pours two mugs of juice. "Redberry."
"Thank you." Lorn grasps the
nearest mug and takes a small swallow. "Patroling the Accursed Forest is
not that dissimilar to patroling the Hills of Endless Grass," Maran says,
"and yet it is also totally different." He smiles apologetically at
Lorn.
"I understand dealing with
barbarians," Lorn offers, "but exactly how does one patrol the
Accursed Forest?"
Maran's warm smile turns ironic. "The
Forest and the barbarians are much alike. They would invade Cyador and rob us
of the fruits of chaos and prosperity. The Forest is a creation of wild order
that would consume all of Cyador and return it to a forest where each creature
would be ordered to destroy every man, woman, and child, because the wild order
does not recognize us as a part of its patterns." Maran coughs, takes a
sip from his mug, and continues. "The Firstborn pushed the wild order back
into the smallest area possible, and confined it with barrier wards. There are
a dozen chaos towers which provide chaos energy to the wards. Each tower
provides enough chaos energy to power the wards for sixty-six kays, so that
each ward receives power from two towers. There are eight wards evenly spaced
over each kay of wall, and all are linked by cupridium cables encased in
vitrified ceramic."
Lorn nods, wondering just how the Forest
could escape such a chaos barrier.
"You ask, if you are like most lancer
officers, how the Forest can escape such a prison." Maran pauses for
another sip of redberry. "There are several ways. First, some of the trees
can expel their seeds beyond the wall. Once such a seedling takes root, it
grows quickly. That is why the area for a half kay back from the walls is
continually tilled and sowed with salt to ensure that nothing will grow there.
Second, the Forest has grown trees so large that when a branch breaks it falls
across the wall. Full grown trees also fall, even when they appear to have no
rot or illness. Trees or branches breach the barrier, and animals use such as a
bridge to escape. We have found chaos cats over eight cubits in length, ten if
you include their tails, which weighed more than fifty stone. You will see, on
the wall in the officer's dining room here tonight, the remnants of the skin of
a giant stun lizard killed here twenty years ago. It is twenty cubits in
length. It took a special firecannon to kill it. Third, occasionally a tree
will send a root under the foundations of the wall. The foundations go down
more than fifty cubits." A crooked smile appears on Maran's face.
"The Accursed Forest is a dangerous adversary."
Lorn waits.
"Seedlings can be destroyed by
firelances, but if you destroy such, you send a lancer as a messenger immediately
to the nearest Mirror Engineer detachment, with the exact location of the
seedling. You can determine that because each ward on the wall is numbered. The
first ward to the east of the north point is north ward one east; the second is
north ward two east.... You understand? Roots are more dangerous, if
infrequent, and all you can do is quarter off the area and destroy any animals
that climb through them. Yes... they can be hollow. Fallen limbs require the
most effort, because you will have to destroy all animals that try to use the
limb as a bridge. The wards will eventually destroy the limb, but that could
take anywhere from a day to an eightday...."
Lorn finds himself nodding.
Maran extends a thin book. "This is
the patrol manual. You need to study it immediately." He shrugs
offhandedly. "It is straightforward. Patrol the ward-wall. Contain the
wild creatures of the Accursed Forest when it is breached. Protect your lancers
and use them wisely. Oh... there is one structural difference here. We have one
less squad leader per company. That means your senior squad leader also leads a
squad." The warm smile returns. "I expect you will find time to study
it. From here it is roughly a solid four-day ride to the post at
Jakaafra."
Lorn takes the manual. The time to ride to
Jakaafra is certainly understandable, since Geliendra is on the southernmost
point of the diamond walls that surround the Forest, and Jakaafra above the
northernmost.
"Your senior squad leader will be
Olisenn.... You are expected to patrol thirty-three kays each day, and rest on
the fourth. There are way stations every thirty-three kays, and, of course, an
outpost at each corner of the ward-walls." Maran coughs lightly.
"Tomorrow, when you're rested, first thing, we'll take a ride to the wall.
There's really no other way to explain it, not really." Maran shrugs.
"Some things have to be seen before any explanation makes sense. Then, the
day after, you'll be in charge of taking the replacement lancers for both
Westend and Jakaafra. You'll ride the wall, as, if you will, a quicker example
of a patrol."
The majer rises. "In the meantime,
we'll get you a room for a visiting officer. I'll give you a quick tour, and
then you can get cleaned up and familiarize yourself with Geliendra. Please
feel free to look throughout the compound and to ask anyone any
questions."
Lorn rises. "You've been most
helpful."
"Nonsense. The more you know, the
better you'll do." Maran smiles his warm and friendly smile and gestures
toward the study door.
LXII
The
late afternoon air is far warmer than in many recent days when Bluoyal'mer
steps onto the balcony where Luss'alt waits. After a glance at the
Captain-Commander, the merchanter looks back over his shoulder, then steps away
from the doorway into the Palace of Light.
The second-in-command of the Mirror Lancers
does not speak as the Merchanter Advisor to the Emperor approaches, but waits
for Bluoyal's words.
"The heir to the Yuryan Clan was
murdered, and I wished to speak to you of it." Bluoyal bows slightly.
"That has been reported, and it is
most unfortunate, but Fuyol of Yuryan has many heirs, I understand." Luss
frowns, as if he is uncertain why Bluoyal has requested the meeting.
"Before I consulted with the High
Lector or the Second Magus... I wished to advise you."
"Of what, Bluoyal'mer?"
Captain-Commander Luss does not conceal his puzzlement. "The City Guards
report to the Majer-Commander, but unfortunates within the city do die at times
under the blade despite the efforts of the City Guards. Why would such a
killing be of interest to the Magi'i... or me?"
"Ah... you do not know." Bluoyal
nods happily. "That is best."
Luss waits.
"The heir was killed with a lancer
sabre. A single cut of a lancer sabre."
"I wish that I could say that no
lancer would do such to a trader known for his arrogance. Or that such has
never happened." Luss offers a shrug and a smile. "Yet those who have
their golds speak for them sometimes find themselves without voice."
"As happened with Shevelt,"
Bluoyal points out. "You know aught of this?"
"No. I wish that I could say that it
had not happened. Or that all lancers were so effective. But it did occur.
However... this trader was killed on foot and in the dark, as I recall. Those
are not the conditions for which lancers are trained. Also, I recall something
about a dagger...." Luss raises his eyebrows.
"There was a dagger. It did not kill
him. A healer was summoned. There were traces of focused chaos around the wound,
and the killing wound was made by cupridium. Nothing else cuts the way a lancer
sabre does."
Luss frowns thoughtfully. "That sounds
far more like a renegade magus who has stolen a blade than any lancer officer I
have known. Far more. And a lancer from the ranks, in the trade quarter? That
would be impossible in Cyad. He would have been noticed immediately."
"We also looked into this. Someone
stole a Dyjani trade plaque and used it as authorization to have a Brystan
sabre plated and refinished with cupridium...." Bluoyal lets the words
drift off.
"You see... it could not have been a
lancer. Lancers are constrained from keeping such weapons, and certainly
someone would have noted an outland blade being reformulated with cupridium.
Any lancer who attempted such would immediately have been noted."
"As I said... the man was
noticed."
"Oh? Perhaps you had best explain how
this might implicate a lancer." Luss waits.
"The Brystan sabre was replated-under
false pretenses."
"You said such." Luss's voice
betrays a trace of exasperation.
Bluoyal smiles crookedly. "There is
one... difficulty...."
"Oh?"
"The Brystan sabre was not delivered
until the day after this Shevelt was murdered."
"Why are you telling me this?"
questions Luss. "You claim the man was killed with chaos added to a
cupridium blade that did not exist until the day after the murder. No lancer
was ever seen, and the weapon was not handled by a lancer. Or is that what you
wished to know?"
Bluoyal shrugs. "It is helpful. An
enumerator ordered the blade to be plated, and reclaimed it. Yet no one knows
who that enumerator was. Except that he was of average size and wore the garb
of a senior enumerator and had ten golds and a Dyjani trade plaque."
"Ten golds? Someone could have hired a
halfscore bravos for that."
"You see?"
Luss frowns.
"You do see. There are two threads.
First, whoever killed this Shevelt did not wish it traced to him. Or her.
Shevelt was a danger to someone. Or he knew something. That by itself is
meaningless. It could have been over a woman. Or a slight. Anything. But...
then we have someone who has taken the risk of stealing a trade plaque and
spending ten golds to make a Brystan sabre cut like a lancer weapon. Yet no one
has been killed in such a way in the eightday following. And the blade was not
even finished when the killing took place."
Luss shakes his head.
"One other matter..."
Luss stares hard at the Emperor's
Merchanter Advisor.
"The journeyman who dealt with the
enumerator swears the man knew nothing of blades. I trust you understand what
that portends."
"I fear I do. There is more here, and
more than one man involved."
"Then you would not take it amiss if I
discussed this with Lector Kharl?"
"Perhaps we both should," Luss
suggests.
"A most excellent and worthy idea,
Captain-Commander." Bluoyal blots his face with a green shimmering cloth.
"Most excellent."
LXIII
In the
early morning light, Lorn rides easily beside Maran as the two lancer officers
near the wall warding the Accursed Forest. Lorn's mount is a white gelding of
moderate size, while Maran rides a fractious white stallion three hands taller
at the shoulder than the gelding.
"You're lucky it's clear," Maran
observes. "We often have an early morning fog in the winter, especially
around the wall. It can make it difficult if the forest tries to use a fallen
trunk as a bridge to escape because no one sees anything until the giant cats
are loose and killing cattle or peasants or until a stun lizard has killed an
entire wagon team."
Lorn nods, listening to the words and
remembering them, neither accepting nor rejecting what the majer says.
Even from a kay away, the Accursed Forest
towers into the sky, a mass of greenery that appears more like a dark,
low-lying cloud than vegetation. The crown of the forest canopy rises at least
two hundred cubits skyward, and the ward-wall itself appears as little more
than a thin shimmering white line at the base of the trees it confines.
The grass through which the narrow road
leads dies away, and the white paving stones continue toward the wall through a
grayish white dirt that oozes the red chaos of salt-killed soil. The light
breeze intermittently swirls powder-like soil and salt across the road. Lorn
can also sense residual chaos-from firelances, or magus-bolts, or perhaps from
the specal firecannon Maran had mentioned the afternoon before.
"It's amazing the first time you see
it," Maran observes. "It's hard to believe that anyone could have
built something this massive and so long. Remember, the part that's underground
is ten times as deep as what you see."
As they approach the wall more closely,
Lorn glances upward at the dark-trunked trees that appear evenly spaced just inside
the wall. Each trunk appears to be set no less than thirty cubits from the next
and no more than forty. At the height from which Lorn can see their bases
across the top of the wall, he judges each trunk to be between ten and fifteen
cubits in diameter.
Maran reins up the white stallion a good
fifty cubits back from the wall, and Lorn follows the majer's lead.
Then Lorn studies the wall-a barrier not
terribly high, perhaps five cubits high, low enough that he can look beyond it
while mounted. Each white granite wall stone is an oblong two cubits long, one
cubit high, and approximately one thick, from what Lorn can tell. The wall's
thickness is three courses. He looks to the southeast, but there the wall seems
to end less than a kay away, a spot marked by the fifty-cubit-high granite
structure that stands a quarter kay back from the wall-the southernmost chaos
tower. The tower is windowless and squat.
He glances back to his left, where the wall
seems to stretch endlessly to the northwest, a line of white dwindling and then
vanishing into the gray-green of the horizon. "It looks as though any one
of those trees could fall and crush the wall."
"If it were a normal wall, they might.
The bark and the outer layer splinter and shatter, but their heartwood absorbs
all the chaos for a long time, and that allows all sorts of animals to use the
trunk as a bridge." Maran snorts. "Then, to remove it from the wall
proper takes special engineer equipment, and the engineers have their hands full.
Sometimes, there are seeds that sprout as well."
"Even in the salted soil?"
"Even there, and at times the seeds
and fragments get thrown or carried beyond the barrier strip."
Lorn glances from the wall back along the
road. At most, one of the tallest trees would cover less than a quarter of the
distance to where the grass begins. "How often does that happen?"
"An actual full trunk falling-perhaps
ten a season in a bad season, five in a good season. Two years ago, there were
close to three score in the autumn. That was the most ever."
Lorn frowns. Between twenty and forty tree
trunks falling across the wall every year? In a bad year, that might approach
one an eightday.
"A giant cat or a stun lizard-they're
about as dangerous as a company of barbarians."
"How many lancers do we lose every
year?" asks the captain.
"Some years, perhaps a handful. Two
years ago, we lost almost tenscore." Maran shrugs. "That was
high." The majer turns his mount right, along the white paving stones of
the twenty-cubit-wide road that parallels the wall, back along the wall toward
the chaos tower.
Lorn follows, his eyes and senses still
studying the wall.
Every two hundred and fifty cubits is a
glittering cube of crystal, from which chaos radiates above the whitened
granite. A stronger, but less obvious, line of chaos runs from ward to ward
through the cupridium cables within the white ceramic casings set under the
capstones of the wall, cables that link each cube with the next.
The entire wall glitters with chaos and
power, yet it seems almost insignificant against the unseen wall of dark order
that the Accursed Forest represents. Lorn does not quite shudder, but he
wonders how Maran can accept the Forest so casually. His chaos-order senses
range over Maran as they have over the wall, and he has to force himself not to
stiffen in the white leather saddle. Smoldering beneath the pleasant exterior
and the uniform of a lancer is a magus-or a lancer with the power of a
second-level adept.
Lorn lets a faint smile cross his lips. His
eyes lift and study the road and what lies ahead-the white granite structure
that is one of the dozen chaos towers to power and reinforce the very structure
of the ward-wall. A low chaos-reinforced white granite wall-built exactly like
the ward-wall-runs from the chaos tower building to the ward-wall proper.
Although it rises nearly fifty cubits above the dead and salted-soil area in
which it is located, it too is dwarfed by the bulk and power of the Accursed
Forest to its north.
Just what sort of chaos-power had the
ancients used to confine the Accursed Forest? And how had Cyador been able to
maintain those wards for so long?
Knowing that he has more immediate problems
than the source of the wards' power, Lorn glances from the wall to Maran, then
back to the ward-wall.
LXIV
The sun
has not cleared the crown of the Accursed Forest, effectively the eastern
horizon, as Lorn's replacement lancers mount up around the second waystation on
the southwestern ward-wall. The waystation is simple enough, a single low
structure with stables and barracks for three squads, three officer's rooms,
and a mess staffed by the local cadre of five. The walls are the same white
granite as every building associated with the ward-wall, and the roof is of
hard green ceramic tile.
There had been another reason for delaying
Lorn's departure, he has discovered. Had he left Geliendra a day earlier, both
his de facto company and the Fifth Forest Patrol Company would have been at the
same waystation at the same night-a cramped situation. As it was, the two
patrol-ing groups had merely passed each other the day before.
Lorn rides the gelding out into the center
of the courtyard and waits. He is in command, for the trip to Westend, of the equivalent
of two squads, each headed by a very fresh junior squad leader. Before long the
two squad leaders ride up.
"Ser?" asks Kusyl, the older of
the two junior squad leaders. "You want us to start on the wall?"
There are two perimeter roads that follow
the ward-wall. One is set fifty cubits back from the wall-the other more than a
kay back from the wall, roughly a hundred cubits back from the area of deadened
soil. Patrols ride in a line abreast, one squad on strung out from the wall
road, one in a line inward from the outside perimeter road.
"You had the perimeter yesterday
afternoon, right?" replies Lorn. "Yes, ser."
"Then you start on the wall road. I'll
be riding with you." Lorn turns in the saddle. "Fynyx... you and your
squad patrol in from the perimeter road."
"Yes, ser."
Kusyl has already ridden back toward the
lancers clustered around the stable doors. "Form up! First squad starts on
the wall road!" Fynyx follows. "Second squad here! Column by twos!
Now!" Once the squads are formed up, Kusyl reports, "First squad
ready, Captain."
"Second squad, ser," Fynyx
reports next.
Lorn nods and uses his heels to nudge the
gelding forward and out through the open courtyard gates. A low ground mist, no
more than a cubit high, covers the grass to the south and west of the
waystation, fading away over the salted ground that borders the ward-wall.
"Line abreast!" go out the orders from the squad leaders. Riding
side-by-side, Lorn and Kusyl ride toward the Accursed Forest, turning their
mounts onto the wall road. The column follows, each lancer turning until all
are in the line abreast. Then, the first squad heads northwest in the shadow
cast by the forest crown that towers over them, even though the massive trunks
do not rise until they are almost seventy cubits back from the wall.
Muted sounds that Lorn cannot make out
exactly drift across the comparatively low ward-wall, barely audible above the
clopping of his mount's hoofs on the white granite stone of the road. A scent
that is partly floral, partly something else, swirls past Lorn intermittently.
His nostrils twitch as he tries to identify the sources... and fails.
"Quiet morning, ser," offers
Kusyl. "Is it this quiet in the Grass Hills?"
"Sometimes, it's much quieter, except
for the wind. The wind blows most of the time there." Lorn stands in the
stirrups, trying to readjust to the riding he has not done for nearly half a
season.
"Times... you can hear the big cats
scream... eerie... comes across the wall like an arrow."
"I've never heard one," Lorn
confesses.
"You'll know," promises the squad
leader. "You'll know. No mistaking that."
The squad rides parallel to the wall road
at a steady walk, passing ward after ward as the sun rises until Lorn and the lancers
are riding in sunlight instead of shade.
As mid-morning nears, he wants to yawn.
After two days of riding the wall, and time spent in the evening studying the
ward-wall patrol manual that Maran had provided, his eyes tend to blur whenever
he looks toward the chaos and whitened granite that prisons the Accursed
Forest. Yet... he will be doing this for years to come.
Lorn glances at the wall once more, sensing
the cascading webs of chaos that hold back the dark order back.
"Ser!"
Lorn follows the yell and the gesture from
one of the junior lancers. In the midst of the dead soil, perhaps a hundred
cubits west of the wall road, rising from the salt-dead soil is a sprout of
green, a shoot that is nearly three cubits high and beginning to branch out.
Lorn can sense the pulse of dark order
within the green, and it almost seems as though the shoot is growing as he
studies it. "Lances ready," he orders Kusyl.
"First squad! Form up! Lances
ready!"
"Have them attack and discharge."
"First duad! Advance and
discharge!"
Lorn watches as the first two lancers ride
toward the green sprout, then rein up ten cubits short of the growth, train
their lances, and discharge them. Golden-white chaos floods over the greenery,
but little occurs except a shivering of the growth that is nearly shoulder high
on the lancers' mounts.
"Second duad!"
As the first pair turns and rides to the
rear of the column, the next two lancers ride forward and repeat the effort.
Lorn watches. It takes six lancers before
the growth blackens and begins to crumble, and four more before nothing
remains.
"Ser! There's no sign of anything
remaining," calls Kusyl. "Good. Have them reform while I ready the
message to the Engineers."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn turns the gelding toward the wall,
reining up perhaps five cubits from the shimmering granite beside one of the
chaos-pulsing crystal wards. There, he takes out the grease pencil and jots
down the ward number on the blank message scroll. "Ward West 163 South,
150 cubits due west of the wall road. One sprout three cubits high. Destroyed
with fire-lances." Then he signs the missive and rolls it, riding back
toward the column that has reformed. He also makes a note of the location on a
blank scroll for himself.
"Ser?" asks the squad leader.
"Kusyl, here's the message to the
Mirror Engineers at Westend. Pick someone to ride ahead and deliver it."
"Yes, ser." The squad leader
scans the ranks. "Prytr! Forward!" A small and wiry lancer ranker
moves his mount to the side and rides along the side of the column, where he
reins up. "Yes, sers?"
Kusyl extends the scroll. "You're
acting as messenger. Take the captain's scroll directly to the duty desk of the
Mirror Engineers at Westend."
"Yes, ser."
As Prytr rides off ahead of the column, and
as the first squad resumes its measured pace and study of the wall and the
deadland, Lorn glances back at the residual chaos, slowly leaching away from
where solid black order and focused white-gold chaos had met. The firelances
have destroyed the sprout, and infused the trunk with enough chaos to destroy
the root structure, from what Lorn can sense. That he will tell no one. And it
has taken full charges from a half-score of lances to destroy one thin green
growth.
Under what seems an unseasonably warm
winter sun, his eyes fix on that distant spot where the white shimmering line
of ward-wall merges with the darker bulk of the Accursed Forest and the
horizon. Ahead of them, twenty kays or so, there is another chaos tower, just
as the midpoint chaos tower lies thirty kays behind them.
Yet the chaos towers all over Cyador are
weakening. How much longer will these hold, and what will hold the Accursed
Forest back when they fail? Lorn snorts to himself. Unless he can determine a
way to deal with both the Forest and Maran before Maran deals with him-and
without alerting anyone else-Lorn will find himself failing long before the
towers do.
He keeps riding, his eyes scanning the wall
and the dead land stretching out from the white granite chaos bulwark.
LXV
The
compound at Westend is a smaller version of that at Geliendra- whitened granite
buildings within a square granite wall, polished oak timbered gates that stand
open, and a spacious courtyard with smooth granite paving stones set edge to
edge with scarcely space for the thinnest of knife-blades between them.
The sun hangs just above the western wall
of the compound as Lorn leads his squads of replacement lancers in through the
gates. Even before Lorn can dismount and lead his gelding into the smaller
stables reserved for the officers passing through or posted at Westend, a
figure hurries across the spotless white paving stones of the courtyard.
"Captain!"
Lorn turns in the saddle to see a man
wearing a uniform cut like that of a lancer, but in the shimmering white of a
magus, and with a tunic piped with red trim. He wears the triple-linked and
lightning-crossed bars of a majer on his collar.
"Yes, ser?"
"Gebynet, Majer, Mirror Engineers. I
assume you're Captain Lorn- the one who sent the message earlier today?"
asks the Engineer majer.
"Yes, ser." Lorn dismounts and
waits for the other to continue.
Gebynet smiles. "There's no problem. I
wanted to thank you for your diligence and your accurate report. I also wanted
to catch you. After you get your lancers settled, if you'd join me in the
officer's dining hall... there are some things we should go over."
"I hope I didn't do something
wrong." Lorn lets a worried frown creep across his face.
"No. The report was by the manual.
But... if you encountered that, you may see worse on the trip to Jakaafra....
These things come in spurts, and I'd like to fill you in... just in case."
Lorn returns the smile. "I can use all
the knowledge you'd like to share."
"I'll see you in a bit, then."
Gebynet, a half head shorter than Lorn, turns and bustles across the courtyard.
As the sun drops below the compound walls,
and shadows cover the white granite paving stones, Lorn walks the gelding into
the stables, glancing around, looking for a hint of where to stable the
gelding.
"Captain... I'll take your mount, if
you would." A youth emerges from a stall, setting a pitchfork against the
stall wall.
"Thank you." Lorn hands the reins
to the stableboy, then unfastens the two green bags from behind his saddle.
"He'll be in the second stall
here."
Lorn fumbles for a copper.
"Oh, no, ser. We're paid by the Mirror
Engineers."
"Well... thank you."
"You're welcome, ser." The
dark-haired youth smiles as he leads the gelding toward the stall.
Lorn purses his lips, then lifts his gear
and heads out of the stable.
There are two officers' rooms empty, each
with little more than a bunk, a table with a lamp, and wall pegs on which to
hang uniforms and gear. Lorn chooses the second, seemingly slightly larger, and
slides the bags under the narrow bunk. Then he closes the door, hoping that his
gear- and the sabre wrapped within it-will be safe for a time. It should be, but
he wonders. He'd once studied wards, years back, and read about the use of
chaos-formed order to create a light-shield.
Maybe he should try that-but not at the
moment, he decides, as he heads toward the officers' dining room.
Gebynet stands by a table for four with
another Mirror Engineer, apparently waiting for the Mirror Lancer captain.
Lorn crosses the room that holds four
tables, all vacant except for the one, and bows to the two engineers.
"Glad you could join us, Captain...
Lorn, is it?" ventures the majer.
"Lorn. I appreciate your taking the
time to fill me in."
Gebynet inclines his head to the other
engineer. "This is Captain Sherpyt. He's in charge of the Second Heavy
Engineers here at Westend." The senior engineer gestures around the small
dining area. "Both Lancer patrol companies are out at the waystations
tonight." Then he snorts. "Of course, each one's out seven out of
eight nights. Much rather be an Engineer, thank you."
The three seat themselves, Lorn with
Gebynet on his left, Sherpyt on his right.
On the bare wood of the table are four
bowls, four large spoons, four heavy glass goblets, and a single bottle of
wine-Byrdyn, Lorn suspects from the color and the aroma he can smell as Gebynet
fills the three heavy glass goblets.
"The food isn't much," declares
the majer. "We all eat the same, but the men's dining area is much
noisier, and the service is better here."
"Not much," suggests Sherpyt.
"That's why you always bring the wine."
"Of course." Gebynet smiles.
"While we're waiting, I'll start." The majer takes a sip of his
Byrdyn. "How tall was the shoot you fired?"
"Three cubits, maybe a shade
more."
"Now... the Fifth Forest Company
passed that area no more than two days before, and they saw nothing,"
Gebynet points out, looking at Lorn.
"I don't know anything that will grow
a cubit and a half a day," Lorn concedes.
"It could be a root, or a seedling
that was launched from the Forest."
"If it's a root, you'll hear lots of
heavy equipment moving in the morning," adds Sherpyt morosely. "We'll
be working there for a good eight-day."
Lorn does not speculate or reveal his sense
that no root from the Accursed Forest had been involved. "I hope it wasn't
a root."
"It could have been worse. If you
hadn't been there, that shoot would have turned into a tree eight to ten cubits
tall by the next patrol."
Lorn fingers his chin. "I don't think
all my firelances could have burned something that large down."
"That's where Sherpyt and his heavy
equipment come in," suggests Gebynet. "But most don't grow quite that
fast." He pauses. "You're sure it was that tall?"
"At least. It was shoulder high on the
mounts."
The Engineer majer shakes his head, then
takes another swallow of the Byrdyn. "It could be that we'll have another
breakout period. That's when you get shoots, roots, and trunks falling across
the wall everywhere. Stun lizards crawling into the nearby villages. Cattle
killed by the big cats... all sorts of amusing things."
"How do you even find the cats?"
"We don't find them all. That's why
stun lizards and crocodators show up in the Great Canal or in the rivers.
That's why there are giant cats throughout this part of Cyador... but the
offspring of those that survive are smaller than those that first escape."
Gebynet's lips twist into a crooked smile. "The animals aren't the
problem; the trees and the vines and bushes are."
"Speak for yourself, majer,"
suggests Sherpyt.
"Ah... well, it shouldn't affect you,
Captain Lorn, but the cats and stun lizards seem to seek out people who handle
chaos-mages especially, and then engineers like Sherpyt who handle
chaos-powered equipment."
"Have any attacked you?"
Sherpyt pulls back his sleeve. A long red
gash runs up his forearm, disappearing under the white shimmercloth.
"There's another on my leg. Two different attacks."
"That's another reason why all the
Engineers on duty beyond the compound carry the short firelances in
sheaths," Gebynet explains.
A server in solid green appears with a
casserole dish, and a basket of bread, then vanishes without speaking.
"Best we eat while it's hot."
Gebynet serves himself two ladlefuls of the mutton stew, consisting mostly of
mutton chunks, carrots, and some other root vegetable that Lorn does not
recognize by sight. Gebynet passes the casserole to Lorn, and breaks off a
chunk of the rye bread. "Eat hearty."
The primary taste of the stew is salt. The
carrots are orange mush, while the roots have been cooked until they are soft
masses held together with stringy fibers. Lorn alternates stew, bread, and very
small sips of the Byrdyn.
"Exactly what do engineers do
here?" asks Lorn after several mouthfuls. "Besides destroying growth
that escapes from the Forest. Or is that all?"
"We're the ones who repair the wall if
it gets breached. That doesn't happen often," the majer explains. "We
also repair anything else that needs it."
"How often?" Lorn persists.
Gebynet frowns, then wrinkles his forehead.
"Only about once or twice a year, and those aren't big breaches-usually
only a course or two of stone-and replacing the cables. That's the harder part
because you have to break the connections on two of the wards, and that usually
means replacing those as well."
Lorn lifts his eyebrows, hoping that the
Engineer majer will add more.
"Repeated chaos flows make anything
brittle. The wards have chaos flowing through them all the time. They're solid
when they're in place, but if anything breaks through the chaos net-or moves
them-most of them shatter."
Lorn takes more of the stew, and more
bread, and enough of a sip of the wine to provide a hint of seasoning,
pondering what the two engineers have conveyed. "You're more like Magi'i
than Lancers...."
"Almost all of the officers are about
the same as third or fourth level mage adepts," concurs Gebynet. "At
some point, it was suggested to each of us that our talents might be better
used in the Engineers."
"We're Magi'i with tools, Lorn,"
adds Sherpyt. "With tools and with far less status and power."
Lorn frowns.
"Have you ever seen a Mirror Engineer
in Cyad?"
The Lancer officer shakes his head.
"You never will." Sherpyt
delivers his words in a matter-of-fact tone that offers more caution than would
any amount of bitterness or emotion. "When they need us to work on a
fireship, it goes to the yard at Fyrad. The Magi'i handle chaos repairs in
Cyad."
Lorn nods.
"Our talents are necessary, and best
kept where they can be employed most fully," Sherpyt adds.
"Just like those lancer officers who
are unwise enough to reveal that they can handle chaos," Gebynet adds
smoothly. "But enough of details. I trust you understand why we wanted to
let you know why we appreciated your timely report on that shoot, and why such
reports save us in the Engineers from even greater... difficulties."
"I had not realized the speed with
which the Accursed Forest grew." Lorn takes a last mouthful of the stew,
knowing he can stomach no more.
"Until they have seen it with their
own eyes, most do not," answers Gebynet.
"It can be frightening," agrees
Sherpyt, pushing his bowl away, and taking a slow sip of the Byrdyn.
Lorn finds himself yawning.
"You have had a long patrol already,
with another three days to go." The Engineer majer lifts an empty glass.
"Do not let us keep you."
Lorn rises. "I must thank you both for
the wine, the hospitality, and for enlightening me about my duties and the
dangers that accompany them."
"Our pleasure. Our pleasure."
Gebynet's voice is warm, and his eyes and mouth both smile. "Anything we
can do... please let us know."
"I will." Lorn bows slightly,
before he steps back toward his temporary room. "I certainly will."
LXVI
The
almost-setting sun falls on Lorn's left shoulder as he rides northeast along
the outer perimeter road toward the white walls a kay ahead-walls that mark the
Mirror Lancer compound at Jakaafra. The sky above the compound is already
darkening with clouds sweeping in from the east. A chill wind blows into the
Lancer captain's face, a wind bringing a raw dampness that foreshadows rain-or
sleet. Behind Lorn rides a half-squad of lancers, just gathered in from their
line abreast formation, the senior ranker riding beside him.
Despite the warnings from the two engineers
three days earlier in Westend, neither Lorn nor any lancers in the squad have
seen any other sign of the Accursed Forest attempting to escape the confines of
the ward-wall.
Lorn's eyes flick to his right, toward the
ward-wall itself where Kusyl rides with the other half of the replacement
squad, then back to the compound ahead, and the white granite bulk of the chaos
tower adjoining the compound and looming over it.
"Not too far to go," Lorn offers,
his words barely louder than the sound of hoofs on the granite stones of the
perimeter road.
"No, ser. Should get there before the
rain," replies Ubylt, the ranking lancer in the squad.
A hundred cubits ahead, to Lorn's left,
splitting off at an angle from the outer perimeter road runs another road, to
the northwest.
"That goes where? Do you know,
Ubylt?"
"To the town of Jakaafra, ser. Folks
use the outer road to get to the towns around Westend. Be faster that
way."
Lorn nods to himself.
Hoofs clop on the hard granite of the road
as Lorn and the half score of lancers with him ride toward the compound, an
oblong of light compared to the towering darkness of the Accursed Forest just
to the south.
Kusyl brings his half of the replacement
squad toward the compound on the western kay-long connecting road that
parallels the wall running from the ward-wall proper to the white-granite bulk
of the structure housing the chaos-tower. The stone glows faintly with the
suffused energy of chaos in the growing darkness of late twilight, a glow
invisible to those without Magi'i-like talents.
"Didn't see anything, ser, not on this
last leg," the squad leader reports to Lorn.
"We didn't either, and I'm grateful
for that."
Lorn and Kusyl lead the recombined squad
through the open gates. The compound at Jakaafra could almost be a duplicate of
the one at West-end, except that the gates are in the middle of the southern
wall, rather than in the middle of the eastern wall.
Two lancers are lighting the lamps on the
wall behind the gates, and lamps have already been lit on several of the low
stone structures deeper within the outpost.
"Stables that way, ser," suggests
Kusyl, gesturing ahead and to his left.
"Thank you." Lorn urges the
gelding leftward.
A heavy-set and jowled lancer waits by the
stables, his round face impassive in the light of the lamp in the holder to the
left of the door, his eyes cold as he surveys the approaching column. He steps
forward as he catches sight of Lorn. "You're the new captain, ser? For
Second Company."
"I am. Captain Lorn, squad
leader."
"Olisenn, ser." Olisenn's mouth
smiles; his eyes do not. "Senior squad leader."
"Pleased to see you, Olisenn."
Lorn swings out of his saddle and gestures to Kusyl. "Squad leader Kusyl.
I believe he'll be leading the second squad."
Kusyl dismounts quickly.
"Good to meet you, Kusyl."
Olisenn nods to the junior squad leader before turning back to Lorn. "You
have the second room in the officers' section, ser. I'll be taking Kusyl to
show him the quarters, if that be to your agreement."
"Once the mounts are set, that would
be fine." Lorn nods to both squad leaders.
Both bow before they turn away.
As in Westend, a stableboy scurries up to
take Lorn's gelding, and he has to remind himself to recover his gear.
Lorn walks from the stables, carrying his
gear, and starts toward the end of the barracks building that should hold the
officers' quarters. As he nears the lamp-flanked door on the south end, another
lancer captain emerges and struts toward Lorn.
The oncoming officer is dark-haired,
slightly taller than Lorn, but slender, with a thin mustache, and black eyes.
His uniform is tailored to show a narrow waist, and the custom white boots
shimmer, reflecting the courtyard lamps. He stops a good five cubits from Lorn.
"You must be the new Second Company officer, I take it."
"That's right. I'm Lorn."
"Meisyl. I'm the one you're relieving.
You picked a good time to arrive. We just finished patrol." ..? "So
we'll have tomorrow standing down."
"Exactly."
Belatedly, Lorn lifts the hand with the
seal ring, and starts to reach for his orders.
"We can handle that in the
morning." Meisyl laughs, a languorous sound, as if he finds the exchange
both amusing and boring simultaneously. "I'll take you through the records
and all the reports that Commander Meylyd so enjoys."
"When you think it best," Lorn
demurs.
"Tomorrow is early enough. I won't be
leaving until tomorrow afternoon anyway."
"How will you get back to
Geliendra?" Lorn asks. "You aren't riding back by yourself? Or taking
a detachment of lancers for rotation?"
"Oh, no. The rotated lancers won't
leave for an eightday. I'll catch a ride on the Engineer's small firewagon on
its next run for replacement wards or whatever." Meisyl shrugs almost
delicately. "It only takes two days to get to Geliendra from here that
way."
"You have the second room. It's the
same as the first, and when I leave you can take your choice. The third is
smaller, and that belongs to Undercaptain Juist. He heads the First Company;
they do the domestic patrol. He's been an undercaptain for a long while, but he
was promoted from senior squad leader when they did such." Meisyl
dismisses Juist's promotion with a graceful wave of his long-fingered left
hand.
Lorn nods.
"I'll see you in the officer's dining
room-just the two of us tonight- after you're settled. Olisenn will take care
of the incoming men."
"We've discussed that," Lorn
says. "He was waiting for Kusyl and me."
"Very conscientious, Olisenn is,"
Meisyl replies. "Most knowledgeable about many matters as well." With
another smile he turns.
Lorn picks up the green bags and begins to
cross the courtyard, following Meisyl's steps. The wind has continued to rise,
and the faint splatt of rain on stone begins to fill the courtyard.
The second room in the officers' section is
more spacious than that in Westend, and it even has a wardrobe and a narrow
desk with a separate lamp in a bracket over the table desk.
After closing the white oak door behind
him, Lorn unpacks his uniforms, hanging the tunics in the space in the wardrobe
and the waterproof and winter jacket on the wall pegs. The screeing glass goes
under his smallclothes in the wardrobe, but he leaves the Brystan sabre in one
of the two green bags that he folds and slips into the shelf under the single
bunk. Then he goes to find the wash chamber where he shaves and cleans up
before repairing to the small officer's dining room.
Meisyl is waiting, but does not stand as
Lorn approaches, merely gesturing for him to seat himself. Meisyl has a bottle
of wine before him, and there are two of the heavy goblets on the time-darkened
but bare and smoothly polished white oak of the table.
"That's one thing, Lorn. You have to
make arrangements for your own ale or wine. I'd suggest the chandler in
Jakaafra. His name is Duluk. Very fastidious about his wines. Sometimes he can
even get Alafraan."
"All the way from Escadr?" Lorn lifts
his eyebrows.
Meisyl laughs. "I'll win a gold from
Juist on that."
"The Alafraan's better than Fhynyco.
At least, I think so."
"Depends on whether you like body or
bouquet better." Again, Meisyl's tone is almost bored. "The Alafraan
goes better with meat. I like the Fhynyco better with fowl. Only desperate men
drink Byrdyn." He fills the two goblets three-quarters full and nods to
Lorn.
"Thank you." Taking the nearest
goblet, Lorn reflects that, while he enjoyed Zandrey's Alafraan while he was
stationed at Isahl, he has never been desperate for any kind of wine.
"Desperate men do have strange tastes."
A server in green appears with platters and
cutlery which he sets on the side of the table, quickly leaving and then
reappearing with a larger serving platter and two baskets. "Sers?"
"Just put it down," Meisyl orders
off-handedly.
"Thank you." Lorn nods to the
server, who bows and retreats.
Dinner is a platter with sliced mutton
covered with a brown sauce and boiled potatoes in one of the baskets. The
second basket holds bread- cool.
"The other company here?
Juist's?" asks Lorn. "They patrol the northeast perimeter?"
"Not except for the eightdays when
Second Company's on furlough." Meisyl shakes his head. "They're the
peacemaking company for the villages on the north side of the Accursed Forest.
Juist acts as a justicer about half the time. They also chase bandits... when
there are any."
"Peacemaking?" Lorn raises his
eyebrows.
"Once you get north of the Forest,
there aren't that many towns between here and the Westhorns or the Hills of
Endless Grass. It's almost like a province. So someone has to act as the
Emperor's Presence. Juist is good at it; he understands those people."
Meisyl offers a condescending sniff before he takes a small swallow of the
purplish Alafraan.
"So there's no Engineer detachment
here? Just the two Lancer companies?"
"This is the only perimeter base that
has no Engineers. They send a detachment here every third day to check the tower.
I'll ride back on their firewagon."
Lorn wonders. Is he stationed at Jakaafra
for just that reason? That it is the only base without the engineers who are
effectively low-level adept mages? Who else like him else has been stationed at
Jakaafra? How would he find out?
"How many engineers do they send up
here?"
"Three or four, usually. Mostly
officers." Meisyl breaks off a chunk of bread and dips it in the brown
sauce. "You'll get to know them all... such as they are."
"Has there been much trouble with the
Accursed Forest lately?" Lorn takes a bite of the dry mutton, glad for the
sauce.
"Not for a season. Oh, you always have
shoots and seedlings popping up somewhere, but that's to be expected. We
haven't seen a limb bridge in..." Meisyl frowns. "...since late
summer. There are always a few trunks falling over a season, but it's been a
while lately. So you won't have many lancers left who are prepared for more
than the occasional order-assault."
"I suppose the records tell how long....
Where are the records on the Second Company?" asks Lorn guilelessly.
"You have a study. Or you will
tomorrow. It's the building across from the north end of the barracks. Olisenn
keeps the records on the men, and they're in a chest in the outer study when
he's not working on them." Meisyl looks at the already half-empty bottle
of Alafraan. "It will be pleasant to return somewhere that one can get a
decent wine besides Alafraan."
"Where will you be going?"
"The port detachment at Summerdock. My
consort-to-be will be joining me there, as my consort, then, of course."
"You must be nearing sub-majer."
"A mere formality." Meisyl
refills his goblet and glances at Lorn.
"No, thank you." Lorn smiles,
knowing he must be scrupulously polite all the while Meisyl remains. "Tell
me about how you came to Jakaafra, if you would."
"There's little enough to say. I grew
up in Fyrad, and went to the Lancer Academy, as had my sire, and his
sire...."
Lorn smiles and nods, taking another sip of
Alafraan, one so small that the wine never really passes his lips.
LXVII
Meisyl
and Lorn stand in the rear study by the desk table. Outside the single window
the morning is gray, and fat drops of rain splat against the ancient glass
panes. Meisyl reads the single sheet of paper drafted by Olisenn, then smiles,
and affixes his signature before handing it to Lorn, who reads it himself.
...certifies
that Meisyl, Lancer captain commanding the Second Forest Patrol Company, hereby
relinquishes that command to Lorn, Lancer captain, and that upon signature this
fourday of the ninth eightday of winter, in the year one hundred ninety-seven
of the founding of Cyad, Captain Lorn assumes command of the Second Company,
with all duties and privileges associated thereto....
Lorn signs the bottom of the document,
below Miesyl, with scripted characters far less flamboyant than those of the
dark-haired captain who is departing.
"You have it all, Lorn, and I wish you
well." Meisyl's smile is clearly one of relief. He fumbles two bronze keys
from his belt wallet and extends them to Lorn. "The first key here is the
key to the records' chests. The second one is to the door locks for the
officer's rooms. If you have any questions, I won't be leaving until late this
afternoon or tomorrow, depending on the engineers."
"Thank you. I'll find you, if I
do."
After Meisyl departs, Lorn looks over his
study closely, for it is the first individual study he has had in his duties
with the Mirror Lancers. The room is small, seven cubits by seven, with only a
narrow table-desk set against the wall, and a single chair pulled up to he
desk, and a window with a chest-high sill behind the chair. The sole lamp is
fixed in a bronze bracket on the wall over the desk. Set on the granite floor
tiles, just in front of the desk, there is a foot chest, two cubits broad, one
cubit high and one deep. A single armless chair completes the study's
furnishings. With the exception of the lamp, every item in the room is formed
of white oak, and all hold the gold of age.
Lorn nods and then steps out through the
open door into the outer study where Olisenn is seated at a larger table, an
open foot chest on the floor to his right.
"Yes, ser?"
"Captain Meisyl mentioned that you
maintain two sets of records, Olisenn...."
Olisenn smiles. "Just one, ser. There
are two sets of records." He points to the foot trunk beside his work
table. "The ones I keep are the individual personnel records. There is one
sheet on each lancer... the lancer's name and rank, a simple physical
description, place and date of birth, his closest family, when the lancer
joined, his term of service, and past duty stations, and expected date of
rotation. The reverse side is used for remarks, either for commendations or
disciplinary actions." Olisenn lifts his ample shoulders. "Now... I
have to make a sheet on each new lancer."
"The ones who arrived yesterday?"
"Yes, ser. I'll start each sheet, and
Kusyl will be here shortly to finish them. They all go here in this
chest." His hand drops to indicate the foot chest to his right.
"And the other set?"
"Those are the patrol records in the
chest in your study, ser. Those are the only records we keep. The bronze key
Captain Meisyl gave you... it opens the lock on either chest."
"He mentioned that." Lorn nods.
"Later today, or perhaps after the first patrol, I'd like to read through
your records."
"Whenever you wish, ser. It would be
better after we update the records."
"I'll try not to impede your
work." Lorn turns and re-enters the smaller rear study. He closes the
door, and then lifts the records' chest onto his desk. The key slides smoothly
into the lock and turns easily.
As Olisenn has said, the trunk holds the
patrol records, a report on each patrol, written and signed by the company's
captain. Leafing through the most recent of these, Lorn notes that most of the
time a number of patrols have been reported on a single sheet, with little more
than the notation "Patrol on schedule. No Forest activity," followed
by "Meisyl, Captain, Second Forest Patrol Company."
Others have more description:
...ward
cube crushed by limb, north 45 east. Killed small stun lizard, seared
seedlings, found giant cat tracks, but no cat. Sent messenger to First Engineer
Company at Eastend. Held station on fallen limb until Engineers arrived. No
casualties...
...two
ward cubes destroyed by double limb, north 323 and 324 east. One giant cat
attacked second squad. Cat killed. Two other cats fled as Second Company
arrived. Stun lizard tracks noted. Sent messenger to First Engineer Company
Eastend. Held station until Engineers arrived. Casualties: 2. Kyscyt killed by
cat at ward-wall. Onymt slashed, will probably lose right arm...
Lorn leafs through the reports more
quickly, more trying to get a feel for the pattern of what has happened with
the Accursed Forest than deeply analyzing the reports. Roughly three years
earlier, patrol reports for nearly three eightdays have been signed by Olisenn,
as senior squad leader. Lorn picks up the report just before the first one
signed by Olisenn, but, like so many of the others, it merely states,
"Patrol on schedule." It is signed, "Dymytri, Captain, Second
Forest Patrol Company."
After studying Dymytri's last report, Lorn
flips through the papers more rapidly until he reaches Dymytri's first
report-only three seasons before his last. Then he looks at the reports before
that-four eightdays' worth, all signed by a senior squad leader named Fyondr.
The previous head of Second company had been Undercaptain Zylynt, who had been
in command only a few eightdays more than a year. Zylynt's demise, unlike
Dymytri's, is listed in the first report signed by Fyondr: "...Casualties:
2. Undercaptain Zylynt, killed by giant stun lizard when firelance failed.
Lancer Hyun, killed by lizard while supporting Undercaptain..."
Abruptly, Lorn comes to the end of the
Patrol reports. After a moment, he nods and replaces the files in the small
foot trunk and closes it. "Olisenn?"
After a moment, the heavy squad leader
opens the door and lumbers into the rear study. "Yes, ser?" He bows
slightly following his words.
"The Patrol reports only go back about
five years," Lorn observes.
"Yes, ser. We just keep five years
here, sometimes almost six, but since you were scheduled in, Captain Meisyl
sent off the older ones last eight-day. They're all in Majer Maran's files in
Geliendra." Olisenn nods. "It keeps matters easier here."
"I can see that." Lorn smiles.
"Thank you,"
"That's not a problem, ser. It's what
I'm here for." Olisenn nods and waits for a moment before asking, "Is
there anything else, ser?"
"No, thank you." Lorn stands.
"I'm going to inspect the compound, Olisenn. I'll be gone for a
while."
Olisenn's eyes lift to take in Lorn.
"Would you prefer me to accompany you?"
"I don't think that's necessary. If I
have questions, I'll ask you when I get back. You and Kusyl have more than a
few records to update with all the replacement lancers that arrived."
"That is true, ser." The senior
squad leader turns and walks back out through the door, closing it behind him.
Lorn replaces the Patrol reports in the
foot chest and locks it, replacing it on the floor where it had been, then
opens his door and steps out into the outer study.
"Ser!" says Kusyl, who has
apparently just arrived. "Just keep on with getting the personnel records
in order, Kusyl, Olisenn. I'm going to get more familiar with everything in the
compound." Lorn nods and steps past the junior squad leader out into the
short corridor that leads out to the courtyard.
The rain that had been falling earlier in
the morning has given way to a fine and cold drizzle. Lorn readjusts the summer
garrison.cap and steps out into the courtyard, heading toward the stables.
The mist-shrouded courtyard remains empty
as Lorn crosses the damp stones to the stables, where he eases through the
barely open sliding door into the warmer and drier air of the stable. He blots
his forehead and glances around, then begins to walk farther back into the
stable. The main corridors are swept clean, and each stall contains fresh
straw. He glances upward, but he sees no cobwebs, or any piles of dirt in the
corners.
"Ser? Is something wrong?" The
thin-faced blond-haired stableboy appears, a worn broom in his right hand.
"Not a thing." Lorn glances
toward the stall where the gelding is. "Since I'm new here, I'm just
trying to learn about things. What's your name?"
"Suforis, ser."
"I'm Captain Lorn, Suforis. How long
have you been here?"
"I only started here when Captain
Dymytri was in charge... winter turn when I was twelve. Say the captain afore
him was nice, too, but I didn't know him."
"Do you like it here?"
"Yes, ser. So long as I keep the stable
clean and the officers' mounts and the spares groomed, and all of them fed,
Clebyl doesn't look my way, and that's fine by me. Lesyna-she's agreed to be my
consort next winter turn, and Clebyl says I can be the assistant compound
keeper if I keep working good. Haven't had an assistant here in two years.
Assistants get the second quarters with the kitchen." Suforis smiles
brightly.
"How many stalls do you have?"
"Stable has two score and
twelve-enough for two companies and a half score spares. Not that many, though,
'cause Undercaptain Juist only has a score and a half for the domestic patrol.
Says he doesn't need that many, really, but I'm not supposed to know
such."
"He must not have much trouble."
"Almost never. Towns north of here
real peaceable, ser. Good reason to live here. They say some of the rankers
settle down here when they get through."
"How are the mounts?" Lorn
gestures toward the gelding.
"Yours be a good'un, ser. Most are.
Have to rotate the mount the big squad leader rides, even if he gets the
biggest...." Suforis shakes his head. "Other'n that, n' gettin' the
farrier up here from Jakaafra regular like... well... take care of the mounts,
and they take care of you. Get to ride the spares... make sure that they get
exercise... it be a good life...."
"Good." Lorn smiles.
"Anything I should know?"
"Well... ser... not that I'd be
knowing, but I heard tell that if'n you run into a stun lizard best you stay
leastwise fifteen cubits back. Cats don't matter much... have to get claws into
you, and if'n they do..." Suforis shrugs.
"I appreciate the advice, Suforis. If
there's any way I can help out... let me know."
"Thank you, ser." The young man
bobs his head.
"Thank you." Lorn turns and slips
back out into the courtyard and the drizzle. Looking up into the clouds, he
nods abruptly and heads back to his quarters.
Once he crosses the courtyard and enters
his quarters, Lorn locks the door, then opens the wardrobe and extracts the
screeing glass Jerial had stolen from their father's study and given to him.
Carefully, he sets it on the desk and studies it. Can he do what he knows can
be done? What his father and the Senior Lectors can?
Finally, he pulls up the chair, seats
himself, and concentrates on the circular mirror. His thoughts go to the
enigmatic Olisenn. Lorn doesn't want to try Maran unless he becomes proficient.
The glass fills with a grayish mist, which
silvers into a blank and bright surface reflecting nothing. Finally, a small
image swims into view-two squad leaders at a table.
Lorn swallows, surprised, and loses his
concentration. A blank glass reflects his own perspiring face back at him. A
single drop of sweat falls on the glass.
He can do it!
He leans back in the chair and takes a deep
breath. How can he develop and use the skill... without revealing that he
possesses it, for revealing it will certainly create greater incentives for the
senior Magi'i and Mirror Lancer officers to ensure his death-and the Second
Company records illustrate a high mortality for company officers-a mortality
higher than for the average lancer, and far higher than it would be reasonable
to expect.
LXVIII
In the
grayness of dawn in late winter, Lorn leads his white gelding from the stable
in the first waystation on the northwest side of the Accursed Forest-exactly
thirty-three kays southeast of the compound at Jakaafra.
Olisenn is waiting, standing by the
oversized mount that will bear him.
"It looks like another cool morning,
Olisenn," Lorn offers.
"Yes, ser. It won't be long before the
Forest truly stirs."
"I wouldn't be surprised." Lorn
waits for whatever the senior squad leader has in mind.
"You intend to keep riding with the
second squad and Kusyl, ser?" asks Olisenn.
"It seems like a good idea for now," Lorn temporizes.
"You have the experience to command the first squad, indeed all of Second
Company, should anything happen to me. Kusyl does not."
"But I cannot offer easily any
insights."
"That is true, but perhaps you can
continue to share them in the evenings at the waystations. In that fashion, all
can benefit." Lorn smiles easily.
"I will as I can, Captain."
"I'm sure you will, Olisenn, and we
all appreciate your knowledge and experience." With another smile, Lorn
mounts and then guides the gelding to his right, to where Kusyl has begin to
form up the second squad.
"Ser?"
"I'll be riding with second squad
today, possibly for the entire patrol." Lorn shrugs. "We'll have to
see how things go."
Kusyl nods.
Once both squads are formed up and mounted,
waiting in waystation courtyard under the heavy but formless gray clouds, Lorn
gestures for Kusyl and Olisenn to bring their mounts nearer. He waits until
they have reined up before he speaks. "This morning, second squad will
ride the wall position; first squad will do the perimeter."
"Yes, ser."
"Yes, ser."
"Let's go."
The sound of hoofs on stone echoes for a
brief time as Second Company rides through the gates and toward the ward-wall,
each squad deploying into the spread line-abreast formation used for
surveillance of the border of the Accursed Forest.
Lorn rides about twenty cubits to the right
of Kusyl, closer than the normal spread of fifty. Despite the lingering dampness,
the ward-wall is dry and sparkles in the indirect light filtering through the
low-lying clouds.
The sun continues to struggle to burn
through the mist left from the rain of the night before, but without complete
success, so that the second squad rides along the ward-wall under a sky that
shifts from dark to bright gray, then almost brilliant white, before it turns
darker once more.
One stretch of wall looks precisely like
another, white-gray blocks evenly matched, topped with crystal wards that flicker
chaos. The wall stretches southeast, seemingly an endless line to the horizon.
ZZZZzzzzzpt! Lorn frowns as he turns toward
the sound above the wall. At a second loud zapping sound, he glances toward
Kusyl. "Kusyl?"
Noting Lorn's expression, Kusyl calls back
an answer. "One of the big flowerflies, ser, the bloodsucking ones. Some
reason, they can't cross the wall. Heard an engineer explain it once, something
about the bloodsuckers coming with the firstborn, and that there aren't any in
the Forest."
"I'm not sure how that makes
sense," Lorn says slowly, his eyes still on the wall along which the
gelding carries him. "The chaos barrier is there to keep the Forest in. So
why would it choose an insect that's not part of the Forest?" Why would and
how could the chaos barrier choose anything? He frowns. Does the Forest choose
to destroy foreign insects? Why? Or would it destroy any foreign body that
crosses the ward-wall?
Kusyl shrugs with both hands. "That,
I'd not be knowing, ser."
The two continue to patrol, silently, since
the distance between them makes conversation uncomfortable.
The second squad patrols another kay of
wall and deadland, then another.
"Ser!... Ser... Ser!" The yell
comes from near the end of the line, a good six hundred cubits to the
northeast, relayed by nearer lancers.
"Line halt!" Kusyl orders.
As the lancers rein up to a halt, Lorn
guides his mount away from the wall to the lancer with the raised firelance.
"Yes, lancer?"
The lancer points to the ground. On the
deadland soil is a single bone, and a line of giant cat tracks. The
bone-looking like it might have come from a sheep or goat-has been there for a
time. There are no other signs of the giant cat's prey, and the tracks are
indistinct, blurred by the light rain of the night before.
"Just keep an eye out. It looks like
that happened yesterday "
"Yes, ser."
Lorn turns his mount back toward the
ward-wall, gesturing for Kusyl to give the order for the patrol to resume.
The morning warms until the air is almost
uncomfortably damp, and sweat collects under the edge of Lorn's white garrison
cap.
The clop-clop-clop of hoofs offers a
regular, almost soothing rhythm as the second squad continues in a spread
formation that stretches from the road wall in a double line abreast, each
rider a good fifty cubits from the next.
Lorn suppresses a yawn. He can understand
why officers can get killed on Forest patrol duty, lulled into boredom by the
endless sameness and suddenly confronted with the danger of a great cat or a
giant stun lizard.
He has individual bits of information that
should allow him to form a better image of the situation he faces. He just
needs to look at them differently, but it is difficult to think after a day of painstaking
and mind-numbing patrol, looking for any trace of the Forest's breakout.
Suddenly, he straightens, fully erect in
the saddle. That, too, is another bit of information. He thinks about what the
Engineer Gebynet had said, something about patterns... of immense breakouts
following a shoot as vigorous as the one he and his squad had destroyed on the
southwest side of the Accursed Forest.
Patterns? What are the patterns? He shakes
his head. The other question is who knows what the patterns are? Who has all
the Patrol records?
Lorn nods grimly.
LXIX
To
Lorn's right, a good dozen kays northeast, high and white puffy clouds scud
along, swiftly, in the direction of the Westhorns. Between the clouds, sunlight
falls in shafts that angle toward that distant ground. Directly overhead, the
early afternoon's green-blue sky is mostly clear. At times, the slightest hint
of a breeze wafts by Lorn, but the air has been largely still, despite the
fast-moving clouds above.
Beyond the deadland and the outer perimeter
road, the grass, and even farther away, the fields and woodlots are slowly
greening, with the winter-gray leaves returning to their spring colors and the
new leaves and shoots showing a lighter and brighter shade of green.
Lorn looks to his left, along the line of
the second squad lancers riding the deadland inside the perimeter road. Beyond
them are the riders of the first squad. Lorn can even make out the rounded bulk
of Olisenn near the ward-wall.
After nearly seven days on patrol, with a
day's respite at Eastend-a virtual duplicate of Westend-Lorn will be happy when
they reach the compound at Northend, although it is always called the compound
or Jakaafra, just as the compound at Geliendra is always called by the name of the
nearby town as well, rather than the official name of Southend. "Ser!
Shoots ahead!"
"Shoots ahead!... ahead!" The
report is echoed by the other lancers in the patrol line and relayed toward
Lorn and Kusyl.
Lorn shakes his head as he uses his heels
to nudge the gelding into a trot toward the lancer with the upheld firelance.
"Line halt! Line halt!" After
barking the order, Kusyl turns his mount to follow the company commander.
Both the squad leader and Lorn rein up a
good thirty cubits short of the shoots sighted by the lancer. At less than two
cubits high, the twin green fronds are far shorter than the one Lorn had seen
and has destroyed on his ride/patrol to Jafaafra, and they seem far more
slender. He can sense only a hint of the black order that looms behind the
ward-wall, but he studies the greenery for a long moment. "Ser?"
"Have them flame by duads," Lorn
orders Kusyl. "Yes, ser. Form up!" Kusyl orders. "Prepare to
flame by duads!" After the lancers of the second squad reform from their
line into the standard column of twos, Kusyl looks to Lorn. The company captain
nods. "Advance, and discharge lances!"
Under the warm afternoon sun, Lorn watches,
but the shoots wither under the chaos flames of the firelances, leaving nothing
but a black ash that disintegrates into a power, and then disperses under a
light breeze that fades into stillness.
Lorn watches the ashes disperse, letting
his chaos-order sense probe the ground, but there is no sense of any underlying
well of dark order. Then he pulls out a message blank and turns his mount
toward the ward-wall to note the ward location before dispatching a messenger
to the Engineers at Eastend. He knows that the Engineers will find nothing, but
he will not suggest that, not at all. He also adds the location in his own
small notebook.
He erases the momentary frown from his face
as he rides toward the ward-wall-and Olisenn. The frailty of the shoots bothers
him, especially after he has sensed the incredible dark order that lurks behind
the whitened granite stones of the ward-wall.
LXX
Lorn
sets aside the bronze-tipped pen as he finishes the second of the two patrol
entries, then lays the paper at the side of his study desk to dry. He turns in
the chair and glances out the window at the clouds flowing from the south and
building and darkening to the north. With the warm dampness of the morning and
the clouds, he has little doubt that it will rain, perhaps for several days.
But the Second Company will have to set out on patrol the next morning, rain or
no rain.
He turns back to the desk, fingering his
clean-shaven chin before he lifts the thin manual that Maran had given him,
already showing smudges and scuffs. Inadvertently, he compares that to the
ancient and spotless silver-sheened volume that Ryalth had presented to him,
and he shakes his head, forcing his thoughts back to the patrol manual as he
slowly searches for something he had seen-or thought he had-when he had first
read it.
...a
Lancer company captain cannot halt breaches in the ward-wall, nor can he
prevent the inimical creatures of the Accursed Forest from escaping such
breaches, but he must do all within his power to ensure such creatures are
destroyed before leaving the deadland barrier and before they can inflict
damage upon the people of Cyad or upon their livestock and lands.
A wise captain will manage his deployments
in such fashion so as to assure that his lancers are exposed to no unnecessary
danger and so that casualties are minimized while making sure that as many
creatures as practicably possible are destroyed before they can create harm....
Lorn snorts as he sets down the manual.
Destroy the creatures, but don't lose many men, and a wise captain will best
know how to do that. Except that the manual offers no real tactics for such
situations-just cautions.
After more time of silent contemplation, he
stands and lifts the foot chest containing the Patrol reports. Those of the
past five years, he reminds himself as he sets the chest on the clear side of
the desk and unlocks it.
He re-seats himself, then begins to leaf
through the older reports again, trying to check a nagging thought. He reads
the last season of reports from Captain Dymytri, checking the events reported
by the captain more closely, trying to focus on details that might just tell
him something more.
...limb
fallen short of guard wall from northwest mid-point Chaos tower... Casualties:
2....
...trunk
[twenty cubit diameter] smashed through chaos cables and a single course of
wall stones... attack by three giant cats and one stun lizard... one cat
escaped... casualties: 4....
...long
limb bridged ward-wall seventy cubits into deadland... night leopards attacked
Engineers....
Lorn frowns. Night leopards? He has not seen
references to such before. Or had he overlooked them? He continues studying the
patrol reports, apparently showing more than a score of problems.
...double
trunk breach... rendered five hundred cubits of ward-wall inoperable...
Casualties: 15....
...limb
fall in heavy rainstorm... casualties: 4....
Just as suddenly, the reports revert to the
standard, "Patrol on schedule. No Forest activity."
Lorn sits back in his chair, thinking. From
late spring to early summer, three and a half years earlier, Dymytri's reports
chronicle an outbreak of limb and trunk fallings which claim scores of wards,
nearly three score injuries to lancers and engineers, and at least a score of
deaths. In that time period, several dozen wild creatures from the Accursed
Forest escape. Then, the outbreaks cease. And shortly thereafter, with nothing
on the record, one Captain Dymytri disappears or is killed.
Lorn replaces the records, then adds his
own latest report, and closes the foot chest. He stands and replaces the chest
on the floor before the desk, then walks to the window, looking at the
thickening clouds, and at the Second Company banner that flies above the
barracks. The green-trimmed pennant with the numeral two in the center is held
out almost stiffly by the steady wind, whipping but little.
Thrap! At the knock on the study door, Lorn
turns. "Yes? Come in."
Olisenn enters, leaving the door open. He
bows. "A scroll for you, Captain Lorn. It arrived by private local
messenger."
Lorn steps forward to take the missive that
the senior squad leader extends to his captain. Although Lorn can sense that
the seal has been removed and then reheated somehow, he accepts the scroll
effortlessly and without hesitation, stepping back and sideways so that he stands
over the desk. "Thank you." He breaks the blue wax without looking at
it, even before Olisenn can move or retreat to the front study office, and lets
the wax fall on the golden-aged oak surface of his desk.
Lorn begins to read.
Honorable
Lancer Captain Lorn...
I am pleased to inform you that the goods
you ordered from Ryalor House have arrived and that, once you have inspected
them, we will be more than pleased to deliver them to whatever destination is
your desire....
Lorn manages neither to smile nor frown.
"Ser? Do you require me further?"
"Oh... no. I'm sorry, Olisenn. It's a
private matter... not about the Lancers. It's about some things I
ordered." Lorn smiles at the heavy senior squad leader. "You can
go."
"Yes, ser." Olisenn bows
deferentially, then leaves the inner study, gently closing the door behind him.
Lorn continues with the scroll.
We would suggest a slight haste in dealing
with the case of Fhynyco and the two cases of Alafraan, but remain at your bidding,
honored ser.
The missive is signed and sealed by one
Dustyn, factor in spirits and liquids, with the phrase beneath the seal,
"Off the main square, Jakaafra."
Lorn nods slowly to himself. Although he
does not doubt that the wines are from Ryalth to make his duty easier, he
wonders what else will come with the shipment... perhaps a scroll that has not
been already read.
LXXI
The
warm misting rain of spring enfolds the Palace of Light, and within the private
study of the Emperor and his consort, Toziel stands by the wide window
overlooking the harbor he can barely see through that mist.
He turns, but does not step onto the
Analerian wool carpet of subdued green and gold geometric designs that has
graced the study from the time of the Emperor Alyiakal. "I am troubled. I
should not be troubled by this trifle, and yet I am. You have noted that my
sleep has not been as it should be."
"That I do know." The Empress
Ryenyel smiles knowingly, and affectionately. "What trifle?" she asks
after a moment, looking up from the black oak desk at which she is seated, the
sole item of furniture within the entire Palace of Light made of that dark oak.
"The murder of a trader." A thin
and humorless smile crosses the Emperor's mouth.
"That is a trifle. Yet... if it
bothers you, it may be the first shoot of a noxious vine. Tell me of it."
She smiles warmly. "That is what you wish, is it not?"
"I have no secrets from you, my
dear."
"Nor should you, not if I am to assist
you."
"You... you have always been of great
assistance, and without it, as both we know...." He shrugs and half-turns
to study the mist.
"Enough of your flattery, my dear,
welcome as it always is."
Toziel clears his throat. "Bluoyal'mer
brought the matter to my attention several eightdays previous, and he mentioned
it but once. Yet I have not dismissed it. The first heir of the Yuryan Clan of
merchanters was murdered nearly a season ago. He was killed by a sabre tinged
with chaos, a lancer's sabre, say the Magi'i. The day after the murder someone
re-claimed an iron Brystan sabre that had been plated with cupridium. This
merchanter used a stolen Dyjani trade plaque as authority and paid ten golds
for the work. The cupridium master and his journeyman have been truthread by
several Magi'i, and the truthreading confirms their tale. Both master and
journeyman swear that the blade was in their care and not ready when the murder
was committed. The journeyman also swears that the enumerator who picked up the
blade was unfamiliar with weapons." Toziel turns back from the window and
watches his consort.
"Who is the new heir?" asks
Ryenyel.
"Veljan-a man far more suitable,
according to all. Yet..."
"Yet, what?"
"His consort is the daughter of
Liataphi, the Third Magus of the Magi'i. Liataphi has no sons and heirs. And
this Veljan is honest and straightforward. Too honest and straightforward, from
all I discover."
"That is far too obvious, dear
one," observes Ryenyel. "Liataphi is too intelligent and too devious
to have done such. He would see that such a ploy would illuminate him as if
with a score of lamps."
"Then... who wishes to plant such an
appearance? And why?"
"Who else would benefit, if far less
obviously?" Ryenyel slips the cupridium-tipped pen into the holder on the
left side of the desk.
"Rynst'alt, clearly."
Ryenyel shakes her head.
"Oh... Luss'alt, you think?"
"Luss'alt would benefit, but he could
not have created such a scheme. I would guess that the one with the most to gain
would be Kharl'elth."
Toziel nods. "When you put it that
way..."
"What thinks your Hand?"
"He says but little, saving that it
would appear to be a matter of trade and personal affairs, and trade rivalries
best be solved by traders, and that using the Hand to meddle in trade or the
personal lives of traders can lead but to disaster."
"Has he been right in what he
advises?"
"More often than not."
"So it is unlikely to be a plot
hatched here, though many here may seek to benefit by such." Ryenyel
smiles but faintly. "Now, my dearest... that is the fashion in which it
makes the most of logic, but not all plotters are of such logic. You
must..."
"I know... set small traps to see who
understands, and would use such, or who refuses to understand." Toziel's
laugh is mirthless.
"Then, too," Ryenyel continues,
"there is the matter of the sabre. Does anyone know who could wield such?
None of the Magi'i would dare, for the deadly danger it would pose to them.
None of the lancers would benefit from the attributes of such a weapon. And the
merchanters could neither wield it nor comprehend its power."
"So there are two plots?" Toziel
frowns. "And the second plotter a descendent of Alyiakal?"
"Only in spirit," Ryenyel says
quietly. "You must tread carefully, for I would wager that neither knows
of the other, nor should they."
After a moment of silence, they both nod.
Outside the mist lightens as the sun begins
to struggle through the spring rain, and the greenery of the City of Light
begins to reclaim the first city of Cyador from the gray-green of winter.
LXXII
The
rains of the previous day have passed, but air is warm, humid, and heavy, even
in the early morning, as Second Company leaves the first waystation southeast
of Jakaafra. The deadland is still muddy, with pools of shallow standing water,
and with early mosquitoes humming everywhere. Mist hangs over and around the
Accursed Forest to Lorn's right, and above the ward-wall. The sun is barely
above the fields to the east, a fuzzy orange-white ball in a sky more a
mist-shrouded green than blue.
"Be a hot day, specially afternoon,
ser," says Kusyl from where he rides to Lorn's left.
"Very hot." Lorn glances toward
the ward-wall nearly a kay away and at the mist that shrouds the massive trunks
beyond the wall. Something does not feel right. He glances toward Kusyl. On the
morning of the second day of the patrol, the second squad is deploying inward
from the outer perimeter road, while Olisenn's first squad will deploy in a
line outward from the ward-wall road. "Kusyl-this morning, I'll be riding
with the first squad. I'll ride with second squad this afternoon."
"Yes, ser." The squad leader's
cheerful voice indicates nothing.
Spreading the lancers into a line abreast
and slogging through the mud will make for a long day, but keeping them on the
roads will mean that too much of the Forest's activity could go undetected,
particularly roots or new shoots carried above or beyond the ward-wall during
the storm of the night before. Lorn turns the gelding southward and urges him
to catch up with Olisenn and his overlarge beast. Absently, he brushes away an
inquiring mosquito.
Zzzzzzpp!
Lorn does not wince at the sound of a
flowerfly being destroyed by the chaos-net cast upwards by the wards, but the
sound does remind him that the peaceful scene is not what it seems.
At the sound of another mount nearing,
Olisenn turns in the saddle and offers a puzzled glance as Lorn rides toward
him. "Ser?"
"I'll be riding with first squad this
morning."
"As you command, ser."
The two ride silently and slowly as the
line abreast forms and begins to ride parallel to and out from the ward-wall.
"Even it up, there!" Olisenn
calls-more than once.
Lorn does not offer suggestions, or orders,
but watches. Once the line is formed, and he and Olisenn ride on the opposite
sides of the wall road, Lorn turns his attention to the ward-wall itself.
Although the wall looks the same as it
always does, it is not. The relatively even pulses of chaos-if one can call any
chaos energy regular-that are carried within the cupridium conduits and cast
upwards in the net that restrains the Accursed Forest are different. While the
chaos pulses are always different, always changing, usually each pulse does not
differ greatly in power or duration. Lorn is not certain those are the right
terms, but are closest to what he feels. This morning, there are larger pulses,
much larger ones that feel shallower and some that feel like they are scarcely
there at all. After a time, he studies the road and the deadland past Olisenn
to his left, but there are no signs of shoots or seedling-or roots. Nor fallen
trunks. As the lancers ride, more slowly than ever, through the mud of the
deadland, and as the morning passes, Lorn continues to watch, trying not to
overstrain his eyes and senses, but knowing that all is not well somewhere
along the wall. He also knows that to reveal that will leave him all too
vulnerable in the seasons ahead. So he rides and watches. And the spring heat
and hot dampness builds. While the discomfort rises, at least the deadland's
mud has become less viscous, and progress somewhat less laborious.
Sometime after midmorning, Lorn nods,
finally seeing a line of darkness on the horizon, a line that should not be
there.
"Have them watch more closely,"
he finally tells Olisenn. "Eyes sharp now, the captain says!" orders
the senior squad leader. "Eyes sharp!"
"Ser! Trunk down! Trunk down!"
The line of blackness has become clear to
all the lancers-a huge trunk jutting more than a hundred cubits out from the
ward-wall-a trunk thicker at its uprooted base than the portion of the wall
itself that is visible above ground.
Lorn glances at the nearest ward marker, then
shakes his head. The closest engineer company is beyond the breach in the
ward-wall, and to send a messenger past that without an escort would be
foolhardy, considering the possible wildlife that the forest has had time to
send forth. "Olisenn. Form up by duads on the road!"
"Ser?"
"On the road! A lancer won't have much
chance against a cat in this muck."
The senior squad leader nods, then turns.
"First squad! Duads on the road! Duads on the road!" Olisenn's voice
carries, and lancers guide their mounts toward the Lancer captain and the first
squad leader.
"Send a messenger out to Kusyl,"
Lorn adds. "Have him form up by duads on the perimeter road-and have the
messenger stay clear of the trunk." Lorn blots away the sweat that has
been gathering under the brow of his garrison cap.
"Yes, ser."
Lorn lets the gelding carry him ahead of
the reforming squad, his fingers brushing the firelance in its holder,
reassuring himself that the weapon is fully charged. His eyes go to the
ward-wall, and then his senses. While the chaos-net is still intact, its web is
fragile, and, closer to the fallen trunk, that chaos will do little to halt
whatever the Accursed Forest intends to cast across the wall that will become
little more than mere granite in a kay or so.
"Vyon! Message to squad leader Kusyl.
From the captain. They're to form up by duads on the outer perimeter road and
advance. They should be ready to repel creature attacks!"
"Yes, ser."
As a second thought, Lorn also checks his sabre,
then glances at the huge trunk once more. The closer the two squads draw to the
massive trunk-a grayish brown wall so dark it is almost black-the more Lorn
begins to understand deep within himself the concerns expressed by both Maran
and Commander Meylyd about the Accursed Forest. The trunk dwarfs any fireship
Lorn had seen and, were it upright, could shade the Palace of Light with fifty
cubits to spare.
Small catlike animals are racing down the
trunk, jumping clear even before they reach the twisted and crushed branches of
the brilliant green crown. Some are already clear of the toppled foliage.
The fallen trunk towers above the ward-wall
a good fifteen cubits, a dark wall stretching perpendicular to the ward-wall.
Only the lowest course of the ward-wall's granite is visible. Yet the granite
of the wall appears to have held, except that it has cut into the trunk like an
axe, and the trunk is firmly wedged in place. Then, Lorn reminds himself, under
the five-cubit visible section of the wall is fifty cubits of granite
foundation laid on solid rock, and reinforced with chaos bound in order.
"Prepare lances," Lorn says
quietly to Olisenn.
"First squad, lances at the ready.
Lances at the ready!"
Two blackish gray shapes seem to elongate
from the trunk, then separate. Lorn blinks, to realize that two huge cats
sprint toward Lorn, their long bounding strides narrowing the distance, far
faster than a galloping horse or a racing firewagon.
"Lances ready. Prepare to
discharge!" Olisenn's orders are flat. "Discharge at will."
Forcing himself to be calm, Lorn lifts his
firelance, and focuses it on the leading giant cat.
Hssstt! A single narrow beam of chaos
flies, seemingly curving to strike the cat. The half-charred body tumbles into
a heap.
Hhsstt! The second cat begins a spring
before Lorn's followup bolt takes it in the chest.
Lorn pulls the gelding toward the wall, and
turns in the saddle, checking to see where Olisenn's lance might be pointed,
but the squad leader's eyes remain on the trunk that lies less than two hundred
cubits away.
"Company halt!" Lorn orders.
"Company halt!" Olisenn echoes.
"We can do five abreast for now,"
Lorn suggests.
"Five abreast! Stay on the road."
Lorn glances to the northeast, but can see
little except the formation of the second squad-and a series of flares that are
firelances discharging. He turns to study the trunk wall ahead.
A pack of smaller cats-the night
leopards?-each perhaps ten stone, charges toward the first squad.
"Discharge at will!" Lorn orders,
wheeling his gelding so that he can bring his lance to bear while continuing to
watch Olisenn.
"Discharge at will. Short bursts!
Short bursts!" Olisenn orders.
Hssst! Hssst!
Three of the cats fall. A fourth comes up
under one of the men's lances, and the lance falls, and before the lancers-or
Lorn-can react, the man is down.
Three quick firelance bursts sear across
the smaller cat's back and upper shoulders. The cat spasms, then falls still.
The fallen lancer does not move.
"Stop discharges. Save your
lances!" snaps Olisenn.
Two of the cats flash back toward the
gray-brown trunk, scramble lithely up it, and then sprint northward along the
tops of the trunk away from the ward-wall and toward the crushed vegetation
that is the crown.
"Gythet's dead, ser," one of the
lancers announces to Olisenn.
"Strap him over his mount,
quickly," responds the squad leader.
Lorn turns his mount to the northwest,
paralleling the massive trunk, but at a good hundred and fifty cubits. He
glances back at Olisenn. "We need to ride around the crown. That's to make
sure we can send a messenger safely to Eastend."
"Ah... yes, ser. There are many
creatures in the tops of the fallen trees. They wait until it falls, and then
they hurry down and hide there, lying in wait."
"I'm sure they do. We'll try to give
it a wide berth."
"Reform! Lances at the ready. Follow
the captain."
At Olisenn's orders, Lorn lets the gelding
slow, until he is riding to the left and slightly behind Olisenn. The hint of a
frown appears on the squad leader's face, then vanishes, replaced with an
expression of professional competence.
Neither Lorn nor Olisenn speak as the
column rides out along the trunk to where the smashed limbs of the tree's crown
form a small hill.
The captain wants to shake his head, but
refrains. In the scurry and the attacks by the cats, he had forgotten that
Olisenn presents as great a danger as do the creatures of the Accursed Forest.
Lorn has his own firelance ready, if but with a fraction of its original chaos
charge, and from where he rides he can cover both the squad leader and survey
the fallen forest monarch.
Kusyl rides to meet them. His left sleeve
bears a rent, but shows no blood. "Ser."
"How many casualties?" Lorn looks
from the squad with at least one empty-saddled mount to Kusyl.
"Two dead, ser. Two wounded."
"One dead, ser. One wounded,"
Olisenn adds. "Thus far."
At the sound of crackling and rustling
branches, all three men turn in their saddles toward the middle of the mound of
branches and leaves. A single branch, more than two cubits thick, falls outside
the crown, snapped by whatever stirs within the vegetation.
The light wind out of the south carries a
musky bitter scent to Lorn, that and an acrid odor of crushed leaves.
"Prepare to discharge lances!"
Lorn snaps. Anything that moves branches a cubit thick and whose power and mass
move the entire fallen crown is something that will require more than a single
firelance.
"Prepare to discharge-"
The last words of Olisenn's orders are lost
under the crashing of displaced limbs and vegetation.
MMMMMmmmmmmmmmmnnnnnn.... A soundless, yet
paralyzing mental scream slams into Lorn, and his mount. The gelding seems to
stagger and steps sideways. Lorn wants to hold his temples, so intense is the
pain, and for a moment he cannot see, for what feel like knives ripping at his
eyes.
He blinks through the involuntary tears at
the monster that emerges from the crushed crown, strewing aside vegetation like
wet paper.
A huge gray lizard slithers from the crown,
except that it is so large that it appears at first as if the gray trunk were
turning and growing-or extending itself toward Kusyl and the second squad.
Fully five cubits at the shoulders, and more than twenty cubits in length, the
lizard pounds toward the second squad. A black tongue whips out, looking like a
lash.
Before the mental order attack, three of
the second squad's mounts have actually gone down, one to its knees. A lancer
scrambles for his lance, not realizing the lizard's speed. The webbed and
clawed left foot flashes, and the lancer vanishes under it.
Lorn winces. "Discharge lances! Now!
Discharge lances!"
Hssst I A single line of fire flare from
one of the second company lancers, but the chaos flame rolls off the gray hide
of the monster stun lizard.
Hssst! Hsst!
In response to the lines of chaos fire, the
lizard swings its head from side to side, then pauses, as if calculating which
lancer will be its next victim.
Almost without thinking, Lorn sheathes the
firelance, and pulls out the lancer sabre, willing the chaos that surrounds him
and the lizard into the blade. He nudges the gelding. The mount shivers. His
heels dig into the gelding's flanks, and the white starts forward, slowly, then
moving into a quick trot.
Lorn rides toward the lizard, angling from
behind its head on the left side. He hopes the lizard will hold for just an
instant.
Abruptly, the giant snout turns, impossibly
quickly, toward the lancer captain.
Lorn hurls the sabre with all the force he
can muster. The chaos-infused cupridium sabre spins lazily end-over-end as Lorn
wills the point to strike the lizard's head or eye point first. Even as he
wills the impact, he is leaning in the saddle, turning the gelding away from
the stun lizard's gaping mouth and hot breath, and angling toward the second
squad, pulling his own nearly depleted firelance from its holder.
MMnnnnnnnnnnnn.... The stunning soundless
metal scream is followed by an enormous grunt. Then the lizard convulses,
thrashing, and a webbed forefoot claws at the sabre that protrudes from the
platter-sized eye.
Lorn can sense the raging flames within the
lizard's skull-as order and chaos war.
He reins up the shivering gelding.
Kusyl looks blankly at his captain.
"Discharge firelances! Now!" Lorn
snaps at Kusyl.
"All firelances! Now!" echoes the
junior squad leader.
"Aim at the head!" Lorn commands.
"The head!" Olisenn's and Kusyl's orders merge.
Firelance beams play across the thrashing
lizard, winking out of existence as lance after lance is depleted.
The long tail lashes sideways and high.
Lorn cannot even yell before it smashes
through a lancer from the first squad who has ridden too close. Then that tail,
like a serpent, or an independent being, thumps up and down in slow beats,
pounding itself into the ground, and pulping both dead lancer and mount.
Mmmnnnn.... The last mental scream rocks
Lorn, both with its dying force, and the sense of despair.
Lorn takes a deep breath.
The lizard twitches... and keeps
twitching....
"Hold your discharges! Hold
discharges!" Lorn orders.
The lancers watch the dying lizard.
The squad leaders watch the lizard, the
crushed mound of the tree's crown, and the trunk that leads back to the
Accursed Forest.
Lorn watches the lizard, the crown, trunk,
and the senior squad leader.
There is a sigh, like a dying wind, and a
last twitch, and the monster lies inert.
Lorn and the two squad leaders still study
both the crushed vegetation of the crown and the lizard's corpse for a time
before any speak.
Finally, Lorn clears his throat. He has to
do it twice before he can speak. "We need to check the far side as
well."
Both squad leaders nod slowly, reluctantly.
"Form up!"
While Second Company forms up, Lorn rides
toward the dead lizard, looking for his sabre, but there is no sign of the
weapon. The lancer captain nods and eases the gelding away from the dead beast.
Second Company rides slowly around the
crown of the fallen tree. While there are rustles from the crown, and the acrid
odor of crushed leaves comes and goes, nothing emerges from the twisted and
splintered vegetation.
The company reins up on the southeastern
side of the gray-brown trunk.
Lorn beckons to Olisenn, who edges his
mount closer to the captain.
"We still need to send a messenger to
the Engineers."
"Ah... yes... ser." Olisenn blots
a face drenched in sweat.
Kusyl does not speak, but nods.
"We'll have to keep watch here until
the Engineers arrive."
"Yes, ser." both squad leaders
reply, neither with great enthusiasm.
Lorn takes out the grease stick and begins
to jot down the particulars of where the trunk fell, and the ward locations, on
the blank message scroll. Finally he hands it to Olisenn. "Warn the
messenger to ride well clear of anything else that may have fallen." Lorn
pauses, then adds, "Have a half-score escort him around the trunk."
"Yes, ser." Olisenn eases his
mount away from Lorn and toward the first squad.
Kusyl's eyes stray to the enormous bulk of
the dead stun lizard. "Never... never seen anything that big...."
Neither has Lorn, and he nods, slowly.
"You wonder how many more there might be waiting on the other side of the
wall."
"Rather not think on that, ser."
Kusyl glances from Lorn to where Olisenn briefs the lancer acting as messenger.
It will be a long afternoon and a longer
night, Lorn suspects.
LXXIII
Lorn
does not sleep well, or long, and is up even before dawn, as worried by the
comparative silence as by the bulk of the trunk and the section of ward-wall
that does not function. He ignores the griminess he feels because the little
water they have has to be carried from three kays to the north and does not
even try to shave or wash, but merely takes a long swallow from his water
bottle.
In the gray that will precede a clear dawn,
with only a hint of mist rising from the Accursed Forest, he walks past the
duty sentry toward the granite of the ward-wall. While he carries both a sabre
that had belonged to one of the dead lancers, and his firelance, he knows he
will need neither, and doubts that knowledge as well.
As he faces the wall, dry and smooth in the
dawn despite the dew that coats the wall road and the ground, he can sense
where the chaos flows end, perhaps a hundred and fifty cubits to his left, at
the last functioning ward. Without the flaring webs of the chaos net, Lorn can
sense the order-chaos depth of the Accursed Forest, and the solid granite wall
by itself seems a frail barrier to the height and power of that intertwined
order and chaos.
Lorn cocks his head, trying to recall words
from his days as a student magus. "Always called the Forest order-death...
never mentioned twined order and chaos," he murmurs to himself. He looks
up again, both with chaos-order senses and eyes, but he is not mistaken. The
Forest has a depth of order wrapped in chaos, or chaos wrapped in order.
Despite the breach in the chaos net, as he
continues to study the Accursed Forest, Lorn senses no probes of either order
or chaos, and no creatures massing beyond the granite. He studies the Forest
for a time longer, until the sun begins to rise above the deadland and fields
to his left, but the silent presence and lack of overt threat does not change.
When the sun falls on his shoulder and side, he turns and walks silently back
toward the bivouac area.
By the time he reaches the tielines where
the mounts are tethered, Olisenn is waiting, looking as bedraggled as Lorn
feels. "You were at the wall, and it is not warded there. Was that wise,
captain?"
"Probably not." Lorn laughs.
"I'll learn, I'm sure." He pauses as Kusyl walks toward them.
"Good morning, Kusyl."
"Good morning, ser."
"I checked with all the sentries
before I left." Lorn's eyes fall on Kusyl. "I was inspecting the
ward-wall this morning. It's been quiet all night."
"Might be more creatures this morning,"
hazards the junior squad leader.
"There might be," Lorn agrees,
looking at Olisenn. "How long before the Engineers arrive?"
"They have firewagons that can make
good speed on the perimeter roads, and I would judge that they might arrive by
midday-if they left last evening or early this morning."
Lorn nods. "Both of you set some
pickets, say, four from each squad. Just use the firelances to keep anything
away. We're not going to try to destroy anything else right now." His
smile is wry. "We don't have the charges for that."
"No, ser, we don't," Kusyl says
strongly.
Olisenn frowns, but nods.
"I'm going to take a few men and ride
back around the crown." Lorn unties the gelding from the tieline.
"Does it matter who I ask?"
"No, ser."
After picking four men, nearly at random,
Lorn checks the girths and the bridle and mounts the gelding. He and the four
lancers slowly ride around the mass of tangled branches and crushed and
uncrushed leaves that had formed the crown of the enormous tree. They circle
the tangled mound at a distance of well over two hundred cubits from the
nearest greenery. While there are occasional rustlings, and more than a few
birds, including two enormous vulcrows that burst from the branches, they see
no other creatures.
On the northwest side, a dozen vulcrows are
tearing at the carcass of the stun lizard, but the birds scarcely raise their
sharp hooked beaks. Two night leopards slink back to the branches as the riders
near the dead creature.
After studying the area of the struggle
with the lizard, and determining, again, that there is no sign of his lancer
sabre, and no other creatures visible, at least, Lorn turns the gelding.
"We'll ride back now."
As the five riders return to the main body
of Second Company, Lorn watches the deadland and the battered crown, but while
the rustlings continue, nothing emerges except occasional birds that he does
not recognize, not that he has ever spent much effort in studying avians.
Olisenn and Kusyl are waiting, eyes
expectant, as Lorn and his lancers reins up.
"Nothing. Vulcrows, two leopards that
scurried back to the tree, some birds." Lorn shrugs and dismounts. He
pulls out a water bottle that will need to be refilled before long and takes a
swallow, then blots his forehead. "We watch and wait for the Mirror
Engineers."
He is blotting his forehead again, in the
midday heat, when a voice rides through the silence.
"Ser!" calls the duty sentry,
pointing to the north.
Lorn unties the gelding and mounts, as do
the four lancers he had selected earlier. From the saddle he can see three
firewagons approach, crossing the deadland from the outer perimeter road, and
angling toward the point where the trunk and the ward-wall intersect.
"Mount up! Engineers are here."
"Mount up!" Kusyl and Olisenn
echo Lorn's orders.
Lorn fingers his grimy and stubbly chin,
then eases the gelding toward where the three firewagons are slowing along the
inner road that flanks the ward-wall. The third firewagon is armored in
cupridium plate and tows an armored two-wheeled device with a tubular
projection that can only be one of the special firecannons that Commander
Meylyd had mentioned.
A thin-lipped engineer majer steps out of
the first firewagon. He glances around, then spots Lorn, and marches toward the
mounted lancer captain.
"Majer Weylt, Captain. I'm in charge
of the engineer detachment at Eastend." The thin lips twitch into a smile.
"When we received your message, I had some questions about the size of the
trunk. But your lancer messenger was insistent, and I decided to come with the
large firecannon. I'm glad we brought it."
"Captain Lorn, Majer. We're glad to
see you." Lorn smiles. "The tree seemed large, but I'm new to this. I
just followed the procedures." He calls up what he has read. "You'll
cut away the trunk from the ward-wall...."
"Exactly." Weylt bobs his narrow
face up and down. "We make sure that the road is clear first, and then
destroy the crown to make sure it harbors no creatures, and that there's no
residual order poison."
"What do you need from us?"
"Just a loose guard while we set up.
That's so we're not surprised. Then you pull back and let us get on with
it."
"Yes, ser."
"Good." The majer almost spins on
one boot and heads back to his firewagon.
Lorn remains mounted, with Kusyl to his
left, as the half-score of Mirror Engineers unhitch the armored firecannon on
the wall road, and wrestle it into a position roughly three hundred cubits from
where the trunk rests on the ward-wall. One turns a crank-like handle, and a
hatch opens on one side of the cannon. The engineer vanishes into the hatch.
Another rolls a long cable from the
firewagon that has towed the cannon to an assembly on the rear of the cannon
and inserts it into a square bracket. Lorn senses that the cable is cupridium
sheathed in something, almost a shimmercloth substance of many layers, clearly
designed to keep the chaos flows within the cable.
Seemingly from nowhere, Majer Weylt
appears, again marching briskly toward Lorn. "Pull your lancers back
behind the cannon, Captain- and out from the ward-wall," orders the
thin-lipped Mirror Engineer. "At least a third of a kay back. Have them
ready for more creatures."
Lorn wonders about how many more cats and
stun lizards will rush from the crown and the upper trunk, but only nods.
"Yes, ser." He turns and stands in the saddle. "Second Company!
Pull back to seven hundred cubits!"
Half-wondering just how accurate any of
them will be judging seven hundred cubits, Lorn guides Second Company to a
position perpendicular to the trunk, closer to a half kay, he suspects, back
from the crown itself. He turns his mount and reins up, watching Olisenn from
the corner of his eye, and observing the engineers as well.
Two of the three firewagons roll back down
the ward-wall road, almost a kay, leaving only the firecannon and the firewagon
to which it is connected. All the Mirror Engineers have vanished, except for
one, who then climbs inside the hatch door on the right side of the cannon and
closes it behind him.
Of the score of Engineers, none remain in
the open, Lorn notes.
HHHSSSTTT! With a whining, whooshing hiss,
a single jet of flame slices through the dark order of the trunk. The heat
radiates even to where the lancers are reined up.
Clunnnnnk! The ground shakes, a half kay
away, as the trunk outside the ward-wall drops onto the road and the deadland.
A second jet of flame-somehow both blue and
black-flares skyward from where the trunk has contacted the ward-wall. Smaller
explosions follow, and sections of wood, shredded and twisted, begin to fall.
A dull clunking announces the impact of a
ten-cubit length of branch on the armored shell of the firecannon.
Lorn turns in his saddle and studies
Olisenn. Is the heavy-set squad leader pale? Lorn's eyes go to Kusyl, who is
definitely pallid and tense. Then his eyes go to the tree's fallen crest, where
the branches keep twisting.
In an instant, a half-score of the night
leopards appear at the edge of the crown. Abruptly, all charge the Second
Company, clearly without any hesitation, as if they had known all along where
the lancers were.
"Discharge lances at will! Short
bursts! Short bursts!"
"Short bursts!" Olisenn adds in
an even louder bellow.
Nine of the leopards fall before reaching
the Second company. The last slams into a lancer's mount, but the man keeps his
head and drives his sabre down and through the beast's neck, awkward as the
blow is.
The mount screams, a long slash across the
point of her left shoulder, but the lancer manages to remain mounted, and
slowly gentles the mare.
The rest of the lancers reform into their
squads, watching the vegetation, but no other creatures emerge.
Discreetly readjusting his garrison cap,
and blotting his forehead, Lorn glances back toward the cannon, where the
engineers are working to reposition the weapon. "Steady! They're going at
it again!"
Another whining whistling blast follows,
and a gap ten cubits wide appears between the ward-wall and the remainder of
the trunk.
The second blast dislodges no more
creatures, although a number of birds circle the trunk.
There is no sign of the vulcrows-none at
all. Once more the engineers reposition the firecannon, and after each searing
blast do so again until they have opened a gap between the wall and the
remainder of the trunk that is more than fifty cubits wide.
Once the gap has reached that width and the
inner road is clear, the Engineers turn the firecannon. The armored firewagon
slowly tows it outward until it is roughly a hundred cubits from the crushed
crown, between the crown vegetation and Lorn's company.
The Engineer Majer strides from the cannon
toward Lorn, and Lorn rides forward to shorten the senior officer's walk.
"Thank you, Captain." Weylt
smiles.
Lorn waits.
"Captain Lorn... now we're going to
fire the crown. It's going burn hot. I'd leave your men where they are until
the worst dies down. You might get another giant cat or two. You might
not."
"We'll be ready, ser."
"Fine." Weylt turns and walks
back to the firewagon.
Shortly the cannon screams again, except
the fire flares into a broad fan, and immediately flames begin to shoot up from
the center of the mangled limbs and leaves. As the fires spread, one section of
the branches shudders, and a long gray-black giant cat leaps from the twisted
branches and greenery, padding right past the armored firecannon.
The cat pauses two hundred and fifty cubits
out from the spreading flames. Its dark eyes study the Second Company, lined
five abreast at least good five hundred cubits away. Then, as suddenly as the
others had attacked, the giant cat lopes almost due north, well away from the
lancers and the engineers and their equipment.
Lorn has no intention of chasing it, not
with the state of his company's firelances.
The flames continue to rise, crackling a
fierce orange, and thick and acrid black smoke, twined with plumes of lighter
gray smoke, rises into the now-clear green-blue sky, forming a haze that begins
to spread.
At the ward-wall, several engineers are
working, replacing the smashed crystal wards with others, ignoring the flame
that flares three hundred cubits northward.
The flames are subsiding, leaving the trunk
seemingly untouched, when the engineer majer returns, striding briskly toward
Lorn, who urges the gelding forward again.
The majer begins without greeting, without
preamble. "The wards are working, and there's little enough more we can
do."
"Do you just leave the trunk
now?" asks Lorn.
The majer laughs. "We're through with
it. So are you. There's a timber factor who has a contract on anything like
this. There will be a team out here in a couple of days, and within two
eightdays, you won't know that there ever was a fallen trunk here. Good timber,
they say. I wouldn't touch it, not with the residual dark order in it, but they
ship it down the Great Canal and then sell it to the coastal traders. Get a
good price, I understand. The fees they pay help pay our stipends, Captain,
yours and mine."
Lorn nods. He understands the logic, but he
wonders about the merchanters profiting on the deaths of lancers. "This
seems like a large trunk," he observes, watching the Majer. "Is it,
ser?"
"Thirty-five cubits at the ward-wall.
That's the biggest I can recall. Be a few loads of solid timbers for the
merchanters." The majer smiles ironically. "More than a few, I'd
wager. They can handle it. I wouldn't. Once this dies down, we'll be returning
to Eastend, and you'll be free to continue your patrol."
"We'll need to recharge or replace our
lances at Eastend," Lorn says quietly. "There probably aren't a dozen
lances left with charges."
"That we can handle, Captain. I'll see
that a full set of lances is waiting for you."
"Thank you."
"Least we can do." The majer
nods, then turns and leaves Lorn.
Lorn rides back to the second company. They
will have a long ride to the next waystation, a very long ride, that will last
well into the evening. Even when the return patrol is over, he will have no
rest, not with the need to request replacements and draft letters to the
families of the fallen lancers, and to handle all the other details that must
wait until Second Company returns to Jakaafra.
LXXIV
In the
late afternoon, Lorn leans forward in the saddle. He rubs his forehead,
ignoring the burning in his eyes, and the itching of salty sweat on the two-day
old stubble on his neck. Then he straightens, forcing himself erect as Second
Company nears the locked and sealed granite structure that is the northeast
midpoint chaos tower.
"...too bad didn't put a waystation
here..." murmurs a lancer riding behind Lorn.
"...make too much sense..."
Lorn motions, and the second squad turns
out from the ward-wall and follows the road that loops around the midpoint
chaos tower and the low wall that connects it to the ward-wall.
In the fading afternoon light, as he rides
within fifty cubits of the solid granite walls, Lorn studies the bulk of the
midpoint chaos tower. Is it his imagination, or does the granite of the tower
somehow seem less solid than the tower at Jakaafra? He frowns, concentrating on
the tower with both sight and fatigued chaos-senses. He shakes his head.
"Ser? You all right?" asks Kusyl.
"I'm fine." He offers a laugh.
"As fine as any of us are, anyway." As Kusyl nods and looks away,
Lorn's lips tighten. From what he can tell, the midpoint chaos tower has
failed. There are no pulses of chaos energy flowing in the cupridium conduits
from the building to the ward-wall, although the wards along the wall proper
still hold and flare their chaos net.
The flow of chaos must be traveling all the
way from Eastend and Jakaafra. Is that why the Accursed Forest is now attacking
along the northeast ward-wall? Or had the tower failed years earlier and the
failure been kept silent?
Again... what he does not know would fill
endless scrolls. He rubs his forehead once more, knowing that they still have
another sixteen kays to cover before they reach the waystation.
LXXV
As the
Second Company forms up in the courtyard of Eastend, its compound a mirror
image of Westend, Lorn walks toward the long building that holds the Mirror
Lancer detachment, wondering if anyone will even be there. The corridors and
studies are empty, and Lorn heads back to the officers' dining area. With each
step, his boots click faintly on the polished stone floor of the corridor.
There, at the sole occupied table in the
dining area, he finds Majer Weylt and two engineer captains. All three rise as
he approaches the table.
"Captain," offers Weylt,
"can you join us?"
"I fear not," Lorn says. "My
company is forming up now." He bows to the majer. "I just wanted to
let you know that I appreciated your having the firelances ready, Majer. Your
efforts were most welcome."
"Thank you for your courtesy."
Weylt's eyes twinkle above his thin lips. "I see you found another...
appropriate... sabre."
"There were some spares in the armory
here." Lorn's lips quirk momentarily. "I'm not the first, I
gather."
"You broke yours?" asks the squat
captain to Weylt's right.
"Ah... not exactly. I put it in a stun
lizard's eye, and it dissolved, I think. At least, I couldn't find it after the
lizard died."
"You... killed a stun lizard with a
sabre?"
"...and most of the charges in my
company's firelances," Lorn adds smoothly. "We still lost more than a
few lancers."
"The lizard was over twenty cubits in
length. I saw the carcass before we burned it," Weylt adds. "Most
impressive." He nods his head. "We won't keep you, Captain, but it
has been a pleasure meeting you and working with you."
"And you, also." Lorn returns the
nod with a bow and smiles. "You will pardon me if I hope we do not work together
too often?"
Weylt laughs. "Indeed! Indeed. Have an
uneventful return patrol."
"We hope to. Thank you again."
With a smile and a last bow, Lorn turns and
walks back to the courtyard where he reclaims the gelding from the stableboy.
He checks his gear, leads the gelding into the courtyard, and then mounts
quickly.
While the courtyard remains in shadow, the
sun has risen, and the deadland beyond the gates is flooded with light as Lorn
lets the gelding carry him toward the waiting lancers. He frowns as he
considers he should have looked for Weylt earlier. There are so many little
aspects to his job that are not in the manual and on which he has not been
briefed. Then, he supposes, that is true of many positions within Cyador and
the Mirror Lancers.
"Wondered where you were, ser,"
offers Kusyl as Lorn rides up to the head of the column where both squad
leaders wait.
"I was offering our thanks to the head
of the Mirror Engineer detachment for the replacement firelances and sabres. He
was out on his own patrol yesterday, but he was the one who ensured they were
waiting for us."
Kusyl nods. "He seems solid enough, if
a bit brisk."
"He has to cover twice as much
ward-wall as we do," Lorn points out. "Is everyone ready?"
"Yes, ser," reply both squad
leaders.
"Let us go. First squad will start on
the wall."
"First squad, advance!"
"Second squad..."
As Second Company rides through the gates
and northwest toward the ward-wall, Lorn wonders what awaits them on the
patrol. Was the other Engineer majer-Gebynet-correct in predicting a rash of
excursions by the Forest? Or will the ward-wall offer another quiet and
uneventful patrol?
Thinking about the non-functioning midpoint
chaos tower, Lorn doubts that many patrols will be uneventful, but ensures that
a pleasant smile remains on his face as he rides beside Kusyl.
LXXVI
In the
late early morning, the sun hangs just over the Accursed Forest, its towering
trees revealed and then obscured by the scattered and white puffy clouds that
scud westward. A cooler breeze blows out of the northeast, reminding Lorn that
the season is spring, where summer heat is followed by chill and then by rain
or mist... and then by wind or more heat, before the irregular cycle begins
once more.
To Lorn's right, the two squads of lancers
are spread in a long line abreast, searching the deadland for signs of Forest
activity beyond the ward-wall. To his left is the ward-wall, that seemingly
unchanging low rampart of chaotic permanence that stretches northwest to the
horizon, reflecting as it has for generations the vision and the skills of the
Firstborn. And the power of the Accursed Forest.
The low clopping of hoofs and the breathing
of lancer mounts are the only sound beside the sighing of the breeze that is
slowly changing into a cold wind. Lorn hopes the chill will be dry, and not one
that leads to cold rain or sleet.
He looks to the wall and notes the chiseled
marker: N 480 E. They have another ten kays to ride before they reach the
midpoint of the northeast ward-wall-and the granite structure housing a chaos
tower that does not work.
His shifts his weight in the saddle and
glances once more to his right, out at Olisenn and the first squad, riding
methodically across the dead-land, looking for signs of growth Lorn doubts they
will find.
As the sun rises, so does the wind, and the
cold air, sweeping off the winter heights of the distant Westhorns, chills more
than the spring sun warms, but the Second Company's lancers ride steadily
northwest.
After covering another two kays, Lorn
glances toward the wall, and both his eyes and chaos-chorder senses study it.
The chaos pulses through the cupridium cables are less regular. Does that mean
another fallen trunk? A breach in the wall itself? Trouble with a chaos tower?
Or his own imagination?
He shivers as another cold chill washes
across him-that of someone using a chaos glass to scree him. Maran? Or a
higher-level magus from the Quarter of the Magi'i. He maintains a faint smile
until the chill fades.
Is the screeing because of what he senses?
Or is what he senses independent of the user of the chaos-glass?
Whatever it may be, he must wait. Still,
Lorn gestures for Kusyl to ride closer.
With a puzzled expression, Kusyl follows
Lorn's gesture and guides his mount almost beside Lorn's gelding.
"Ser?"
"Do you think we should space the men
farther apart when we go five abreast?" Lorn asks. "Say another cubit
or so apart?"
Kusyl frowns. "Too far, and there is a
greater risk that their lance fires will strike each other if leopards or cats
get too near."
Lorn nods, his eyes on the wall ahead,
waiting until he can make out the faintest hint of darkness where the ward-wall
touches the horizon. Finally, he turns once more to Kusyl. "There's
another tree trunk down, across the ward-wall up ahead. I can just barely see
it."
Kusyl stands in his stirrups and squints.
"I see nothing."
"In a kay or so you will," Lorn
assures the junior squad leader.
They ride nearly another kay and a half
before, abruptly, Kusyl peers forward. "There is a trunk. You have good
eyes, Captain."
"It's in knowing what to look
for," Lorn replies. "I didn't know what that was when I started.
Let's form up on the road, and send a messenger out to Olisenn. He might have
seen it, but he might not yet." After a moment, he adds. "We can ride
five abreast on the road for a while, until we get nearer the tree."
"Form up on the road!" Kusyl
orders. "On the road, five abreast!"
"...not another fallen tree..."
"...would draw unlucky bastard of an
officer..."
"...more angel-fired cats... stun
lizards..."
"...don't know that..."
"...by Steps of Paradise, I do...
better believe I do...." Lorn ignores the mutterings, keeping a pleasant
smile on his face as he lets the gelding carry him forward.
"Formed up, ser," Kusyl reports.
"A messenger is riding out to first squad."
"Good. We'll move out from the wall
once we get within a half-kay of the trunk." Or sooner if the chaos-net of
the ward-wall is gone.
Lorn scans the area ahead as the second
squad rides forward, checking the ward-wall, the area around where the trunk
spans the wall, and the crushed green crown of the forest giant farther to his
right. While he sees small creatures scurrying from the Accursed Forest down
the trunk to the crown area, Lorn cannot be sure what they might be, other than
they do not seem to be large enough to be stun lizards or the giant cats.
Some three hundred cubits from the trunk,
Lorn raises his hand and reins in the white gelding. "Squad halt!"
In the silence, he studies the ward-wall,
noting to himself that the chaos-net has vanished. While the fallen trunk is
not so large as the one they had encountered on the first half of the patrol,
even from where he is reined up, he estimates that the diameter is still
greater than fifteen cubits.
Beyond the trunk, he can see the bulk of
the non-functioning midpoint chaos tower.
"Don't usually see 'em this close to a
chaos tower," offers Kusyl.
"That's our luck," Lorn offers.
"Send another messenger out to Olisenn. Have them form up five abreast and
ride toward the crown. We'll wait here a moment while I write out the message
to send back to the Engineers. Then we'll ride toward the crown, say, a hundred
cubits off the trunk."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn finishes the message as quickly as he
can and hands it to the squad leader. "Here."
In turn, Kusyl rides to the rear of the
column and turns the scroll over to a thin lancer, who immediately turns his
mount and heads back toward Eastend. The squad leader rides back to Lorn and
reports, "On its way, ser."
Lorn nods. Both men know that the Engineers
will not arrive until late the following day, if then. "Let's see what
this trunk holds."
"Yes, ser. Lances ready! Forward at a
walk!"
The horses' hoofs powder the dead soil, not
quite crunching the lifeless ground, turning up white streaks of the stones and
stones of salt once poured onto fertile soil.
They have covered no more than fifty
cubits, and are still close to two hundred cubits from the trunk, when two of
the giant cats bound from the trunk, one to the left of the line of lancers,
and one to the right. Both animals angle toward the lancers, running at speeds
that seem to halve the distance with each breath.
"Discharge at will!" Both Lorn
and Kusyl shout the orders near-simultaneously.
Hhssst! Hssst! Firelance bolts flare toward
the cats, and all appear to miss.
"Short bursts!" Lorn adds.
Hssstt!
One cat falls, growling, before the
firelances converge on it. The other cat dashes sideways at an incredible speed
and sprints northward through the gap between the two squads, heading away from
the lancers.
"Hold your discharges!" Kusyl
orders. "This one's dead, and you'll need 'em!"
The fallen cat seems slightly smaller than
the one that had escaped the firelances, although it is hard to tell with most
of the forward part of its body charred.
"Lances ready," Lorn orders,
urging the gelding northwest, edging along the trunk toward the crushed mound
of vegetation that had been the crown-a circular matted mass clearly smaller
than that of the tree they had encountered on the outward patrol.
Perhaps fifty cubits short of where the
tree's crushed upper branches begin lies a separate branch, nearly two cubits
across, Lorn judges, and more olive colored and without smaller branches,
almost like a huge vine torn from the Forest.
The branch undulates along its entire
length, creating salt smears on the dead soil, and the lizard-like triangular
head of a serpent rises beside the darker gray-brown of the tree trunk. The
jaws open, extending wide enough to swallow a man.
"...mother of the Steps!"
"...barbarian's she-boar..."
"Advance and discharge at will! No
closer than thirty cubits," Lorn adds. "Aim for the head. Short
bursts!"
"Short bursts!" adds Kusyl.
The serpent curls, as if coiling for a
strike.
Hsstt! Hssst! Hsst! The firelances probe,
searing the unprotected serpent's head, which twists and turns as if trying to
avoid the chaos-fire.
Then the head lifts and turns toward the
lancers, slowly moving outward, trying to strike at the source of its pain.
More lines of fire converge on the
slow-moving giant snake, and a series of shudders ripple up and down its
length. The huge triangular head, blackened beyond any recognition, drops onto
the deadland with a dull thump!
"Hold your discharges! Hold
discharges!" Lorn orders.
He and Kusyl watch carefully from a good
thirty cubits, but the shudders that shake the serpent slowly die away.
Measuring the dead snake with his eyes, Lorn gauges the serpent to have been at
least forty cubits in length.
He looks up as Olisenn leads the first
squad toward them, at a slow and deliberate pace, far too slow, Lorn decides,
although he says nothing.
The heavy-set senior squad leader reins up
and looks at the dead serpent, then at Lorn. His mouth opens, then closes, then
opens again. Finally he speaks. "One of those... I have not seen before.
Nor have I heard of such."
"If you and the experienced lancers
haven't heard of these, I hope we don't run into more of them," Lorn says
quietly. "It wasn't near as bad as a giant cat or a stun lizard. It was
much slower. You need to stay a good thirty cubits back."
"That I will remember." Olisenn
nods, his eyes still on the snake.
Lorn tenses, turning the gelding toward the
bottom of the tree's crown, where the branches have begun to rustle.
"Lances ready!"
Even as the words leave his mouth, with
another rustling of branches, a half-score or more of night leopards bound
toward the two squads. One mount in the first squad shies sideways, and several
lancers struggle momentarily to bring their horses back into formation.
"Discharge at will! Short bursts!
Short bursts!"
Hsst! Hssst! Hssst!...
Short firelance bursts crisscross, forming
almost a wall against the smaller leopards-smaller only in comparison to the
giant cats.
Before Lorn can issue another order, the
firelances are silent. Eight of the leopards are down, dead.
Lorn turns the gelding, watching as the two
surviving night leopards sprint northward, their paws barely touching the soil,
leaving the faintest puffs of dust as they make their way toward a distant
woodlot.
"That be not good," observes
Olisenn, "the Forest creatures amid the woodlots and fields of the people
of Cyad."
"No," Lorn agrees, "but we
have no way to track them or catch them." And forty lancers and firelances
are not enough to deal with all that accompanies one of the tree trunks that
topple, or are toppled, from the Accursed Forest across the ward-wall.
"I'd be surprised if we have charges in half the firelances."
"More like a third," suggests
Olisenn.
"If that," adds Kusyl. "And
half a patrol to go yet."
"We still have to wait for the
Engineers and make sure nothing else shows up," Lorn points out, probably
unnecessarily, but he wants the lances spared, if possible.
"They will not soon arrive,"
predicts Olisenn.
Lorn fears that as well. "We need to
circle the crown and go down the other side. We'll keep the squads
together."
"Yes, ser." The quick response
from both squad leaders conveys definite approval of that tactic.
Although Lorn thinks he hears some rustling
in the branches, he sees nothing on the slow ride around the fallen tree. Nor
do his squad leaders or any of the lancers see any more aggressive creatures.
The only animals they see are when they
circle back to the southeast side of the tree in completing their circuit. The
vulcrows and other carrion birds have already begun to feast on the dead
serpent and the fallen night leopards.
Lorn looks south toward the Accursed
Forest, wondering how many more trunks will fall across the ward-wall in his
three years at Jakaafra, and how many more surprises like the giant serpent
await him.
LXXVII
Lorn
wakes the next morning, just after dawn, stiff from lying on the hard soil of
the deadland with only a thin blanket for padding and for warmth against a
night that had almost been close to freezing. His skull aches, both from
fatigue and from a vague memory of dreams-dreams of white walls being poured
into the very earth itself, trees being scythed from the forests, and acid
being dripped on his skin, except his skin had been the ground itself. His eyes
turn south to the bulk of the Accursed Forest, but the Forest offers no
answers.
He shakes his head slowly and stretches,
gingerly. He drinks nearly an entire water bottle before he has any of the hard
biscuits and cheese that comprise the emergency rations. The combination of
liquid and food seems to clear his thoughts somewhat, and he studies the day,
seemingly as cool as the previous one, although the wind out of the northeast
has died down into an intermittent, if cool breeze.
As Lorn is smoothing his uniform in place,
wishing again that he had been able to shave, Kusyl appears.
"The sentries say that nothing
happened with the tree, ser," Kusyl reports. "No cats, no leopards,
no serpents."
"Good. I'm going to have another look
at the serpent. I won't be long. Besides, there's little enough we can do
except try to keep any more leopards from breaking free."
"Yes, ser." Kusyl's tone is not
quite dubious.
"The sentries are still on duty?"
"Yes, ser."
"When I get back, we'll discuss the
day-both for first and second squads."
Kusyl nods.
Lorn walks the five hundred cubits or so
from the bivouac area beyond the crown of the tree down the east side of the
tangled branches. Four vulcrows flap off as the lancer captain nears the trunk
and the dead snake. The astringent smell of crushed leaves mixes with the odors
of musk and death as Lorn steps closer to the charred remnants of the serpent's
head.
For a time, he studies the mass of charred
scales and the blackened white bone showing through. Then he studies the trunk,
and then the branches. Finally, he walks back to where the two squad leaders
wait. His boots are covered with the powdered dust of salt- and chaos-killed
soil even after his short walk.
Olisenn raises his eyebrows as if to ask
why Lorn had been studying the dead serpent. Kusyl merely waits.
"We need to maintain the guard to keep
any more creatures from leaving the Forest or the tree. We'll need to continue
the sentry with four lancers with firelances behind him, until the engineers
arrive and fire the crown."
Both squad leaders nods reluctantly.
"We won't mount anyone else until the
engineers arrive, but we can rotate groups of lancers to that stream to the
north to get water for themselves and their mounts-and to wash up if they
want."
"Yes, ser."
"Why don't you take the first group,
Olisenn," Lorn suggests. "You and Kusyl alternate groups of four from
each squad."
"As you wish, ser."
Lorn nods. His thoughts are still on his
dreams and the puzzle of the giant serpent.
"I'd Like to report that to the second
squad, ser," Kusyl says.
"Of course."
Lorn does not join the rotation for washing
until well after mid-day, with the last group from the second squad. The cool
water clears his head more, and he feels less itchy and more presentable after
shaving.
It is late afternoon before two firewagons
appear with the armored cannon. The officer who emerges from the lead firewagon
to seek Lorn is one of the captains Lorn had met when thanking Majer Weylt the
morning Second Company had left Eastend.
Lorn rides the gelding closer and reins up,
waiting.
"Captain Lorn, Captain Strynst. Majer
Weylt sends his apologies, but the spring rains were too heavy, and there was a
break in the retaining walls for the Great Canal, and he was summoned to assist
there."
"From Eastend?" Lorn asks.
"It's a distance, even by firewagon,
but there aren't that many good engineers, and the Majer is one of the
best." Strynst smiles apologetically.
"We're glad to see you," Lorn
replies. "I was just surprised that he'd be called from so far."
"There aren't that many Mirror
Engineers any more. Most of us are here, except for the few that are in Fyrad
working on the fireships." Strynst turns and studies the trunk. "Not
too bad, this one." He gives a wry smile. "Of course, it fell right
on a ward. Happens nine times out of ten. Biggest reason to believe the
Accursed Forest thinks in some way. That couldn't happen by accident-not year
after year."
"I never thought anything with the
Forest was an accident." Lorn laughs once.
"Some lancer officers do. Most of them
end up dead." The engineer captain gestures toward the upper branches
three hundred cubits northward. "Have many creatures running loose?"
Lorn's eyes follow the gesture momentarily,
then fix back on the engineer. "Two giant cats, one serpent, and a pack of
night leopards. Vulcrows, of course."
"A serpent? Never heard of one of
those."
"It's a big one," Lorn says,
gesturing in the general direction of the crown. "Forty cubits, maybe
longer. Two cubits thick."
"We'll take a look when we fire the
crowns." The captain pauses. "You get all the creatures?"
"One giant cat and two of the leopards
escaped. There wasn't any real way to catch them."
"There never is once they leave the
trees and get past the lancers. Until some holder gets killed trying to protect
his stock or kills them because they get cornered in a pen or something."
Strynst shakes his head. "Might as well get started. Pull your men back,
and we'll set up the firecannon."
"They're all back at the crown area
now, Captain. I thought it would be better to set up there to keep any more
creatures from breaking loose. If you want, I can move some up here."
"A half-score-behind the
firewagons," Strynst suggests.
"I'll have them there shortly."
Lorn turns the gelding and rides back north, knowing, again, from the
order-chaos patterns that he feels and cannot yet fully explain, that nothing
more will occur. Not with this fallen trunk.
"Thank you." Strynst turns and
walks back to the firewagon. Lorn turns the gelding, letting the horse walk
slowly toward the waiting lancers. He takes a deep breath. Spring has just
barely begun.
LXXVIII
The
bright mid-morning light of spring is pouring through the window of the inner
Mirror Lancer study as Lorn struggles with the last lines of his latest patrol
report. He looks it over once more, then signs it and looks up at the closed
door, beyond which is the empty outer study.
Theoretically, he has the day off, as a
stand-down period, but if he does not use part of the day to catch up on the
reports and the letters to the families of the fallen lancers, it will be
another eightday before he can, and then he will have twice as much to write,
with a memory far less fresh.
After he sets aside the patrol report to
let the ink dry, he picks up the next sheet of paper to begin the summary
reports that will go to Majer Maran in Geliendra-carried by the next firewagon
of the Mirror Engineers. In one patrol, Second Company has dealt with two
breaches of the ward-wall by the fallen trees-a giant stun lizard, something like
four giant cats, three packs of night leopards, and a giant serpent-and lost
five lancers.
Lorn dislikes mentioning the number of
creatures that escaped, but does, since all the reports in the file do so, even
if the format does not necessarily require such. But, as Lorn knows, what is
required and what is expected are not always the same. After finishing that
scroll, he lays it by the first, and then begins writing the scroll he
dislikes.
...with
great sadness I must inform you that... was killed while performing his duties
as a Mirror Lancer. He died in protecting the land that he served and loved
from the continual dangers of the Accursed Forest....
After five such letters, Lorn finally picks
up the other scroll, the sealed one that has been waiting for him.
Rather, it is addressed to: Lancer Captain,
Northend, Jakaafra. The seal is blank maroon wax, without even an initial on
the glob that holds the scroll closed. Lorn breaks it, unrolls the missive, and
begins to read.
Honored
Captain:
I am writing this scroll on behalf of my
family, and my brother in particular. They have suffered great depredations as
a result of the failure of the Mirror Lancers at Jakaafra to destroy wild
creatures from the Accursed Forest....
Last eightday, a black leopard entered the
sheep pen and dragged off a prize ewe, two nights in a row. The day following,
my brother found dead a bullock he had been fattening for market. Little was
left, save the head and bones. The prints in the ground were of a cat whose
size could scarce be imagined...
I am fortunate in that I do not require
livestock for my livelihood, but all too many in and around Jakaafra will not
survive in winter, save in despair and poverty, unless these awful creatures
are destroyed....
Whatever needs be done, we beseech you do
so....
The signature reads: Kylynzar.
Lorn takes a deep breath. So... now he must
worry about sacrificing even more lancers to save cows and sheep-or possibly
save those farm animals. Or can he task Juist with rooting them out? How? He
takes a second breath, considering that the victims could have been children as
easily as livestock.
Yet... he has not had enough charged
firelances or enough lancers to kill and contain all the night leopards and
giant cats they had faced, let alone the giant serpent.
He frowns, catching himself. Knowing what
he knows, he has not been able to do such. Will he have to? He worries his
lips. He certainly has no intention of attacking every stun lizard with but a
sabre or trying to chase down giant cats.
The serpent still preys on him. Setting
aside the scroll for a moment, he searches for the patrol manual that Majer
Maran had provided. When he finally pulls it from the single desk drawer, he
flips the pages slowly, going all the way through the volume. Not finding what
he seeks, he starts on the first page and begins to scan each page, if quickly.
When he has completed a second search, he
sets the manual down slowly. There are no references to serpents. The manual
lists the dangers from the night leopards, from giant cats, from the stun
lizards, even from a kind of tortoise Lorn has never seen, and from vulcrows
and the circular nests of giant paper wasps-wasps as long as a man's index
finger. The captain winces at that thought, and resolves to keep that
possibility in mind with the next fallen trunk.
Lorn had not seen teeth in the serpent's
jaws, nor had the serpent actually attacked the lancers. Yet it could have
swallowed a lancer.
Lorn fingers his chin and glances down at
the scroll he must answer- or send back to Majer Maran. He likes neither
alternative.
Finally, he begins to write....
Honored
ser,
I appreciate the magnitude of the
calamities which have befallen you and your family and your brother....
...do the best that we can, but Second
Company patrols a wall ninety-nine kays in length with but two score lancers.
...At the time of your difficulties, we
were opposing the Accursed Forest and killed near-on a score of creatures,
including four giant cats, two packs of the black night leopards and a giant
stun lizard... in these endeavors in which five lancers lost their lives it may
have been possible that some creatures did escape, but not through the lack of
effort or the unwillingness of lancers to die to protect the folk of Cyador...
and we will continue to do our best in this struggle....
With all best wishes and heart-felt
condolences...
After the third scroll dries, Lorn locks
all eight responses into his chest, since there is no way to send them at the
moment, and since he may reconsider his wording of the last response.
He closes the door and walks down the empty
corridor, turning at the cross-corridor and going through the double doors to
the courtyard of the compound. The courtyard is also empty, since Juist is
patrolling the roads somewhere thirty kays to the north, as Lorn recalls.
On the other side of the courtyard, the
stable doors are open, and Lorn steps inside.
"You're about early, ser," offers
Suforis, the thin-faced blond stableboy, scurrying up to the lancer captain,
"that be, for a stand-down day." He glances toward the stall that
holds Lorn's gelding. "You're not going to ride him far, ser?"
"Only to Jakaafra."
"He'll do for that. The farrier'll be
here after your next patrol, ser."
"How many of the mounts need new
shoes?"
"Could be a half-score, ser. Not as
bad as undercaptain Juist's mounts; they ride the roads, mostly, and it's hard
on 'em. He needs most of the spare mounts."
Lorn nods, then asks, "You said that
you were allowed to ride the spares for exercise?"
"Have to, ser. And Undercaptain Juist,
he uses me as a messenger, at times."
"You're good at it, I'd bet,"
Lorn answers. "I might ask you to do that, as well, except it's for me to
send scrolls to order things. Could you do that, say for a copper a
scroll-carry them to a factor in Jakaafra?"
"Did that for Captain Meisyl, half
copper each." Suforis grins.
"So a copper would be fine." Lorn
grins back. "Now... If you'd saddle the gelding."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn does not wait long before the
stableboy returns.
"You best be riding easy, ser,"
cautions Suforis, after leading the saddled gelding out to Lorn.
"I will." Lorn smiles at the earnest
young man.
The lancer captain lets the gelding set his
own pace. It is not as though Lorn is in that much of a hurry, although it is
far later than he had intended to get back in touch with Dustyn the factor.
Then, when has he had any stand-down days to do so before this?
The air has warmed from the previous two
days, but a light breeze from the east remains, making riding comfortable.
Green has suffused the shoots in the fields, and the winter-gray leaves
retained by the trees in the woodlots and orchards have turned deep green,
while the fresh leaves are a lighter and more intense shade. The apple trees in
one orchard already show white blossoms, although the pearapples' limbs are
near-bare yet, with winter-gray leaves still furled.
The gelding's hoofs tap-click on the
granite stones of the road, a smooth way, but narrow, only ten cubits wide.
Twice Lorn goes onto the grassy shoulder to pass wagons headed for the town. He
nods politely to both drivers, and both nod back, somberly, without speaking.
Although the town is supposedly only five
kays from the compound, it is nearly mid-morning when the gelding brings Lorn
to where the houses begin to gather together, past the kaystone announcing the
town lies yet one kay farther. Lorn rides past the yellow-brick houses, each
with the green ceramic exterior privacy screens, and the trimmed privacy hedges
that circle rear porticos. Most of the green shutters are open. With all the
dwellings of one story, to Lorn, Jakaafra seems something less than a town, if
more than a hamlet.
The single square in the midst of Jakaafra
is small, merely an open, stone-paved expanse no more than a hundred cubits on
a side. Lorn rides slowly around the square, making a full circuit before his
eyes light on a building on a short lane just off the square. There is a narrow
storefront, above which is a green barrel. Lorn hopes that the green barrel is
the symbol for a factor in spirits and liquids. It should be, since Dustyn's
scroll had indicated he was "off the square."
With a smile, Lorn guides the gelding to
the granite hitching post below the narrow porch, and ties his mount to the
bronze ring, slightly tarnished. He steps onto the porch and through the single
doors and finds himself in a small room, bare except for a counter, behind
which no one stands, but on which is a handbell. Lorn rings it.
"Coming..."
Lorn waits, but no one appears. Finally, he
rings it again.
"...said I was a'coming." The
curtain behind the counter is drawn back and a man appears a span or two taller
than Lorn. His straight brown hair is pulled back and held by an ornate silver
clip. "I said... oh, Captain, didn't know as it was you. Captain Lorn, I
take it, since you'd be the only Mirror Lancer captain around, and today being your
stand-down day, I'd wager, seeing as you wouldn't be here on any other
day...."
Lorn laughs. "I'm Captain Lorn."
He lifts his hand and shows the seal ring.
"And I'm Dustyn, factor in spirits and
liquids, only one north of the Accursed Forest, only one 'tween here and the
barbarians, 'tween here and the Westhorns...." Dustyn bows. "If you
would accompany me, honored captain."
As he follows Dustyn through the narrow
curtained archway, Lorn wonders why he is an the "honored" captain,
but he follows the older man along a corridor and down the narrow brick steps
to a cool cellar. Against one wall is a long platform, on which rest kegs and
barrels of differing sizes, made of staves of various woods. On the adjoining
wall are racks containing hundreds of bottles.
Before the racks are three wooden crates
and two baskets.
"You see... we have two cases of the
Alafraan and one of the Fhynyco...." Dustyn lifts both hands theatrically.
"And of course, the two baskets of dry goods we accepted on your behalf,
as they were so small."
Lorn nods. The baskets are small, no more
than two cubits long and slightly less than a cubit in diameter-small enough to
be fastened behind his saddle. He extends silver to the factor. "I
appreciate your care." He smiles. "You did well to treat with Ryalor
House. It is small... but not without influence."
Dustyn offers a lopsided smile in return.
"Indeed, ser. I know some who trade with both the Yuryan Clan and the
Dyjani, and my inquiries, always discreet, you understand, they have returned
the words to me that the Ryalor House is honest and returns value." Dustyn
shifts his weight from foot to foot nervously.
"All kinds of value?" suggests
Lorn.
"Ah... yes, ser."
"I will put in a good word for you, Dustyn."
The lancer captain smiles. "Perhaps we could work out something." He
pauses. "I would rather not accept all these bottles at one time, and you
do have some storage here."
"Yes, ser." Dustyn's smile loses
its nervous edge. "If you would wish a few bottles every eightday... for a
small fee...."
"How small?" asks Lorn warily.
"Very small-a half copper an
eightday?"
"We have an agreement." Lorn
extends another silver. "This should accommodate you until fall, should it
not?"
"Yes, ser."
"Do you know a holder named
Kylynzar?" asks Lorn. "From somewhere around here?"
"Kylynzar? Yes, ser. A most respected
man. He holds much land to the north, in the red hills, and he grows melons,
and some of them he turns into the gold melon brandy. It is good brandy, though
most in Jakaafra prefer the rice beer or the ale."
"Hmmm... do you have a bottle of the
brandy?"
"I have several... more than
several."
Lorn nods. "I have a suggestion. I
will be sending a scroll to someone I know at Ryalor House. You can make those
arrangements, can you not?"
"It would have to accompany some
goods... or for a fee...."
"The golden melon brandy. I would
suggest sending a small case to Ryalor House. A gold in shipping?"
"Ah... yes, ser, and a gold for a
half-score of the smaller bottles."
Lorn nods, and extends two golds, hoping he
will not need to spend much more for at least several eightdays, when his next
stipend as a lancer captain arrives. "Consider it done. You send my
scroll-you will receive it tomorrow or the next day-with the shipment back to
Ryalor House."
"Yes, ser."
"And for that, Dustyn, you could spare
me one small bottle of the golden brandy to go with the Alafraan and Fhynyco I
will take with me, could you not?" Lorn smiles winningly. "If I like
it, and Ryalor House likes it, you might find more trade with them."
"A bottle I could spare."
Dustyn's smile is half-relieved, half-speculative.
"And you know that Ryalor House
respects confidences, and expects its confidences to be kept?"
"Ah... yes, ser... many have said
such."
"Just so we understand each
other."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn gives up a last silver. "For your
assistance and continuing efforts, Dustyn." He thinks the combination of
implied lash and honey will keep the factor dealing honestly, and his own
rudimentary truthreading skills indicate that Dustyn has not lied to him or
tried to deceive him.
Lorn does need to borrow some cord to
fasten the straw-padded sack with the brandy and wine and the two baskets to
the gelding, and he ties them securely behind his saddle.
With a nod and a wave, he turns the gelding
back toward the compound. Concentrating on all that must be done, his thoughts
flicking from one problem to another, the return ride seems far shorter.
Once he is back in his quarters, with the
three bottles of wine-one of Fhynyco and two of Alafraan-and the brandy sitting
on his small desk, he opens the brandy and pours a finger width of it into his
mug.
Then he sniffs it, slowly. The aroma barely
holds the scent of melon, and there is a deeper and warmer flavor there. He
takes a sip, and cannot help but smile. If Ryalor House can arrange matters
quietly, there will be more golds from the brandy. If...
Then... all of life holds its ifs.
Lorn bends down and opens the first basket.
On top is a set of smallclothes, and then a lightweight summer shimmercloth
Lancer tunic. Under that is a second set of smallclothes. Within the second set
is a folded and sealed paper. He smiles and sets aside the clothing for the
words written in Ryalth's bold script.
My
dearest captain,
As promised, here are some goods that may
be of value in the seasons ahead.
Much gossip came of the death of Shevelt. I
believe that occurred after you departed. The Dyjani Clan offered its respects
to the new heir, in golds. They also presented an exquisite Hamorian tapestry.
At the moment, all is calm.
Ryalor House suffered some loss when the
Redwind Courser foundered in a storm in the Gulf, but not so much as many, and
recouped some of that in other trades....
Lorn nods. While he had hoped the ship
would last for a few voyages, he had warned Ryalth, and she had acted
accordingly. He would like to wait to respond to Ryalth, to take time to answer
properly, but time he does not have, not when he will ride out on the morrow
for another patrol out and back, another eightday before he can send a scroll
in a manner he knows will reach its destination with far less chance of being
read than sending it through the lancer courier system.
Still... he had the forethought to make
arrangements with Dustyn- the forethought, and the luck, he reminds himself.
Below the garments, and wrapped in heavy
oiled leather are several other packages-some cheeses, dried fruits, and nuts.
The second basket holds a package of fine linen paper, three bottles of ink,
and a cupridium-tipped pen that has clearly come from a craftsman. Concealed in
the middle of the paper are ten golds. Also at the bottom of the second basket
are more dried fruits and nuts.
Lorn smiles at the clear reminder that he
is expected to write, and at the suggestion that the golds are to be used to
ensure such missives arrive.
Once he has emptied the baskets and stored
their goods, Lorn lights the lamp in the bracket above the desk, seats himself,
and begins to write, using the new pen and ink.
My
dearest lady trader,
Thank you for the Alafraan and the
Fhynyco... and for all the manner of fine goods you have sent. You are truly
amazing.... I have made arrangements, through Dustyn the factor, to send you a
small case of a gold melon brandy. Dustyn recommended it, and I have tried one
bottle. It has a good and mellow taste, strong as it is, and I've never seen it
before. Perhaps it might prove useful and profitable as an item to sell to the
Austrans or Hamorians....
I also suggest you look into the timber
gleaned from the Accursed Forest. It's carried down the Great Canal and sold to
coastal traders and Hamorians... wouldn't be surprised if it made good
shipbuilding timber, but couldn't tell you why. The Brystans might be
interested....
Lorn pauses, holding the pen, wishing he
could offer her more insight, for it seems that is all he can offer in these
days. Finally, he adds a few more lines and closes it.
From your faithful partner, one most
appreciative of the clothing, the sustenance, and the wines and the spirit in
which they were all conveyed.
He lays that scroll aside for the ink to
dry while he begins the second, also overdue, to his family, but that will go
through the lancer courier system, where it will doubtless be read, and will
say little that is not expected.
It was a long trip to Jakaafra, and it has
taken some time to become familiar with all that it necessary here. My
immediate senior officer, Majer Maran, is most friendly, and reminds me of my
old school-mate Dettaur....
Only Jerial will understand the full
meaning of that.... and his mother....
...patrols
here different from those in Isahl... we ride three days, have a day of
stand-down, then ride three more- unless there is a problem.... Jakaafra is the
smallest of the compounds around the Forest.... I have met some Mirror
Engineers and am developing great respect for their work....
After he adds more pleasantries, and allows
the second scroll to dry, Lorn seals both scrolls and sets them on the corner
of the desk, for dispatch, in their differing ways, in the morning.
Then, he stands and stretches, before
moving to the wardrobe, and slipping the chaos glass out and setting it upon
his desk. He frowns. He has only felt one magus screeing him since he came to
Jakaafra. Does the Forest inhibit such? Or does no one care about his actions
in distant eastern Cyador?
Laying the glass on the golden-aged white
oak, Lorn concentrates on the silvered glass, trying to call up the image of
Ryalth. The mists appear, and swirl for what seems an inordinately long time,
but they do clear and present an image.
A red-haired woman walks along Second
Harbor Way in the fading light of early evening. Abruptly, her step hesitates
and she turns. For a moment, Lorn looks full into the face in the glass, then
lets the image go. He does not wish to disturb her-not too much.
His forehead is beaded with sweat from that
short effort, and he can tell he will need practice, much more practice.
What of Maran? He shakes his head.
Then he smiles and concentrates on
recalling Dustyn the factor.
When the mists clear, Lorn finds himself blushing,
for Dustyn is within a bedchamber, and not alone. He quickly allows that image
to fade.
Does the Forest inhibit a chaos glass?
He concentrates on the last tree trunk that
had fallen across the ward-wall, trying to recall the location near the
midpoint chaos tower and even the shape of the trunk that remained after the
engine captain had fired the crown.
The mists take far, far longer to clear,
and Lorn can feel the heat pouring from his brow, but he continues to seek the
image.
Finally, he is rewarded with an image. Four
wagons flank a trunk that appears half what it had been. A score of men labor
with shimmering long saws. Lorn tries to shift the image to see beyond the
wall, but nothing appears except a black-silver curtain. He tries again.
His head feels light, and tiny stars flash
before his eyes. He sits on the edge of his narrow bed until the flashing and
dizziness subside. Then he stands and replaces the glass in the wardrobe.
He needs to find something to eat. He reclaims
the opened brandy bottle and steps out into the corridor, turning and locking
his door. Then he starts for the dining area, where he knows he can find bread
and cheese, at least. Perhaps Juist has returned and will like some of the
brandy.
Lorn shrugs, smiling. The day has not gone
that badly, and he does not have to think of the morrow's patrol. Not yet.
LXXIX
The
spring-like breeze gusts past Lorn as the lancer captain rides along the
perimeter road just north of white granite structure that holds the northwest
midpoint chaos tower-the tower that Lorn is convinced has not operated perhaps
in several years. The gelding's hoofs barely tap on the smooth granite of the
road, and the faint chirping of insects in the fields to his left occasionally
lifts above the sighing of the wind in the meadow grass that is already
knee-high there.
With the breeze, Lorn feels cooler, and the
perspiration he has blotted from his forehead does not return, not until the
breeze dies down. To his right, the second squad continues riding forward in
their line abreast formation, looking for signs of any Forest incursions, but
in the three patrols since the last fallen tree, there have been no shoots or
any additional fallen trees.
Behind Lorn's saddle is fastened a second
sabre in a battered sheath. All the men know it is there, and none remark upon
it, not after seeing that their captain had lost his first sabre battling a
stun lizard. Yet that is not why Lorn carries it. He can sense the dark order
within the cupridium forged-exterior of the blade, and he knows that, in some
instances, it will have greater effect against the order-backed attacks and
creatures of the Accursed Forest, for it has become all too clear that the
Forest employs linked order and chaos, and that such is far more effective than
either order or chaos alone. Where and how-of the exact circumstances-he is
less certain.
He readjusts his garrison cap.
"Going to be a hot summer, ser,"
Kusyl says, raising his voice to cross the stretch of road that separates the
two men. "All the signs point to it, every one. Vytly says the grapes are
coming in early, and not a late frost to nip 'em, either. Melons, too, and even
the redberries are fruiting early."
"I hope it's not as hot as the Grass
Hills," Lorn answers with a laugh. "I could do without that."
"No, ser. Nothing that hot. Maybe
feels hotter here, though, 'cause the air's damper, you know." Kusyl
gestures to his left, toward the silent bulk of the Accursed Forest.
"Always rains more around the Forest. Be why folk live here, even worrying
'bout the creatures." The junior squad leader pauses, then asks,
"Heard any more about the big cats?"
"Every so often, I get a scroll
complaining that a bullock or a sheep's been killed. I try to explain."
"They should be out here, looking at
one of them trunks after it falls. Give 'em a real different look at things.
Wager none of them be pensioned lancers."
A murmur rises from the lancer fifty cubits
to Kusyl's left, one that Lorn barely hears, and Kusyl does not. "...such
a man as a pensioned lancer... not Paradise likely!"
"I'm sure they're not," Lorn
answers across the ten cubits between them. "I doubt a pensioned lancer
would stay too close to the ward-wall."
Kusyl laughs. "Not me. Be going back
to Kynstaar, I am, when that day comes. Open a tavern there, and take golds
from lancer officers."
Lorn smiles.
Ahead is the place where the last tree had
fallen, but, as Majer Weylt had told him eightdays before, there is no sign
that a Forest tree had ever toppled across the ward-wall. The wind has filled
in the depressions in the deadland with loose salty soil and carried away the
sawdust. Poorer peasants have crept out into the deadland at dawn and at
twilight and carried off the remaining branches for firewood. And the wind and
the insects have removed the leaves. To the south, Lorn can discern no
noticeable gap in the huge trunks that comprise a second wall behind the
ward-wall itself.
It is almost as though no tree had ever
fallen across the ward-wall.
Except... Lorn recalls that there are dead
lancers, strange animals roaming the northern lands of Cyad, and farm animals
killed and dragged off into the dark. And he knows that other trees will fall,
as falls the rain, as blows the wind.
LXXX
In the
bright light supplied by the wall lamps and their polished cupridium reflectors
that are unnecessary for those within the chamber, First Magus Chyenfel moves
deliberately, almost cautiously, to the armchair beside the desk in the austere
study on the uppermost level of the tower that crowns the Quarter of the
Magi'i. It is a tower in name only, for it rises but five levels, far less
imposing than the Palace of Light-except to the Senior Lectors of the Magi'i
and those who know what transpires within the Quarter. Silently, Chyenfel'elth
seats himself, then waits for the Second Magus to take the chair before the
desk.
"Ser?" asks Kharl'elth. "You
do not summon often in the evening."
"When I am tired, and less on guard?
You are right. I do not." A smile appears and vanishes. "I wish to
know why you discourage Captain-Commander Luss from voicing his support of the
sleep-ward project to the Majer-Commander, and why you have likewise
discouraged the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor."
Kharl smiles warmly, his green eyes
dancing. "I have said not one word against this effort. Not one word
against it to anyone, ser."
Chyenfel offers a dramatic sigh. "That
is the same as discouraging it, and we both know it. I have held my counsel,
believing that we had time, and that in the fullness of that time, the need
would become obvious without having to raise one's voice or the power of the
Magi'i."
"That was wise, ser, for the
replenishment towers here in the Quarter may fail soon, if one by one, and the
barbarian attacks are increasing, requiring more firelances, and more charges
for those lances." Kharl's words are bland. "As you know, I fear the
barbarians more than the Accursed Forest."
"Failing to deal with the Accursed
Forest may be wise for a season or so, perchance, even a year, but not
longer." The sungold eyes of the First Magus lock upon the green eyes of
the Second Magus, which carry but a shade of the sungold sheen. "Yet you
know as do I that the ward-wall on the northeast side of the Accursed Forest is
barely holding, and that we have lost yet another chaos-tower there."
"I have read the reports from the
Mirror Engineers that have suggested such." Kharl shrugs offhandedly.
"We both understand the dangers. Yet we do not wish to incur the Emperor's
displeasure-or that of the Majer-Commander of Lancers-by limiting further the
chaos charges we supply to the Mirror Lancers. Or by reducing the number of
firewagons that travel the Highways of Cyador. We have already limited the use
of tow-wagons on the Great Canal."
The First Magus waits.
"That is why we... intimated that
Captain Lorn-or should I say, Lorn'elth?-be assigned such patrols on the
northeast ward-wall border." Kharl brushes back a stray reddish hair,
almost absently, yet affectedly. "He is likely to be... more
effective."
Chyenfel'elth's mouth smiles, but his
sungold eyes are politely intent, never leaving the Second Magus. "That
was indeed wise, Kharl, if not precisely for the reasons you discussed with
Captain-Commander Luss."
"We also need the time to ensure your
project works," Kharl continues, "and that is another reason why I
have not yet pressed for its implementation. All the while, the ward-wall must
seem as strong as ever until we are most certain we can complete your
project."
"I almost believe you, honored Second
Magus." Chyenfel steeples his long delicate fingers before him.
"Are you convinced it will work,
ser?" asks Kharl abruptly. "This great project of which you speak to
the Emperor so intently?"
"Completely? No. But it matters not.
If it does not work, then Cyad is better served by knowing such while other
chaos towers yet remain. There will be no towers in a generation, and only a
handful of firelances charged by the laborious concentration of the scattering
of first-level adepts. Each year will find but a few score cupridium blades
produced to hold back the barbarians of the north." The sungold eyes
flare. "You know this. The risk is worth it." An ironic smile
follows. "Except to those who wish to seize power now-or in the poor
handful of years to come."
"I have never opposed you, ser."
The warm smile plays once more across Kharl's face.
"But... knowing how I can truthread
you, most honored Second Magus, you are most careful of what you say, and how
you say it."
"As are you, ser," replies Kharl.
"As are we all."
"Again, you are most accurate, Kharl,
most accurate. I would that you consider turning your considerable charm and
judgment to support what we must do to confine the Accursed Forest for more
than the handful of years left to the chaos towers and their crystal
wards."
"I hear, honored First Magus, and I
will begin."
A faint smile once more appears on
Chyenfel's lips, and he rises to signify the meeting is at an end.
Kharl also rises, and his smile could be a
mirror of that on the lips of the First Magus.
Neither the sungold eyes nor those of
dancing green with the intermittent gold cast bear any semblance of a smile.
LXXXI
The
waystation is silent, under an early summer sky so cloudless, dark, and still
that not even the stars overhead twinkle. Lorn does not look skyward as he
slips silently across the granite stones of the courtyard to the small side
postern that is neither locked nor guarded. Wearing the Brystan sabre on his
right hip, in addition to his lancer sabre on his left, Lorn slides into the
shadows, melding with them as he opens the gate and departs, walking silently
southward on the stone walkway that flanks the walls.
Once clear of the walls, he places his
boots as quietly as possible on the dry deadland soil, for he would rather not
take the narrow road that leads from the front gates of the waystation past the
perimeter road and inward to the ward-wall. Even so, his steps carry him
steadily through the darkness toward the ward-wall and the presence that looms
behind the whitened granite and the chaos-net that flares above it-a net unseen
except by the Magi'i-and a lancer who remains magus.
He stops on the inner wall road, where he
studies the subtly glowing granite, the chaos net, and the deep twining of
black order and golden-red chaos. He wonders again how something that
incorporates such chaos can be as evil as the Magi'i have depicted. Yet there
is no denying the animosity that the forest creatures have toward the engineers
and the lancers. Or is it exactly animosity?
"Do you want to try this?" he
murmurs to himself, knowing as he does that merely continuing as a skillful
lancer is not enough. After winter and spring, with summer continuing the same
pattern of scattered Forest shoots and too many fallen trees, and escaping
creatures too swift and numerous and dangerous for the numbers of lancers and
firelances in Second Company, he knows that sooner or later, he will make a
mistake that will be fatal-or that could be, and he has no wish to trust his
future to fate alone.
He unsheathes the Brystan sabre, holding it
before him. Then... Lorn concentrates, much as he once did in transferring
chaos from the tower in the Quarter of the Magi'i to the chaos cells that power
the firewagons of Cyad. Except this time, he merely shifts that energy away
from a single ward, in order to create an unshuttered window-or a door
temporarily open-to the Accursed Forest.
With the fading of the small section of
chaos-net, Lorn can fully sense the power-the white chaos and dark order of the
Forest that is greater in its own way than the combined energy of the all the
chaos towers that weave the chaos web that holds the Forest within its bounds.
And he understands, and he shudders.
A dark lance flares through the window in
the ward-wall, straight at Lorn, attacking the lancer-magus as if he were the
Forest's gaoler.
Lorn lifts the Brystan sabre, lifting
untested chaos-order shields, shields he has practiced only in private since
leaving the Quarter of the Magi'i, and letting the ordered iron within the
cupridium catch the Forest's bolt of order-chaos... catch and turn it upward
into a flare that flashes upwards.
Nonetheless, he staggers, and with his
staggering releases his hold on the chaos diversions, and the chaos-net surges
back, confining the Forest.
Lorn's face burns, and sweat drips from his
forehead. He has been foolhardy... and survived by luck, and his own lack of
chaos control. He smothers a bitter laugh, knowing he has barely begun to
understand what he must learn.
As he walks back through the darkness he
glances at the sabre once more. Within the shimmering cupridium is a core of ordered
iron-and iron that feels darker, almost black, and far stronger than either the
original wrought material iron of the blade or of the comparable cupridium
lancer sabre that remains in his scabbard.
A faint glow surrounds the Brystan sabre.
Lorn sheathes it carefully and walks even more silently and circuitously back
toward the side gate from whence he had departed. Overhead, the stars have
begun to twinkle once more with the slight breeze that helps to cool his
fevered countenance.
Lorn slides through the shadows, and is
walking across the courtyard, almost to the courtyard door that will lead to
his quarters.
"Ser! That you, Captain?"
Footsteps cross the stones, and Lorn hears
the hiss of a drawn sabre.
"Yes. I just wanted some air. It's all
right." Lorn lets the lantern show his face.
"Ah... yes, ser." The sabre is
sheathed. "You see that, ser?"
"See what?" Lorn temporizes.
"Been so quiet... then there was this
flash out by the wall. I thought maybe another of those big trees falling. But
nothing happened. Thought I heard footsteps, you know, but there was just a
glow moving by the wall, and it vanished."
"You can't ever tell with the Accursed
Forest," Lorn points out, truthfully.
"No, ser. Sorry to bother you,
ser." The lantern is lowered.
"It's not a problem. I'm glad you're
watching for us." Lorn inclines his head, though he doubts the lancer can
see the gesture fully. "I'm going to turn in. We still have a long ride
tomorrow." And again the day after, and the day after that-and for who
knows how many more days and seasons of trees falling and creatures escaping.
LXXXII
Under
high but thick gray clouds, Lorn watches as Olisenn orders his squad into the
line abreast formation that runs inward from the perimeter road toward the line
already formed by Kusyl's second squad. The heavy squad leader's voice is firm
and carries, yet Lorn finds himself watching the senior squad leader more and
more, trying never turning his back on the man at any time when firelances are
in readiness. Even so, there have been a few times when Lorn has forgotten, and
sooner or later, that will create problems.
Lorn reaches forward and pats the gelding,
grateful that his mount has proven more trustworthy than all too many people in
Cyador. Lorn frowns at his thought. It is not that so many have proven
untrustworthy; it is that his observations, and those of his father, have shown
that so many will prove untrustworthy. The gelding is what the gelding is,
unlike people who change in response to their perceptions of events that may
benefit or threaten their power.
He glances toward the clouds that do not
seem to promise rain. Second Company has but one more day's patrol before
reaching the compound at Jakaafra-and the two full days off they receive after
every fourth complete patrol to Eastend and back.
As he turns the gelding northwest on the
wall road, Lorn studies the white-granite wall to his left. The chaos-flows are
once more irregular- the response to his efforts of two nights before? Or
another fallen tree? Or both?
A faint smile crosses his lips.
There will be another tree trunk down. That
he knows. And there will be more wild creatures-and another day on station
before the Mirror Engineers arrive.
"Was it worth it?" he murmurs.
"Ser, you speaking to me?" asks
Kusyl from the other side of the wall road to his right.
"No, Kusyl. I was thinking out loud.
How I'll be glad when we finally get back to Jakaafra."
"You and me, too, ser. Been a long
summer, and it's hardly been two eightdays since it even started."
Lorn nods. Will he ever see the ripening-of
pears and praise-or of anything for which he has silently worked?
LXXXIII
The
four officers sit around the small table in the dining area at the Jakaafra
compound. Only a single lamp on the wall is lit, illuminating the table but
dimly, to Lorn's advantage. Lorn takes a sip of the Fhynyco, then glances
across the table at Gebynet, the Mirror Engineer majer, on his way through on
one of the periodic inspections of the chaos tower that lies just beyond the
compound. To Lorn's left is Captain Ilryk, a tall and blond officer, with a
high forehead and an angular face and pointed chin. After a moment, Lorn's eyes
travel to Undercaptain Juist, sitting to Lorn's left. "How do you like
it?"
"Good!" The stocky Juist takes a
solid swallow.
An enigmatic smile curls onto Ilryk's lips,
but he does not offer an opinion.
"It's better than Byrdyn," admits
Gebynet, after a more refined sip, and another sniff of the bouquet. "How
did you get it here?"
"I have some contacts with merchanter
houses," Lorn admits. "They have been kind enough to ship some items
to a factor in Jakaafra."
"You don't look or act like you come
from a merchanter clan," Juist states bluntly.
"I don't," Lorn says easily,
taking what appears to be a deep swallow, but is not, more like a bare sip.
"I just know a few people, and Captain Meisyl suggested that it would be
wise to order in a few bottles of a decent wine for times like these." He
laughs. "Few enough that they are with each of us gone off some place or
another most days and nights."
"True," admits Gebynet.
"As I am when I am here," says
Ilryk, who commands the Fifth Forest Patrol Company based in Westend. As Lorn
patrols the northeast ward-wall, so does Ilryk patrol the northwest wall.
"We're all riding somewhere most of
the time," Juist says after another swallow from his goblet of Fhynyco.
"Leastwise, none of you have to chase bandits."
"I think, Juist," offers Ilryk
sardonically, "Captain Lorn and I would prefer the handful of bandits to
facing stun lizards, giant cats, and night leopards. The bandits fear
firelances and lancers, and fight seldom."
"Most days... we ride longer,"
counters Juist.
"Through more pleasant
surroundings," suggests Ilryk.
Gebynet laughs. "I've heard this
before, and you two won't change. I'd rather enjoy the Fhynyco, if you don't
mind."
Ilryk smiles, still sardonically, while
Juist looks at this empty goblet mournfully.
Lorn half-fills the undercaptain's goblet,
then addresses the Engineer majer. "Do you have to do more inspections
when they send Majer Weylt off to work on the Great Canal? Or do they send him
sometimes and you other times?"
"We do different things beside
maintaining the chaos towers. Last year, after the storms, I spent almost a
season in Fyrad, repairing the trading piers there." Gebynet sips more of
the wine. "Rather good vintage, captain."
Lorn swallows obviously, then lifts the
second bottle. "You should have some more. No sense in letting the bottles
stand unused." He refills both goblets and appears to refill his own as
well. "Not these days."
"You been having a lot of fallen
trees, I hear," offers Juist.
"Have the local people been
complaining to you about the escaped creatures?" Lorn's smile is crooked.
"We did get a night leopard last
eightday, out east of here," Juist answers. "That made a big melon
grower happy."
"Kylynzar, I'd wager," Lorn
suggests.
Ilryk shakes his head. "It would be
that one."
"How did you know?" asks Juist,
glancing from Ilryk to Lorn.
"He's been writing scrolls to
me." Lorn rolls his eyes, letting his words slur ever so slightly.
"He wishes us to make sure that no creatures escape from the Accursed
Forest. None at all. So I must risk lancers and myself- or risk myself even
more." Lorn turns to Gebynet.
"You have been here the longest of us.
Are more trees falling this year?"
"Quite a few more than normal," says
Gebynet, adding quickly, "but not an unheard-of number."
"Not unheard of," Lorn says,
looking blankly at the Mirror Engineer, "but how many companies have
handled so many fallen trees in three seasons? Not quite three seasons,"
he corrects.
"We have seen more this year than last
on our wall," interjects Ilryk, "but there are always more on the
northeast. In he past two years, anyway."
"I would not know...." the majer
answers slowly.
"Perhaps one?" asks Lorn idly,
letting his truth-reading senses scan the Engineer.
"Three or four, I would say."
Lorn nods. Gebynet is lying, and unhappy
about it as well. He lifts the bottle again. "Some more. No sense in
letting the bottle stand unused."
Gebynet and Juist exchange glances, but allow
Lorn to top off their goblets. Ilryk refuses, his amused smile still in place.
LXXXIV
In the
mid-afternoon sun, Lorn stands in the stirrups to let damp trousers dry as much
as to stretch his legs. As on every afternoon in the recent days nearing
harvest, the few scattered clouds provide little relief from the damp heat, and
the late-day rainstorms only add more moisture to the steamy heat. Each patrol
day ends with uniforms soaked in sweat, and the soil of the deadland is powder
under the hoofs of the patrol mounts, rising and infiltrating boots and
uniforms, and leaving every lancer's skin dry and itchy from salt and sweat and
dust.
Lorn glances to his left, along the
line-abreast of lancers, riding almost a hundred cubits apart now that first
squad has but thirteen lancers out of the twenty when he had arrived three
seasons earlier. The second squad has but twelve. No replacements are scheduled
until the end of fall or the beginning of winter, and Lorn wonders how small
Second Company will have gotten by then.
As he looks back to his left, as he takes
in and ignores another zzzzzppp for a dead bloodsucking flowerfly, he can sense
the intermittent pulses of chaos in the cupridium cables that link the crystal
wards. Another tree is down across the wall, but how far from Second Company he
cannot tell.
"Hot... never gets any cooler... be
glad when it starts to frost," grunts Kusyl from the outer edge of the
wall road.
"Then we'll have to slop through
mud," Lorn reminds the squad leader.
"I think I'll take that."
"That's what you say now." Lorn
grins.
As they ride through the afternoon, Lorn
keeps looking to the southeast, until his eyes confirm what his chaos senses
have told him far earlier. Yet another trunk has fallen across the ward-wall.
"Another tree is down."
"Five abreast!" Kusyl turns in
the saddle and calls to Lorn. "Olisenn's already seen it. His squad is
going to five front now."
"Set up the containment pattern for
the crown," Lorn tells Kusyl. He no longer bothers with checking the trunk
first. If there are giant cats, they will attack no matter where the lancers
are. Stun lizards are slow enough to be chased down if necessary, and the night
leopard packs are always in the crown. As for the giant serpents, Second
Company has seen but the one in three seasons.
"Five abreast! Move out to the tree
crown!" Kusyl orders. "Ubylt! Ride out and inform squad leader
Olisenn that we're riding out to join them to block the tree crown!"
"Yes, sers!" Ubylt turns his
chestnut northward.
As Lorn and the second squad angle their
way toward the tree crown yet several kays away, Lorn tries to estimate the
size of the fallen giant, judging that its base diameter is about twenty
cubits, larger than many, but not so large as the mammoth trunks they have
sometimes encountered.
"Think the forest'd run out of big
trees," mutters Kusyl.
"With ninety-nine kays on a side to
work with?" Lorn laughs.
"Didn't used to be so many."
"Maybe it was waiting for the big
trees to get bigger."
Kusyl snorts.
The two squads join at the perimeter road
to the northwest of the crown. Lorn estimates that the nearest part of the
twisted greenery lies almost three-quarters of a kay from them.
"First squad... you take the left
side, second squad the right."
"You heard the captain."
"First squad to the left!" booms
Olisenn.
With roughly a hundred fifty cubits between
them, the two lancer squads ride toward the forest crown, lances at the ready.
Lorn blots the sweat from his forehead,
ignoring the heat from the continual sunburn on the back of his neck and the
way his sweat-soaked uniform clings to him. He shifts his weight in the saddle,
but his eyes remain on the crumpled green canopy.
The first creature that lumbers outward,
angling more to the east and the first squad, is a smallish stun lizard-if a
lizard a mere three cubits at the shoulder and fifteen cubits in length can be
termed small.
MMMnnnnn... The silent mental scream halts
several mounts, and one lancer sways in his saddle.
"First squad," Lorn orders.
"Discharge at will! Now! Short bursts!"
"Short bursts at will!" repeats
Olisenn.
MMMnnnnn... The stricken lancer slumps in
his saddle, and one mount rears.
"Second squad, lances ready! Stand
by," Kusyl orders.
Hhssst! Hssst!... The orange-golden-red of
firelance discharges flares across the lizard, which, uncharacteristically,
turns as if to retreat into the tangle crown foliage. The firelances lash again
and again, and the lizard is still.
"First squad, let the second squad
lead a little," Lorn orders, nodding to Kusyl.
The lancers of the second squad move
forward faster, closer to the tip of the crown. Lorn looks back, and it appears
as though the stunned lancer is beginning to recover, being supported in his
saddle by another lancer.
Lorn glances toward the vegetation ahead,
now well less than two hundred cubits away. "Company halt!" He reins
in the gelding, watching the mass of green and brown, sniffing for the musky
odor that goes with the cats, but for the moment, he smells but the astringency
of crushed leaves.
First company reins up to Lorn's left,
their lances at the ready as well.
The forest canopy is silent, almost too
silent, Lorn thinks.
Then, both Lorn and Kusyl see the telltale
shifting of branches and the rustling of leaves that always precedes an attack
by the black night leopards.
"Stand by to discharge! Short
bursts!" Even as those orders are in the air, Lorn has to add, "Discharge
at will!"
Nearly a score of the night leopards bound
from the greenery, straight at the second squad.
Hsst! Hssst!...
Firebolts from lances flare, and golden-red
chaos collides with streaking blackness.
Three leopards converge on Lorn, and while
his lance strikes two, the third flattens itself and springs toward the
gelding.
Lorn slashes down with his sabre,
reinforcing it with his own personally guided chaos force, and the night
leopard drops, leaving but a thin scratch along the gelding's shoulder.
Dark bodies strew the deadland soil.
"Ser! There it goes!"
Lorn's eyes follow the sole surviving
leopard. It has sprinted back toward the ward-wall, then to the east, and then
outward toward the perimeter road well clear of any area where lancers are
positioned to intercept the lithe dark cat.
"Ser! We can't catch it!"
"Hold where you are!" Lorn
orders, ignoring the grim, almost pleased smile on Olisenn's broad face. He
takes a deep breath, thinking about another leopard's escape about which he
will doubtless hear, one way or another. No one will care that of nearly a
score of the night leopards, they have killed all but one.
"Hold fast!" Both Kusyl and
Olisenn echo his orders.
Lorn blots the sweat from his eyes with the
forearm of his sleeve. He studies the canopy again wondering if they will see a
giant cat again-or a serpent-or anything.
He has been commanding Second Company for
nearly three seasons of patrols... and encountered a fallen trunk practically
every second or third patrol. Is the Forest going to continue probing the
northeast ward-wall? Even if it does, what could he do about it? Except
position his lancers and watch every move Olisenn makes?
"Stand by," Lorn orders tiredly.
"We need to send a messenger to Eastend."
Again.
LXXXV
Lorn
glances at the scroll on the desk in the inner study, and then at the window.
Outside, a warm drizzle is falling, and a hot fog rises from the granite stones
of the courtyard. It is afternoon of his stand-down day, and he has not
finished all the reports that have piled up. He cannot remember when he last
had a clear-eyed moment in which to write Ryalth or his family, and he still
must write a request to Commander Meylyd to pay the farrier for reshoeing ten
mounts.
Finally, the lancer captain picks up the
scroll from Majer Maran a second time and re-reads it slowly.
...while
it is true that Second Company has been forced to deal with a singular amount
of activity from the Accursed Forest, that does not relieve you of the
responsibility for the safety of the people of Cyad.
Lorn snorts. It is not as if he has not
already been made well aware of that requirement by many souls-beginning with
the Patrol Manual itself. His eyes go back to the scroll.
Commander Meylyd has received more than a
dozen message scrolls begging greater efforts in containing the creatures from
the Accursed Forest, and I am hereby conveying his concerns to you. All in the
Mirror Lancers know the difficulties of carrying out the duties laid upon us,
often without the ideal support and supplies. This necessitates long eightdays,
and fortitude not required of others. Such is the life of, and the glory of, an
officer of the Mirror Lancers. As are all officers in the Mirror Lancers, you
are required to accomplish your duties to the fullest of your abilities.
Rationales and excuses may serve for merchanters and outlanders, but the duty
of a Mirror Lancer in the service of the Emperor and of chaos is to comply, and
the accomplishment of the unbelievable and the impossible must be the
commonplace for us. To allow a single creature to escape from the order-death
realms of the Accursed Forest is not acceptable, not when the lives and
livelihoods of the people are at stake....
Lorn sets down the scroll and looks out the
window once more at the steaming mist rising from the courtyard.
What can he do? Does he have any choice? If
he does not bring greater use of his personal control of chaos to the fore, he
will end up discredited. If he does, he may end up dead. After a time of
blankly staring at the window, he bends and reclaims the scroll, then seats
himself at the desk and begins to write his reply-his short reply.
I have received your scroll reminding me
most persuasively of the responsibilities and the glories of serving as a
officer of the Mirror Lancers. You have made most clear what is required of me,
and I hear and obey.
He lets the ink dry before he seals the
scroll and summons his senior squad leader. "Olisenn?"
The heavy-set lancer opens the door and
steps into the inner study. "Yes, ser?"
Lorn gestures to the scroll on the desk he
is sure that Olisenn has already read. "Majer Maran has more clearly
outlined our responsibilities, and I have acceded fully to the scope of duties
required of us. If you would make sure this reply is sent with the next
Engineer firewagon... ?" Lorn extends the sealed scroll.
"Yes, ser." The senior squad
leader nods.
"And Olisenn?"
"Yes, ser?" The oily politeness
of the squad leader covers a deeper contempt.
Lorn continues to smile, almost blandly,
waiting several moments before he speaks. "If I recall, is not the
Accursed Forest the largest concentration of order and death in all of
Cyador?"
"As you say, Captain, that it
is."
"And does order not have the property
of converting the power of chaos into sterile death if chaos is not used in
perfection?"
"That be what the Magi'i say. Me,
being but a simple lancer, I'd not be knowing."
Lorn nods. "Majer Maran has suggested
that we must make greater efforts to keep the Forest creatures from reaching
the holders and their herds and flocks." He frowns. "We may have to
make some changes to ensure that forms of sterile death are restricted to the Forest,
and that, somehow, we can do such without casualties. It will be a challenge,
but, as Majer Maran has pointed out, that is indeed our duty."
"We've not been losing many lancers,
ser. That is, not so many recently."
"True... but we'll have to stop more
of the creatures."
"Order it as you see fit, ser, and
we'll carry it out."
"I'm sure you will. Still... one never
knows when matters change, and I wanted you to know that we have been ordered
to make changes." The captain nods politely, waiting before adding.
"It's been said that in the past, some senior squad leaders developed
their own communications with the command in Geliendra. You wouldn't know of
that, would you?"
"Me, ser? That would be against the
line of command, ser."
"So you never thought of anything like
that?"
"Me, ser? No, ser."
"I'm glad to hear you say that,
Olisenn." Lorn smiles. "That's all for now, and please make sure that
scroll gets to Majer Maran."
"That I will, ser."
Olisenn is lying about communicating with
Geliendra, not that Lorn has expected otherwise, but now it is clear that
matters will change... must change.
After checking the Patrol reports he has
written once more, Lorn puts them in the foot chest and locks it, useless as
that clearly is against Olisenn's surveillance, but somewhat effective, he
hopes, against Olisenn's understanding of what Lorn knows.
Then he steps into the outer office, but
Olisenn has already departed.
Lorn ponders his next steps as he walks
slowly toward his personal quarters. Maran's scroll is clearly an attempt to
put Lorn in an impossible situation. Use of chaos by lancers is effectively
forbidden, and now Maran has insisted that Lorn not let a single Forest
creature escape. Under the current circumstances, that will run lancers and
mounts into the ground, and increase casualties. Increased casualties mean
fewer lancers and more likely more animals escaping.
He takes a deep breath as he enters his
deep quarters. He paces in a narrow circle for a time, then takes the silver
volume from its concealed resting place and begins to page through it,
half-wondering if the ancient Firstborn who had written the lines contained in
the imperishable pages had ever faced a Majer Maran. What sort of steps would
he-or she- have taken. What provisions made?
He continues to page through the volume.
Suddenly, he stops, and reads.
I have no soul,
but a nibbled kernel...
feelings dried and stored
on the shelves of self
in the deep cellar where
provisions must be made
Provisions must be made.
I made them
gleaning
those wild leftovers of
unharvest days,
hoarding hard-to-come-bys
of cold reason
against colder seasons.
Provisions must be made,
and I have made them.
Slowly, he nods. While not exactly
analogous, the basic truth is there. Provisions must be made, provisions of
cold reason against colder seasons. Perhaps... just perhaps... the Firstborn
were not all that different, after all.
That does not comfort him, and he shivers
ever so slightly as he closes the volume.
LXXXVI
Provisions
must be made..." The antiquated words run through Lorn's thoughts as he
rides the white gelding slowly to the southeast, this time patrolling the perimeter
road with Kusyl and the second squad. He feels as though his neck and back get
twice as stiff when he rides with the first squad, and it is a tremendous
effort not to watch Olisenn all the time.
Yet he has nothing that he would actually
call proof against the heavyset squad leader, only the knowledge that the man
is communicating with Majer Maran and lying about it, only the growing contempt
the senior squad leader has for Lorn. And Olisenn's contempt does not seem
based in fact, for all the other officers, and even Kusyl, have acknowledged in
some fashion that Second Company has handled far more ward-wall breaches than
has been common, and with far fewer casualties for all the dangers involved.
No... Lorn had not done as well as he
should have at the beginning. This he acknowledges, at least to himself, but no
one offered assistance, and he had had to learn on his own. He also had to
learn, that, as part of its efforts to strike against Cyador, the Accursed
Forest always seemed to have its wild creatures attack the lancers before
making their escapes. Or was that because they do not attack until they somehow
know the Lancers and the Engineers are going to destroy each particular fallen
tree? Which of those may be true, Lorn still does not know, only that the
pattern has held for the time he has directed Second Company.
He puts his weight on the stirrups for a
moment, lifting himself off the saddle, then looks to his right at the
too-spread, line-abreast formation. Are he and the lancers being asked to hold
back the Accursed Forest with no real hope of success in the years ahead? Just
to purchase years or seasons for Cyador?
He laughs to himself. Nothing lasts
forever. That he already knows. Some time, the ward-wall will fail. Even if the
project Ciesrt had mentioned works and another way-whatever it may be-is found
to restrain the Accursed Forest from reclaiming all of eastern Cyador, in time
that, too, will fail. Is that why duty becomes important?
With a headshake, he smiles. Some men seek
power, like Maran, because life ends. Others, like his father and Myryan, seek
meaning. But the world is the same for both, and makes no effort to accommodate
either.
His eyes survey the whitened granite of the
ward-wall-stretching endlessly to the horizon, or so it seems, without a break,
without a stream, without a river. Lorn straightens. He wants to shake
himself-not that the observation would change anything-but he should have
noticed. In all of Cyador, even in the Grass Hills, is there a diamond-shaped
area ninety-nine kays on a side without a watercourse leaving or entering it?
One with trees and high vegetation? One with flat lands immediately around it,
which turn into rolling hills and plains within two kays?
Because the Accursed Forest is, he and
everyone else have just accepted it. But what sort of power had it taken for
the Firstborn to create such a containment-one that moved rivers and
watercourses? And what sort of power did the forest possess to survive without
such watercourses? Can it reach upward and tap the clouds? Is that why there is
always more rain around it?
"Ser!"
Lost in his thoughts, for once Lorn is not
the first one to spot the fallen tree-another of the mid-sized forest monarchs.
His eyes confirm the alert, and he turns
his head toward Kusyl. "Form up five abreast here on the perimeter road.
Send a messenger to Olisenn. Have him join us a kay this side of the
crown."
"Yes, ser."
To the south, over the Forest, clouds are
forming, and darkening. Lorn wonders if the rain will reach the deadland where
they ride and if they will have to wait through a storm for the Engineers and
then ride through mud to reach Eastend. With all that seems to be happening, he
will not be surprised if Second Company will face rain and mud.
The second squad gathers itself back into a
loose formation on the road, and Lorn and Kusyl ride just ahead of the first
rank of the five lancers abreast, and on the inward side of the perimeter road.
"Still say more trees fall on the
northeast side. Reyt-he's an engineer lancer-he says it's 'cause the winds come
out of the northeast." Kusyl snorts. "So why do the trees fall into
the wind?"
Lorn laughs softly. "Engineers have to
explain, whether they can or not."
"Like we got to fight, whether we like
it or not?"
"Something like that."
The two lapse into silence as they near the
point on the perimeter road closest to the fallen tree.
"Squad halt!" Kusyl orders.
"Easy in the saddle."
He and Lorn turn to watch the approach of
the other squad.
"Ser." Olisenn nods as the first
squad draws up parallel to the second.
"Staggered lines! We'll advance
now," Lorn calls out. "Lances at the ready."
"Staggered lines. Lances ready. Stand
by to discharge."
With
a hundred fifty cubits between the two wide-spaced, five-abreast formations,
the two squads move southward, each almost flanking a side of the tree's crown.
The staggered lines allow the second line to fire past the first, as necessary,
or to move forward when a lancer ahead exhausts his firelance.
The squads are still two hundred cubits
from the crown when a pair of giant cats, their shimmering gray coats almost
the color of the clouds gathering over the Accursed Forest, bound toward the
lancers-toward the second squad, seemingly almost directly at Lorn himself.
"Discharge at will! Short
bursts!"
Hssst! Hhhssssssst!
"Short bursts! Angel-fire! Short
bursts!" Kusyl bellows.
Hsst! Hsst!
Five beams crisscross and find the leading giant
cat, and it stumbles and rolls forward in a heap, dust rising around its body.
The second creature sprints to the left side of the second squad. Lorn can see
that, unless he does something, it will escape. He lifts his own firelance, and
sights, boosting the chaos with what he has learned and practiced both in the
Grass Hills and in secret-and confining it with the order binding he has seen
from the Accursed Forest.
Hssst!
The narrow beam curves and burns through
the huge cat's skull, and it skids along the powdering soil of the deadland.
"...see that!... captain's getting
good with that lance...."
"...always been good..."
Lorn's eyes do not remain on the fallen
creature, but fix on Olisenn, and the self-satisfied and sardonic smile that
fades as the senior squad leader glances up to meet Lorn's eyes. Lorn returns
Olisenn's expressionless scrutiny with an insouciant smile that he maintains
almost as an insult.
Olisenn cannot conceal a frown.
Lorn wipes the smile from his face. He
should not have given any warnings to the contemptuous senior squad leader, but
he has had to pretend and ignore so much from the man that it is difficult to
remain impassive all the time.
He hears a rustle in the branches, and his
eyes and senses refocus on the greenery that appears dull in the afternoon sun
that is dimmed by the high thin clouds to the west. He can almost sense the
night leopards gathering.
"There's something coming from the
crown. Leopards, I'd guess." Lorn raises his voice and gestures toward the
vegetation. "Olisenn, move your line in closer! We don't want any to
escape between us. Not after Majer Maran's last orders."
"To the right!" Olisenn repeats,
frowning.
"Move it up. Lances ready!" Lorn
orders the first squad, urging his own mount to the left so that he is almost
beside Kusyl. "Second squad, lances ready. Prepare to discharge!"
The leaves twitch and rustle one more time,
and then the leopards burst forth, not toward first squad, but toward the
second squad.
Absently, Lorn wonders if that is because
he bears some concentrated chaos, even as he orders, "Second squad.
Discharge at will. First squad! Hold your lances!"
The leopards almost reach second squad
before firebursts stud the air.
Hsst! Hssssttt!
"Short bursts!" Kusyl insists.
Hssst! Hssst! Hssst!
The short bursts that Kusyl has demanded
rain across the fifteen or so night leopards that are almost among the lancers.
Lorn lifts his own lance as if toward the
leopards, raising it slightly and turning it just beyond the leopards.
Two leopards scream... and one claws at a
lancer's mount to Lorn's left before it falls.
Hssst! Hssst!
Lorn's eyes cross Olisenn's, and the senior
squad leader's mouth opens, as if to protest, before the single chaos bolt
blasts through his throat.
Seemingly without looking near Olisenn,
Lorn sweeps his lance across two other leopards, letting his own chaos senses
bend the flame to take them down. Other dark cat figures, some charred, some with
but small-looking wounds, lie across the salt-streaked and powdery deadland
soil.
"Close, ser!" Kusyl says,
glancing around nervously. "Too close."
Lorn scans the area, but surprisingly, not
a single leopard has escaped. This time. Nor are there movements or any
rustling from the snapped and twisted limbs and crushed leaves of the tree's
crown.
"Ser! Ser!"
Lorn looks up, surprised.
"It's Olisenn, ser!"
Lorn urges the gelding the seventy cubits
or so toward the first squad.
When he reins up, two lancers, white-faced,
are on the ground with the prone figure of the senior squad leader.
"What happened?" Lorn asks.
"Don't know, ser. When the leopards
attacked you and second squad, ser... maybe a firelance... See... he's burned."
Lorn swallows hard. That he can do.
"It could have been anyone's. It could have been mine. They were closer
than I thought. It was probably my fault." He shakes his head. "I
didn't act quickly enough." And that is certainly true, Lorn knows.
After a moment of silence, he adds. "He was a good squad
leader. We'll miss him." He looks down. "If you... Fry gel...
would..."
"Yes, ser."
"And Askad, too."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn glances at the tree crown, as if to
check to see that nothing else lurks there, then back at the two lancers.
"I'll be acting as squad leader... for the rest of the patrol...." He
lets his words trail off, before straightening in the saddle. "...wish...
otherwise." He closes his mouth and slowly turns the gelding.
"Captain's upset...."
"...wouldn't you be...."
"...he charged that lizard... saved
three-four last spring... and those cats... doesn't get upset... just killed
three... right here...."
"...doesn't like to lose
lancers..."
Lorn rides slowly back to Kusyl, shaking
his head. "It shouldn't have happened this way."
"That sort of thing happens,
Captain," Kusyl replies with a long face. "Happened before, try to
avoid it, but you spread out too much, and they get away. Won't be the last
time 'less we get more lancers."
"We won't get enough." Lorn
laughs, a harsh bark. "We're not getting any until winter turn." He
takes a deep breath. "If you'd set up the sentries, Kusyl. I need a
moment. Then... then we'll have to send another messenger to the
Engineers."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn needs more than a moment, but a moment
is all he will get, since he will have to take over the first squad, and watch
them as well.
The slow roll of thunder from the south,
from over the Accursed Forest, passes across the Second Company, and the south
wind rises, with the hint of dampness that foretells the rain and the mud Lorn
is expecting.
Then too, before long, he expects Majer
Maran will be arriving. Of that, Lorn has no doubts.
LXXXVII
Lorn
glances out the inner study window into the courtyard, where the early fall
sunshine bathes the white granite in a clear light. Then his eyes drop to the
stacks of papers on his table desk.
In the outer study, a dazed-looking Kusyl
is reading through all the personnel files in the foot chest. Lorn worries
about Kusyl's administrative abilities, but Kusyl can read and write, if
slightly laboriously, since lancers are not promoted to squad leaders, even
junior ones, unless they can. More important to Lorn is that Kusyl, rough-edged
as he is, is loyal to Lorn and to the Mirror Lancers, not to blind ambition.
Should Lorn have acted against Olisenn? How
could he not? Maran would not have transferred the man, and even a request for
transfer would have created the incentive for Olisenn, or Maran, to act against
Lorn, and Lorn does not wish to have to deal with both Olisenn and Maran at
once. Lorn has no doubts, even if he has no proof, that Olisenn was an
accomplice in the removal of Captain Dymytri. And Lorn has seldom regretted
acting; he has regretted more the times when he has not acted, as in the case
of Myryan's consorting, which he fears will harm her more than he knows.
Still... that he has been forced so to act troubles him.
He glances over the scrolls.
Although he has finished the patrol report
summary to Majer Maran and the request for a replacement squad leader and the
authority to promote Kusyl permanently to senior squad leader, Lorn has more
than a few tasks of his own remaining.
One of them is to request, again,
replacement lancers for his understrength company. Another is to write to his
family, carefully, since Maran will certainly intercept such a scroll and read
it. He must also consider how to change the tactics of approach to the fallen
trees, in such a way that seems, if not natural, at least understandable to his
men.
Lorn picks up the pen. A scroll to
Commander Meylyd for more lancers will be the easiest. He does not expect much,
but knows that if he does not request such, he will be considered lacking in
concern for accomplishing his duties and protecting both the people of Cyad and
his lancers.
After he completes it, his eyes scan the
page.
...the
first squad of the Second Company stands at twelve lancers, with no squad
leader, only an acting leader from those twelve. The second squad consists of
thirteen lancers and the new senior squad leader. Second Company is less than
two thirds its normal complement... but has been tasked with handling double
the number of ward-wall breaches seen in past three-season periods running from
winter through summer. Therefore... requesting replacement lancers to bring the
Company to full complement, and your action, insofar as dispatching or
promoting a permanent junior squad leader....
Lorn sets aside the scroll to dry and
starts on the second one, the one to his family that will doubtless be read by
Maran or Meylyd.
...the
past seasons have exacted a toll on my company, for the Accursed Forest has
continued to press against the ward-walls with continued presence. More than
that, it would not be proper to say, save that we have persevered against all
manner of obstacles foreseen and unforeseen... most difficult charge is to
ensure that the wild creatures do not escape to plague the people of Cyad and
yet not to expose the lancers to untoward harm or attack from such creatures...
few understand the true need for the tasks which I now undertake, nor would I
before I had come to Jakaafra....
...trust
that all is well with you in Cyad, and that Myryan's gardens have indeed borne
the fruits she has hoped for and that Jerial continues to find satisfaction in
her duties as healer....
Lorn smiles as he adds the next line.
...I
have not had the time to discover new vintages here in Jakaafra, and so
doubtless will return to Cyad in years to come with my palate at a great
disadvantage....
A few more lines about the apples in
Jakaafra, and the joy of cooler weather, and he signs it and sets it aside to
dry.
Then he leans back, thinking about tactics.
Exactly how can he change formations and approaches to let him use chaos more
freely without close scrutiny-and make such a change seem acceptable to the
lancers, without their noticing what he must do?
He closes his eyes, mentally trying to
visualize what Second Company has done so often, and dares do no longer.
The scroll to Ryalth will wait until he is
in his own quarters and probably until evening.
LXXXVIII
Outside
Lorn's inner study, the first cold rain of fall splats on the ancient
blued-glass panes, and chill radiates from the glass far, far older than
Lorn-or than Majer Maran, who lounges in the single chair across the table desk
from Lorn.
"You have had some time to consider
the message in which I conveyed the sentiments of Commander Meylyd."
Maran's blue eyes express concern. "Those are also the sentiments of the
Majer-Commander in Cyad."
Despite the headache engendered by the
storm outside, Lorn returns the smile with one equally warm. "I appreciated
that you made the effort to make matters clear. When one is spending most of
his days patrolling the ward-wall and attempting to contain the Accursed
Forest's creatures and efforts with far too few lancers, one has a tendency to
forget that there are other concerns."
"You have indeed grasped the
difficulties facing the Mirror Lancers and Commander Meylyd," Maran says
warmly. "He and the Majer-Commander must ensure that all lancer officers,
especially captains who command patrol companies, carry out their duties in a
way that is harmonious with the distinguished reputation of the Mirror Lancers,
and that their enthusiasm for the accomplishment of their individual duties and
the well-being of their lancers does not create a situation at variance with the
higher goals of the Mirror Lancers. You understand that, and it is indeed
rewarding to work with such a perceptive officer."
"I doubt that I am that
perceptive," Lorn demurs, "and for that I have welcomed your
instructions and advice."
"You have obviously considered in
great depth my earlier suggestions, Captain," Maran observes, "and I
look forward to telling Commander Meylyd that there will be no more reports of
creatures that have escaped from the Accursed Forest to plague and disturb the
people of Cyad. In fact, I will be assuring him that you have gone to great
lengths in using the traditional methods of patrolling to make sure of
such."
"Second Company will be employing all
the truly traditional means at its disposal to carry out the instructions you
have conveyed," Lorn replies.
"The Commander will be most
pleased." Maran's seemingly endless smile is replaced with an expression
of mild concern. "There is one other matter."
"Yes, ser?" Lorn responds in a
tone of respect.
"We were all so disturbed to hear of
the death of senior squad leader Olisenn. He was experienced and
well-respected." Maran touches the end of his short and trim mustache.
"I suppose that an accidental death from a misaimed firelance was one of
the few ways such an experienced lancer could have died."
Lorn nods. "It's always the things you
don't prepare for, I've discovered, Majer, that are the ones that are the most
dangerous. That accident was something that none of us anticipated, and that
could not have been foreseen. I have been reviewing approach plans to ensure
that nothing of that sort will occur again in Second Company."
"You make it sound as though one must
be prepared for everything." Maran laughs warmly and gently. "No
lancer officer can prepare for everything. No matter how hard he works, there
will always be surprises. That's what makes life interesting." The laugh
is followed by the warm smile that Maran always bears. "Still, your
efforts under slightly strenuous circumstances have revealed that your emphasis
on preparedness may indeed bear welcome fruit, and we look forward to your
future reports."
"Have you and Commander Meylyd had a
chance to consider the replacement lancer request which accompanied my last
reports?" Lorn smiles off-handedly. "I understand that you and the
Commander have much to consider, but since you are here in Jakaafra..."
"Ah... yes." Maran nods
knowingly. "You will receive replacements at the turn of season, some
three eightdays from now, as will all the ward-wall patrol companies. The
Commander would wish that we could have fully reinforced Second Company, rather
than only return you to three-quarter strength, but trained lancers are
becoming more scarce. And you have been dealing with the Forest without... permanent...
casualties for the last half season, excepting the unfortunate accident with
senior squad leader Olisenn. But that was not a result of the actions of the
Forest creatures."
"We have been fortunate," Lorn
admits. "It would be best to be at full strength, but we understand all
the many requirements that the Mirror Lancers and Commander Meylyd and you must
address." He raises his eyebrows. "The barbarians? Are their
depredations... ?"
"We are not informed of such, but I
would surmise so." Maran's smile widens, and he stands. "I fear I
have little else to add."
"You have been most kind and
helpful," Lorn responds as he also stands.
"Oh... and Captain Lorn, I must tell
you again that Commander Meylyd will be most pleased to learn of your success
in containing the Accursed Forest with the traditional methods. He looks
forward to your continuing success with such." Maran's smile and blue eyes
remain warm.
"As do we," Lorn replies, adding
after a slight pause, "Will you be staying at Jakaafra tonight?"
"Alas, those higher duties call, and I
will be returning to Westend with the Engineers' firewagon, so that I may
attend Commander Meylyd tomorrow." Maran offers a last smile. "I do
appreciate your concern for my comfort and welfare, and I would that you know I
feel the same for yours."
Lorn bows. "A fruitful journey,
Majer."
"It has been, Captain Lorn, most
fruitful." The majer returns the bow before he departs.
LXXXIX
Ser?"
Lorn glances up from the papers on his table
desk, papers covered with lines and angles and distances-and the rough-scrawled
shape of a fallen tree... and a set of double lines that represent the
northwest ward-wall.
"Yes, Kusyl?"
"The replacement lancers just rode in,
ser. There's someone to see you, ser."
"Have him come in."
"Yes, ser."
The tall and broad-shouldered lancer with
the single stripe of a junior squad leader on his sleeve steps into the inner
study. "Squad Leader Shynt, ser. Reporting, ser, as junior squad leader to
the Second Company." The swarthy and black-haired Shynt utters the words
as though they were a sentence to death or exile, his baritone voice bleak and
without emotion.
"Close the door and sit down,
Shynt." Lorn gestures to the chair across from him and carefully stacks
the papers, then replaces the pen in its holder.
"Yes, ser."
Shynt sits lance-straight on the edge of
the armless chair across from Lorn.
"Black angels only know what you've
been told about Second Company, Shynt." Lorn's voice is conversational.
"Would you care to share any of that, or would you prefer I guess?"
"Ser... I've been told nothing."
Shynt's voice remains bleak.
Lorn ignores the lie, then tilts his head
to the side slightly. "You are a very good squad leader, and you also
dislike incompetent captains. You aren't good at concealing that fact, and as
soon as the opening for a squad leader here appeared, you were selected."
"Ser?" For the first time,
Shynt's voice loses its almost brittle edge.
"You were doubtless allowed to
learn-and someone will ensure you hear it if you haven't already-that I'd
managed to lose the most experienced squad leader in all of the Forest patrol
companies through a totally avoidable mistake. Then, I'm sure through overhearing
and 'accident,' you were allowed to discover that more Forest outbreaks occur
along the northeast wall than along any ward-wall, and that Commander Meylyd
and others are most concerned about that and about Second Company. Finally,
someone suggested, most indirectly, that only you could put it right, leaving
matters to your own initiative."
Shynt remains rigid in the chair, as if he
dares not speak.
"You also probably escorted the most
inept group of replacement lancers you have ever seen, and have just discovered
that they won't bring either squad up to more than three-quarter
strength."
When Lorn stops talking, silence is the
only response.
"And now you don't know what to
say," Lorn laughs softly, ironically, but Shynt remains immobile. "That's
because most or all of what I've said appears true to you, and because you know
you can't lie convincingly, which is why you were picked for this impossible
duty assignment." He pauses. "Except it's not impossible. Only Majer
Maran believes it's impossible, because he believes concealment and evasion are
stronger than truth." Lorn's amber eyes lock on Shynt's black ones.
"Tell me, squad leader Shynt, are you strong enough to deal with
truth?"
"Yes, ser." Shynt's tone is close
to defiant.
"Good. Before you leave the outer
office, before you do anything, you will read all the patrol reports for the
last five years, and you will tally up all the fallen tree trunks encountered
by Second Company under each of its captains. You will also tally the casualties
by year under each captain. You may ask senior squad leader Kusyl any questions
you wish, and I suggest you do. Then, you will come back into my office and
report what you have discovered. Is that clear?"
"Yes, ser." An edge of
bewilderment colors the squad leader's voice.
"Good." Lorn stands. "I will
be here as long as it takes you. But, since we'd both like to eat, I suggest
you set to it." He bends and lifts the unlocked foot chest, setting it on
the side of the table desk. "You may read anything else in here as well,
if you think it will help your understanding."
"Yes, ser."
Shynt takes the chest carefully, and Lorn
opens the door to the outer study for him, then closes it and returns to the
diagrams and calculations on the papers that he unstacks and spreads once more
before him.
It is late afternoon before there is a
thrap on the door, although at times Lorn has heard voices, often intense, if
whispered, as though Lorn might have been listening.
"Come in," Lorn says, restacking
the tactics sheets, with which he thinks he has reached a solution.
"Ser?" Shynt stands in the
doorway with the foot chest in his arms. "Might I return this?"
"Come on in and close the door. Set it
on the floor against the wall there."
Shynt deposits the foot chest carefully,
then straightens. "Ser... I apologize."
"Accepted, without reservation. Now...
sit down and tell me what you discovered." Lorn gestures to the armless
chair.
"Ser..." After he seats himself,
Shynt raises a single sheet of paper. "I could tell you the numbers, but
you know them. Else you would not have asked. You had a few more casualties in
your first season than the other captains. Your-Second Company had close to
four-fold the number of fallen trunks. You have continued to encounter more
fallen trunks, but your casualties for the past two seasons are less than any
other captain's in a season."
Lorn nods. "Do you see why I wanted
you to read those reports?"
"Yes, ser."
"Did you talk to Kusyl?"
"Yes, ser."
Lorn nods.
Shynt looks down, then the black eyes meet
Lorn's. "Ser... it be not my province to ask...."
"But you'd feel more comfortable
knowing what you stepped into and how it happened?"
"Yes, ser."
"That's understandable." Lorn
fingers his chin, leaning back slightly in his chair. "I am not certain
that there is a simple answer. I'll try. When the large trees fall, they create
a breach in the ward-wall. With each breach, Accursed Forest creatures wait for
lancers to arrive. We don't know why this is so, and it is not written down
anywhere, but it happens. The more trees that fall, the more attacks on
lancers, and if the lancers are not very careful and very good, the more
creatures that escape to attack the people and herds and flocks beyond the
deadland." Lorn smiles. "There is nothing new about that. But... you
know there are only so many chaos towers that charge our firelances and that
not every person makes a good lancer?"
"Yes, ser."
"And you have heard that the
barbarians to the north are mounting more attacks every year."
Shynt nods.
"If the Mirror Lancers do not provide
more lancers in the north, then the Emperor will not be able to protect his
people from the barbarians. If there are more lancers in the north, but not
that many more lancers in all the Mirror Lancers..." Lorn waits.
"There must be fewer lancers
here."
"And you have seen that this is
true," Lorn concludes. "But if we have fewer lancers, and more trees
falling, what will happen here in Jakaafra?"
"Second Company must face more wild
creatures with fewer lancers... and there is the possibility that more will
escape?"
Lorn nods. "Let us say that one giant
cat escapes-just one-for every tenth tree-fall. If three tree-falls occur in a
season, how many cats will escape over the year?"
"One... three over two years."
"Now... what happens when a company
faces twenty-four tree falls in not quite three seasons?" Lorn answers the
question before Shynt can. "You would have six giant cats loose." He
smiles crookedly. "I suggested such to Commander Meylyd in requesting a
full replacement complement. It was not well-received." Lorn shrugs.
"We have done better than that- with only three giant cats loose, as I recall,
but there have also been more than a few night leopards that escaped.
"I have changed the Patrol procedures
slightly. We do not send a messenger for the Mirror Engineers until after we
have been attacked by Forest creatures. We move toward the crown of the tree
from the perimeter road, with two squads flanking it at a half-square angle,
and we use but short bursts on the firelances."
"Such procedures have worked. Your
casualties have been reduced."
Lorn nods. "I have been strongly
requested to return to 'traditional' lancer patrol techniques, but I have been
also ordered not to allow any wild creatures to escape." A crooked smile
follows. "Squad leader Olisenn was most committed to traditional
procedures, and I fear that his inability to adapt to the new procedures may
have contributed to his ending up in the line of a firelance. I do not know
that, but that is all I can surmise."
Shynt nods slowly. "If I might ask,
ser... what patrol tactics will you adopt?"
Lorn grins. "I am informing Majer
Maran that I am abandoning those procedures about which he and Commander Meylyd
had expressed concern and that Second Company intends to do its utmost to stop
any wild creatures from escaping the deadland."
Shynt almost smiles. "Ah... I
see."
"Then we will see." Lorn looks at
the black-eyed squad leader. "So long as no creatures escape and I do not
disobey any direct orders, we will doubtless hear little."
Shynt nods. "Thank you, ser."
Lorn stands. "I'm glad you're here.
Kusyl will introduce you to First Squad, and I'll ride mostly with you on
patrols to begin with, until we're comfortable."
As Kusyl leaves with the junior squad
leader, Lorn closes the door, then turns. He looks out the study window at the
gray clouds that will become more prevalent as winter nears, recalling the
lines from the poem in the silver-covered book.
Provisions must be made.
Lorn has made them.
XC
The
evening is cold and overcast as Lorn walks across the damp stones of the
courtyard to the stable, and the mist rising from the stones swallows much of
the light from the lamps set in their bronze brackets along the walls. The
captain wears two sabres-a lancer officer's sabre on his right and the Brystan
sabre on his left. He also carries a firelance. His steps are sure, silent, as
he slips into the warmth of the stable and the welcoming scent of dry straw.
"Suforis?"
"Coming, ser." Suforis scurries
out from the tack room. "You going out tonight, ser?" asks the blond
ostler. "It be mighty chill and damp, and with you starting out on another
patrol tomorrow...."
"I know. I won't be riding far or
hard, and I won't overheat him." Lorn smiles. "I promise. It's just a
short ride."
"Be but a moment, ser." The young
ostler hurries off.
Lorn glances around the stable as Suforis
saddles the gelding. As always, the structure is swept and clean, without a
trace of cobwebs or dust, and the wood of the stall boxes gleams in the dim
lamplight.
Suforis returns, leading the gelding and
looking anxiously at the lancer captain as he hands over the mount's reins.
"I'd be going, ser, but if you'd not be long..."
"You like being consorted?"
Suforis flushes. "Ah... yes, ser.
Much, ser."
"Good for you." Lorn's laugh is
warm and friendly. "I will not be long, but I can groom and stall him, and
I would not wish that you keep your consort waiting." Lorn slips the
single firelance into its holder.
"I could wait, ser."
"Go." Lorn smiles before leading
the gelding out through the stable doors and into the mist of the courtyard.
"You've been here late enough."
Outside, in the thickening mist; Lorn
mounts and rides slowly to the open gates. The clicking of the gelding's hoofs
is preternaturally loud, amplified by the mist and dampness.
"Ser?" asks the gate guard on the
right as Lorn reins up in the light of the lamp. "You going out?"
"I won't be too long. I just need a
quiet ride to think."
"Ah... yes, ser."
Lorn nods and guides the gelding out into
the misty darkness beyond the walls. He hopes that the combination of the mist,
the darkness, and the closeness to the ward-wall will preclude anyone using a
chaos glass to determine exactly what he does. The sentries' low voices are
carried through the dampness to Lorn as he guides the gelding toward the
ward-wall.
"...got much to think of..."
"...all do... not be an officer for a
guarantee to the Steps of Paradise...."
"...not like as we'd be getting either
such, Myttr..."
"...none of them, neither..."
A faint smile appears and disappears,
unseen, as Lorn continues to ride along the cross-road that leads to the
ward-wall. To his left, he is aware of, but cannot see, the granite structure
holding the northpoint chaos towers. Once he reaches the ward-wall, he rides to
the southwest for perhaps another kay before he turns the gelding to face the
ward-wall and then reins up, roughly midway between two of the wall-ward
crystals.
For several long moments, he studies the
whiteness of the granite wall and the darkness that looms behind the wall and
the chaos-net broadcast by the crystal wards. Among the scents that drift out
of the darkness is that of erhenflower. Did it originally come from the
Accursed Forest?
Lorn draws the Brystan sabre, then
concentrates on the flickering chaos-net, grasping that flow with his chaos
senses and turning it aside, to open once more that narrow window or door to
the massive intertwining of order and chaos beyond the white granite of the
ward-wall.
This time... although a narrow aperture is
open-there is no immediate thrust of power toward the lancer captain, not of
chaos or of black order.
Lorn waits, the black-iron-cored Brystan
sabre in his right hand, his eyes and senses on the Accursed Forest.
As he waits, an image builds, one of
bubbling red-white fountains of chaos, of dark pillars of order, and deep ponds
of a different kind-or color-of order, more shaded in deep gray, and then vines
of golden-white chaos twining around the dark order pillars. That mental image
vanishes and is followed by a second image-one of which he has dreamed more
than once.
Knives of white fire gouge the very earth,
laying down deep trenches that stretch across the land, and from those trenches
rise white walls, walls that burn into Lorn's flesh if he is to so much as move
toward them. Beyond the trenches is fire, an endless fire that turns the very
land and trees into ashes. Rivers are wrenched from their courses, and hills
are flattened by other knives of focused chaos.
Lorn finds he is sweating profusely as the
images break off, despite the misty chill.
A single beam of chaos-order lances through
the aperture that he has created. The sabre flashes up, almost without Lorn's
volition, and catches that narrow line of power.
Lorn struggles, both instantly and
endlessly, it seems, to re-cast the fire back at the base of the ward-wall
where it splays across the granite and fountains upward in a flare of light.
Even as he directs that energy, so much vaster than any mage firebolt he has
seen, even as he lets the chaos-net flow back into place, cutting off the flow
of linked order and chaos, Lorn understands that what the Accursed Forest has
cast out is but a fraction of the power it possesses.
Lorn also understands not just within his
thoughts, but with every sense and feeling he has, that the Forest's power lies
in the melding of all that is within the Forest-and that Cyador and the Forest
cannot occupy the same lands. With that feeling comes a sadness, a melancholy,
as if it should not be so, and yet cannot be otherwise.
After sheathing the sabre, he turns the
gelding, without looking back at the ward-wall or the Forest beyond, wondering,
not for the first time, why the Forest has not tried in greater fashion to
overwhelm him. Because it cannot, or because it understands that his death
would avail it little? He laughs softly. The latter is true enough, for if he
died, the chaos net would flow back in place. But does a forest, however filled
with order and chaos, have that kind of understanding? Or does it just play the
very patterns of order and chaos, without understanding, in the way that a
river must follow the lines of the land?
It comes to him, as he nears the gate to
the compound, that he will never know that answer, and that, too, casts another
kind of melancholy over him.
"Ser?"
"It's me. Captain Lorn."
"Getting worried about you, ser."
Lorn avoids looking surprised. Has he been
gone that long? "I appreciate your concern."
"Saw some torches out there...."
"I was trying something with a
firelance," Lorn explains. "It must have taken longer than I
realized."
"That be no problem, ser."
"Good night." Lorn offers a smile
and guides the white gelding through the gate. He can tell now that he has not
been gone that long, but he wonders how bright his manipulation of order and
chaos was to have been seen through nearly two kays of the misting rain.
Suforis has indeed gone, but left a single
lamp lighted, and the stable door slightly ajar.
Opening the door, Lorn smiles and leads the
gelding back to the stall to unsaddle and groom him.
When he finally returns to his quarters,
the first thing he does is set the unused firelance in the corner. Then he goes
to the wardrobe and studies his face in the mirror on its door. His skin is
flushed, red, as if sunburned, as it has been when he has manipulated the
ward-wall chaos-net before.
He shakes his head, then removes his belt
and sabres, followed by the damp tunic that he hangs on one of the wall pegs.
His sits on the chair and pulls off both boots before he returns to the second
drawer on the side of the wardrobe. From there he removes the chaos glass and
carries it to the narrow desk.
With a half-cynical smile, Lorn looks at
the glass, then concentrates on Maran.
The silver swirls part slowly, and the
image of the dark-haired and mustached Majer Maran appears in the center of
those swirls. Maran sits before his own desk, pausing as if thinking, with a
scroll below, and a half-empty goblet of an amber wine to his left. The majer's
face stiffens, as if he too can sense a chaos glass scrutinizing him.
Lorn smiles coldly and releases the image,
quickly replacing the chaos glass between the smallclothes in the wardrobe.
He has barely found Ryalth's volume of
ancient poems and stretched out in his trousers and undertunic on his bed,
looking at the silver-covered book, before he can feel the chill of someone
using a chaos glass to see him. He smiles faintly, but does not reveal that he
senses the screeing. Nor does he nod, but merely continues to study the
shimmering cover of the volume of poems, knowing that Maran will puzzle over
that cover.
As the mental coldness created by the
distant user of the glass lifts, Lorn finally opens the book, selecting a page
he has read before, the one Ryalth selected for him so many years before, yet
one whose feelings seem familiar despite the antique slanting characters and
the references and the style used by the ancient writer.
SHOULD I RECALL THE RATIONAL STARS?
There I had a tower for the skies,
where the rooms were clear...
Should I recall the Rational Stars?
Or hold my ruin on this hill
where new-raised walls are still,
Perfect granite set jagged on the dawn,
with striped awnings spread across the
lawn...
Lorn thinks about the concluding words,
then reads them softly, aloud, in the stillness of his chamber.
Oh... take these new lake isles and green
green seas;
take these sylvan ponds and soaring trees;
take these desert dunes and sunswept sands,
and pour them through your empty hands.
Almost... almost... those words bring up
feelings like those evoked by the Accursed Forest with its images. Or were the
images his-created within his mind by something different from the Forest?
Lorn closes the silver cover of the thin
volume, shaking his head slowly. Then he stands and replaces the volume in his
wardrobe and begins to complete his disrobing. The words of the ancient writer
and the melancholy they hold flows over and through him.
Should I recall the Rational Stars...?
XCI
Although
Lorn has expected more treefalls as a reaction to his "practice"
sessions along the ward-wall, there have been none for two full round-trip
patrols to Eastend and back since Shynt's arrival. The only remnant of Lorn's
efforts in the nights along the ward-wall is the occasional sense of melancholy
he feels when he looks beyond the white granite of the ward-wall at the
towering trunks and high canopied greenery of the Accursed Forest. He has also
had one more dream about walls that burn and rivers being wrenched from their
beds.
The lancer captain pushes that thought away
as he rides with junior squad leader Shynt on the wall road, his eyes scanning the
ward-wall, the Accursed Forest, and the granite stones of the road. As always,
the Forest retains its greenery, even as winter is arriving beyond the
ward-wall, with chill winds and graying winter leaves, even as Lorn and Second
Company ride through a gray early morning on the second day of another outbound
patrol from Jakaafra. He is reminded once more of the differences outside and
within the wall by the zzzzpp of an expiring flowerfly against the chaos-net.
Lorn wonders how long before they will confront
another fallen tree, and how long before Majer Maran again appears at Jakaafra
and under what pretense. Lorn also ponders how he also must carry out his
commitment to Ryalth in a manner that meets the full requirements of
consortship, yet in a way which protects her more than it threatens her. And he
must continue to improve his control of chaos and order while not letting his
lancers know that is what he does. That is one reason why he bears two
firelances in a specially adapted holder. He smiles at that thought, for no
one, not even Kusyl, has asked about the twin lances.
"Cool and damp, maybe get wetter,
ser," offers Shynt.
"Colder, I'd say, but not
wetter." Lorn is beginning to sense irregularities in the chaos net and
the flow of chaos force along the wall, but says nothing, just keeps watching
the wall ahead as the lancers ride southeast.
It is not quite mid-morning when Lorn
senses what he has known must be coming, and not much after that when a lancer
reports, "Fallen tree ahead, ser!"
"Shynt, have them form up five abreast
and ride out to the perimeter road," Lorn orders.
"Yes, ser."
Lorn turns the gelding across the dampened
but not yet muddy earth of the deadland, and he and the first squad cross soil
that smells vaguely of a harbor, and more so with each hoof that strikes it.
Kusyl and the second squad are waiting at
the perimeter road for Lorn and the first squad, reined up a good kay to the
south of the point on the road directly north of the fallen tree.
"First squad stands ready, ser,"
Kusyl reports as Lorn and Shynt ride up.
"Good. We'll stay on the road until
we're opposite the crown, and then reform into two squads. The men know we'll
be trying something different this time?" He looks at Shynt, then Kusyl.
"Yes, ser."
Lorn nods and urges the white gelding along
the perimeter road, his eyes checking the tree canopy as they ride closer, but
he sees no creatures on the trunk or beyond the canopy, not that he would
expect such.
Finally, he turns, "Halt here."
"First squad, halt!"
"Second squad, halt!"
Lorn turns the gelding off the road and
rides forward perhaps a hundred cubits before reining up and waiting for the
two squads to form up flanking him.
"Second squad forward!"
"First squad, right turn."
As the squads draw into their staggered
five-abreast formations, Lorn continues to watch the fallen tree, but sees
nothing. To his left, he knows, perhaps as few as five kays southeast, lies the
non-functional midpoint chaos tower, but it is just beyond his vision.
"Second squad stands ready, ser!"
Kusyl calls.
"First squad ready."
Lorn raises his hand, then begins to ride
forward, alone between the squads as they close the distance to the crushed
canopy of the fallen tree. Approximately seventy-five cubits separate Lorn from
the first squad on his right, and seventy-five cubits from the second squad on
his left. He now wears the Brystan sabre on his waist, although he has never
called attention to his switch in weapons. And he carries the two firelances in
their specially adapted lance-holder.
When Lorn is about five hundred cubits from
the tangled and crushed crown vegetation, he removes one of the two firelances,
and calls, "Lances ready! Prepare to discharge."
Both squad leaders echo his command.
In near silence that follows, as Second
Company rides closer, Lorn's hearing seems to sharpen and he can pick up a few
phrases across the distance.
"Why is he doing it like that?"
"...maybe since the old squad leader
got killed..."
"...like he's mad..."
"...more like bait, 'cept he's got
teeth..."
"Cats get him sometime..."
"You haven't seen him..."
At two hundred cubits from the tree's
canopy Lorn can sense the tension ahead, and calls out again, "Prepare to
discharge lances!"
The gelding has carried Lorn to within a
hundred and fifty cubits from the canopy when the pair of giant cats break from
the screen afforded by the twisted limbs. They bound, predictably, bound toward
Lorn, drawn by the sense of chaos and order he embodies.
Lorn raises his firelance, aiming at the
rear cat, the one that will always turn and angle away, given the opportunity,
waiting until the beast is almost within the range of a traditional firelance.
Hhsstt! The animal drops as the single bolt
drills through it, a firebolt that does not curve that noticeably under Lorn's
chaos control.
The first giant cat seems almost to
stumble, then launches itself toward the lancer captain.
Hhhsssttt! The line of fire burns away its
eyes and upper skull. Lorn does not lower the firelance until he is certain the
beast is dead.
"...see what I mean..."
"...no one that good with a
lance..."
"...captain is..."
"First squad! Close in about fifteen
cubits!" Lorn orders, mentally checking the angles as he overtly switches
firelances. Next, once they are within a hundred cubits, will come an attack by
the night leopards.
Lorn slows the gelding until the first
squad has eased toward him, closing the gap that had widened back to about
seventy-five cubits, before he lets his mount resume a slightly faster walk
southward and toward the creatures that await them.
The strange sense of melancholy passes over
him, but he pushes it aside, his eyes and senses centered on the danger ahead.
The canopy branches rustle, then tremble,
but no leopards appear. Lorn slows the gelding, knowing that the attack will
and must come, that it will follow patterns that the Accursed Forest has set.
"Stand by to discharge lances! Short bursts!"
That command is barely repeated before the
two packs of leopards emerge and accelerate toward the lancers. "Discharge
at will!" Hhsst! Hssst! Hssst! Firelance bursts flare across the packs.
Lorn wheels the gelding to the right, charging just behind the first squad,
moving to anticipate the pair of lagging leopards who will sprint northwest to
escape the lancers.
Focusing his firelance on the leading black
cat of the two that trail, he discharges the entire lance before the cat
staggers and tumbles. The trailing cat, cut off by Lorn's charge, abruptly
shifts and springs straight toward the captain.
Lorn takes down the last leopard with the
Brystan blade-or actually-the chaos-fire he extends beyond the cupridium tip of
the curved blade. At the angle he has used, he doubts that his lancers have
seen what he has done, and even if they have, few if any will understand or
remember that the sabre seemed impossibly long for one short moment, but Lorn
has no intention of allowing the cat close enough to harm him or his mount.
Breathing heavily, Lorn reins up the
gelding. He still holds the depleted firelance and the Brystan sabre. Once he
is certain both fleeing leopards are dead, he switches firelances, and turns
the gelding back toward the point where, as he has ordered earlier, the two
squads have drawn up facing and flanking the crushed canopy of the fallen tree.
The two squad leaders ride from their
squads and toward Lorn, reining up perhaps fifteen cubits away from their
captain.
"First squad reports, no creatures
escaped, ser," reports Shynt.
"Second squad reports, no creatures
escaped, ser," states Kusyl.
"Good." Lorn nods. "I'll
have the message for the Mirror Engineers in a moment." His eyes burn, and
his head throbs from his use of order and chaos. As he continues to look at the
two squad leaders, his vision blurs, and for a time, there are two images of
the two men.
He blinks, and the images merge, but the
headache remains. Also, he is aware that his uniform is far damper than those
of his squad leaders and lancers, and even the muscles in his thighs are close
to cramping. Still, he turns in the saddle and says easily, "Kusyl, Shynt,
have the squads stand by with lances ready, but if there's no movement for a
while, then you can set up the sentries for the afternoon and evening."
"Yes, ser," reply both squad
leaders in near-unison.
Lorn slowly replaces the sabre and the
firelance, and then pulls out the message blank for the Engineers. Even at one
tree-fall every three patrols, it will be a long winter.
XCII
Lorn
reins up under the green barrel and just beyond the narrow porch that leads
into Dustyn's establishment. As he dismounts, the lancer captain glances upward
at the heavy gray clouds, hoping that his business with the factor will not
take too long and that he can ride back to the compound before the downpour
that threatens actually begins. He ties the gelding to the bronze ring of the
hitching post outside Dustyn's narrow porch, then climbs the steps and enters
the narrow foyer.
He reaches to pick up the bell when the
thin face of the factor appears.
"Morning, Captain," offers
Dustyn. "Must be a stand-down day for Second Company, seeing as you'd be
here so early in the day."
"It is one of those few days,"
Lorn admits.
"You'd be wanting some of the
Alafraan, I'd wager, not waiting for your messenger fellow to bring it."
"I could do with a bottle or
two," Lorn admits, "but that's not the reason I came."
Dustyn opens the door and gestures for Lorn
to follow him along the corridor and into a side study even smaller than the
one assigned to Lorn at the northpoint compound. Besides the small high desk
there are but two stools. The inner wall is stacked with foot chests, three
abreast and two high. The gray curtains on the single window are dusty. Lorn
ignores the cobwebs as he takes the proffered stool.
"And what can this poor factor in
spirits and other liquids be doing for a mighty captain of lancers, might I
ask?" Dustyn grins at his own words.
"Well might you ask," Lorn
returns, grinning as well, "for you are a well-respected factor, and one
who can accomplish tasks that none would know or suspect, saving that they be
accomplished, and none beside you could have done the same."
Dustyn guffaws, shaking his head.
"Aye, and you should a' been a factor with such words, or stayed in the
family trade, if'n that were their lineage."
Lorn looks at Dustyn, continuing to grin.
"Well... you are a factor, one who can arrange many things."
"So it is said, but what is said is
often more than I can do." Dustyn chortles loudly. "And I tell folk
that I can do anything!"
"Do your talents go so far as to
arranging for a consorting, one to be recorded here in Jakaafra?"
Dustyn frowns. "One of the parties,
the man to be sure, would have to live, say... in some proximity and be known
by someone... if one of your lancers... you and I could... you know, such is
frowned upon...."
"But not forbidden," Lorn points
out. "All who have left their families' households or established their
own have the right to a consort of their choice."
"Aye, and like as it is not always
easy for such... should the households from which they come differ more than a
fingertip in... shall we say, the style of their lace and their privacy
screens?"
Lorn nods. "But I would have this
arranged. You-or those respected in Jakaafra-know the man, and some even know
of the woman."
"Why would... I should not ask."
"Let us just say that both the man and
the woman wish this consorting, and both are old enough and established in
their doings that consent is not required."
"Consent is always required of woman
of altage or elthage," Dustyn suggests carefully, "and even of women
who are merchanters, unless they hold the house."
"Consent is not required," Lorn
emphasizes, with a grin, "although discretion may be advisable."
Dustyn frowns.
"No ill will come to you," Lorn
says. "Has not your trading prospered from my suggestions?"
"Mightily, Captain, else I'd not be
listening." Dustyn's face is expressionless, except for his eyes, which
contain a hint of amusement. "Now... you want this to be a real
consorting?"
"A very real one."
"And am I to know the names of the
parties?"
"Not until that day, or as close to it
as possible." Lorn smiles. "You understand merchanting, for you are
an excellent factor, and you could call this consorting a matter of trade. It
is, in a way, as you will see when the season is right."
At the terms "a matter of trade,"
the factor's brow furrows slightly. "Now, Captain, I'd been thinking this
might be a lancer officer consorting with a lovely lady from, some might take
it, understand, a senior commander's household or even a Magi'i hold or a high
family... a love match, you might say."
Lorn smiles. "It is a love match,
Dustyn... and I promise that you will not be disappointed in either the match
or the trade that benefits you which will come from it."
The factor finally grins. "Captain...
all say you keep your word in a place that it be most hard to do, and I must
confess that I am mightily curious, but there be times to wait for the cat to
move, rather'n chase it, and this, I'd be thinking, is one of those
times."
"It is indeed one of those
times."
"Still... for it to be recorded here,
as a real consorting, I needs must know the names two days afore. Should be an
eightday, but... two days I can arrange, if that be suitable."
"Two days before you shall know, and
you will understand then." Lorn grins. "If you do not do so
before." He inclines his head. "Now... the second matter... the one
less difficult."
Dustyn inclines his head.
"You have seen that goods are coming
to reach me... ?"
"Ah, yes, ser. In point of being, that
I was going to tell you, it dropped clean from my thoughts at your...
request... you have received three more cases, and two others, of which I
cannot fathom."
Lorn nods. "It appears as though I
will be stationed here for a time, perhaps for many years, and my family is
attempting to make my life more comfortable, yet..."
"You'd be looking for a small place a
yer own? Thinking on... consorting, say?"
"I'm too young for that, yet,"
Lorn says with a straight face, "as this business has shown me for sure.
But... I'd not want to go through what this fellow will face when the time
might come. And, I cannot keep leaving cases in your cellar, not dry goods,
nor..." Lorn shrugs. "You know that officers often do such, because
we cannot keep much more than uniforms and weapons. I think I have a local
woman, a consort of one of those who maintain the compound who will keep such a
dwelling for when I need it. If you can find such a dwelling."
Dustyn laughs. "That be easier, far
easier than the first, for I know of four such, and that be without lifting my
eyes past the road east."
Lorn frowns.
"Ah... captain, the young folk now
flock to Cyad or Fyrad or even Geliendra. Even my own Asbyl-she be consorted to
a factor's son in Geliendra, and never shed a tear on her way south."
Dustyn shrugs. "Fact be... my ma's place. I fixed it for her, Asbyl, I
mean, even new tiles on the roof. I'd been wondering... you could have it for a
silver a season, if you'd be keeping it neat. If it's as you say, I'd be
selling it to you for ten golds, any day you wish."
"I would not wish to...."
"There's but three of us, and Hyul
took Da's place last year. Wryul'n I... our place got rooms we don't use from
one season to the next. Now... I couldn't give ma's place away'. Youd be doing
me a favor, a' sorts, and, well, without the trade you and your friends at
Ryalor House brought me... be a harder life for us...." Dustyn smiles
almost sheepishly.
Lorn lifts his hands helplessly.
"Done." He extends two silvers. "I'll take two bottles, and if
this would pay for the use of the dwelling for a pair of seasons."
"You trust speaks well for you,
Captain, but best you see it, first." Dustyn glances outside, not taking
the coins. "Not yet. You have a mount. I'd be meeting you in front."
Not long after Lorn has mounted, Dustyn
appears on an almost swaybacked brown mare, and the two men ride along the
narrow lane until it joins the road leaving Jakaafra to the east.
Lorn hopes that what Dustyn has said about
the dwelling is accurate, but the factor has been reasonably fair in all his
dealings. So the lancer captain rides and watches to see what awaits him on the
east road.
The dwelling sits on a low rise on the
eastern road from Jakaafra, less than a kay from the square, and just beyond
the kaystone that notes the town center is one kay away. The new roof tiles
glisten pale green, even in the dim light of the cloudy day.
Dustyn dismounts heavily, and limps
slightly, past the privacy screen and to the door, which he opens with an
ancient bronze key. Lorn follows, and silently walks through the house.
The dwelling is small, as Dustyn has said,
with but a bedchamber, a larger room containing a tiled stove and space for
eating and meeting, a bath-chamber, and a rear room for storage, no more than
five cubits on a side. There is a serviceable bed, even a doorless armoire, in
the sleeping chamber, and a table with three old oak chairs in the main room.
"Even got a handful of pots
there." The factor gestures to the golden oak cabinet beside the stove.
"And a few pieces of crockery."
The floor tiles are a pale blue, faded by
time, but not cracked, and the joins have been recently grouted. There are both
interior and exterior ceramic privacy screens, and the hedge providing privacy
for the small rear portico needs but little trimming. There is a stable that
will hold two horses, but without space for a carriage.
As the two stand looking at the privacy
screen before the front entrance, Lorn nods. "This will do well for
me."
"I was thinking it might."
Lorn extends the silvers again, adding a
third. "If I could trouble you to bring the goods in your cellar sometime
in the next eightday or so... ?"
"A pleasure, Captain, a
pleasure." Dustyn glances upward. "Best we be getting back. I'd not
be thinking I'd like to be getting too damp, and you've a much longer ride than
do I."
Lorn nods at that and remounts the gelding.
The first drops of rain begin to dribble
out of the gray sky when Lorn is little more than a kay out of the town of
Jakaafra on his return to the compound. By the time he rides through the gates
the rain is falling so fast that he can scarcely see a hundred cubits ahead,
and he is most grateful for the stone-surfaced roads of Cyador.
Water pours from his uniform and has
plastered his garrison cap and hair flat against his skull as he leads the
gelding from the downpour into the stable.
"Ser..." Suforis looks at Lorn
wide-eyed.
"I know," Lorn says tiredly.
"I know. But there are few days I even have free to get to Jakaafra."
"Yes, ser. I'll make sure he gets dry
and rubbed down."
"Thank you." Lorn takes the wine
and marches back through the rain-filled courtyard. His feet squush in his
boots as he walks down the corridor to his quarters. After wringing out his
uniforms, and hanging them out to dry-slowly, he suspects, Lorn changes into
dry trousers and a dry undertunic. Then, he dries and oils the sabre and leaves
it out of the scabbard, hoping both will dry before he has to leave on patrol
again.
Only then does he seat himself at his desk
and read through the last scroll from Ryalth once more.
...we
are quiet house and becoming regarded as an example for the Clanless Traders. I
have tried to keep our image that way. This has been helped by the occasional
appearance of a senior enumerator from elsewhere. It has also been aided by the
growth of our shipments of a golden brandy that is of high quality. Since it
and many of our more profitable items are shipped through Fyrad, we are known
to have distant contacts. Some of those contacts date from the other ship
disaster that we discussed. They are now pleased to see that house reborn
through its heir. That is well these days.
While we remain on the topmost level, we
are now paying for three times the space we had previously, and I have
purchased a warehouse from the Jekseng Clan that has never been regarded as
well-fated since it was once rented by a Hamorian trader. It helps to know the
past of some matters.
I see I have forgotten to tell you that,
because of certain information about timbers, Ryalor House has become involved
in other ventures which we should discuss before too long. The serving lady you
never met also says all is well.... and I look forward to hearing from you.
Lorn smiles and begins to pen his reply.
My
dearest trader,
My two-eightday furlough begins the ninth
eightday of winter, and I have made the arrangements discussed a year ago, and
am well-pleased with the thought of keeping my word on this matter. I am hoping
that it will be convenient for you to come to the town of Jakaafra at that
time, and I have arranged a modest dwelling for you, so that all can be handled
with decorum and grace. Should I not be immediately present on account of my
duties, inquire of the factor who has arranged much....
Should you wish to demur, I will make other
arrangements to keep this word whenever you desire it to be such....
Lorn frowns at his words. He does not wish
to seem too formal, but he does not wish Ryalth to be compromised in the event
the scroll falls into the wrong hands.
Finally, he concludes.
As you know, I am less than most perfectly
able to express myself under these circumstances, and must trust to words more
formal than what I feel, but I trust that my actions will express me far better
than my poor words, and that you will understand as you have done so well and
so often over the years.
He looks blankly toward the window and the
rain beyond as he finally seals the missive, his eyes fixed far beyond the
grayness of the compound.
XCIII
As the
white gelding carries him southeast along the road beside the white granite of
the ward-wall, Lorn wipes the cold drizzle off his forehead. Sweat continues to
ooze from under the garrison cap to mix with the fine rain. Without the oiled
white leather winter jacket, he would be soaked, but cold as it had been when
they had left Jakaafra, he had chosen the warmer jacket over a waterproof. The
weather has warmed somewhat, and under the jacket, even unfastened as it is, he
is too warm.
No lancer can carry enough for all types of
weather, not and be able to fight giant cats-not and carry two firelances and
two sabres.
"Far too wet and cold not to wear a
jacket," Shynt observes from where he rides on the outer side of the
ward-wall road, echoing Lorn's feelings, "and too warm to wear such."
Lorn shakes his head. "And it's not
really wet enough for this to help crops much, and too damp for healthy riding.
No one really benefits. Some patrols are like that."
"Most... in the winter."
The lancer captain nods in agreement, then
glances ahead. Through the mid-day drizzle, the white granite oblong bulk of
the structure housing the non-functioning midpoint chaos tower looms ahead and
slightly to the left of the ward-wall road. Before long, the first squad will
have to ride around the mid-point tower, and then, somewhere beyond that,
farther southeast, they will find another fallen tree.
It has been almost two eightdays and two
complete patrol circuits since he sent off his fateful scroll to Ryalth, and he
has heard nothing, but still he must deal with patrols and trees and escaped
creatures. Then, he reminds himself, it is still early for her response. He
turns back to study the wall. His eyes and senses check the chaos-net and the
increasingly irregular pulses of the chaos flows confirm to him that another
tree has fallen across the white granite barrier-several kays to the southeast
of the midpoint tower. The irregularity of the chaos-greater irregularity, he
corrects himself, for chaos flows are never regular-remind him again that he
pursues a dangerous path... as his father had suggested more than once.
Yet, being who he is, what other can he do?
Other than smile and make provisions.
Smile? The ancient words, in their slanted
characters, run through his mind.
Smiles... images on the pond of being,
reflections only made possible by the black depths beneath.
Black depths-he has black depths. That he
knows as he pushes the words away. He knows, too, that what he must do in
dealing with the fallen tree ahead-riding alone as a target-will work, and that
no wild creatures are likely to escape. He also knows that if too many more patrol
reports show neither casualties nor escaped animals, it will not be that long
before Majer Maran returns to Jakaafra with another chore in mind- one for
which Lorn is not certain he is fully prepared.
Provisions must be made... and I have made
them.
But are they enough? That... he will never
know, unless he fails, and then it will be too late. With a faint smile, Lorn
leans forward slightly in the saddle and runs the fingertips of his right hand
over the two firelances, one after the other. Both are fully charged. Then he
straightens up and studies the ward-wall to his right once more, trying to
guess how many kays they will ride before a lancer will spot the fallen Forest
tree, how many kays before he will have to use concealed chaos once more,
because a magus-born lancer cannot be suffered to be successful.
XCIV
Lorn
looks up from the patrol report he is writing as Kusyl stands by the door to
the inner study.
"This came with the Engineers,
ser." The senior squad leader extends the white and green sealed scroll.
Lorn stands to take it. "Thank you. It
will be a bit before I have the reports ready to go."
"Myserk will stop back before they
leave," Kusyl replies. "He understands." With a nod, he steps
back and closes the door.
Lorn
looks at the scroll, then forces himself to set it on the side of the desk. He
picks up the pen and continues until he reaches the last lines of the summary
that will be dispatched to Majer Maran.
...no
casualties, and no creatures escaped. Patrol remained on station at the fallen
trunk for two days until Mirror Engineers could respond. Return patrol without
Accursed Forest events.
With a smile of relief, he lays the summary
beside the completed full report for both to dry and finally picks up the
scroll Kusyl had brought him. Lorn is not that surprised to see that the seal
has been carefully slit from the paper and then re-heated-as shown by the
blurring of his father's "K" on the wax.
He breaks the seal and begins to read.
...is
always good to hear how well you are doing. I have received favorable reports
on your progress from many, including the officer who recommended you for
lancer training so many years ago. He continues in that post today as well as
then. Apparently, younger lancers are the ones who move more from duty
assignment to duty assignment....
Jerial has spent more time with me lately,
and perhaps I was too hasty in my suggestions about future consorts. This is
indeed something that we should discuss when you return, but I would like to
assure you that I now believe your earlier inclinations may have true merit,
and would be in your best interests if you still remain so inclined....
Lorn frowns. Has Jerial talked about Ryalth
to their father? Or has Ryalth's success become more noted? Or is something
else afoot about which Lorn knows nothing?
Vernt continues to pursue his efforts with
both diligence and recognition. He has been raised to a lower second level, as
has Ciesrt, although both are in very different aspects of magial endeavors.
Myryan's garden is a wonder, and she is most pleased with that aspect of her
life and dwelling....
Lorn winces. He suspects he knows exactly
what his father's words convey, and he can only hope his younger sister is not
too terribly unhappy.
Sylirya has been taken as a consort by a
cabinet-maker, so that Kysia has become the head of the household staff. She is
good enough to run the household of a trading magnate and will in time perhaps
have the skills needed to assist some high functionary in the Palace of Light,
though we would certainly miss her here. In time, she will doubtless leave us
for a younger family, but her loyalty cannot be faulted...
Lorn shakes his head with a wry smile.
In the end, little has changed within the
house since last you were here, excepting that we all miss you, and wish you
well in your struggles along the ward-wall of the Accursed Forest.
The lancer captain lowers the scroll, then
lifts it and studies the writing itself, rather than the words. While his
father's writing retains its ability to offer detailed observations between the
lines and the characteristic angular flow of the letters, there is something...
Lorn studies the scroll more closely, noting the slight wavering of some pen
strokes. Age? The toll of being a senior magus?
Lorn sets aside the scroll and fingers his
clean-shaven chin, thinking about his father's apparent change of heart-or
thought-concerning Ryalth.
Does Ryalth's scroll give any indication of
any reason for that?
He takes out the other scroll-the one
Suforis had delivered with two bottles of Alafraan from Dustyn the night
previous, after Second Company had finally returned to Jakaafra, once again
running almost three days late, this time because of tree-falls earlier along
the southeast ward-wall. With only two of large moveable firecannons, and the
need to recharge them after use, tree-falls close together meant one lancer
company or another had to guard a fallen trunk for several days, at times. This
time, it had been Second Company's fate.
He unrolls the scroll.
My
dearest lancer,
I told myself I would not be disappointed
had you forgotten our discussion of a year ago. I would have been disappointed.
That I can tell from my reaction to your scroll. I will be in Jakaafra for this
venture as you have requested. The trip will allow me to visit some factors in
Fyrad and in Geliendra and other towns along the route.
All is well with Ryalor House. We have been
able to broker some additional timber shipments when the amount of timber
increased past the anticipated contract levels, as I had suspected might well
occur....
Why had she suspected? Because the timber
came from fallen trunks and because Lorn's presence meant more falling trunks?
...our
interests in coastal shipping have also offered solid results, for equally
predictable reasons....
Lorn sets down the scroll of his
consort-to-be and laughs. His father and Jerial must have just looked. Jerial's
wagering ventures have let her overhear much of the gossip, and many of the
facts could not have been hidden. Not when Ryalor House has trading spaces
three times as large as before, its own warehouse, interests in coastal ships,
and who knows what else that Ryalth has not told him.
And all because a student mage saved a
pretty face from being attacked years before? A pretty face that hid so much
more?
Lorn glances to the cold and sunlit
green-blue sky beyond the study window. He hopes that Majer Maran will wait a
season or two before returning, but doubts he will have that much time. If...
if Lorn is fortunate, he and Ryalth will be consorted, and she will have
returned to Cyad before the majer reappears. If...
XCV
Lorn
puts his saddle bags on the top of the barrel of grain set beside the gelding's
stall and carefully props the pair of firelances between the barrel and the
stall wall, waiting for Suforis to finish saddling his mount.
"Be just a moment, ser," the
ostler calls.
Lorn smiles to himself, and studies the
stable, still as neat and clean as ever, then runs his fingertips over one
firelance and then the other, making sure that both are fully charged. Although
the patrol before the last one had found a fallen tree-the one they'd had to wait
two days for the Engineers to clear, the fact that there had been no fallen
trees on the last patrol made it more likely that he and Second Company would
encounter one on this patrol-or the next.
"We'd be wishing you a good patrol,
ser," offers Suforis as he extends the geldings reins to Lorn.
"We?" asks Lorn with a grin.
"Me and Lesyna. She is most pleased to
be cleaning and watching over your new dwelling, now. Her da even said it was
worth the old mare he gave her, 'cepting the mare's not for much but carrying
her. Leastwise she can go to town now and visit her folks." Suforis grins.
"Or carry a scroll or two when it be not wise for me."
"You don't mind her riding
alone."
"Lesyna? Always liked the horses, she
has. 'Sides, captain, what sense it be to say she'll not ride. Be different
when Clebyl gets pensioned off and we get proper quarters, screen and all,
instead a' just a big room... and have children... but now?"
"I'm glad it worked out and that
you're pleased."
"That be two of us, ser." Suforis
bows his head and gestures toward the next stall.
"Go ahead," Lorn says.
"You've work to do."
After Lorn fastens his saddle bags in place
and slips the two firelances into the holder, the captain leads the gelding out
of the stable into the courtyard where the lancers of Second Company are
mounting up. The high thin clouds that had been visible at dawn are thickening
into a more solid gray-or perhaps the dawn clouds just foreshadowed the heavier
clouds moving in from the northeast. The brief gusts of wind seem colder as
well.
Outside the stable, Lorn mounts the gelding
and rides to the north end of the stable building where Shynt is mustering the
first squad. "Good morning, Shynt."
"Good morning, Captain." Shynt
glances past Lorn toward the double column of riders. "We be ready,
ser."
"How is Hykylt?"
"He will ride, ser." The junior
squad leader looks at Lorn and lowers his voice. "Were you trained by a
healer, ser?"
"One of my sisters was fortunate
enough to become a healer, and I watched closely," Lorn replies. "I
would rather that word not be spread." Lorn laughs softly. "A fierce
lancer officer must not be seen as a gentle healer."
"Don't know many as would call you
soft, ser."
"That's best." Lorn nods and
guides the gelding back southward toward Kusyl and the second squad.
"Ready, ser," Kusyl reports, even
before Lorn reins up.
"We might as well get started."
"Yes, ser. Second squad, forward, in
column by twos!"
"First squad, forward, in column by
twos!" echoes from behind them.
Lorn's heels urge the white gelding
forward, and his eyes go to the clouds. A light snow would be better than rain,
but only a light snow. So they will have rain or heavy snow, he suspects from
the twinges in his skull that foreshadow a storm-headache, as he rides out
through the compound gate toward the chaos tower building to his right. His
face offers but a pleasant smile when he turns the gelding to the southeast and
the patrol ahead.
XCVI
Lorn
steps out of the stable at Eastend and into the twilight of a winter day.
Carrying his saddlebags, he stretches his legs, and readjusts his grip on them.
The firelances have already been collected and delivered to the Engineer
detachment for replacement or recharging.
The Lancer captain keeps trying to stretch
his legs as he crosses the courtyard toward the quarters he will occupy as a
transient officer, much as Captain Ilryk does when Third Company finishes a
patrol at the Jakaafra compound. Although Second Company's latest patrol
offered no tree-falls, the ride had been cold and seemed longer than usual.
Lorn's breath leaves white clouds as he walks briskly across the white granite
stones, glad this time for the white winter jacket that he wears.
"Captain!" A figure in the
uniform of a Mirror Engineer waves from fifty cubits away.
"Majer." Lorn raises his hand in
reply as he recognizes Majer Weylt.
Weylt waits for Lorn to reach him before
speaking. "I'd hoped you'd get here this evening. Otherwise, it would have
been a lonely evening meal."
"Are all the other officers
gone?" asks Lorn.
"Yes. Be just us here tonight. Captain
Strynst is off checking a tree-fall on the southeast ward-wall. And the patrol
captain here... have you met Gowl?"
"Just in passing. We've shared a few
meals."
"He's the one who found the tree. So
that leaves us." Weylt shrugs, then smiles briefly. "I'll see you in
the officers' dining area shortly."
"I need to clean up a bit."
"That's fine." With a nod, Weylt
turns and walks toward the building adjoining the quarters.
Lorn shaves and washes quickly, and pulls
on his one clean runic before leaving the transient officer's room and walking
out across the now-empty courtyard. When he enters the next building, Lorn can
hear the hubbub from the larger hall where the lancers are already eating. In
the officers' area, the engineer majer is waiting at one of the two tables,
alone.
"I did hurry," Lorn says as he
nears.
"I can tell. The food may not be worth
the haste." Weylt gestures toward the bottle on the table. "All I
have is Byrdyn, Captain. Scarcely repayment for that Fhynyco you had for me at
Jakaafra."
"After a cold and long patrol, the
Byrdyn is most welcome," Lorn replies, seating himself across from Weylt.
A server in gray appears and deposits a
small casserole dish on the square table, a poor rendition of emburhka, from
what Lorn can smell. A small loaf of a rye-like bread in a basket accompanies
the dish.
"How long were you working on the
Great Canal?" Lorn asks while Weylt fills both goblets.
"Near-on a season. That's the way it
seemed." Weylt lifts his goblet. "To better days." After a quick
small swallow, the majer heaps some of the emburhka onto his crockery platter.
"To better days," Lorn reiterates
as he lifts his own goblet and takes a sip. Then he serves himself, then breaks
off a chunk of the bread in the basket and sets it on one side of his platter.
"What happened? I heard the retaining walls of the Great Canal
collapsed...."
"In a way." Weylt tilts his head,
as if thinking of a way to explain. "You know that the Accursed Forest
lies in the middle of Eastern Cyador. It's raised just a little, and the land
is flat around it, and then slopes down... well, if it rains too much over or
around the Forest the water has to go somewhere. And if the land to the south
and west is already soaked, then the Fryadyr River overflows. It overflowed,
and broke through the levees near Geliendra and then carved a way to the Great
Canal...."
"So... when the rains stopped, the
river was flowing into the canal?" Weylt nods. "Almost like there had
been a river there once. Maybe there was, before the Firstborn changed things.
That made it hard. We had to build a dam and then replace the levees before we
could even start on repairing the Canal." He frowns. "I didn't
realize that they've started using oxen to pull the freight boats along the
canal."
Lorn shrugs helplessly. "I wouldn't
know. I didn't come that way."
"No one could tell me why. Oh... they
said things like the chaos-cells for the tow wagons were needed elsewhere. But
that doesn't make sense. There are plenty of cells."
"Is there plenty of chaos-force away
from the Accursed Forest?" asks Lorn, almost idly. "Or maybe they
need it to charge firelances used against the barbarians."
"That could be." After taking a
swallow of the Byrdyn, Weylt glances at Lorn. "You've been carrying two
firelances for the past few patrols."
"Seems like I've had to. Even with
reinforcements, we're only at three-quarters strength." Lorn but sips from
his goblet, looking guilelessly at the major. "We've had a lot of fallen
trees on the northeast ward-wall."
"I can see where the extra lance might
help." Weylt's tone is even, unforced. "Of course, we don't have
enough lances to issue two to every lancer."
"I wouldn't be using a second one if
we had a full complement," Lorn points out.
"There don't seem to be enough lancers
anywhere, these days. That's true." Weylt pauses to take several mouthfuls
of the casserole before speaking again. "Be glad to get home leave, and
some good emburhka."
"How long for you?" Lorn asks
between bites of the too-heavily peppered and overcooked emburhka.
"Another three seasons, at the end of
summer." Weylt's lips twist. "Afterwards, I'll be back here, just
like you will be."
Lorn nods, waiting, knowing from the edge
in the engineer's voice that more is coming.
"You make reports on every patrol,
don't you?" Weylt asks.
"We all do."
"Reports..." Weylt snorts.
"We even have to report on every lance we recharge or replace. By squad
and company, of course. And a separate place for the officers. They all go to
Majer Maran. Don't know what good they do."
"I think every report must go
there," Lorn suggests. "I suppose he could figure out how much chaos
energy it takes each squad to handle each tree-fall. Except each one's
different."
"They might be trying to find out how
much chaos energy it really takes. If they have trouble powering the Canal tow
wagons..." Weylt refills his goblet, and glances at Lorn.
The lancer captain looks down at a goblet
still half full. "I think not. With more Byrdyn, I might not wake up that
easily in the morning."
"Then, Commander Meylyd or your Majer
Maran might have something else in mind," suggests Weylt.
"They might," Lorn agrees.
"Who would know, though?" He takes another small sip of the Byrdyn.
"I thank you for the wine. It's been most welcome... and the
conversation."
"Not at all. I hate eating alone, and you're one of the very
few who understands the position of a Mirror Engineer." Weylt raises his
eyebrows but slightly. "Now... or even perhaps in the future."
"I think I do," Lorn replies.
"And it's clear you're of one of the few here who understands what a
lancer captain such as I might face." He lifts the goblet.
Weylt lifts his in return.
They both smile.
XCVII
The
Emperor Toziel'elth'alt'mer, who carries the elthage lineage although he has no
magely talents, remains at ease in the malachite and silver chair as he listens
to those who speak before him. In her smaller chair, back behind his right
shoulder, also listens the Empress Ryenyel.
"Why can we not continue to use the
chaos towers that surround the Accursed Forest to recharge the firelances and
replenish the chaos-cells for the firewagons? I have heard many and elegant
words and more words about this," declares Majer-Commander Rynst,
"but I cannot say that I have heard an explanation that fully satisfies
me."
"We are using those chaos towers
exactly for that," replies the First Magus smoothly. "As well you and
His Mightiness know. We are sending firelances from Geliendra all the way to
the Cerlyni and even the Jeranyi border in some cases. Now is not the problem.
It is the future that presents the difficulty." After a long pause,
Chyenfel adds, "I have not been exactly silent on the difficulties posed
by the Accursed Forest."
"You have been most eloquent in
stating that the Accursed Forest presents a difficulty," Rynst agrees, his
words warm. "Yet... my lancers, even my Captain-Commander, as I am most
certain you know from your Second Magus, would know what is so deadly about the
Forest that it is to be feared more greatly than the barbarians of the north.
Their blades claim far more lancers than do the creatures of the Forest."
"There are none so deaf as cover their
ears and will not hear." Chyenfel's smooth voice drips honey. "Not
that you have ever covered your ears, wisest and most powerful of lancers and
Warrior of Light, but it may be that other lancers, more concerned about what
may happen in the handful of years immediately before us, have done so."
Only the slightest tightening of the
muscles around his eyes betrays the interest of the Emperor. There is no
visible change in the Empress, who continues to look vaguely amused, as her
eyes rest not on either the First Magus or the Mirror Lancer Majer-Commander,
but upon Merchanter Adviser Bluoyal.
"My dear friend, never have you been
so effusive in your compliments." Rynst smiles indulgently. "But I
beg you explain in terms simple enough for me to convey to those lancers who
may die without the chaos-cells charged by the Forest towers."
Beside Rynst, Bluoyal looks at the white
and glistening stones of the floor of the audience chamber.
Chyenfel turns toward Rynst once more.
"Perhaps I have tailored my previous presentations to your great
perception. I will attempt greater simplicity. The chaos towers are beginning
to fail. Yet we cannot move the chaos towers without causing them to fail
immediately. We now have barely more than the minimum number of chaos towers
required to maintain the wards. At times already, the chaos-net on the
northwest ward-wall is breached. If... if our effort is not undertaken soon, it
cannot be undertaken at all. Then the Forest will breach the wall and surround
the remaining towers so that they cannot be used. So... we can contain the
Forest, and lose the excess power from the chaos towers, or we can refuse to
contain the Forest and lose the excess power from the towers-and turn much or
all of eastern Cyador back to the Forest." Chyenfel bows to Rynst.
"You are most clear, O master
magus." Rynst pauses. "Yet you and your predecessors have assured us
of the power of your magely towers. We have relied on such. Now... you say such
powers will vanish within years-or sooner."
"The Firstborn said that the chaos
towers would not last forever, only that their power would be uncontested while
they endured. Now... one by one, they are failing. We have but one tower more
than the minimum we need to create the sleep-ward barrier, and thus restrain
the Accursed Forest for generations to come. If we do not act now, we cannot
act in the seasons and years ahead."
"I could say, although I will
not," Rynst declares, "that if we do not have more firelances, the
barbarians will take northern Cyador. Nor will I suggest that a barbarian can
lop a poor lancer's head from his body more effectively and more swiftly than
can the fastest growing of trees."
"You are most eloquent, my dear
Majer-Commander." Chyenfel laughs. "Most eloquent. Not that I would
call you verbose. Nor vain. Nor simplistic. No, for you see far beyond what
passes in this chamber. You are most wise, and you know that the barbarians
remain raiders and bandits. You even know that, even were our northern borders
undefended, the barbarians would move but a few dozen kays southward in your
lifetime or that of your children or grandchildren. And you know, too, that the
Accursed Forest can grow a large tree in two seasons. And that you lose half as
many lancers to the Forest as to the barbarians-and that is with the
ward-walls." Chyenfel shrugs. "So I do not have to tell you that if
the ward-walls fail because we maintain them to charge a few score firelances,
you will be fighting both the barbarians and the Forest, and you will indeed
lose. You are wise enough to see that and more. Would that others saw as
much." Chyenfel bows deeply to the Mirror Lancer Majer-Commander.
"I thank you for your most cogent
explanation." Rynst's tone grows more indulgent. "I truly understand
that all Magi'i have limitations that we can but dimly grasp. We of the Mirror
Lancers also have limitations, for it is difficult to contest with blades alone
and far fewer numbers, an endless flow of barbarians, whether they be raiders
or not."
Toziel laughs-long and loudly. "I
applaud you both. For both of you have outlined the dilemma most eloquently. So
eloquently that I must ponder the wisdom you have so masterfully
conveyed." He stands. "Until tomorrow."
Ryenyel rises silently, then follows the
Emperor from the chamber.
When Toziel and Ryenyel have returned to
her salon, he seats himself one side of the white divan, she the other. Toziel
studies her face. "You are tired."
"Much occurred."
"Rynst has never been so intemperate.
Nor Chyenfel," muses Toziel. "Yet I could sense no anger. Both were
acting."
"That is because they were trying to
get you to act, my dear. They know that what you decide and how you decide will
determine the power to be in Cyador for generations."
"Because we have no heirs."
"Because I would not bear heirs and
have them twisted by what must happen in the Palace of Light. You understood
that from the first, my love."
"It makes matters more
difficult."
"You have time yet," Ryenyel
points out.
"Not so much as others think, and
those others would replace both Rynst and Chyenfel. That is clear, but beyond
that... who might know? A dozen rationales, or more.... Yet Chyenfel cannot
live too much longer. He is already almost consumed by chaos."
Ryenyel nods for the Emperor to continue.
"Liataphi? Do you think he wants
Kharl'elth to be First Magus to expose his venality and weaknesses?"
"That could be," responds the
mahogany-haired Empress-consort, "but what of the plot to place his
daughter in control of the Yuryan Clan through her consort Veljan? She advises
him on everything."
"As you do me," Toziel reminds
her.
"Veljan is forthright and honest and
devoted to his consort-mistress. So is an ox."
Toziel laughs gently. "I trust I am
not an ox."
"Far from that, my dear." Ryenyel
frowns slightly, showing the tiredness on her lightly freckled face.
"There is still the missing ordered-death sabre. I fear we have not seen
the last of that plotter."
Toziel raises his eyebrows.
"Ten golds... a stolen trade plaque...
a dead heir... and a cupridium-plated sabre filled with iron order-death... and
silence." Ryenyel smiles. "Each is by itself a trifle. Less than a
trifle. Yet your Merchanter Advisor Bluoyal was worried enough about that to
ask of Luss and Kharl. Did Shevelt know something? And why is Bluoyal so
concerned about a Brystan sabre?"
"It makes one wonder." Toziel's
voice is near-expressionless.
"It makes me wonder," she
replies. "Shevelt's death is tied to that weapon, and Liataphi would not
have dared such. Nor could he have used such a weapon. Someone wants the calmer
Veljan to succeed his father, and Bluoyal is most concerned about that."
She smiles. "Then there is the silence. Silence is the surest of
assurances that an able plotter still lives. All crow when such dies, and they
crow sooner and louder when an inept one dies."
"What else troubles you?"
"Bluoyal was telling me-"
"You meet with my advisors without
me?" Toziel's eyes twinkle.
"As necessary." She arches her
eyebrows. "He was telling me about a clanless trading house that is
wealthier and more influential than many of the smaller clan houses."
Toziel waits.
"It is called Ryalor House. He but
mentioned it in passing, and Bluoyal never mentions anything without a
reason."
"That tie is stretching, my
dear," says Toziel, grinning. "It is run by the mistress of a lancer
captain who could have been a magus, and the captain is the son of a magus who
is a senior lector-" He breaks off and looks at her.
They both laugh, almost joyously.
After a time, Toziel shakes his head.
"So why does Bluoyal wish this known? He knows we talk."
"Kien'elth's daughter is consort to
Kharl's son... and Bluoyal does not trust Kharl."
Toziel raises his hands helplessly.
"So we have an unknown plotter advancing both Liataphi and Kharl. The pair
so dislike each other that none will have them in the same chamber save on the
most formal of occasions."
"Who lies below them?"
"Any number of senior lectors-Kien,
Abram, Hyrist-they're the most senior. Hyrist and Abram are thought arrogant
and self-centered. Kien'elth is well-regarded, but he is almost as consumed by
chaos as Chyenfel, and so cannot succeed him, for that, as well as for the
reason we both know. Kien's younger son is solid, but not brilliant enough for
what we have seen. Kharl will not support Liataphi, nor Liataphi Kharl. Luss is
Kharl's tool, and for that reason alone, we dare not replace Rynst, arrogant as
he has become, for Rynst knows that, and that is why he suffers Luss to remain
as his second."
"There is something else," offers
Ryenyel.
"Oh?"
"The Lady Trader of Ryalor House-her
fortune cannot be reckoned... but she has gained on ventures that only one with
knowledge from the Quarter of the Magi'i would have. And she has left on a
coaster for Fyrad."
"Most convenient for Bluoyal, I would
say."
"What of Bluoyal?" asks the
Empress.
"That is the question, is it not? Who
does he scheme to put in Chyenfel's place?"
"Someone we do not know-or could not
pick." Her lips turn up. "Or we would know already."
"So... my dearest... what should I
decide?"
"Agree to Chyenfel's plan.
Immediately. That will ensure that Rynst must concentrate on defeating the
barbarians without the extra firelances from the Accursed Forest. Also, if
Chyenfel is accurate, if Cyador is to survive, then it must be done, and about
purely magely things, he is usually accurate."
"And then we wait to see who betrays
who and why? And we watch Bluoyal? And Kharl and the heirs of Kien." The
Empress nods.
XCVIII
The day
is cold but clear as Lorn reins up the gelding before Dustyn's narrow front
porch, and it feels warmer than it is because the winds of the previous day
have died away. Winter has raced by, or so it seems to Lorn, for it is sixday
of the seventh eightday of winter, ten days until Ryalth is supposed to arrive.
Already, Juist is muttering about having to take patrols for Second Company's
two eightdays of furlough.
Because Lorn will leave on the morrow for
another patrol and because he may not be back until just before Ryalth arrives,
he needs to talk to Dustyn. He dismounts and ties the gelding to the bronze
ring, then mounts the steps and opens the door. For the first time since he has
come to Dustyn's establishment, the proprietor is actually standing at the
half-door counter.
"Captain, I been wondering when you
might be arriving to let me know about this mysterious consorting."
"I'm here," Lorn grins. "I
do have a question about it. The lady is traveling here, and while she is
expected by firstday of the ninth eightday of winter." Lorn shrugs,
"Traveling does not always lend itself to exact days."
"That be no problem. The Emperor's
rules say that the recorder must know at least an eightday before. Wasyk'll
bend that to two, knowing how hard it be for some folk to come up with the
silver, but there's folk tell him a season in advance."
Lorn nods. "That is good."
"And who be these folk, Captain?"
Dustyn asks.
"I am one of them," Lorn says
quietly, "although it would be better if it were not widely known until
afterwards."
"I thought maybe it might be you,
Captain," Dustyn says slowly. "But when I asked some merchanters I
know about you... no offense, you understand... they said best they say
little." The factor frowns. "Seems like you have powerful friends and
as many of power that may not be such, especially..."
"For a mere lancer captain, you
mean?" Lorn offers a sardonic smile.
"Captain... none'd be calling you
mere. Even old Kylynzar been mumbling about how he didn't like much what you wrote
him, but he couldn't complain none about how you'd stopped the wild creatures.
For him... well... he complains about aught any time."
"I told him we did our best, and that
I couldn't guarantee killing every wild creature that escaped."
"You been killing most of 'em, isn't
it so?"
"So far," Lorn admits, quickly
changing the subject. "I haven't been consorted before, and I was in Isahl
when my sister was. So what do I do?"
"Consorting be simple enough. It be
after the consorting that it be no longer simple." Dustyn laughs hoarsely,
then clears his throat. "Wasyk be the recorder of consorts and the tax
farmer for the Emperor here in Jakaafra. Be easier 'n I'd thought, 'cause your
havin' a place of dwelling means no winking at whether you be proper in
consorting here. Doesn't say which dwelling, but a man's supposed to be
consorted where he has one. Anyway... you and your lady..." Dustyn frowns.
"Don't recall your saying her name, and I'll be needing that to give to
Wasyk." He waits.
"Ryalth... she's an independent
trader, and the head of Ryalor House."
Dustyn shakes his head, even as he smiles.
"Now... some matters be making more sense. A lancer captain from a Magi'i
family-I did find that out, not much more-consorting to one of the powerful
rising trading houses... more 'n a few not be pleased to see that kind of
alliance...."
"Why... because they worry about mage
blood in merchanter offspring? The children can only claim either merage or
altage heritage. So what do we have to do?"
"Plain forgot to finish... you sign
the register in front of Wasyk and seal it there with a silver. That be it, so
far as the Emperor's concerned."
Lorn somehow doubts that.
"And then your troubles are your
own."
"They're always our own." Lorn
pauses, then adds, "I have to be on patrol starting tomorrow. If the lady
should arrive... well, she has the welcome of the dwelling... if you understand
and would assist in that?"
"That I can do with great
pleasure." Dustyn frowns. "She be truly the house leader of Ryalor
House?"
"Absolutely."
"Ryalth... Captain Lorn...
Ryalor..." Dustyn shakes his head. "Should a' figured... I
should."
Lorn forces a laugh. "Leave the
figuring to others, Dustyn, and Ryalor House will continue to help you
prosper."
"Oh, that I will, ser. That I will.
Owe you two far too much to be flapping my chin, outside a' my own place, you
see, that is...."
"And to make sure you prosper..."
Lorn slips a silver into Dustyn's hand.
"Ser... you needn't..."
"I need not, but times have not been
easy for you."
"Thank you, ser, and I will be taking
the best care when the lady trader should arrive."
"I know you will." Lorn glances
toward the door. "And I have to ready a company for another patrol."
"You do that, ser, and I'll be watching out for you."
Lorn nods as he steps toward the door, and
the cold ride back to the compound.
XCIX
Fat and
wet snowflakes swirl past Lorn, so heavily that he cannot see the ward-wall
from the perimeter road from where he rides with Kusyl and the second squad, so
thickly that he is continually brushing slush and water from his forehead. He
ignores the headache that accompanies the snow.
After briefly considering stopping the
patrol, he decides against it, at least for a time. The biggest danger is
fallen tree trunks, and even the snow won't hide anything that large.
"You think this will last, ser?"
"I hope not. Usually, the big flakes
don't. Then, we're going on furlough after this patrol." Lorn says with a
rueful laugh that carries the fifteen cubits between their mounts. "With
our luck, a cubit of it will fall on the deadland."
They both know that while the green crowns
of the giant trees of the Accursed Forest may accept some snow, it will neither
remain nor filter into the warmer green below.
"Or it'll turn to rain and
freeze," counters Kusyl.
"Let's hope not." Lorn has had
enough of patrols in cold and wet rain.
"May not get any tree-falls."
"Let's hope not."
Snow clings to the gelding's mane, and
creates wet splotches where it melts on the thighs of Lorn's trousers. The two
ride silently, through the hushed whiteness created by the fast-falling snow,
and Lorn continues to brush away snow and water.
Then, as abruptly as it has started, within
the space of riding less than a kay, the snow stops falling, leaving the
deadland covered with white less than a fraction of a span deep. Only puddles
of slush remain on the granite of the perimeter road itself.
Lorn looks to his right. White steam-like
vapor rises from the heights of the Accursed Forest, creating a misty effect
above the high crowns and around the ward-wall.
Above them, the heavy gray clouds move
swiftly northward.
"We'll get rain before we're
done," predicts Kusyl.
Lorn has no doubts about that. He just
hopes it does not create another fallen tree or delay the patrol too much.
C
Lorn
checks the locks on the armory door, then nods to the duty guard- from Juist's
company. "Everything's secure. The Mirror Lancer firewagon should be here
to replace these tomorrow. Pass that along to your relief. Squad leader Shynt
knows already." Shynt also knows how to send a message to Lorn through
Dustyn, although Lorn does not wish any interruptions on his furlough.
"Yes, ser."
The lancer captain offers a nod before
turning and leaving the small white granite building. In the chill of late
afternoon, Lorn walks quickly across the courtyard to pack his bag. As he nears
the quarters building, he sees Kusyl standing by the door, waiting for Lorn.
"You be moving quickly, ser,"
observes the senior squad leader, a hint of a smile running across his face.
"I am. What about you?"
"I be leaving early in the
morning."
"You're riding to Geliendra and
leaving the mount there?"
"Yes, ser. That be allowed."
"I know. I wasn't questioning."
Lorn offers a smile. "You're glad Shynt's the one staying, and not
you?"
"Bein' senior squad leader has some
privileges, ser." Kusyl grins. "What you be doing on furlough,
Captain? If you don't mind my asking?"
"I've got a place outside Jakaafra.
I'm from Cyad, and it's too far to try to get home without spending nearly half
the time traveling. I'll just try to enjoy myself here. It'll be good not to be
patrolling. What about you?"
"I'm from Fyrad. Only four or five
days down. Want to see my family. So I'll travel... and travel."
"Have a safe journey."
"Thank you, Captain."
Lorn slips into the quarters building and
back to his own room. There, he begins to gather what he will need. He forces
himself to pack the formal uniform carefully, although shimmercloth does not
wrinkle easily, and he slips both the chaos glass and Ryalth's book in with his
other clothes. He certainly doesn't want to leave them behind.
As the familiar mental chill of a chaos
glass being used to scree him falls across his quarters, he concentrates on not
allowing himself to stiffen, but instead fastens the bag and checks the
wardrobe, as if to see what he may have forgotten. He already wears the Brystan
sabre. The chill fades, but Lorn wonders how often he will feel it over the
next two eightdays.
The sun is touching the horizon when he
finally rides out through the compound gates and turns the white gelding toward
Jakaafra. He looks ahead, wondering if Ryalth has come... or if she is still on
the way. He does not dwell on other possibilities.
The sun is below the horizon when he passes
the keystone that indicates he is one kay from the square, and his breath
leaves white clouds in the fading light.
Lorn rides slowly through Jakaafra in the
dimness of late twilight, toward the dwelling he has scarcely used. The glow of
a few lamps glimmers past shutters mostly closed against the chill of a winter
evening. Will there be a lamp glimmering at his small dwelling, or will he be
the one to light it and wait?
The scent of burning wood fills the air as
he nears the small dwelling on the east road. Lorn smiles as he sees lights
past the front shutters, and he forces himself to ride to the stable. A
chestnut is stalled in the small stable. As he unsaddles the gelding, his eyes
pick up the blue-and-green-bordered saddle blanket.
With a smile, he closes the stable doors
and carries the bag with his formal uniform and other clothing to the front
door. He pauses, then knocks, listening for footsteps he does not hear in the
dimness of evening, with the scents of burning wood and cooking spices sifting
around him. After a moment, the door opens, and Ryalth smiles. "You could
come in. It is your dwelling."
Lorn just stands there, at the door,
looking at Ryalth, her red hair, faint freckles, and creamy skin. He finally
speaks. "I'm so glad you're here."
He steps forward. So does she.
How long the embrace lasts, Lorn does not
know. Nor does he care.
When they step apart, he studies her again,
unable to stop smiling.
"The way you look at me..." She
looks down.
"I missed you. Each time I see you
after we're apart, I realize that more."
"Sometimes... you're still that
student I met that night. After all these years, it's hard to believe you still
want to see me that much."
"More than when I was that
student," Lorn admits. "Much more."
"For that, I am glad... more than
glad." Her eyes twinkle and her lips curl into a smile as as she steps
around him and closes the door, clicking the bronze latch in place. "We
might be better off with this closed."
Lorn looks back. He had forgotten the door.
"I suppose I do need to clean up," he finally admits as she turns
from the door. "I didn't want to take the time after we finished the
patrol. I was just thinking about how you might be here...."
"You were more than thinking, my
lancer captain. That I can feel."
Lorn can feel his face redden.
"So was I." Her voice is gentle.
After a moment of silence, Ryalth
continues. "There is a stew and some bread. I have tried my cooking
skills. I find I'm not preparing meals as often these days. This stove is like
the one at my Aunt Elyset's...."
"Old, I know." Lorn grins.
"Of course, cooking is possibly beneath your wealth as a rising trading
house?"
"Wealth... ?"
"Wealth, I suspect. I've heard from
many sources..."
"Go... and wash up." Although her
voice is stern, her eyes sparkle.
"As you command, Lady Trader."
Lorn can't help grinning. "As you command."
"Your supper will be ready before you
are," she cautions.
"I'll hurry." Lorn finds himself
flushing again.
Ryalth smiles as she shakes her head,
before turning and walking back to the ancient ceramic stove that is built out
from the far wall.
Lorn carries his bag to the bedchamber. He
unfolds the formal uniform and hangs it in the armoire. He smiles as he sees
the two sets of blues- one very formal on one side of the hanging part of the
armoire. After unclipping his scabbard and leaning the weapon in the corner of
the bedchamber, he makes his way to the small bathing room where he washes
quickly with the two buckets of water and the pitcher of hot water Ryalth has
clearly heated for him.
Then, before he comes to the table, he
retrieves a bottle of the Alafraan from the small rear storage room. "Such
cooking deserves a good wine." He looks for glasses in the small cupboard
but can find none and settles on two mugs that are but slightly chipped. After
uncorking the bottle, he fills the mugs two-thirds full, and stands by the
table.
"We deserve it, one way or another. I
hope as reward. You may need it as recompense. You can sit, dear lancer."
The redhead sets the stew kettle on the cracked green ceramic trivet in the
middle of the table. She sniffs. "Oh... something's burning." She
scurries back to the stove and uses a heavy woolen mit to open the oven door. A
curl of gray smoke drifts upward as she struggles to get a short baking paddle
under the roughly circular loaf of dark bread. After a moment, she turns and
eases the loaf into a dry woven grass basket that she carries to the table.
"Good. It didn't burn. It was just the dough that I slopped on the bottom
of the baking grate."
"You don't slop things." Lorn
pulls out the ancient armless wooden chair and seats himself.
"When I cook, I do." Ryalth seats
herself.
Lorn takes the battered wooden-handled
cupridium ladle and dishes the stew into Ryalth's crockery bowl, then into his
own. He nods toward the basket and the steaming loaf.
"You don't trust my cooking?" Her
tone is mock-plaintive. "Even before we're to be consorted?"
"My most honored lady trader, I have
always trusted your cuisine... long before I proposed this coming consortship.
Or have you forgotten that so soon?" Lorn does his best to mimic her
plaintive tone.
Her laugh is a warm caress, and he smiles
inanely.
"The sole worry I have had about
you," he says, "is your traveling all this way from Cyad into the
near wilds of the east of Cyador."
"I did not travel alone, but your
factor friend Dustyn was kind enough to provide lodging... for Eileyt-I thought
it wise to bring an enumerator-and a hired guard."
"You were probably most wise, and even
wiser not to have them here."
"Wiser for you... or for me?"
Ryalth arches her fine eyebrows.
Lorn finds himself flushing, and takes
refuge in a mouthful of the crusty hot bread. He swallows abruptly, reaching
for the crockery mug that holds his Alafraan, as he senses the chill of a
chaos-glass casting for him.
"Still?" Ryalth murmurs, her lips
barely moving.
"It is the second time since I came
off patrol," he murmurs back, lifting the mug in a toasting gesture he
does not feel, forcing a smile.
"To us, despite those who watch."
Ryalth responds with a smile that appears less forced than Lorn's feels to him.
"To us." His smile feels more
natural as the chill of the glass fades.
"Has this happened often?" she asks
quietly.
"At times since I've been here, but
more often recently. A majer in Geliendra suspects that I am more than I
appear. What of you?"
"But a time or two, and the chill was
not near so... unfriendly... not so cold."
"Perhaps it was my father. He has
recently hinted that I was right about you, and that he was mistaken."
Her fine eyebrows arch. "Your father
of the Magi'i-the renowned Fourth Magus?"
"There is no Fourth Magus," Lorn
points out.
"Not in name, but that is what many
call him, in respect," Ryalth says. "All throughout Cyad."
Lorn laughs. He cannot help it. "He
tries to discover more of you, and you of him, and neither tells me."
Ryalth shrugs so helplessly that Lorn finds
himself shaking his head, half in admiration, half still in amusement.
After a moment, Ryalth takes a sip of the
Alafraan, and then some of the stew. "It does have a good taste."
His mouth full, Lorn nods.
They both eat for a time, until Ryalth
looks up. "I've never been consorted," she says slowly.
"Nor I, dear lady."
"I know it must be recorded for the
Emperor."
"Recorded for, but not sent to
him," Lorn points out. "Unless requested. It may be that no one will
request the records of the town of Jakaafra for a long time." He shrugs.
"If they do, what will they find? That a lancer consorted with a
merchanter lady?"
"That is but what they would find in
Cyad."
"But where they find it conveys a far
different message. Were we to consort in Cyad, all manner of schemes would be
placed at our doorsteps. Here... the message is that we wish to escape
notice."
Ryalth frowns slightly. "You think
that to be true?"
"I hope many will take it so. If
indeed they discover such."
"With Magi'i screeing us both?"
Lorn shrugs. "They may not scree
farther, now that they have seen us together in a quiet dwelling. If none see
the signing of the book tomorrow..."
"I care not who may know."
"I would prefer none know till you
return to Cyad. I will give you scrolls to my parents, and Myryan."
"You would make me a messenger,
now?"
Lorn flushes. "I meant just for you to
carry them to Cyad and send them by messenger from there. That way, they would
learn earlier."
"So long as that is what you
intended..." The serious phrasing that begins her admonition gives way to
lilting, almost laughing, words that are followed by a grin.
"Woman... trader... you are most
dangerous."
"You are the dangerous one."
"Not me. Not now."
Ryalth brushes off his disclaimer.
"You worry about this majer?"
"I would not have him strike at
you."
"No. He will not strike at me. His
lancer honor is too precious for that. Were he a merchanter, now..."
They laugh again, together.
CI
Lorn
paces back and forth in the dwelling's main chamber, trying not to let the
Brystan sabre bang into anything. He supposes he should have worn the lancer
weapon, but he feels more comfortable with the older weapon, and it feels
somehow right.
He glances toward the bedchamber where
Ryalth is fastening a scarf over hair that she has laboriously curled, pinned,
and braided. She wears a formal blue tunic with loose flowing blue shimmercloth
trousers. Then comes a blue woolen cloak, with a narrow cream and green border,
before she studies herself in a hand-mirror.
"Are you ready for me to get the
mounts?" he asks.
"Are you worried?" Ryalth glances
at Lorn, wearing his formal Lancer cream uniform with the green and white
piping. "You keep walking back and forth."
"No. I just feel useless at the
moment."
The redhead turns and studies him.
"You're going to make sure that everyone knows you're a lancer." She
grins. "So much for a quiet consorting."
"Everyone in Jakaafra would know no
matter what I wore," he points out. "Besides, they'll all be looking
at you, not at me."
"Go get the mounts."
He bows with a smile. "As you command,
my lady."
"Go." Both her mouth and eyes
return the smile.
The clear mid-morning remains chill, but
the breeze out of the northeast is light, sometimes even dying away, as Lorn
leads both mounts from the small stable to the door. He had saddled them before
he had washed and dressed. A carriage might have been more appropriate, but he
knows of none for hire in Jakaafra.
He waits for a time longer before the door,
holding the reins of the two mounts, shifting his weight from one foot to the
other, and wondering what other preparations Ryalth makes behind the privacy
screen. He is almost ready to tie the horses to the hedge and go back inside
when Ryalth steps out and latches the door behind her.
"You see? I wasn't long." She
glances at his face. "Not too long, anyway."
"You're even more lovely than
usual." Lorn offers a hand as she mounts.
"I should get consorted more
often."
"I'm sorry it wasn't earlier."
Lorn mounts easily.
They ride slowly toward the square and the
center of town. As they pass one of the larger dwellings-on the north side of
the road, two women standing outside the green ceramic privacy screen watch
closely without speaking. Once Lorn and Ryalth have passed, the women's voices
drift toward them on the barely perceptible breeze.
"...there! Looks like a consorting...
ever I saw one...."
"...captain, all right, handsome as he
is, but who be the lady?"
"That's shimmercloth, and the
cloak-that says there's lancer and Magi'i blood in the union. Don't see that
often, not here."
"Love match... I tell you... no other
reason it'd be here."
Lorn smiles and leans toward Ryalth.
"It is a love match, you know?"
"I know. I've known that for years. It
took you a while."
He shrugs expansively, but the wide smile
remains on his face.
The recording building lies on the west
side of the small town square, around the corner and a good two hundred cubits
from the side lane that holds Dustyn's establishment.
The square has more people on the porches
around the square. A good half-score watch from the wide porch of the cooper's,
and half that from the weaver's adjoining building.
"I've never seen so many people here," Lorn says quietly.
"Dear..." Ryalth laughs.
"They don't get to see this often."
"A consorting? It happens all the
time."
"There are many lancers, and few
lancer officers," she points out.
"You're the one," he counters.
"There are but a handful of trading houses, and none so large headed by a
woman." Still, Ryalth's words nag at him. Despite his mother's words, he
has never considered, not fully, how few lancer officers and Magi'i there truly
are in Cyador. He pushes that thought away as he looks at the far side of the
square.
Dustyn stands on the stone walkway to the
right of the steps up to the yellow brick recording building. He wears a rich
brown cloak, trimmed in blue, over brown trousers and a good blue tunic. Beside
him is a silver-haired woman who smiles broadly as Lorn and Ryalth ride toward
her. Alongside the factor and his consort stand an enumerator in blue-Eileyt,
Lorn assumes-and a guard wearing merchanter blue.
Eileyt's gray eyes take in Lorn. Lorn
smiles politely. The slender enumerator bows, a bow of respect.
Ryalth dismounts gracefully, barely placing
any weight on the hand that Lorn offers. The guard steps forward to take the
reins of both mounts.
"Greetings, Captain, and my best
wishes to you, Lady Merchanter." Dustyn inclines his head first to Lorn
and then to Ryalth. "This be my consort Wryul." The spirit factor
gestures to the silver-haired woman.
"Thank you." Lorn nods, as does
Ryalth.
"You look lovely," Wryul
addresses Ryalth. "And to come so far..."
"We would have had to wait years for
Lorn to return to Cyad," Ryalth explains. "I'm very happy to be
here."
As the couple turns toward the steps of the
small building, a closed carriage of polished golden oak and drawn by a pair of
matched grays approaches from the eastern end of the avenue and enters the
square.
"That be Kylynzar, I do believe,"
exclaims Dustyn as the coach draws to a halt and as a wiry white-haired man in
a maroon cloak steps out. The white-haired man turns and offers his hand to a
gray-haired woman in a matching maroon cloak.
"A quiet consorting?" Ryalth
murmurs under her breath. "I told no one except the ones I had to,"
Lorn murmurs back. "Then why is half the town here?"
"It's not half...." Lorn
protests.
"It is if you look behind us around
the square." Ryalth touches his hand to call his attention to the two who
have arrived in the coach.
"Captain, Lady," offers the man
in the maroon cloak, "with your decision to honor Jakaafra in your place
of consorting, we could do no less than to honor you." A wry smile follows
the words. "We have not met. We have corresponded. I am Kylynzar, and this
is my consort Mylora." Lorn and Ryalth incline their heads. "We are
pleased to meet you," Lorn says. "Not so pleased as are we."
Dustyn clears his throat. "Ah...
ser... lady. Wasyk be waiting for you." Ryalth lifts her eyebrows. Lorn
finds an embarrassed grin on his face. They walk up the two stone steps to the
open double doors of white oak, then step inside.
The recording hall is but fifteen cubits
deep and half that in width.
The floor is over-polished white marble.
Four tall windows-two on each side-provide the illumination. The panes are
glazed with ancient, blue-tinged glass. The hall is empty of all furnishings
except for a single white sunstone pedestal.
A heavy-set figure stands behind the open
book that rests on the stand of white sunstone. Each page of the book is a
cubit in height and two thirds that in width. The man wears a sash-like white
shimmercloth scarf wide enough almost to conceal his brown tunic, despite his
bulk.
"I am Wasyk, the recorder of
consortings. Approach... you who wish to record your consortship here in the
town of Jakaafra." The recorder inclines his head to the couple.
Lorn and Ryalth walk slowly toward the book
and sash-wearer.
Only Dustyn and Wryul and Kylynzer and
Mylora have followed the couple into the building, and the four of them stand
at the back, just inside the doors.
Lorn and Ryalth stand two cubits back from
the sunstone pedestal and the book upon it. Both look to the recorder.
"Do you two-Captain Lorn of the Mirror
Lancers and Lady Ryalth of Ryalor House-declare your intention to take each
other as consorts?"
"I do," Lorn replies.
"I do." Ryalth's words are as
firm as Lorn's, if more melodic.
"Would you each inscribe your name in
the book before you, signifying that such is your choice of your own free will,
in the prosperity of chaos and light and under the oversight of the Emperor of
Light?" Wasyk extends a shimmering white pen.
Ryalth takes the cupridium-tipped pen and
writes her name. She passes it to Lorn, who in turn, writes his name.
Wasyk takes the pen and replaces it in the
ceremonial cupridium holder, then clears his throat before declaiming, "As
entered in the book of Jakaafra, you are hereafter consorts." Wasyk beams
at the couple. "May you always be fulfilled in the light and in the
fullness of time."
Lorn slips the shiny silver onto the pages
of the book, as Dustyn had told him. He stands there for a long moment.
"You could kiss me," Ryalth
murmurs.
Lorn does.
He can hear a gentle sigh from the back of
the small building.
"Such a lovely couple..."
Arm in arm, the newly consorted pair walks
toward the door.
Kylynzar steps up, coughs gently, and
speaks. "It be forward, we know, but Dustyn and Wryul and Mylora and me,
we'd like you to come to the Brick Hearth. Our treat, if you would. It not be
that often that a consorting such as yours happens in Jakaafra."
How can they refuse?
"We would be more than happy to join
you," Ryalth says brightly. "Our families are far from here, and your
hospitality is most welcome."
"Most welcome," Lorn adds.
"It has been three generations since a
lancer officer has lived in Jakaafra, leastwise with his consort, if only part
of the time," says the gray-haired Mylora.
"We'll be here when we can," Lorn
says, recalling his mother's words just before he had left Cyad-her observation
that lancer officers were almost as exalted and rare as the Magi'i outside of
Cyad.
When they step inside the Brick Hearth Inn,
propelled forward by Dustyn and Kylynzar, Lorn's mouth drops open. The public
room has been cleared, and a table set against the side wall. On the green
linen of the table are platters heaped with slices of melons, wedges of
cheeses, and baskets of bread. At the left end of the table are a score of
bottles of amber wine.
Kylynzar and Dustyn both laugh.
"Little enough we can do,"
Kylynzar says. "If you'd not mind, we did ask a few other folk to join
us."
"Of course." Lorn hopes his voice
does not betray too much surprise.
Kylynzar gestures, and within moments
near-on a score of others have flocked into the public room, all dressed in
their best. Lorn recognizes only one couple-the ostler from the
compound-Suforis-and his consort Lesyna. Both wear cloaks of brownish red.
Suforis smiles broadly as his eyes meet Lorn's.
To the right of Suforis is Eileyt, and he
smiles as well.
"Quiet consorting?" Ryalth
murmurs.
"I had no idea...." He whispers
back.
"I can tell. You look like a stunned
bullock."
"One moment!" bellows Dustyn.
"Kylynzar's better with words 'n me, and he's got a few."
The hubbub dies away.
"Just a few," announces the
grower. "Most of you know I never was too fond of lancer officers, and
outside of Dustyn, not passing fond of factors, either. These two are
different, and I wanted to let them know that the real folk of Cyador are most
glad of it. Now, let 'em have a first bite, and then join in."
Still flushing, Lorn edges toward the
table.
Dustyn extends two mugs in which he has
poured the ruddy yet amber vintage. "You haven't tried the like of this."
Lorn grins and accepts the mug, as does
Ryalth.
Lorn tries a wedge of the white cheese, and
sips some of the amber wine as he steps back from the table and turns to his
redhead. "This is different, sweet and dry at the same time."
She takes one sip, then a second.
"It's strong."
Kylynzar approaches. "That's my amber
melon ice wine." He glances at Ryalth. "Perhaps you might... Later,
of course." The wiry grower flushes. "I did not mean to talk of
trade."
Ryalth laughs gently. "It is good, and
we will talk later."
"You are gracious, and you have dealt
fairly, yet firmly." Kylynzar shakes his head. "I will talk no more
of trade." He bows slightly to Lorn. "We have not seen exactly
eye-to-eye, Captain, yet you have lived up to your duty. And my cousin, he has
told me that you always face the wild creatures first, and not last like so
many officers." He laughs, "And your consort has done far better by
us than all the other factors of Cyador combined. In fact, much of our decision
to be here and offer hospitality arises from her, and it is a pleasure to see
that she is as beautiful and charming as she is an effective merchanter."
The grower inclines his head to Ryalth again.
"She is beautiful and charming, and
very effective," Lorn agrees.
Eileyt slips through the crowd and bows.
"Captain, my best wishes to you."
"Thank you. My gratitude to you for
all the assistance you have provided to Ryalth and Ryalor House."
Before either can say another word, a
heavy-set man in a brown tunic so dark it is almost black steps up. Lorn
recognizes Wasyk without his shimmercloth scarf.
"Never seen such a handsome
couple," says the recorder. "Really created a dither here. Hasn't
been a lancer consorting or a merage consorting here in more than a score of
years."
"We didn't know," Lorn admits,
keeping his eyes on the big man, even as he wonders how long the
not-quite-impromptu festivities will continue.
"You both from Cyad?"
"I grew up in Fyrad mostly,"
Ryalth explains, "until I was older."
"I was raised in Cyad," Lorn
acknowledges.
"Won't talk long, but wanted to tell
you both that folk'll remember this day." Wasyk raises his mug.
Lorn takes but a tiny sip, knowing he will
have many sips yet to come.
After taking a sip of her wine, Ryalth
reaches out and squeezes Lorn's hand, warmly. "We'll remember it a long
time, a very long time."
Lorn has no doubts about that. And he'd
thought it would be a quiet consorting....
CII
Lorn
stretches gingerly, yawning, his arm still around the redhead sleeping beside
him. The mid-morning light seeps through the closed shutters of the dwelling's
bedchamber, thin slivers of light angling toward the floor. The air is chill,
because they had gone to bed early the night before and not stoked up the
ceramic stove in the main room.
Smiling reflectively, and looking at the
peaceful and lightly freckled face of his consort, Lorn still finds it hard to
believe that the festivities of their consorting two days earlier had lasted
most of the day and into the evening. He and Ryalth had finally slipped away
near sunset, to more than a few knowing looks. The day after the ceremony they
had spent quietly-the first day Lorn can remember in years where he or Ryalth
had not had to rise early for some reason or another.
"Mmmmm." Ryalth nuzzles up to his
cheek and kisses him gently.
"Mmmm to you, too, sleepy-head."
She yawns quietly, then snuggles against
him. "You don't know how good it feels to sleep in the morning."
"I was just thinking that."
"But you woke up...."
"It is mid-morning," Lorn points
out.
"It's still cold." She shivers
and pulls the worn quilt up to her ears- one-handed.
"I'll start the fire in the
stove."
"Mmmmm... if you don't mind... too
much?"
He grins at the mock-plaintive note in her
voice. "I'll start it and then come back until it's wanner."
The stone floor-the part not covered by the
few braided rugs-is indeed cold to Lorn's bare feet. He pads into the main
chamber where he sorts out some of the thin strips of wood in the starter
basket, and then piles some of the larger pieces above it in the firebox. Then
he concentrates.
Hst! The tiny chaos bolt is sufficient to
create a small blaze within the stove.
Lorn smiles and walks back to the
bedchamber, where he slips under the covers again.
"Your feet are cold."
"I did get the fire started in the
stove."
"Good." Ryalth kisses his cheek,
then pauses, before asking, "Have you ridden around Jakaafra much?"
"Except for the ward-wall? No. When you're on duty most of
the time... well... the only riding I really did was to Jakaafra to deal with
Dustyn and to arrange for the consorting and dwelling."
"You should. Now that you're
consorted, you can wear that uniform when you ride with me."
"I hadn't thought of wearing anything
else."
"You hadn't thought of wearing
anything at all today, you lecherous consort," Ryalth teases.
Lorn flushes. "We've never had days
like this together before, and they won't last that long."
"I know." She sighs softly and
hugs him, then kisses his cheek again. "I hoped for this for a long time.
I didn't think it was possible."
"Lancers consort with
merchanters."
"But Magi'i don't, and you were a
student magus."
"I still would have."
"The way you are now, you would,"
she admits.
"I don't think I could have been
otherwise." His arms encircle her, and they kiss, a long and lingering
kiss.
They both stiffen as they sense the chill
of a chaos glass screeing them, and they hold to each other, barely breathing,
until the scrutiny ends, and the chill fades away.
"Whoever... has no decency."
Ryalth snorts, leaning back just slightly.
Lorn wonders if his small use of chaos drew
Maran, for it could be no other, or if the majer is merely curious about Lorn's
furlough.
"I didn't feel that yesterday or at
the consort signing... did you?" she asks.
"No."
"Then he must think you've enticed
your mistress to Jakaafra. I hope he gets very jealous. Very jealous."
"He might be."
"It's getting warmer," she says.
"What did you do? Stoves don't heat up that quickly."
"A trick I learned as a student,"
Lorn admits.
"Be careful who sees that." She
frowns.
"I am. You're the only one who knows."
A trace of another frown crosses her brow
before she speaks. "Best it remain that way, my very dear lancer."
She half sits up, pulling the coverlet around her. "You didn't read me a
poem. One from the book. You brought it, didn't you? You know it was really my
first present to you?"
He smiles, thankful he can. "It's in
my bag. You want me to read one now?"
"One... we're waiting for the stove to
warm things up."
Lorn eases out of the bed a second time,
extracts the silver-covered volume from bag, and then extends it to her.
"You read one. Your favorite." He slips back under the covers.
"Tonight, you have to read me
one."
"I will."
She leafs through the book, then stops,
nodding. After a moment she reads.
Like a dusk without a cloud,
a leaf without a tree,
a shell without a sea...
the greening of the pear slips by...
Lorn smiles gently to himself as she
finishes the verses.
...and wait for pears and praise
...and wait for pears and praise.
"I like that one, too," he says,
leaning next to her and kissing her cheek. After a moment, he takes the book
and gently closes the cover.
Her fingertips hold him at bay. "You
promised we could take a ride."
"Do you really want to ride around Jakaafra?"
Ryalth nods. "People should see us,
and the air will feel good."
"And?"
"I might get some more ideas. I think
I know where I can sell that amber melon ice wine, if it will travel."
"Always the trader?"
"Not always." She kisses his
cheek again. "Not always."
CIII
Lorn
cocks his head to the side, then looks down at the draft of the scroll he
writes on the table that serves for eating and writing and anything else in the
small dwelling. He glances toward the glassed panes of the window whose inner
shutters he has opened to get more light. Outside the warmth of the dwelling, a
light but cold wind blows through a gray mid-morning. When he had saddled both
mounts earlier, Lorn had been glad for his winter jacket. From the table,
warmed by the ceramic stove, he studies the sky once more. The clouds are high,
and still do not look to bring rain or snow, or not soon.
He dips the pen again and adds a sentence
to the draft of the scroll before him, then pauses before crossing out several
words and penning in changes to the side.
"You are busy this morning,"
Ryalth observes as she emerges from the bedchamber, wearing working merchanter
blues. She walks over to Lorn, and bends down and kisses the back of his neck.
"Are you ready?" he asks,
replacing the pen in its holder and looking up at her.
"As ready as you, my dear
lancer." She smiles warmly. "You do not mind accompanying me on
merchanter business?"
"Not at all."
"Even after yesterday?"
Lorn laughs. They had ridden nearly ten
kays to a hamlet where a smith supposedly forged unique iron implements, only
to find that their uniqueness was only in their size and crudeness. Then they
had talked to a pearapple grower whose fruit was renowned in the region, but Ryalth
had decided even from the dried and winter stored samples that the fruit would
remain a local delicacy because it bruised too easily. Most of the day had been
like that.
"It is just that I seldom get this far
east and north...." She shakes her head. "I would never get this far
were it not for you." She sets a blue leather wallet on the edge of the
table, and there is the dull clink of coins. While Lorn has seen it before, he
had never looked that closely, thinking it a trader's wallet, and little more.
This time, he sees, embossed on the leather, a green emblem-the intertwined
letters "R" and "L" set within an inverted triangle.
Lorn studies the emblem, his lips curling
into a smile.
"That's the symbol I've been using
from the beginning," she explains.
"You never showed me."
"You never asked."
Lorn shakes his head. "I can't ask
what I don't know about."
"Neither can I." She laughs.
"Someone I love taught me that a long time ago."
They both laugh.
"What do you think of this?" Lorn
hands her the scroll he has written. He stands and looks over Ryalth's shoulder
as she reads through his revised and crossed out words.
...Father
had written some time back that, after discussing possible consorts with
Jerial, he had decided that the lady I have spent so much time with over the
years is most suitable. Because that was also my inclination, and because she
is my love, and because it appears likely that I will not be returned to Cyad
at any time in the years immediately before me, she traveled to Jakaafra, where
we were consorted.
I know this was not exactly as we all had
hoped for the placement and timing of such an event, but you all know how
unwise making such a union public in Cyad would be at this time. Mother has
also told me that she views the lady as most lovely....
Ryalth looks up. "You didn't tell me
that."
"I didn't? I thought I did."
She shakes her head ruefully. "Lorn...
my dearest lancer, there are times when I can almost see that there are thoughts
running through your mind, and you look as though you ought to be talking, and
I think you are hearing all the words you would speak. Then, I think you
sometimes feel you have spoken them."
"I will try to be better with
you," he says slowly. "Do not fret about it. That is the way you
are."
"Sometimes I dwell in my thoughts and
words too much." He glances from the redhead to the scroll. "What do
you think?"
"Do you think they'll be too terribly
upset?"
"I don't think so. Did you know that mother
told me not to spend too much time with them when I was in Cyad? She said to
spend it with 'my friend.'"
"I hope they won't be too upset."
"They won't be. They want us to be
happy."
"People say that," she points
out, "until someone else's happiness upsets them. I still worry about
upsetting your parents."
"If you'd rather I not tell
them...."
"You have to... I understand that. All
may be as you say. But I worry. So do you, or you would not take such care in
drafting your scroll." The redhead looks toward the door. "It's
colder out, isn't it?"
Lorn nods.
"It won't get warmer while we
wait."
He smiles as he takes the draft scroll from
her and sets it on the table. Then he takes the sabre from where he has set it
in the corner and attaches the scabbard to his uniform belt. Then he dons the
white leather winter jacket and his winter riding gloves.
Ryalth wears a wool-lined blue leather vest
over her tunic, and then a heavy dark blue woolen cloak. Her gloves are also
dark blue.
"I've already saddled them."
They walk the fifty cubits to the stable
together. Lorn leads out the chestnut first, then the white gelding, closing
the stable door and then mounting.
The raw and damp wind blows in their face
out of the northwest as they ride toward the square, and the smells that had
hinted at coming spring in the days immediately after their consorting have
vanished with the return of winter. Neither speaks as their mounts carry them
the kay into the center of Jakaafra.
Eileyt and Usylt, the trade guard, are standing under the narrow porch
of Dustyn's establishment as Lorn and Ryalth ride down the lane from the
square. As Lorn and Ryalth rein up, the two men hurry down from the porch to
untie their horses and mount.
"We're only going across the square," Ryalth says,
"to the cuprite master's shop."
The shop is on the south side of the
square, close to two hundred cubits from the recording hall, and distinguished
by a small square sign fastened to the eaves of the overhanging front porch.
The sign shows a yellow lamp, and the porch is empty. Lorn dismounts and ties
the gelding to the short hitching rail at the very end, then offers a hand to
Ryalth.
She smiles as she takes it. "I'll have
to get used to doing without all this courtesy before long."
"Enjoy it while we can."
After she dismounts, Ryalth unfastens the
blue leather Ryalor House wallet and extends it to Eileyt. She nods to Lorn.
"It's custom in the smaller towns. If you have an enumerator, then he
should disburse and collect the coins."
"I'll watch the mounts," Usylt
says, more to affirm that he wishes to remain outside, Lorn suspects.
"Thank you," Ryalth replies.
Lorn hurries up the three wooden steps and
crosses the wide porch from which many had watched their consorting nearly an
eightday earlier. He wonders at how quickly the time has passed for them and
how soon he must return to duty and Ryalth must return to Cyad. He cannot help
but worry that her absence will not help her trading. With those thoughts on
his mind, he opens the door for Ryalth, then morions for Eileyt to enter as
well.
The enumerator shakes his head and stands
back to let Lorn follow Ryalth.
Inside, Ryalth steps forward to study the
items on a small table which include several ornate lamps, a kettle, and a lamp
that looks more like a storm lantern of some sort. Ryalth studies the storm
lantern.
The odor of hot metal permeates the shop.
In the rear are a small forge, two workbenches, and a rack containing tools
Lorn does not recognize. A man appears to be heating something in or over the
forge, but his back is to Lorn, and a youth pumps a bellows, sweat streaming
down his forehead. The young man's eyes widen as he sees Ryalth, and he says
something to the crafter.
The crafter turns. He is a squarish man,
short, not even to Lorn's chin, but muscular, with stubby fingers that set
aside what appears to be an ornate bronze vessel. He steps toward the three
figures at the front of his shop. "Lady Trader... Captain... I be
Ghylset." The crafter's eyes flick from Ryalth to Lorn and back to Ryalth.
"What might I do for you?"
"You show good work, master
crafter," Ryalth offers. "Better than many I have seen, even in Cyad
and Fyrad."
"Thank you." The hint of a frown
accompanies his words. "Do you seek something?"
"I seek good work." Ryalth
half-turns and gestures at the table and the objects upon it. "Which of
these might show such?"
"The one you be looking at,
Lady."
Ryalth studies the bronze lamp carefully.
"Begging yer pardon, Lady Trader...
but if you'll be looking at the way the mantel's set... that's the secret...
that lamp... really more a lantern but small enough to carry by mount or ship
or set on a carriage, and it will burn through a gale and the heaviest of
rains."
Lorn can sense the truth of the crafter's
words, and he knows Ryalth can as well.
"Could not another cuprite master copy
this?" questions the redhead.
"Well... supposing they could, but
it'd take someone good as me, and I've figured some ways to make the seals with
the glass tighter 'n most, and quicker to form." Ghylset shrugs. "At
five silvers a lamp for a lamp that'll burn in the worst of storms.... I don't
think there's none can match me for quality nor price."
"Four silvers apiece if I order in
lots of a half-score," Ryalth suggests flatly.
"Half-score?"
"Can you make a score of them by the
turn of spring?" Ryalth asks. "A score... mayhap more." The
crafter frowns. "But four... that is low."
"Nine golds for a score," Ryalth
says firmly. "If they sell, I will order more."
"Nine golds... aye... that be not too
burdensome. Yet... I cannot begin so many... not without some estimation of
faith... beggin' yer pardon, Lady Trader."
While Ryalth and the cuprite crafter talk,
Lorn studies another series of lamps set on the shelf against the outer wall,
taking in those of various sizes. He smiles as he sees one that is smaller than
his clenched fist, wondering as he does what use such a lamp might have.
"...three golds now... so you may
begin... and two more-Dustyn will deliver them-when you bring the lamps to him
to be shipped to me. I will send four more golds when I receive the
lamps."
"They say you have been most
fair...." Ghylset nods slowly.
Ryalth looks to Eileyt, who produces three
golds from the Ryalor House wallet he carries for her.
"I look forward to your lamps, master
crafter." Ryalth's smile is professional, yet with the suggestion of
warmth.
"They be the best."
Lorn nods to himself as he follows her from
the shop. Because she can assess both worth and character, Ryalth has a
definite advantage, and she offers enough warmth so that she does not have to
haggle endlessly.
"Which crafter do you wish to see next?"
Lorn asks as they step out onto the windswept porch.
"No crafter-an oilseed grower."
Ryalth adjusts her cloak.
"The one with the perfumed oils?"
"There's always a market for good
oils, and if they're different..." She shrugs, then mounts her chestnut.
"Dustyn says his place is a solid four
kays out the west road," Lorn says as he quickly mounts. "I hope this
works out better than the pearapple grower."
"Most don't," Ryalth cautions
him, turning her mount toward the recording hall. "You should know that by
now. That's why I visit so many."
"I know." Lorn guides the gelding
alongside her chestnut.
Behind them, Eileyt nods as he and Usylt
ride after them toward the west road from the square.
CIV
In the
clear gray light preceding dawn, Lorn and Ryalth ride side by side on the
perimeter road to the southwest, toward Fyrad and Cyad, and away from Jakaafra.
Behind them ride Eileyt and the Usylt, the guard.
The air is still, and frost has settled on
the deadland, and on the winter-gray trees to their right, well out beyond the
deadland. Lorn wears his winter jacket over his duty uniform, as well as the
winter garrison cap. Ryalth wears her vest under the heavy blue woolen cloak.
Faint puffs of steam indicate their breathing.
Lorn glances to his left, at the glow of
the sun about to rise from behind the ward-wall and the Accursed Forest.
Somehow, the days of Lorn's furlough have raced by until none are left, and he
and Ryalth must return to their duties.
"You have the scrolls?" he looks
at Ryalth, taking in the red hair, the light freckles and the deep blue eyes he
will miss more than he had ever thought. "And you will send them by
private messenger?"
"We agreed on that." Her lips
curl into a smile that is both ironic and resigned, yet warm and accepting.
He laughs once, gently. "You will take
care on the ride to the Great Canal?"
"We will, and I will send you a scroll
when I reach Cyad." She smiles softly. "You need to get back. I would
not have you fail to be where you must be."
Lorn reaches out and takes her gloved hand
in his as they ride side by side. "I dislike parting, especially
now."
"I will visit as I can," she
promises. "But you need to go." Lorn nods. "Take care." He
gives her hand a last squeeze, then releases it.
"I will." Her smile is sad.
Lorn eases the gelding to the edge of the
road, where he watches as the three ride southwest. Ryalth looks back several
times. Finally, he turns the gelding and starts back toward the compound. He
has not ridden two hundred cubits when he looks back over his shoulder. Ryalth
is looking at him, as well, and he raises his arm. After a time, they both look
away.
Lorn continues slowly back along the
perimeter road, and the orangish light of dawn floods up from behind the
ward-wall and the green canopy of the Accursed Forest. He studies the unseen
darkness that is all too real, and wonders how the coming Patrol will fare.
Shortly, he eases the white gelding past
the duty guards and through the compound gates, his eyes checking the
courtyard, noting that both Kusyl and Shynt have begun to muster their squads
outside the quarters building.
He dismounts outside the stable and leads
the gelding inside. Suforis hurries up. "Ser, you'd not be going on Patrol
today?"
"Tomorrow. That's soon enough."
Lorn extends his mount's reins to the blond ostler, then unfastens his gear
from behind the saddle.
"She be a lovely lady, ser,"
Suforis observes, as he takes the gelding's reins from Lorn. "Though I was
surprised that Dustyn asked me 'n Lesyna to the festivities."
"We were glad you were there."
Lorn laughs, almost ruefully. "You two and Dustyn were the only people I
really knew." He shifts his grip on his gear, then nods to Suforis.
"I'd best be getting where I should be."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn walks briskly to the quarters
building, stopping but long enough to drop his gear bag in his duty quarters,
and then returns to the courtyard to see Kusyl, waiting before the formed up
second squad.
"Ser." Kusyl bows as Lorn
approaches.
"Squad leader."
"Halfscore and four, ser. One missing,
ser."
"Very good, Kusyl. You may dismiss
them to their duties. We will inspect all blades and gear before the noon meal.
Once they are working on their gear, I'd like to meet in the outer study."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn nods and heads to the first squad.
"Ser, halfscore and five, ser. All
present," Shynt announces.
"Very good, squad leader. You may
dismiss them to their duties. We will inspect all blades and gear before the
noon meal. Kusyl and you and I will meet in the outer study once they're
working on their blades and gear."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn turns and heads for the study, hoping
that there are no scrolls or messages bearing ill news. There, the door has
been unlocked, doubtless by Kusyl, but the outer desk is bare. He opens the
door to the inner study, but his desk is equally bare.
For some reason, that disturbs him more, he
feels, than would have scathing scrolls from either Majer Maran or Commander
Meylyd. Slowly, he takes off his garrison cap and hangs it on one of the wall
pegs, then doffs the winter jacket.
Tomorrow, Second Company will resume its
patrols, and Lorn has few doubts that the struggles with the Accursed Forest
will continue.
CV
The
Emperor leans forward in the malachite and silver chair that dominates the
smaller audience hall. His eyes are hard as he fixes them upon the First Magus.
"If you would, most honored of Magi'i, explain just how you plan to make
this barrier work, and how long the process will take."
Chyenfel bows. "But, of course, Your
Mightiness. All know that there are chaos towers that confine the Accursed
Forest. As you have been informed, of the dozen towers that once enfolded the
Forest, three have failed. Two of those were at the cardinal points of the
wall. Where once every tower station at the cardinal points had two functioning
towers, now only the south and west stations have two towers. The other failed
chaos tower is the northeast midpoint tower, and that has meant forcing more
chaos energy through the cupridium cables on the northeast ward-wall. That
requires more chaos energies precisely from the cardinal point tower stations
most burdened. Thus..." the First Magus shrugs, "...the barrier on
that wall is not so strong as on the other walls, and there have been more
attempts by the Accursed Forest to break through the wards there."
In the far more modest malachite chair
behind the Emperor's shoulder, Ryenyel sits, her eyes not upon the First Magus
nor upon the Majer-Commander of Mirror Lancers, but, once again, upon Bluoyal,
the Merchanter Advisor to the Emperor of Light.
"We will use the remaining power in
the towers to create a barrier," Chyenfel continues, "a barrier like
that which separates the inner part of a tower from the outer, and that barrier
will also place a slumber-ward, if you will, over all of the Accursed Forest.
We think re-setting the chaos fields to do this will take a good two-score
mages. It will take a season to assemble all that is necessary, and but an
afternoon to accomplish it."
"If it can be done," suggests the
Emperor.
"So you should be able to move the
towers by the fall if His Mightiness agrees to this now?" asks Bluoyal
quietly.
All faces turn to the merchanter advisor at
his interruption. To Bluoyal's right, Rynst nods slightly, almost as if urging
the merchanter to go on.
"We are seeing more pirate attacks
upon our trading vessels," the heavy trader continues. "Yet we understand
that we can expect less support from the fireships and fewer Mirror Foot on our
ships with firelances. For generations, those chaos towers have sat around a
forest that hasn't caused a shade of the trouble that the barbarians or the
pirates have, all because the ancients thought there was something there. So a
few wild creatures escape, and a few cattle and sheep are killed. It would be
far cheaper to pay for the lost livestock, and move the lancers and the towers
to where they can do real good."
"If you may recall," offers
Chyenfel, "no chaos tower can be moved, unless it was placed in something
that contains it and can be moved, such as a fireship. The records and history
are quite clear on that. They are also quite clear on the dangers of the
Forest."
"Has anyone tried to move them in,
say, the past five generations?" counters Bluoyal.
"Which one would you like to lose,
honored merchanter? If we try to move one surrounding the Forest, we cannot
contain the wild order, even under the new barrier. Why would we wish to move
any of the others?"
"I was not thinking of the others,
most honored First Magus."
"As we have told the Emperor before,
although you may have missed such, honored advisor on trade and commerce, the
towers will still be there, although none will be able to see or sense
them."
"Not sense them?" Bluoyal raises
his bushy eyebrows.
"They and the wards will be twisted so
that they will not quite be as they are... or that they do not appear as such,
more precisely."
The Emperor of Light frowns. "If the
towers... vanish... will this not alarm the people? You had not mentioned this
aspect of your barrier. What of the lancers?"
"We would see no need of the present
numbers of lancers," answers Chyenfel cautiously.
"So that they could be moved
northward, or placed on the new sail-powered warships?" interjects
Bluoyal.
"That would be the decision of His
Mightiness, in consultation with the honored Majer-Commander," replies the
First Magus.
"A moment." Toziel lifts his
hand. "Let me make this most clear. You are telling me that unless I agree
to your plan, I will have no choice?"
"Sire..." Chyenfel offers
patiently. "You have no choice. If you try to move the towers, they will
fail, and the Accursed Forest will reclaim much of eastern Cyador. If you do
nothing, the towers will fail within years, if not sooner, and the Forest will
do the same."
Toziel looks at the perspiring magus.
"I cannot say that I am pleased with the performance of the Magi'i."
"Sire... this day has been foretold
from the very first. You have read the original writings of the
Firstborn...."
"And I would be the man to be Emperor
when it may occur?" Toziel's words are like cold cupridium. "So...
for how many more years will your plan confine the Accursed Forest, so that
Cyador may continue to prosper?"
"Sire... as you know, we would use all
the power in the Towers to create a barrier, the slenderest barrier of time
passing, and by doing so, we would layer order and chaos about the Forest, and
place the Forest in a type of sleep, so that it would come to resemble a normal
forest...."
"You have told me that. How
long?"
"Twenty-five to thirty score years, we
would judge-if... if, no one brings a focused order or chaos of that same
magnitude to the ward-walls."
"How could that occur, if there is no
other source of focused chaos or order besides the chaos towers-which are
failing-and the Forest which you will lull into an enchanted sleep?"
"We know of no such way, sire."
Chyenfel bows.
"As you say... I have no choice. Let
it be done." Toziel stands. "We will not visit this issue
again." He turns and moves toward the exit from the chamber.
A smile flits across Bluoyal's face, a
smile noted by Ryenyel alone before she turns to follow her consort.
Rynst's cold eyes scan first Bluoyal and
then the First Magus. The three advisors remain standing in place until the
chamber is vacant of imperial presence.
As is their custom after the audience with
the advisors, the Emperor and his consort return to the Empress's salon, where
she seats herself on the white divan.
Toziel studies his consort. "I do
believe we have finally had enough meetings on the barrier for the Accursed
Forest so that Chyenfel can create it without interference."
"You could have ordered him to proceed
a year ago," Ryenyel points out, "were it not for other
considerations."
"Folk-even high advisors-must talk and
talk and repeat themselves until they are confortable with an idea, for if they
are not..."
"The delay is greater," Ryenyel
finishes drily.
"And I must appear almost dense, as if
forced into acceding to the plan." Toziel shakes his head.
Faint smiles appear on both their faces.
"And all the Magi'i had to understand
that the towers there will fail."
"You mean Kharl and Liataphi...
perhaps Kien," she suggests.
"Kien understands. He always has. He
prefers to advise, and stand in the shadows. That is why he will never seek to
be First Magus. Or even Third."
"Many would not agree."
Toziel grins at her. "But you do, and
I trust your judgment." The grin fades, and he paces to the window. There
he looks out at the heavy spring rain for a time before he turns and speaks
again. "Each eightday we delay, we risk failure of another tower, and the
chance that the Accursed Forest will leap the wards beyond our ability to
contain it."
After a silence, the Empress-consort
speaks. "Rynst now understands that Bluoyal only wishes the towers and the
lancers in order to support the merchanters' trading ships. He also understands
that while he cannot brook Chyenfel, the First Magus can be trusted far more
than the Second. Or the Third."
"Only now?" Toziel snorts.
"Or is it that he fears Bluoyal more than the Magi'i?"
"Bluoyal walks a narrow and dangerous
path, trying to ensure that the lancers and the Magi'i do not see that their
interests are closer to each other's than to his." She reaches for the
goblet of spring water on the table, nearly draining it in a single swallow.
"They see that. They have always seen
that." The Emperor's smile is cold. "But neither can afford to trust
the other allied to Bluoyal. Yet they know that both Magi'i and Lancers are few
outside of the three cities. They cooperate like a pair of giant cats against a
pack of night leopards. Most carefully."
"And when the towers fail?" she
questions.
"There will be towers after we are
gone," Toziel answers.
"Not many, and not for long. You
hesitate to answer?"
"You know, as do I, my dear. There
will need to be more lancers against the barbarians, but the Magi'i who can
draw chaos from around them will be far fewer." He shrugs. "That will
make each more powerful individually, but the families far less so, and there
will be fewer. Bluoyal's successors will find they still need lancers, but not
until many perish, and more than a few vessels are lost."
"Little will change," she
prophesies.
"The appearances will not, but the
emperors to come must either be powerful Magi'i or inspire loyalty within the
Mirror Lancers, for either lancers or Magi'i can destroy an Emperor. Yet they
must have the support of the Merchanters, for without that there will not be
the golds to support the Mirror Lancers."
"Bluoyal is coming to believe that he
can decide who will succeed you, even now. I wonder if he holds the Brystan
sabre in reserve... or the man who does."
"That part of the riddle has not
surfaced." Toziel sinks onto the divan beside her, breathing slightly
heavily.
"No," she replies, "but it will. Bluoyal already
believes that the merchanters will purchase the Palace of Light in years to
come."
"For a season, perhaps, in two
generations. Sooner, if we fail, and blood will stain the sunstone so deeply it
will not be removed, should that occur." He studies her drawn face.
"You give too much to me."
"What else would I do, dearest? We
know there is no one else."
"Not yet." Her fingers rest
lightly on his cheek.
CVI
In the
mid-afternoon gloom, Lorn sits at the narrow desk in his study, reading over
the last lines of his patrol report, before he begins the summary report that
will go to Majer Maran. Outside, the heavy rain that begun the day before on
the final day of patrol continues to beat down on the tile roofs of the
compound and to run in sheets across the slightly slanted stone pavement of the
courtyard, pouring into the drainage canal leading westward.
The lancer captain massages his forehead
with his left hand, closing his eyes for a moment, listening to the drumbeat of
the rain, rain that usually seems to provide headaches.
Ryalth has returned to Cyad, and Lorn has
completed one complete patrol, surprisingly without a tree-fall or another
excursion from the Accursed Forest. Those will come. That he knows, but he
hopes that he will have some time, for he has yet to decide how he will handle
what must come from Maran, if not by spring, then later.
Thrap. The knock on the study door is
gentle.
"Yes?"
Kusyl opens the door and peers inside.
"Ah... ser... the engineers brought the replacement firelances."
Lorn beckons for the squad leader to come
in.
Kusyl does and closes the door behind him.
"They're not fully charged, or there
aren't enough?" Lorn suggests.
"Just a score and a half, ser. If
Frynyl hadn't run for the north, well, ser..."
"I know. There wouldn't even be one
for me. I could have borrowed one from Juist, but only one. He generally has a
few extras, and they don't discharge theirs as rapidly as we do." Lorn
smiles. "I appreciate your telling me. It won't change anything." He
glances toward the window. "I just hope the rain lets up soon."
"Not quite so heavy as earlier,
ser." Kusyl bobs his head. "There be anything you want, ser?"
"No, thank you."
Once Kusyl leaves, Lorn looks out at the
still-falling rain. He shakes his head sadly. Maran has made Lorn's decision
for him, although Lorn doubts Maran will understand the reasons for that
decision. The captain fingers his chin. In a way, Ciesrt has also helped to
make Lorn's decision, and his sister's consort would not understand either.
Lorn takes out another sheet of report
paper and begins drafting the summary report to Majer Maran. Since nothing
occurred, it is short, and before long, Lorn has handed it to Kusyl for
dispatch.
Then he crosses the courtyard to his
quarters quickly, but Kusyl is right, for the rain has diminished to a fraction
of its former intensity.
He bolts the door behind himself, pacing
around the small room, thinking. After a time, he recovers and opens the
silver-covered book, searching for a poem that may reflect his conflicting
emotions, either his sense of loss at Ryalth's absence... perhaps his growing
understanding of how fortunate he has been to have found and held her or his
anger at Maran's smallness. He passes by page after page of verse, feeling the
weight of melancholy, until he pauses, caught by an image, though it is not
what he has sought.
He reads the words slowly, and aloud, for
the combination of the subtle strangeness and the angular characters always
suggests restraint.
An ornamented garden, filled with flowers,
statues surrounding lovers' bowers,
these we will not find in granite walls,
nor in the heights of Palace halls,
vain
images of a world long lost in space
that none can bear to view or to replace.
Love you I will these last days we hold,
loving till we are ash and order cold,
for ancient images are not for keeping,
nor Palace walls and second falls for
weeping.
He frowns, wondering again who the writer
might have been. Then he shakes his head, looking for something slightly less
melancholy, but the best he can find is the first stanza of another verse.
Virtues of old hold fast.
Morning's blaze cannot last;
and rose petals soon part.
Not so a steadfast heart.
"Not so a steadfast heart..." he
murmurs to himself. Is his heart that steadfast? He shakes his head and turns
to the lines about pears, recalling Ryalth's voice as she had read the words on
a chill morning that had been warmer than most he has known.
Then, only then, he slowly closes the book.
Ryalth had asked him so long ago what he knew of the ancients. He still does
not know, only that they had somehow seen an age end, a life end, and it had
colored everything written in the small, seemingly eternal, silver-covered
volume he holds.
CVII
To
Lorn's right the ward-wall glimmers white in the steam of the morning of Second
Company's second day of patrol-outbound from Jakaafra compound on the second
full patrol since Lorn has returned from his furlough and seen Ryalth off on
her way back to Cyad. While it is too early to have heard from her, he worries.
He also worries about the weather and the
Accursed Forest. The cold rain has been followed with still air and a sun that
seems as hot as early summer. The air is damp and warm, and steam rises from
the road and even from the deadland, so much so that Lorn can barely make out
the second squad's lancers in the line abreast stretching in from the perimeter
road.
Lorn blots his forehead with the back of
his hand, even though his jacket is fastened behind the saddle. His eyes and
chaos senses focus on the ward-wall ahead, for the chaos field set up by the
wards is truly chaotic and seems almost to fade away at times. He turns his
head left and calls to Shynt, "Tell them to watch things closely."
"Aye, ser." In turn, the junior
squad leader calls out. "Watch close now! Could be aught all in this mist!
Watch close."
As the gelding carries him along the wall
road, headed almost directly into the sun, Lorn struggles against the glare of
sun and reflected light to make out the midpoint chaos tower that the company
must be approaching-that and the fallen trunk he knows must lie ahead. Still,
Second Company rides another three kays before Lorn sees the line of darkness
crossing the ward-wall ahead-and behind it, the white granite of the midpoint
chaos-tower building rising above the ground mist, less than half a kay behind
the fallen tree. For a long moment, he studies the point nearly a kay away
where the tree has struck the granite of the ward-wall, noting that white
oblongs are strewn across the wall road-the first time he has seen such.
He turns in the saddle and calls to Shynt,
"Form up into five abreast. We'll head out to join the second squad."
His fingers touch the single chaos lance in his holder-fully charged and then
some.
"There's a fallen tree ahead. Form up
five abreast, staggered! Pass it out!" orders the junior squad leader.
"Five abreast!"
After guiding the gelding away from the
ward-wall, Lorn urges his mount up alongside Shynt's. The lancers fall into
their five-abreast ranks as Lorn and Shynt pass, until they have gathered the understrength
squad together. Shynt barely has the first squad formed up a quarter kay from
the wall and riding outward toward Kusyl and his second squad-already formed up
on the perimeter road-when a messenger rides toward Lorn, reining up and then
turning his mount to ride beside the lancer captain.
"Ser," the messenger blurts.
"Squad leader Kusyl, ser, he wants you to know that there's another trunk
down on the far side of the chaos tower."
"Another?" murmurs Shynt to
himself.
"Thank you," Lorn replies.
"Tell him we'll join him on the perimeter road off the crown of this
trunk. And tell him to stay well back until we get there."
"Yes, ser."
The lancer rides back toward Kusyl, and
Lorn and the first squad continue riding in formation, outward through the
ground mist that has begun to dissipate, out toward the perimeter road and the
second squad.
Lorn keeps studying the dark trunk whose
length they parallel, but he sees nothing overt, no giant cats on the trunk, no
night leopards-just a huge trunk-wall that seems blacker than most of the
fallen forest giants he has encountered on previous patrols.
As Lorn nears the second squad, formed up
on the perimeter road, Kusyl rides forward to meet his captain. "Two of
'em down, ser," reports the senior squad leader. "You can see the
second, on the other side of the tower building." He points. "Looks
big as this one. Could be bigger. Hard to tell from here."
Following the gesture, Lorn nods. "Two
or not, we'll have to check this one first. We'll follow the road and then head
straight at the crown."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn continues to watch the two fallen
forest giants, separated by almost a kay, with the bulk of the midpoint chaos
tower and its connecting wall between them, yet he can see nothing moving
except dark birds that are clearly vulcrows.
When they are opposite the first tree, Lorn
reins up, then turns. "Form up on me for the approach to the crown."
The captain looks from Kusyl to Shynt.
"Yes, ser."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn eases the gelding forward, then slips
the white firelance from the holder. He also checks the sabre. Once the squads
flank him, with seventy-five cubits separating him from the forward lancer on
each side, and he rides alone once more, he urges the gelding toward the mass
of twisted and splintered branches and greenery that lie six hundred cubits
before him.
A vulcrow flutters to land on a branch
protruding higher than the others, its black feathers glistening under the hot
spring-like sun, something dangling from its mouth before the morsel disappears
when the scavenger swallows. Lorn rides closer to the forest canopy. He can see
long strands of moss-like vegetation.
The air smells of splintered and resined
wood, of acrid crushed leaves, and slightly of the acrid and musky scent that
tells of stun lizards. The branches rustle, then crack ominously, and the
crackling is followed by a greater odor of musk and an intensified acridity.
"Prepare to discharge
firelances!" Lorn orders without turning his head, his eyes sweeping the
twisted greenery. "Firelances to the ready."
The two stun lizards that crash from the
fallen tree are five cubits high at their front shoulders, and stretch more
than twenty-five cubits. The heavy tails do not lash. The nearer and
fractionally larger lizard halts, then watches Lorn through black eyes that do
not blink. Soundlessly, a black tongue flicks out like a lash, pulling a gray
sparrow Lorn had not even seen from the air.
After taking the bird, the first lizard
remains perfectly still. So does the second.
A gap of a hundred cubits separates Lorn
and the two squads of Second Company from the pair of lizards.
The first lizard lumbers forward a good
twenty cubits, then halts. The tongue flicks the air once more.
Lorn waits.
The trailing lizard angles to Lorn's right
and continues forward slowly until it comes to a halt ten cubits forward of the
first.
The first lizard takes another dozen
ground-covering strides, then lifts its head.
MMMMnnnnnnnn...
At the mental scream of the lizard, several
lancers sway in their saddles. One drops a firelance and clasps his hands to
his forehead, as if to try to keep his skull from exploding.
"Discharge at will!" snaps Lorn.
"Fire at will!" echoes Kusyl.
MMMMnnn... The second lizard charges for
Shynt.
Hssst! Hsstt! Hssst! Firelances flare
everywhere, but most concentrate on the second lizard, the one that has almost
reached the five-abreast formation before slowing under the flash of lances.
MMMnnnnnn! Lorn feels rocked in his saddle
by the mental blast, even though he knows the sensation is but within his mind.
The giant lizard half-turns and the tail
swings. A lancer tries to duck, but is swept from the saddle, and the return
swing, lower, sweeps his mount from its hoofs.
Lorn digs his heels into the gelding's
flanks and urges him forward. Recalling his previous encounters with the
lizards, he directs his lance blasts at the first lizard's left eye.
Hssstt!
MMMMMmmmm... The stun blast contains a
sense of pain and rage. MMMnnnnn... The big tail thumps the deadland, then
lashes toward the second squad.
Mmmnnnn... Lorn fires again, glancing
toward the first squad momentarily. Two mounts are down, but the second
lizard's head is a charred mass. He concentrates on the lizard that continues
to lumber away from him and toward Kusyl and the second squad.
The first lizard flees Lorn, its tail
sweeping through the legs of another lancer mount, and sending mount and lancer
down. Lorn urges the gelding more to his left, trying to circle past the
flailing tail to get another blast at the lizard's eye.
Abruptly, the big creature slows and its
tongue flashes toward a lancer, but the lancer has the presence of mind to
slash with his sabre.
MMMMnnnn!
The lancer shakes his head, managing to
hold his blade against the lash-like tongue.
HHHssssTTT! Lorn focuses a long bolt, one
that curves under his control, into the lizard's left eye.
A deep roaring groan fills the air, and the
tail slams the ground, once, twice. Lorn senses that the beast is dying, and
lets loose another fireblast before he turns the gelding. His eyes travel
toward the ward-wall, where, even as the two lizards are still twitching,
another set of four large dark forms come streaking, not from the foliage, but
down the massive tree trunk from the forest.
"Giant cats! Reform!"
"Lances ready!"
Before the second squad can turn toward the
south and the ward-wall, one of the giant cats has struck a lancer.
Hhhsttt! Hssst!
The bursts from the lances are shorter,
weaker, and many lancers have dropped exhausted lances and are using their
sabres.
Lorn finds the Brystan sabre in one hand,
and the firelance in the other. His eyes are watering, and his head is
splitting, but he lets loose with another chaos blast, this time at a giant cat
that has started to spring toward Kusyl from the side, while the senior squad
leader is using his sabre on a third cat that has slashed the shoulder of a lancer
in the first rank.
The cat squalls, then crumples, and Lorn
tries to scan the area between the lancers and the crushed canopy.
A round tannish object rolls out of the
canopy, surrounded almost by a dark fog, that starts to swirl away from rough
sphere.
Paper wasps! Lorn turns his lance in the
general direction of the nest and lets loose a chaos bolt. Hssst!
Knives slash his vision, and he understands
he is drawing chaos from around him, that the charge in his weapon is long
since depleted. He drops the lance. This is one time that he isn't worrying
about the weapons, not with all the wild creatures swirling around and
attacking Second Company.
He glances back at the tan sphere, but the
wasp nest flares yellowish, as do some of the finger-long wasps. A handful
escapes the chaos flash, and the insects whine toward the nearest lancers-those
on the left end of Shynt's company.
Lorn jerks his attention back to the
crushed green leaves of the canopy, and the rustling that foretells night
leopards. "Night leopards!"
"Frig!"
"Dark angels..."
Lorn manages to drag out the other sabre
and wonders just how effective he will be guiding the gelding with his knees.
He swallows and blinks as the smaller cats continue to bound from the greenery-far
more than a score.
Hssst! Hssst! Hssst! The handful of
firelances left from those lancers who had been in the third rank flare, and
lines of chaos crisscross the dark feline forms, those that have not already
reached lancers and their mounts.
"Short bursts! Short bursts!"
Shynt bellows.
A mount screams.
Lorn finds himself swinging the Brystan
sabre left-handed to drop a night leopard that has streaked toward him, while
holding the second sabre ready in his right.
Hsst! Hsst!
Lorn does not recall well the next moments,
only that he employs both blades, and that no leopards turn and flee, but all
continue to attack.
Abruptly, impossibly, it seems, there are
no creatures attacking.
Lorn glances down. One trouser leg is
slashed, and there is blood splattered across his boots and legs. His eyes feel
like knives are being driven through and behind them, and his skull feels as if
it had been split with a dull wedge. He blinks and tries to assess what remains
around him.
Close by, he can see five mounts lying on
the deadland. One shudders and tries to rise, shudders and tries again, but the
mare's right foreleg is crushed and twisted, possibly from the lashing tail of
one of the stun lizards.
One lancer lies on his back, his body
swollen, and his face covered with red blotches from the attack of those paper
wasps that had escaped Lorn's firelance.
Other unmoving forms-five-lie beside the
charred forms of the lizards, the giant cats, and the night leopards.
Kusyl rides slowly toward Lorn. Dark
splotches cover his gray's coat, blood is smeared across the forearms of both
sleeves.
Not sure that the attack is over, or that
the comparative stillness is a lull, Lorn keeps scanning the area, with both
chaos senses and sight. The only sounds come from the lancers and their mounts,
and the pitiful whimpering of the mount that will have to be destroyed.
A vulcrow flaps overhead, then glides above
Lorn and down toward one of the lizard carcasses. Lorn blots his forehead to
keep the sweat from eyes that already burn and slash into his skull, but he
does not close his eyes, but keeps watching.
"Form up on me!" Kusyl orders.
"Reform!" yells Shynt, his voice
cracking slightly.
Lorn watches the greenery as the lancers
reform, those that remain and can, then rides to where Kusyl sits on his mount
before the remaining eleven members of the second squad.
"Never... ever seen aught like that,
ser," observes the squad leader.
Lorn shakes his head, but only minutely,
for each movement sears his vision. "I haven't either." He swallows,
but that helps little with the dryness in his mouth and throat. "Best we
remain formed up and see what happens for a bit. Except... have a couple of men
look to the wounded... do we have any?"
"Yes, ser." Kusyl frowns.
"Seven down, I think, both squads. Those that stayed mounted be all right,
save slashes... excepting Thylt... lizard tail snapped his arm."
Shynt eases his mount to join them, as all
three continue to survey the twisted branches of the fallen tree. "We have
no charged lances remaining."
"I doubt if anyone does," Lorn
says hoarsely.
The silence continues for some time, yet
the only movement is that of the handful of vulcrows that are gathering, flapping
down to feed on the dead lizards.
"There is a second tree," Lorn
says. "Have second squad remain here with the wounded. First squad and I
will circle the other tree, but we'll stay well back. Well back," he adds.
Shynt nods.
"We won't send a message to the
Engineers until we look at the second tree-carefully." The captain looks
at Kusyl. "If you'd have someone collect the lances that were discarded or
dropped, and see how many are left with charges...." He laughs once,
harshly. "If there are any at all."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn turns in the saddle to Shynt.
"First squad ready?"
"Yes, ser."
Lorn and the first squad slowly ride past
the midpoint chaos tower, then continue almost another half kay before turning
southward and beginning a circuit around the second fallen trunk, at a distance
of a good five hundred cubits. Lorn watches the trunk... and listens. All he
hears are the murmurs of lancers.
"...two stun lizards... never saw so
many of those angel-dead leopards..."
"...captain killed one lizard
himself... big cat... lots a' small ones..."
"...better... got the worst luck of
any officer..."
"...not worst luck... worst wall...
northeast always been bad... say it be the winds..."
"...heard he got consorted on furlough..."
"...might as well... lots don't live
to get back to Cyad...."
Lorn concentrates on the fallen tree, but
no branches rustle, and there are no signs of any other wild creatures-besides
the vulcrows that perch on the trunk, and then fly back to pick at the
carcasses.
"Not a thing on this trunk. Strange it
be," Shynt observes. "They were waiting for us at the first."
Lorn nods, his eyes going to the ward-wall
that lies still ahead, continuing to ride parallel to the second trunk, the
firelance held out, even though the chaos charge is gone. He compares the bark
to what he has seen earlier, a bark that is darker, smoother-harder perhaps.
As they near the wall that hardness is
clear. Once again, the trunk has also destroyed or knocked out of the wall a
good three courses of the granite stonework.
"Tough tree, this one," Shynt
says. "Hope we don't see more like this."
More like what they have just endured, and
there will be no Second Company. Yet not a single wild creature has escaped-unless
they had left well before the lancers arrived. Lorn shrugs. If that is the
case, he can do nothing, but accept that Maran will blame him for that as well.
No matter how carefully Lorn writes his
patrol report, Maran will find a way to blame Lorn.
CVIII
After
turning the gelding over to Suforis and ensuring that the firelances are locked
in the armory, Lorn hurries back to his study, stopping only to drop his gear,
and reaching the Second Company studies even before Kusyl-if Kusyl even intends
to do so. Lorn carries the scroll passed to him by Suforis, who has informed
Lorn that Lesyna has actually brought it from Dustyn. A second scroll waits in
the outer study, one from Cyad through the lancer courier system. The one from
Cyad has been opened and resealed, if most carefully.
Once he is in his study, and has lit the
lamp to lift the twilight gloom, Lorn opens Ryalth's scroll first, smoothing it
out gently.
My
dearest,
I have returned safely. It is most late
tonight, but I will write now, else I will have little time for eightdays to
come. No... Ryalor House did not suffer in my absence. Having three enumerators
and a junior trader sufficed. There are many opportunities, and some I see
clearly for the first time.... I already have a buyer for the lamps, and an
offer on the melon ice wine....
He skips over the rest of the general
references to trade opportunities, looking for her reaction or his family's
reaction to their consortship.
You had asked I send the scrolls. I did,
but I sent them with a scroll of my own, requesting their leave to call. Your
sister Jerial appeared at the Plaza herself and escorted me to the evening
meal. Your father apologized for not coming personally, but he asked that I
understand his presence in the Plaza would have negated all we had done in our
arrangements. They were not only kind, but far warmer than I would have
believed. We will continue to be circumspect, and I have officially engaged
your sister as my personal healer. That is rare, but not unheard of....
Rare for a merchanter, but not for a Magi'i
family without healers, Lorn reflects. Trust his consort and his sister to
immediately find a way to work matters out.
...Eileyt
is now a senior enumerator, and pleased with that. So am I.
Lorn nods.
If matters progress as well as may be
possible, I may be able to return to eastern Cyador to arrange future goods and
shipments as early as next fall. That would please me no end, and I trust you,
as well.
The words, "my love," are written
above her signature.
Lorn smiles, looking at the last words.
Finally, he reaches for the second scroll. While he knows Ryalth reads people
well, he still frets as he breaks the seal and smooths out the heavy paper.
Your scroll arrived, accompanied by
another, and I must say that you surprised us, not so much for your choice or
the location, but for the timing. Yet I must admit that this was not totally
unexpected, considering the situation in which you find yourself. The lady
asked our permission to call, and Jerial escorted her to us, the best
arrangement possible. I told her that while her courtesy was charming and her
discretion remarkable, that she was welcome at any time. She is indeed
remarkable, and I must praise your ability to see far more than either your
mother or I would have...
Lorn laughs to himself. Those circumspect
words were as close to a compliment of Ryalth and an admission that his father
had been wrong as he was ever likely to get.
...Jerial
is also pleased, although she has been hard-pressed lately as a result of
recent unfortunate incidents, such as occurred the last time you visited.
Recent unfortunate incidents?
Myryan has also been pressed into service,
and has had far less time with her new dwelling and her garden than she would
have wished, but her skill is undeniable. Vernt may well be considered for
elevation to a lower second level adept in the year or so ahead, so devoted he
is to his work. Your mother and I have introduced him to several young ladies,
and, in light of recent events, he might even consider seeing one of them.
Your mother and I are well, if not
possessed of quite the vigor of our offspring, and I am most pleased to be
where I am at this time in my life...
Lorn frowns. From what he can tell, there
has been another chaos-explosion, perhaps on a fireship, and a great deal of
stress and pressure has been placed on the highest level of the Magi'i. The
very highest level, Lorn knows, for his father is just below the three who lead
the Magi'i.
The lancer captain looks at the locked foot
locker on the far side of his desk. Tomorrow... tomorrow he will deal with the
patrol report and the other administrative duties.
Tonight, he is relieved.
Half-relieved, he corrects himself as he
leaves the inner study.
CIX
Lorn is
in his study early the next morning, working on the patrol report. Short as it
is, he writes three versions, and it is well after mid-morning before he is
satisfied. Then... he must plead for replacement lancers in a scroll to
commander Meylyd. Drafting that request is almost as laborious, but finally he
finishes a draft.
He glances out the study window at the
green-blue sky and the puffy white clouds that drift out of the north, then
looks back down at his request, his eyes taking in what he has written.
...as I
had noted in a previous meeting with Majer Maran, Second Company was well under
strength even before the extraordinary demands placed on it by the excursions
of the Accursed Forest... have managed to restrict the wild creatures using the
most conventional of Mirror Lancer tactics, and without use of additional
firelances... toll has been high, and both squads now number less than half
their normal strength... should the most recent level of activity by the
Accursed Forest continue, it would appear unlikely that even the most esteemed
and loyal Mirror Lancer officer could continue to restrict the escape of wild
creatures without reinforcements.... Therefore... requesting replacements
necessary to bring Second Company up to full strength....
Lorn reads through the draft. He purses his
lips. The wording is still not right, and it nears mid-day.
Thrap.
He looks up at the knock. "Yes?"
Kusyl opens the door. "There be a
Majer Weylt here, ser."
"Have him come in." Lorn stands.
Weylt enters the inner study, and Kusyl
shuts the door.
"Majer, what can I do for you?"
asks Lorn.
"I wondered if we could have something
to eat before I leave. We were checking the tower," Weylt explains.
"There's not much at mid-day,"
Lorn says. "Usually just bread and cheese, maybe some dried fruit."
He smiles. "I can offer some wine."
"I'd appreciate that."
"I can go now." Lorn gestures
toward the papers on the desk. "Reports, but they can wait until after we
eat."
"Thank you."
"If you would like, I'll meet you
there. I keep the wine in my quarters," Lorn points out.
"That would be fine."
Lorn crosses the courtyard. He notes that
the Engineer firewagon is being loaded with several firelances-those expended
by Juist?
There is but one bottle of Alafraan left in
his room, but Lorn suspects that it will be worth serving for the majer, who
has often provided good, if indirect, advice before.
Weylt sits alone at the table, a platter with a large wedge of
cheese and a basket with two cold loaves of bread in the middle of the battered
but polished golden oak surface of the table.
Lorn uncorks the bottle, then seats himself
and uses his belt knife to cut several slices of the hard white cheese. He
pours a half goblet of the Alafraan for himself and closer to a full one for
the Mirror Engineer majer.
Weylt takes a slow sip. "Thank you,
Captain. You have the best wine of all the compounds around the Forest."
"I was lucky. My trader provided
it."
"You were lucky in more than
that." Weylt breaks off a chunk of bread, eating it with some cheese
before speaking again. "You were fortunate we were free when your
messenger arrived. When we returned to Eastpoint, there was a messenger from
Captain Tysyr."
"He's at Eastpoint now?"
"That's right. He replaced Ivinyt...
about half a season ago. He had a trunk down on our side of the southeast
midpoint chaos tower. So... a bit later, and you'd have been out there another
day, perhaps two."
"I'm glad we weren't." Lorn takes
the bread and a large wedge of cheese. "We were there long enough."
Weylt nods deliberately, slowly. "I
did notice the charred remnants of a large paper wasp nest, purely by
accident." Weylt smiles. "I trust you did not bother to put such an
insignificant addition into your patrol report."
"With the giant cats and the stun
lizards?" Lorn laughs. "It didn't seem that important, I must admit,
and I never did get an accurate count of the night leopards. So I just
mentioned that there seemed to be two packs, and none escaped."
"Most sagacious, Captain." Weylt
lifts the goblet, but does not drink. "I would say that you are not in the
most enviable position. Those two trees were the largest I have seen. They were
among the most substantial to have fallen, according to the Engineer records.
We keep very accurate records, you understand?"
The lancer captain nods.
"Normally, those falls would release
large numbers of creatures. Yet you have indicated that you reported success
with keeping a modest number from escaping. A... skeptical superior might
question the numbers. He would request our report, which would verify the size
of the fallen trees. Then he would wait for reports of escaped creatures. If
such reports occur, of course, there might be disciplinary action for
falsification." Weylt shrugs. "You do not falsify, and... well...
sometimes the truth is even less palatable." He takes a sip of the
Alafraan. "Did I tell you that this is excellent wine?"
"No, but I believe it is, and I am
fortunate to be able to share it with you."
"There are times when I wonder whether
I should have attempted to remain an insignificant magus, and times when I
wonder if I should have tried for the Mirror Lancers." The Mirror Engineer
looks down at the wine left in his goblet. A wry and sardonic expression
appears. "Then we have an event such as this, and I am most happy to be an
Engineer. I'm glad I'm not a lancer. We are but expected to do what may be
necessary, and no one lets us near anything, especially in Cyad."
"We also do but what is
expected." Lorn takes another sip of wine. "It can be difficult to
attempt more."
"Ah, yes," replies Weylt,
"and yet the time may come when more is necessary. It is difficult to
recall that at times." The majer swallows the last of the wine. "Best
I go, for we need to return to Eastpoint before too late tonight." He
stands. "I thank you for the wine, and the company, and wish you the best
with your patrols and reports."
Lorn follows the majer to his feet.
"Thank you. I appreciate your observations."
"Sometimes, that's all a good Engineer
can do." He looks at the table. "Don't let me keep you from finishing
your meal." With that, Weylt nods and departs.
Lorn re-seats himself and cuts another
slice of cheese, his brow furrowing as he considers Weylt's words and what they
signify.
CX
Lorn
takes a deep breath, and blots his forehead. Despite the breeze from the open window,
the study is warm, a heat of a spring that foreshadows an even warmer summer,
he fears, and one that may bring even more fallen trees and wild creatures. The
lancer captain has just completed his patrol report for the second uneventful
patrol since the one that had involved the two fallen trees. He has heard
nothing from either Maran or Commander Meylyd, nor have any replacement lancers
yet arrived at Jakaafra. Lorn doubts that they will, but if he hears nothing
after another patrol, he will again request replacements. He has also noted his
requests for replacements in the patrol reports kept at Jakaafra.
He has just begun the summary report for
Majer Maran when there is a thrap on the door of the inner study. He looks up
to see Kusyl standing there, a slight frown on his face.
"Majer Maran, ser."
Maran walks past Kusyl even before the
senior squad leader has finished announcing him. "Greetings,
Captain."
"My greetings to you, Majer,"
Lorn replies, standing, if somewhat indolently. "I had not expected you so
soon."
Kusyl quickly retreats and closes the door.
"I am gratified to see that you are so
industrious on your stand-down day," Maran offers. "Not that one
would expect any less from such a creative and hard-working captain."
Lorn smiles politely.
"I have received your patrol
report-the one where Second Company encountered two fallen trunks." Maran
again offers his warm and concerned smile, and the brown eyes beam gently.
"It was a rather amazing report."
Lorn shrugs gently, his eyes and senses
fully upon the more senior officer. "It was accurate."
"Oh, I am most certain it was
accurate. Every report you have submitted has been most truthful in every
detail you have provided."
"And I have provided every important
detail, Majer," Lorn continues, "so that you and Commander Meylyd
will be kept well informed."
"We both appreciate that. Yes, we
do." Maran's smile turns vaguely apologetic. "Captain... there are a
few items we should discuss. Better alone, I would think. I suggest that we
should take a ride."
"Perhaps that would be best,"
Lorn concurs. "Is your mount... ?"
"He is tied outside. I will meet you
by the gates," Maran suggests. "Shortly." He flashes his warm
smile once more before he turns and leaves.
For several moments, Lorn looks to the open
window, knowing that he must face the results of his decisions, and that, after
today, there is no turning from his course, that he-he and Ryalth, for his
decisions no longer impact but himself-are committed to long and dangerous
years. He shakes his head. Being who he is, there never was another course, and
all he can do is work to ensure she is not too adversely affected. That will be
more than difficult, for his failure will lead to death.
He laughs, once, harshly. Turning from
one's dreams is a greater death than failing to reach them. A far worse
death-that he has already seen in others-for one experiences it each day anew.
Lorn stacks the reports and places the thin
Lancer manual on them to hold them against the breeze from the window before
reclaiming the Brystan sabre and clipping the scabbard to his belt. Then he
steps out into the outer study.
"Ser?" Kusyl looks up.
"I'll be taking a ride with Majer
Maran," Lorn tells the senior squad leader. "He has requested I
accompany him. I would doubt it will be long." He grins ruefully at Kusyl.
"With senior officers, one never knows, though."
"No, ser." Kusyl's brow furrows,
but he does not speak further.
"I hope to be back soon." Lorn
adds as he leaves.
When he crosses the courtyard, he looks for
the majer, but Maran has already left or is on the other side of one of the
courtyard structures.
Suforis is not in the stable, and Lorn has
finished saddling the gelding and is leading him out before the blond ostler
appears.
"You won't be riding him hard today,
will you, ser? I could get another mount... ? It would not take but a
moment."
"No. I doubt I'll travel more than a
few kays. Majer Maran has something he wants to talk about or show me."
"Yes, ser." Suforis's assent
contains some doubt.
"There's no rain or chill, Suforis,
and I won't be riding hard. Or far." With a smile, Lorn mounts the
gelding. He rides at a walk across the stone-paved courtyard and past the duty
guards.
Maran is waiting, reined up a half-kay from
the gates on the road that leads past the chaos-tower building and toward the
ward-wall. The majer's mount is the same white stallion he had ridden earlier
when he had given Lorn a tour of the ward-wall near Geliendra.
"You took your time, Captain."
"The ostler was out, and I had to
saddle up my mount. I wasn't expecting to take a ride." Lorn's voice is
even, casual.
"No, I suppose you were not. At least,
not today." A hint of amusement colors Maran's deep and warm voice. The
majer's heels touch the stallion's flanks, and the big mount carries the majer
along the access road.
Lorn follows Maran's lead, suppressing a
knowing nod as the majer follows the road that flanks the wall connecting the
chaos tower building to the ward-wall. They turn southwest on the wall road,
riding toward Westend.
Lorn does not speak, just rides on the side
of the road closest to the wall, as the two officers cover first a kay, then
nearly a second, before Maran looks at Lorn again. "It is too bad you were
not born five generations earlier, Captain."
"I appreciate the compliment."
Lorn laughs. "But I like this time, thank you." He glances back over
his shoulder, but he cannot make out any figures near the compound, just the
walls.
"This time does not behoove you."
Maran continues in his deep and thoughtful tones, almost as if Lorn were not
riding handful of cubits away. "You are capable, Captain, far too capable
for a mere lancer."
"All lancers should strive to be
capable," Lorn says conversationally, breaking into the older officer's
monologue, "as a mere beginning."
Maran glances at Lorn, the brown eyes
momentarily flat, instead of warm.
"Tell me, Maran," Lorn adds,
deliberately omitting the senior officer's title. "When does a senior
officer have the right to threaten the lives of a junior's company and men for
the sake of secretive plotting? Or for the interests of a few senior officers
in Cyad?"
Maran raises his eyebrows, and the warm
smile returns to his deep brown eyes. "I do not believe that has ever
occurred. Threatening the lives of lancers, that is."
"By the way," Lorn says, "I
thought you might wish to know that you have made my decisions far easier...
oh, and that I have taken the liberty of taking a consort."
"You did not consult with the
Commander, or me, and that is usual. Then, you seldom do the usual."
"But not required," Lorn says,
"not under the Lancer Rules of Procedure." He continues to smile.
"There are many things which are not required, but wise,
nonetheless," Maran adds, "as you will doubtless discover in your
short career."
"No," Lorn replies quietly.
"As you will discover in a shorter career." He draws the Brystan
sabre that looks little different from a lancer sabre now that it shimmers with
a cupridium finish.
"You do anticipate, Captain,
but..."
Hssst.' The firebolt of a full magus flies
at Lorn.
Lorn raises the sabre and twists it, also
twisting the shields he holds, and flings the firebolt, energy he has now
encased in black order-ordered chaos-fire-back at the majer. He turns the
gelding so that he faces Maran's right side.
"Trifling." Maran languidly
raises a hand as if to dispel the firebolt.
Lorn follows the returned firebolt with the
sabre, letting it fly, guided by chaos-order, and filled with the twined order
and chaos he has learned from the Accursed Forest.
"Uhhh!" As the firebolt shatters,
the Brystan sabre's sharpened point drives through the majer's shoulder.
The warm smile vanishes from the majer's
face, and Lorn uses his chaos senses to drive another order-chaos beam at
Maran.
"Black... angel..." Those are
Maran's last words. There are no hisses, no screams-Maran's body just flares as
the glowing golden white of chaos, enfolded by the deep black of order, flows
around it. Then, there are no traces that he had ever been there, except for a
handful of buckles, some coins-and the two sabres, Lorn's and Maran's, all of
which slide off the white leather of Maran's saddle.
Lorn sits stock-still for a moment, somehow
both surprised that his attack has been so successful and gratified that his
understanding of Maran has been so accurate. He also silently thanks Majer
Brevyl.
After that short moment, Lorn rides forward
and grasps the reins of Maran's stallion, then dismounts.
First, he reclaims the Brystan sabre,
gleaming as if it had never drawn blood. Then, he gathers Maran's sabre and the
metal in his gloved hands. He walks toward the ward-wall.
There he lifts the sabre... and tosses it
over the ward-wall, followed by the other metal remnants. As the weapon crosses
the chaos-net, it flares, and the heat-shimmering blade tumbles into the
greenery on the inside of the granite.
After remounting the white gelding, Lorn
leads the majer's mount along the road for a time, although the stallion tosses
his head more than once. After another kay, Lorn loops the reins over the
saddle and then, with a yell, and he slaps the fractious stallion's rump. The
bigger mount trots a distance, then slows, but continues to the southwest.
Lorn watches until he is certain the
stallion will travel for at least a time before he turns the gelding and begins
the ride back to the compound.
As he nears the gates, Lorn reins up and
addresses the pair of guards. "Majer Maran should be back later. Tell him
I'll be in my study."
"Yes, ser."
Suforis hurries from the tack room even
before Lorn has fully led the gelding into the stable.
"You see? It wasn't all that long, and
I never had him at more than a fast walk."
"That be good, ser." Suforis
studies the gelding, then nods.
Lorn leaves his mount with the ostler and
crosses the courtyard to re-enter the company study.
"Ser?" asks Kusyl.
"Majer Maran had a few words for
me." Lorn does not smile. "He said he would be back later when I had
a chance to consider them."
"Ah... yes, ser. I'm sorry, ser."
"We often have to do what our seniors
wish, Kusyl." Lorn's laugh is harsh. "As I'm sure you know."
"Ah... yes, ser."
With a nod, Lorn closes the door to the
inner study.
He looks out the window once more. From now
on, even more than in the past, he must watch and weigh every action, every
word. And he must anticipate.
He
wishes he could talk to Ryalth, but perhaps it is better that he not, for a
time.
Lorn shakes his head and seats himself at
the desk, where he continues work on the patrol summary report that Maran had
interrupted. He will send that off, as required, with the next Engineer
firewagon. Then he begins drafting yet another request to Commander Meylyd for
replacement lancers. He has completed the second draft and is reading it when
there is a knock on the door.
"Ser? There be some lancers here, asking
of Majer Maran."
Lorn frowns. "He hasn't come back?
Have them come in." He remains seated as two lancers step into the inner
study.
"Ser.... squad leader Jugyt, ser, and
Shalar, ser," offers the broad-shouldered junior squad leader. "We
had been expecting the majer... but none be seeing him."
Lorn offers a puzzled look. "We took a
short ride. He said what he had come to say, and then said he would be back
later. I came back, and I haven't seen him since. I thought he had come back
and left with you, since I hadn't heard anything."
"No, ser."
Lorn fingers his chin. "The last time
I saw him, he was riding the wall road, toward Westend, but we were only a few
kays from here." He stands and calls, "Kusyl!"
"Yes, ser?" Kusyl re-appears.
"Do you know if anyone has seen Majer
Maran?"
"No, ser."
"He said he was coming back, but his
men here haven't seen him," Lorn explains.
"I don't know as anyone has seen him
since he left the compound, ser."
Lorn purses his lips. "If you'd check
with the guards and any of the men-or see if Juist's company saw him. They rode
back in a while ago."
"Yes, ser."
After Kusyl leaves, Lorn looks at the two
lancers. "All we can do is look and see if anyone saw him. I'll have my
company check the area. It seems strange that he'd leave without you, but maybe
he did."
"He rides alone at times, it be true,
ser, but always he returns," says Jugyt.
Lorn shrugs helplessly. "I scarcely
know what to say. We can check to see if there has been a tree-fall nearby, or
if there are any tracks on the deadland." He glances toward the window,
and gestures toward the sun that hangs just above the compound walls.
"Best we hasten."
"Yes, ser."
Lorn reclaims his sabre, then heads for the
stable. This time he will use a spare mount, for despite the search for Majer
Maran, Second Company will still begin a patrol tomorrow. After all, Maran
would certainly not to have wanted Lorn to deviate from accepted Mirror Lancer
procedures.
The captain who would be more offers a
brief smile as he nears the stable.
CXI
As
Second Company rides slowly toward the gates of the compound at Jakaafra, Lorn
looks down at his blood-splattered trousers, and then at the depleted firelance
in the holder. The sun is almost touching the western horizon, outlining the
silhouettes of distant orchards to the west, and casting long shadows from the
walls of the compound.
Lorn does not look back at a company that
is now really but the size of a single full-strength squad, nor at the three
mounts that bear dead lancers. They have not permitted any wild creatures to
escape despite another fallen trunk, but that is due to luck, and to the
renewed tendency of the creatures to attack the lancers, rather than to attempt
to escape beyond the deadland.
"We getting any replacements,
ser?" Kusyl asks quietly, from where he rides alongside Lorn.
"I've requested more lancers three
times, Kusyl. Majer Maran never offered much encouragement, but he didn't say
no, either. That's if he got back to Geliendra, but I haven't heard about that,
either."
"Funny about that, ser. His men found
his mount, but not him. Think the Forest got him? They say that happens,
sometimes."
"It could have happened, but we didn't
see any traces of wild creatures." Lorn shrugs tiredly as they near the
gates. "I just wish he had sent us some more lancers. The men are
accomplishing the impossible, but it can't go on."
"What if we just waited until the
Engineers arrived? Before getting near the trunk, ser?" asks Kusyl.
"We'd have as many dead lancers and
some dead Engineers, probably, and Second Company would have a new captain and
new squad leaders," Lorn replies.
"Thought it be like that, ser."
Kusyl shakes his head. "Can't be saying as I understand. Do you,
ser?"
"Not totally, Kusyl. I've heard that
the Magi'i are going to try something, but that was seasons ago, and nothing
has happened. Maybe they just want us to hang on until they can. Or maybe it's
something else."
"Whatever it be, ser, best they do
something or they'll have creatures running free throughout northeast
Cyador."
"The other companies are short of
lancers, too," Lorn points out.
"Not near so short as Second
Company."
"They don't face so many tree-falls."
Kusyl shakes his head sadly.
"Evening, ser," calls the gate
guard as Lorn nears the gates. "Hard patrol?"
"Hard patrol," Lorn confirms.
He will send another request for
replacements, little good as such requests seem to do, but how can he not make
such requests?
His fingers clench momentarily as he
considers that senior officers- Maran, and now Meylyd-are forcing him to choose
between his own life and risking his lancers. Yet, were he to step aside, or
let himself be killed, nothing would change.
It may not, anyway, for all that he has
chosen to follow dreams.
He pushes that thought aside. He also
pushes aside the desire to use the chaos glass to view Meylyd. If Meylyd is at
all sensitive to its use, that will create more problems, and Lorn knows of
nothing to be gained by using the glass for such a purpose.
For the moment.
CXII
Spring
has come to Cyad, and the green and white awnings fill the streets to the south
of the Palace of Light under a clear green-blue sky. The Second Magus and the
Captain-Commander of the Mirror Lancers stand on one of the smaller western
balconies of the Palace.
Kharl looks out at the harbor, where
scaffolds enfold two white-hulled fireships moored at a guarded white stone
pier.
Luss
glances at the two ships, then at Kharl. "Matters do not look so bright
for the Quarter, these days."
"Nor for the Lancers. Your casualties
in the north are climbing, as are they in the companies along the ward-wall of
the Accursed Forest." Kharl's green eyes shimmer with the hint overlying
chaos-gold. "And... Maran is dead."
"Mirror Lancers do die in the course
of duty," Luss says. "We do believe in duty, you may recall."
"You were the one who had expressed
interest in Majer Maran, as I do recall."
"It should bother me that a renegade
mage who posed as a lancer has died?" asks Luss.
"It might, if you consider the
implications," suggests Kharl.
Luss raises his eyebrows. "Perhaps you
should educate me, devious one?"
Kharl merely shrugs. After a time, he says,
"The glass shows but the ward-wall... and nothing beyond-as usual."
The Second Magus smiles brightly. "As I recall, he was supposed to deal
with a certain captain. It would appear that the captain is clearly more
experienced than some had anticipated."
"In direct combat, he has much
experience," concedes Luss. "You had assured me that he has little
capability and experience as a magus."
"Perhaps he used a sabre,"
suggests Kharl. "I merely suggest some caution."
"And how would you suggest such caution be applied, O devious
Second Magus?"
"It would be best the Majer-Commander
not discover this effort. Nor the Emperor, for who knows what he might ask of
the Hand? Yet... that is up to you. Were I, say, a captain-commander, I might
send word to Commander Meylyd that the Majer-Commander feels that unless there
is some evidence of what befell the majer, evidence that the Emperor would
regard as convincing, that the matter should be dropped with a quiet warning to
the captain."
"You think that wise?"
"Very wise... the captain will fight
to survive. If he is attacked by another officer, such as your Overcaptain
Hybyl, Hybyl will also die, and then this Lorn will flee... or cover it up.
Either way, the Majer-Commander will discover what has occurred. He will need
to blame someone, perhaps someone rather high in the Mirror Lancer Court in
Cyad... someone he does not like. It is better that this not come to light
yet... until later, and then it will appear that he ordered it to be
suppressed."
"Meylyd will try to find
something," suggests Luss.
"I am certain he will attempt such. If
he does, the problem is resolved. If he does not, there will be another field
commander skeptical of the Majer-Commander, and one willing to tell the Emperor
that the Majer-Commander attempted to cover a murder. Since the murder cannot
be proven, the rumor will be more effective."
Luss nods slowly. "Devious as you are,
that makes much sense. But what of the captain's future?"
"He appears to have developed certain
skills... in anticipating or avoiding certain uses of chaos. To deal with him
at Jakaafra would make the effort, shall we say, rather obvious. Then, if the
First Magus is successful in the effort to put the Forest to sleep, any effort
against the captain would become even more obvious." Kharl smiles.
"Were I a senior lancer officer, I would promote him to overcaptain and
then transfer him to where there is much... conflict."
Luss shakes his head. "A third such tour?
For the son of the Fourth Magus? That would come to Rynst's eyes before the
captain reaches Assyadt, and then the Majer-Commander would look far deeper. I
think something like a port detachment, say in Biehl. For a short time, until
he is forgotten. He also may encounter... certain difficulties there...."
Luss smiles. "Then, if necessary, a tour in Assyadt, after another
promotion, so that he will be most inexperienced and also less... conditioned
to combat. Also, if he is transferred now, before a full turn of duty... his
time in Cyad will be limited."
"Best he be in Cyad for but a short
period now, rather than a longer time later," Kharl agrees. "And best
he be away from the Accursed Forest while the sleep barrier of the First Magus
is created."
Both men nod.
"If he should survive yet more
conflict, then he should come to Cyad as an aide to the Majer-Commander... say,
when it is most appropriate," suggests Kharl.
"After certain other events?"
"Exactly."
Without another word, the two turn away
from the view of the harbor and from the striped awnings whose unfurling
heralds spring in Cyad.
CXIII
Sitting
behind his study desk, Lorn looks at the pen holder, and then at the open
window, and the low clouds that promise rain that has not yet arrived. Second
Company has completed another full patrol, encountering only shoots from seeds,
and Lorn must write another patrol report, and a summary, and decide whether to
again request replacement lancers-and sit and wait to see how Commander Meylyd
will react to Maran's disappearance.
Finally, Lorn picks up the pen and begins
to detail the last report. He has barely written three lines when Kusyl steps
into the study.
"Yes?"
"Ser! There's a firewagon here, and
Commander Meylyd. He's coming this way."
Lorn finds a sardonic smile on his lips.
"Perhaps he will tell us about our replacement lancers, then."
"Ser?"
Lorn shakes his head, standing quickly.
At the sound of voices, Kusyl steps back
and holds the door to the inner study as the Commander enters, followed by a
smaller officer, an overcaptain. The squad leader closes it gently but firmly
as he leaves.
Meylyd does not take a chair, but addresses
Lorn directly. "Captain... I am sure you know why I am here. This is
Overcaptain Hybyl. He was Majer Maran's deputy."
Behind two officers, Kusyl opens the door
and slides in a chair and then silently closes the door once more.
"I am afraid I do not." Lorn
offers a polite but confused expression. "I must admit I cannot honestly
say I know why you are here, saving for my continual requests for replacement
lancers."
"You cannot say?" Meylyd now
offers a quizzical expression. "Majer Maran indicated he was not pleased
with you before he left. And you pretend you don't know that? When he
disappeared immediately after meeting with you? At a meeting outside the
compound where no one but you two happened to be present?"
"No, ser. I knew that the majer was
displeased. He took me for a quiet ride, where none would hear, he said. And he
told me that while you were pleased with my results in containing the wild
creatures, he was not happy with the strategies I had adopted. He said they
were against patrol doctrine."
Hybyl nods. "He reported such before
he departed Geliendra."
"For the record, Captain, with exactly
what tactic was Majer Maran displeased?" asks Meylyd.
"My using myself as a target and
carrying two firelances." Lorn shrugs. "There isn't anything against
it in the manual, and since we're understrength, I didn't think one extra
firelance would be a problem-at the time, that was still something like fifteen
less than full complement, and it left the extra in the hands of an
officer."
Another puzzled look passes between the two
officers.
"Now, we have but half the requisite complement, and I had
thought you might be here to discuss my requests for replacements." Lorn
gestures to the single chair. "Ah, ser... if you'd like a seat?"
The Commander takes the chair Kusyl had
shoved into the room, and Hybyl takes the armless one before the desk.
Lorn seats himself slowly, after the other
two, waiting.
"Now, if you would continue,
Captain... With an account of your meeting with Majer Maran," commands
Meylyd.
"I don't know that there's that much
more to say, ser. Majer Maran told me to use standard patrol tactics, and he
said that I needed to contain the wild creatures without wasting chaos charges.
He said that you expected I follow standard procedures. I told him what I just
told you, and he said that sometimes junior officers needed to understand that
not all accepted procedures were written out. He made that very clear. I told
him I'd give up the extra firelance... if that would help."
"And?"
"He got very polite, ser. He said that
I was not quite hopeless and that I had better act like every other captain,
and that he would be watching me closely. Except that he said all of that much
more politely and indirectly, and very pleasantly." Lorn shrugs. "I
could not begin to repeat the way he said things."
A faint smile crosses Hybyl's lips.
"And what did you do after your
ride?" asks Meylyd.
"I came back here. He said he needed a
moment, and that he'd be back in a bit. I kept looking for him, but he didn't
come back. I'd thought at first he'd decided to ride to Westend, but when his
lancers came back and said he hadn't, we all went looking. We found his mount
some three kays from where I left him, but we didn't find him. We didn't find
any boot tracks either. You know that, I think, from the report I sent."
"I think we'll talk to your men, if
you don't mind, Captain. I'd appreciate your remaining here in your
study." Meylyd rises. "Then, I'll be back to talk to you."
Lorn stands. "Yes, ser. They'll tell
you everything they know."
"I'm most certain that they
will." Meylyd smiles coldly.
Hybyl does not smile at all as the two
leave.
After a long moment, Lorn shrugs and sits
down. While it may make no difference, he returns to drafting the last patrol report.
He has long since finished it, and trusting
that his analysis of the commander's position is correct, grateful that, if his
decision of how to deal with Maran was wrong, at least, the results will not
directly affect Ryalth. As he is looking out his open window at the clouds that
have gotten ever darker as the morning has turned into afternoon, he turns at
the sound of voices and is standing behind his desk when Meylyd and Hybyl step
back into the study.
Hybyl closes the door.
Meylyd motions for Lorn to sit down, then
takes the larger chair and seats himself.
Both officers from Geliendra glance at the
closed door.
"Everything appears as you have said,
captain," Meylyd begins. "And all the men are telling the truth. That
presents a puzzle. Majer Maran was most capable. So, clearly, are you. Yet the
majer had no reason to disappear, and you were the last to see him."
Lorn waits.
"Do you have anything to say about
this?"
"Nothing I haven't said, ser. I know
the majer intended to do something as far as I was concerned, but he didn't
tell me. And he never returned to the compound."
"His lancers found his mount."
"Yes, ser. I was with them. So was
squad leader Shynt."
Meylyd glances at the overcaptain. "If
you would go, Hybyl, and make sure the outer study is empty, and stays that
way."
"Yes, ser."
Meylyd studies Lorn as he waits for the two
doors to close. His mouth smiles before he speaks, but his eyes are cold.
"We have a difficult situation. On the one hand, there is a lancer captain
who is holding the most difficult stretch of the ward-wall. He tends to, shall
we say, use lancer techniques in a somewhat different manner. But his results
are good, and all the local... eminences... are pleased. On the other hand, we
have distinguished lancer majer who is most concerned about the ward-wall and
the captain. The two meet; the captain returns; the majer rides off and is
never seen again. There is no evidence of anything. Even the horse tracks show
that. Yes, I checked with the lancers on that. The two men rode together; they
sat mounted and talked. One of them dismounted and walked and then remounted,
and they rode southwest for a time and then they parted. And the majer vanished
from his mount. Was he plucked from it by something from the Accursed
Forest?" Meylyd shrugs.
Lorn remains silent, waiting.
"I asked for guidance from the
Majer-Commander. I was told that it was best that I not act unless there were
facts to support me. So... I guess there's nothing more to be said,
Captain." Meylyd pauses. "It's clear that the majer had something in
mind. A pity that he didn't tell me... or you. Whatever happened, it's also
clear that no one will never know. Perhaps it's better that way." Meylyd looks
out the study window for a long moment, as if considering whether he should say
more, before turning back to Lorn. "I do expect you to follow the
guidelines he laid out, to the very letter. Overcaptain Hybyl will be taking
the majer's place. He'll be promoted to sub-majer shortly, and you'll send your
reports to him. I cannot stress how accurate I expect those reports to
be."
"Yes, ser."
"And, Captain, Majer Maran was very
capable. I hope you understand that."
"Yes, ser."
"I intend to hold you to those standards."
Meylyd rises. "And, to ensure that there are no more deviations from
lancer tactics, your replacements will arrive within the next few days. They
are on their way from Westend."
"Yes, ser. I understand, ser."
Meylyd nods coldly. "Good day,
Captain." After a last cold stare, he turns and walks out, leaving both
doors open.
Lorn wonders if the Majer-Commander of
lancers really had been consulted, and if so, why?
Still, for the moment, there will be
replacement lancers, even if every one has been ordered to report anything
strange that Lorn does.
Lorn takes a deep breath.
Outside, a warm drizzle has begun to fall.
CXIV
Outside
the Jakaafra compound's stable, Lorn slowly dismounts from the gelding, noting
again the long scratch along his mount's shoulder, a scratch he has helped heal
with minute amounts of the black order, as he had been taught so many years
before by Myryan and Jerial. While in the lancers, of necessity, he has held
his healing efforts to those which take little effort and which are little
remarked.
His own uniform has rips in the trousers at
boot level and more than a few splatters of blood from the latest attacks by
giant cats and night leopards. He now has but one uniform left that is not
soiled beyond repair and cleaning with blood or other gore-and that is only
because it is the one that arrived from Ryalth with the latest shipment of
wine. In his next scroll, he will have to ask if she can have another tailored
and sent, although he dislikes asking for such, when she has given and risked
so much for him already.
Lorn glances back across the courtyard,
then shakes his head. He has already seen to the collection of the firelances
and their storage in the armory, not that they pose much danger in their
discharged state.
"Ser?" asks Suforis as Lorn leads
the gelding into the stable. "You have another hard patrol?"
"Yes." Lorn does not elaborate on
the two latest lancers Second Company has lost, or upon the cold scrutiny that
falls over his every move from many of the replacement lancers.
"Sorry to hear that, Captain."
"Some patrols are like that."
Lorn unfastens his gear, and the spare sabre, easing the saddle bags onto his
shoulder.
"Yes, ser."
"That's my problem, not yours. How is
Lesyna?"
"She be fine, ser." Suforis
smiles.
"Good." Lorn nods and, in the
early twilight, walks from the stable toward the quarter's building. The
courtyard is almost empty, the lancers already in the meal hall, he suspects.
Juist walks from the small administrative
building, glancing around, then calls, "Lorn!" The undercaptain
motions, and Lorn forces himself into a walk demonstrating energy he does not
feel, not after another patrol extended by a fallen tree.
As Lorn nears, Juist holds a scroll that he
lifts. "Hybyl's squad leader came with the Engineers. Dropped this off for
you. Insisted I give it to you personally." He grins and holds up a small
leather pouch. "And this. If I be not mistaken, in here are the arched
bars of an overcaptain."
"After all the admonitions I've
received?" Lorn asks.
"Could be, just might be, that the
Majer-Commander likes results," Juist suggests. "Meylyd likes to do
things the way the Lancers always did 'em. Doesn't work so well, from what I'm
hearing."
Lorn offers a wry smile. "What are you
hearing?"
"Other captains losing almost as many
men, except they're seeing half the tree-falls. Those reports go to Cyad, you
know?"
"I know they go. I wasn't sure anyone
read them."
Juist hands over the pouch. "Going to
open it?"
Lorn shifts the saddle bags and takes the
pouch, opening it gingerly. Juist is right. Inside are two sets of linked
double bars, with the arch above them, signifying an overcaptain. He eases the
insignia back into the pouch, and slips it inside his tunic.
"Told you," says Juist.
"You're going to be someone, and I'll be happy to tell everyone I knew
you-'cept I'll be doing it from in front of a hearthstove for years afore
you're out of the saddle." The undercaptain grins.
"You're not upset?"
"Me?" The shorter and older
officer shakes his head. "Lucky to be an undercaptain. Don't come from the
right places, and don't talk fancy, and except for covering furloughs a few
times a year, I don't have to mess with the Forest. Another three years, and I
can take my pension. Few enough lancers get 'em." He glances at the
scroll.
Lorn breaks the seal and reads quickly,
squinting to make out the words in the dim light of the courtyard.
"Well... Overcaptain?" Juist asks
after a moment.
"They're sending me to Biehl, to head
the port detachment there."
Juist laughs. "Hard to believe. It
makes sense. Give a good officer a tour where someone's not out to kill him
every day... maybe learn something besides tactics."
Lorn shakes his head.
"Take the good, Lorn," Juist
advises. "You taken enough of the bad."
The new overcaptain forces a smile.
"Thank you. I'll try." Even as he speaks, he wonders just how good
the promotion and transfer are. With a last nod to Juist, Lorn walks to his own
quarters.
After lighting the lamp, he reads the order
scroll again... and a third time. Then he washes up quickly, but does not
change out of his uniform, and he heads to the officers' dining area, carrying
a bottle of the Fhynyco. Juist and Ilryk have already begun to eat the mutton
stew, overpeppered enough that Lorn can smell the seasonings even before he
sits down.
"Didn't know as you were coming, lucky
fellow," offers Juist, with a laugh.
"Is it true?" asks Ilryk.
"It looks to be," Lorn says.
"The bottle he brings says so. 'Sides,
it was that sub-majer Hybyl's squad leader that brought it. Sour face he had
too." Juist laughs.
Lorn uncorks the bottle and half-fills the
three heavy goblets.
"At least with a sour face, you can
read something. Maran always smiled, always looked like he cared." Ilryk
pauses, then turns to Lorn. "You saw him last. He was headed to Westend,
wasn't he?"
Lorn takes a sip of the Fhynyco before
answering. "He was riding in that direction. He didn't tell me what he had
in mind. Except complaining about the way I handled Second Company."
"He didn't like the way I handle my
company," Ilryk replies. "He said I should always be well in the
fore, so that my men could see me." The blond captain shrugs. "I am
always in the front rank, but too far forward, and I cannot see where they are,
and that makes it difficult to give orders."
Lorn shakes his head. "He told me not
to be well in the fore. He said I was too far forward."
Ilryk laughs. "Senior officers."
He raises his goblet. "May you not be as they, Overcaptain! May you
remember what it was like to be a mere captain."
"You'll be an overcaptain before
long," Lorn suggests after accepting the impromptu toast. He breaks off a
chunk of stale bread and dips it in the overseasoned stew.
"One never counts on a promotion until
the emblem is on your collar. Not in the lancers." Ilryk raises his glass.
"One can but count on the wine one drinks today."
"That be too true," Juist agrees.
Lorn has to nod to that, and then he takes
another mouthful of the mutton stew.
"Good wine," Ilryk adds.
"Thank you."
"I'm glad you like it."
Although the day has been long, Lorn finds
he can barely eat one helping of the thick and heavily spiced stew, and excuses
himself early, leaving the remainder of the Fhynyco for the other two officers.
Back in his quarters, he reads the scroll
again. From what it says, his promotion is already effective, and he can wear
the new insignia immediately. While the next day is a stand-down day, he needs
to get a message to Ryalth immediately.
He sits down at the narrow desk in his
quarters, under the pool of light cast by the small lamp, and lays out one of
the few remaining sheets of paper, then dips the pen in the inkwell. The scroll
will definitely go by Suforis through Dustyn-early on the next day.
My
dearest,
I have been notified rather suddenly that I
am being promoted and transferred, almost two years before I expected such.
Within three eightdays, I will be in Cyad, on my way to take over the Mirror
Lancer port compound in Biehl...
He pauses, then continues.
I will only be in Cyad for an eightday and
a few days, because I am not due for home leave for another two years, and I
dearly hope that this does not find you traveling elsewhere. Still, we must
take the opportunities we have in an uncertain world.
He can think of no news that may help her
trading, nor of anything else of import as great as his coming to Cyad.
Reluctantly, he adds another line.
If you would arrange for another three sets
of uniforms for me, I will repay you when I arrive in Cyad. I will be there so
short a time, I fear that they would not be ready were I to wait until I
arrive.
He looks out his window, but the clouds
block the stars. Finally, he picks up the pen and dips it again and closes.
I look to those moments we will have
together, and to seeing you again far sooner than I had thought possible....
With all my affection and love...
Yawning, he sets aside the pen. He must
still write his family, and, on the morrow, finish another set of patrol
reports. The day after will be another patrol. There will be one more after
that before he can leave Jakaafra, more than enough time to find himself in
trouble if he does not maintain his guard and his skills in dealing with the
Accursed Forest.
Then... will he ever not find himself
facing trouble in such times, he being who he is and not what others would
wish?
He looks into the darkness. Is that not
what all men believe? How is he any different from them?
For that, he has no answer, not one that
does not flatter his self-esteem.
CXV
Lorn
recognizes the face of the officer who rides into Jakaafra compound late in the
afternoon, but for a moment cannot recall the name. The black-bearded captain
is swarthy, and his height is well above average.
Akytol-the name comes to Lorn-was the older
lancer officer candidate with whom he had ridden in the firewagon to Kynstaar
when he had first left Cyad for lancer training. Lorn nods to himself and
starts across the courtyard. He reaches the stable just behind the big lancer
officer.
"Stable!" Akytol calls.
Suforis steps out into the courtyard and
looks up at the tall captain. "Yes, ser?"
"Is this where I can stable my
mount?"
"Yes, ser."
Lorn walks toward the older, but now junior
officer, as Akytol dismounts outside the compound stable.
The black-bearded officer frowns as Lorn
approaches, but then looks back at Suforis to hand over his mount's reins.
"You're here to take command of Second
Company?" Lorn asks pleasantly.
"Yes." Akytol turns, and adds,
quickly, "Ah, yes, ser." as the late afternoon light of spring glints
off the linked bars with the overcaptain's arch that are fastened to Lorn's
collar.
The ostler glances from Akytol to Lorn.
"This is Captain Akytol,
Suforis," Lorn explains. "He is a well-respected and very solid
Lancer officer."
Akytol continues to wear a vaguely puzzled
expression, as if he still cannot place Lorn.
"I'm Lorn. We left Cyad together for
Kynstaar a number of years ago." Akytol swallows. "Oh... I am sorry,
ser. I did not recognize you."
"That's all right. We all change over
the years. You always wore a beard, and that made it easier for me. If you will
get your gear, I can show you the quarters. You can either have the first room,
or mine after I leave tomorrow. It's your choice. Then I'll show you the
studies, and we can talk over the evening meal, such as it is."
"I would appreciate that." Akytol
nods awkwardly. He turns to unfasten the two large kit bags from behind his
saddle, then follows Lorn across the courtyard.
"This is the only compound without an
Engineer detachment, and the other company here is really a domestic
peacekeeping company. It's commanded by Undercaptain Juist," Lorn
explains. "They'll take over patrols during company furloughs, but
otherwise, you have full responsibility for the northeast ward-wall."
"Sub-Majer Hybyl did say something
about that." Lorn opens the door to the quarters. "You can put your
gear in the first room. I've always used the second." While Akytol
deposits his bags, Lorn takes the last bottle of Alafraan from his wardrobe,
and rejoins the captain. Then Lorn leads the taller officer back into the
courtyard and to the small administrative building.
"Our spaces are the first ones. The
outer study is for the lancer records, and the senior squad leader." Lorn
opens the door, but Kusyl has already left for the day. Lorn opens the inner
door. "This will be your study. The small foot chest there holds the
patrol reports and other papers. I'll give you the key in the morning."
Akytol nods.
"Now... let's get something to
eat."
The officers' dining area is empty, as Lorn
had guessed, since Juist had left early in the morning to handle a problem some
forty kays to the west at a town Lorn had not heard of before that morning and
since Ilryk is not due for several days, assuming Fifth Company has not found
another downed tree.
Lorn uncorks the wine and fills one of the
goblets, but only half-fills his own. Then he sits. As if waiting for them, a
server appears drops a casserole dish on the table with the usual basket of
bread.
"Fowl, I think," Lorn guesses.
"It's more often mutton." He gestures to the dish. "Go
ahead."
As Akytol serves himself, Lorn continues,
"You have to keep patrol reports, just as with the barbarians, but you
also have to send a summary report to Sub-Majer Hybyl after each complete
patrol-out to Eastend and back...." Lorn goes on to explain the location
of reports and lancer records, serving himself as he does.
As Lorn speaks, Akytol's eyes take in the
overcaptain's bars again, for at least the third time since they have been
seated in the officers' dining area.
"...handled by the senior squad
leader-that's Kusyl." Lorn stops, and refills Akytol's goblet.
"Thank you."
"Where have you been?" asks Lorn.
"At Inividra-that's one of the
outposts under Assyadt. I had Third Company there."
"The last year or so, you've had more
barbarian attacks, they say."
"Almost twice as many as before. We're
seeing more Brystan weapons, too. Better iron, sometimes nearly as hard as cupridium."
Akytol refills his platter. "The size of the raiding parties is larger,
too."
"Archers?" Lorn asks almost idly,
taking a small sip of the Alafraan.
"Some. They say there weren't any
years ago. They're not very good. Take a good firelance any day." Akytol
swallows the last of the Alafraan in his goblet. "Good wine."
"It's Alafraan. A friend sent me some.
It would be hard to take it with me." Lorn refills Akytol's heavy and
crude glass goblet.
"It is good."
"The barbarians just charged us when I
was at Isahl," Lorn observes. "Was it that way at Inividra?"
Akytol nods, his mouth full.
Lorn waits, encouraging the bigger officer
to go on.
"...just take those big blades and
charge at you. They didn't seem to care who they charged... officer or ranker.
Lately, a couple of groups showed up with local lances-long poles with
billhooks on 'em. Nasty if they got too close." Akytol takes another large
swallow of the Alafraan. "Except they're better suited to a footman."
"Or if your firelances charges are
low."
Akytol nods again. "A couple of times,
we didn't get full charges before we had to go out. Lost a quarter score just
on that count. Sub-majer said he couldn't do anything, that the Magi'i were
having some sort of trouble, he guessed." The bigger officer snorts.
"I understand an old acquaintance of
mine is at Assyadt. A Sub-Majer Dettaur. We grew up together. Have you run
across him?" Lorn refills Akytol's goblet a second time.
"Sub-Majer Dettaur... he's number two
at the headquarters in Assyadt. Sometimes, takes a patrol. Good man."
"He was always good with blades, any
kind," Lorn suggests.
"He still spars a lot, I hear, but I
wasn't there much. It's a good sixty kays from Assyadt to Inividra."
Akytol frowns. "You have a sister... ah, ser?"
"I have two. Sub-Majer Dettaur once
courted one of them."
"You have a... certain
reputation...." Akytol says slowly. "I had not realized..."
Lorn nods. "I'm aware of that. That's
why you're getting Second Company, I'm sure. Commander Meylyd and Sub-Majer
Hybyl wish that my replacement be a lancer who is very traditional. They're
quite pleased that you were available, I am certain."
"Sub-majer didn't say much beyond
outlining procedures, and providing a patrol manual."
"It is a good idea to read it
carefully," Lorn says, almost dryly. "I might add that it is
acceptable to use a staggered line of five abreast in facing the wild
creatures. The giant cats and stun lizards are more durable than the barbarians,
and you will need as many firelances as you can focus on them. And the giant
serpents-we only came across one of those-I don't think they're terribly
dangerous so long as you stay back from them. So I'd suggest dealing with a
serpent after all the other dangers and creatures...." He smiles.
"The manual doesn't mention serpents, but squad leader Kusyl can tell you
more, if you wish to know."
"Giant serpents?"
Lorn nods, looking down at his empty
platter, not that he has eaten all that much. "I will sign over Second
Company in the morning." Lorn pauses. "Do you have any other
questions I might answer?"
"Any place where I can get wine like
that?" Akytol grins.
"You might try the spirit factor in
the town of Jakaafra. His name is Dustyn. He can get any number of types of
spirits. So can the chandler, I've been told, but I used the spirit
factor."
"Good to know." Akytol nods.
"Where are you going, ser?"
"A port detachment in Biehl. A partial
tour, I think, although no one has said."
"You're lucky, ser. Like to get one of those myself, one day."
"Perhaps you will." Lorn stands.
"I need to take care of a few things. You can have the rest of the bottle.
I'll see you in the morning."
"Are you sure... I would not wish to
impose." Akytol stands.
"Enjoy it." Lorn laughs gently,
gesturing for the taller officer to sit down.
"Thank you, ser." Akytol remains
standing until Lorn departs.
As he returns to his room, Lorn is glad
that he has already made arrangements for shipping all the remaining goods in
the small dwelling on the east road from Jakaafra back to Cyad and to Ryalor
House-as well as paying Dustyn an extra pair of silvers for two seasons' use of
the house.
He also hopes that the lancers of Second
Company will not suffer too much before either the Magi'i complete their
mysterious project to contain the Accursed Forest or before the Forest kills
Akytol. He fears the latter is more likely. Although he does not dislike the
big officer whose traditional approach may prove all too convenient for
Sub-Majer Hybyl, there is little he can say or do that will change Akytol.
As he lifts the silver volume once more,
Lorn smiles, recalling pears and praise. He hopes his brief season in Cyad will
be one he can recall and praise. His smiles broadens as he thinks of Ryalth and
begins to pack the last of the few items he will carry with him when he leaves
with the engineer's firewagon on the morrow.
Will he see the Accursed Forest again? Or
will whatever project the Magi'i have in mind render it a memory, its reality
changed before he returns-if he returns.
His lips curl into a smile. He will see
Ryalth, again, and for a time he had even feared that might not occur.
As Ilryk has said, "One can but count
on the wine one drinks today." And it looks as though he and Ryalth will
have at least one other day. Beyond that, neither knows.
CXVI
In the
front compartment of the firewagon, only Lorn is awake. The Mirror Lancer Majer
to his right sleeps, as does the corpulent factor seated across from them. Lorn
looks out into the darkness, a clouded darkness deep and lit-only to him-by the
hints of chaos escaping from the cells of the six-wheeled vehicle as it rumbles
westward across the smooth stones of the Great Eastern Highway toward Cyad-and
Ryalth.
Lorn has killed a senior officer. Maran is
dead, and Maran should be dead, for Maran would have let lancers die, unwisely
and unnecessarily, rather than see Lorn survive. Lorn frowns. Scores of
barbarians are dead because of Lorn, and some lancers in Isahl live because
Lorn has been effective at killing. Is Cyad worth all the deaths it causes to
come to pass-one way or another? Or are Lorn's dreams worth those deaths?
Life without dreams is death, but are
Lorn's hopes to lead a better Cyad worth more than Maran's dreams of holding
together an old Cyad, or worth more than the barbarians' dreams of bringing it
down? Does the best dream win? Or the most powerful dreamer? Or are all dreams
merely illusions that crumple in the end upon the Steps to Paradise with the
deaths of their dreamers?
And what of Ryalth? Although she knows his
dreams, and has helped him in surviving, and in feeling that what he dreams is
worthy... with each action he takes, the possible repercussions are greater,
and so are the threats to her.
The merchanter across the compartment
snores, shifts his weight, and lapses back into heavy breathing.
As the firewagon carries him ever closer to
Cyad, Lorn continues to look into the future and the darkness, a darkness
lightened by the chaos only he can see-and lightened but dimly for all that.
CXVII
Lorn
walks across the Plaza to the wide steps leading up to the topmost level. For
the first time, he wears his lancer uniform in the Plaza, and more than a
handful of merchanters in blue glance in his direction. He cannot help smiling,
half in apprehension, half in anticipation as he nears the steps.
"...overcaptain... don't know
him..."
"...don't see many here..."
"Someone's heir... guess..."
With his smile still broad, he climbs the
wide steps in the middle of the two wings of the structure, wondering whether
to turn right or left at the top, since he only knows that Ryalor House now
holds the entire upper level. He turns left, and discovers that all the doors
are closed. Retracing his steps to the stairs and past them, he comes to a set
of open double doors.
After noting the painted emblem above the
open double doors-the intertwined R and L within the inverted triangle-Lorn nods
and steps through the doors. Amid the tables and the handful of merchanters in
blue, he does not see Ryalth immediately, although there is a closed door that
looks to lead to a private study.
"Ser?" asks a thin-faced junior
enumerator, standing from a table on which are piled stacks of wrinkled papers.
He steps forward as if to question Lorn's very presence. "Might I help you
in some way?"
A thin-faced, slender and gray-eyed senior
enumerator rises from a table desk in the corner and slips forward quickly.
"Sygul... this is Overcaptain Lorn-the Overcaptain Lorn," Eileyt says
quickly.
"Oh, ser... I'm so sorry." Sygul
bows deeply. "I'm so sorry. It's... well... no one ever described
you...."
Lorn laughs gently. "I'm not five
cubits tall with shoulders that touch both sides of the door? I'm afraid
not." He looks at Eileyt. "Is she here?"
"She is, and I think that all of us
will feel better if we escort you there before she sees you being detained
here." Eileyt turns toward the closed door at the left side of the trading
tables.
"...didn't know..."
"...don't let her know that.... You
think she be tough on an improper invoice..."
Lorn smiles sympathetically as he follows
the senior enumerator.
Eileyt knocks on the closed door.
"Lady... there is a most important personage here to see you. Most
important." He grins.
"Show him in, Eileyt."
Lorn opens the door and steps inside.
Ryalth and an older balding trader in the
orange of Hamor are seated on opposite sides of a desk table. The study is
almost stark, with but the desk table and a handful of chairs, several chests
lined up against the side wall. There are two high rear windows, both barred.
The gray and balding trader turns, and Lorn
can see the annoyance in his eyes. Ryalth's eyes widen and she stands.
Lorn smiles. "I can wait, but Eileyt
suggested I should make my presence known."
Ryalth gestures to the sitting trader.
"This is Duhabrah. He is the representative of his house in Cyad."
Lorn bows. "I apologize for the
interruption, and I am most pleased to meet you."
"The overcaptain and his house were
the first backers of Ryalor."
Ryalth smiles. "He is the one who made
the trade of the amber gold spirits possible... and a number of other unusual
goods. Some of the goods we were talking about."
The trader surveys Lorn more closely.
"You are not a trader born, I would say."
"No. My family is elthage." At
the traders' blank look, Lorn adds, "Of the Magi'i."
"A Lancer officer of Magi'i blood who
is involved in trade!" Duhabrah laughs, a full rumbling laugh. "Lady
trader... I see more from this than from all else, and I am pleased I am
here."
Lorn bows. "I will leave you two to
your trading. Eileyt will show me around," he adds. "I have not seen
all that is here."
Ryalth returns his bow with a smile.
Lorn steps back, closing the door gently,
and turns to Eileyt. "She told you to bring me in, even if she were with
someone?"
"Yes, ser."
Lorn nods. He gestures around the large
room. "Tell me a bit about each person and what he does."
Eileyt clears his throat. "Sygul-the
one near the door-is a junior enumerator. He checks the commodities boards in
the Plaza below, and lets me know if anything changes by more than a twentieth-or
if he thinks something is happening to the prices of grains, fruits, the more
widely traded metals. We don't trade them, except for dried fruits and at times
iron and cuprite, but the Lady Ryalth can tell from knowing that prices are
changing what else may be affected. He also checks the bills of lading against
the invoices to make sure the quantities are the same, and..."
Lorn follows the enumerator's restrained
gestures, listening.
"Kutyr-the one in the blond beard in
the corner-he is a trader, mostly in fruits and spirits.... He will travel to
Hydlen in several eight-days to purchase the advance contracts on dried
fruit...."
Lorn nods as Eileyt goes around the large
room, although the overcaptain doubts he totally understands about half of what
the enumerator says-or rather the meaning beyond the words themselves.
"And you," Lorn says, when Eileyt
has finished his summary, "you're the one that makes sure everyone does
what they must, and the one who keeps the ledgers?"
"The Lady keeps the ledgers, but she
requires that I check them to ensure aught is well, and accurate."
"You find mistakes... but not many,
I'd guess."
"Few," Eileyt says, "but it
is best that way, for the Emperor's tariff enumerators require double any discrepancies
as penalties. And Bluoyal-the Emperor's Merchanter Advisor-is hardly loath to
suggest that those houses that are caught cheating steal from the others
because the rest of us must pay more in tariffs while they pay less."
Lorn has never heard of the tariff
enumerators, but he nods, wondering what else there is that his education and
experience have overlooked. He also notes the vaguely distasteful manner in
which Eileyt refers to Bluoyal, and reminds himself to ask Ryalth about the
man.
The study door opens, and Ryalth escorts
Duhabrah to the main doors of Ryalor House, where the foreign trader bows twice
and departs, smiling effusively.
Eileyt slides away as Ryalth returns to
where Lorn stands. Without speaking, he follows her into her study where she is
the one to close the door.
They embrace.
After a long time, they separate, and
Ryalth looks at Lorn, eye to eye. "You came here first, didn't you?"
"Almost... I dropped my gear inside
the door at my parents, said hello and left. I did kiss my mother. I wasn't
sure about trying to enter your quarters, if you even have the same ones, my
wealthy merchanter lady..."
"I'm not that wealthy."
"Everyone thinks you are." Lorn
grins. "And most beautiful."
Ryalth shakes her head. "You are
impossible. Still."
"Very impossible... and wondering if
we can depart before too long."
She smiles. "I am almost through for
the day, and we can leave shortly."
"Ah... mother did ask if we could join
them for dinner." Lorn shrugs apologetically. "I would not... with so
little time... yet..."
"I know. Jerial has already conveyed
an invitation for whatever night you arrived, and I agreed." She grins
back. "I told her we would not stay late, and she said that she would make
sure of that, as well."
"You have everything arranged."
Lorn shakes his head. "You two."
"Not everything, but your family has
been far warmer than ever I would have imagined." Her smile fades.
"They are most cautious, though." The redhead shivers. "I would
not live like that, knowing every word be measured, every action watched."
"It may come to that," Lorn says.
"You have seen that... or felt it... with me."
"For you, that I will accept, but not
merely because of birth and station."
Lorn kisses her again.
"We will not soon leave here, and we
will be late for dinner... if you do not permit me to finish."
"Finish what?"
"The report that goes with the
seasonal import tariffs for the Emperor."
"I would ask," Lorn says, letting
go of her hands.
"I will hasten. Then we will take a
carriage and pick up your things. From now on, you are staying with your
consort in Cyad." She smiles.
"I would hope so."
"You have lecherous thoughts, my
dearest of lancers. Were this not for the Emperor's enumerators, we would
already have departed."
Lorn reaches out and squeezes her hand once
more. "Then, do what you must." He pulls out the seat on the side of
the desk table and seats himself, wondering how to tell her what else he must,
yet knowing that he must, for all that he does affects her, and she is in Cyad,
where all are watched, both for power and weakness.
Ryalth continues to page through the sheets
before her, occasionally lifting her pen. Finally, she signs the last page and
looks at Lorn once more. "I am done, but you are not."
He nods, then stands and moves toward her,
embracing her gently, and murmuring in her ear as he does, "I am here...
and I am most glad to be so. Yet... it is because Maran vanished... the Lancer
officer of whom I told you, the one who was a magus. Commander Meylyd and
perhaps the Majer-Commander of Lancers suspect I managed to remove him-but he
was never found. He... Maran... kept putting more and more restrictions on my
patrols...."
"He wanted the Forest to kill
you...."
Lorn nods, his head against Ryalth's warm
cheek. "Yet... all I do... it may come to bear upon you...."
"Long have I known that." She
returns his embrace-gently, but more tightly. "You stood by me... when
none did... you have risked your ties with your family for me... and always
have you kept your word to me. That you could not do, were you to die."
"You know... for what I hope... and
strive... and the dangers..." he murmurs, his arms still around her.
"Had you not risked yourself one
night, long ago... I might be dead- or a fearful woman at any trader's beck.
Had you not stood for me to your family..." Her lips brush his cheek, and
she lays her cheek against his. "Now... for what you have done, they see
me as I am, not as they thought I was."
"I worried... about Maran... yet I
could see no other course."
"Many worry... few act. You act, and I
will be with you." Her fingers tighten around his. "I will, and never
doubt it. Never." Her last word is whispered fiercely.
Whatever will come, whatever will be...
they will face it together.
"...even if we are thousands of kays
apart," Ryalth murmurs.
He holds her tightly, without barriers,
without reservations... and her arms are as firmly around him as his are around
hers.
L. E.
Modesitt, Jr., lives in Cedar City, Utah.
TOR
BOOKS BY L. E. MODESITT, JR.
THE
SAGA OF RECLUCE
1 The Magic of Recluce
2 The Towers of the Sunset
3 The Magic Engineer
4 The Order War
5 The Death of Chaos
6 Fall of Angels
7 The Chaos Balance
8 The White Order
9 Colors of Chaos
10
Magi'i of Cyandor
11
Scion of Cyandor
THE
SPELLSONG CYCLE
The
Soprano Sorceress
The
Spellsong War
Darksong
Rising
THE
ECOLITAN MATTER
The
Ecologic Envoy
The Ecolitan
Operation
The
Ecologic Secession
The
Ecolitan Enigma
THE
FOREVER HERO
Dawn
for a Distant Earth
The
Silent Warrior
In
Endless Twilight
Of
Tangible Ghosts
The
Ghost of the Revelator
The
Timegod
Timediver's
Dawn
The
Hammer of Darkness
The
Parafaith War
Adiamante
The
Green Progression (with Bruce Scott Levinson)
"Reading any novel in the series
invites the reader to fill in the picture of a tangible setting some critics
have compared to Tolkien's Middle-Earth. With rounded characters, a fast-moving
plot and a convincing alien world, Colors of Chaos shines in all its
facets."
-Amarillo
Sunday News-Globe
"Marked by high intelligence. A
powerful, educated, serious, and understated imagination is plainly at work in
this latest entry to a saga that is beginning to take on the complexity of
Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time cycle."
-Publishers
Weekly on Colors of Chaos
$27.95
($39.95 CAN)
"In a tour de force of
characterization, Modesitt paints the other side of the picture, adding a rare
depth and richness to what is already a landmark fantasy series."
-Romantic
Times (4 stars) on Colors of Chaos
"Modesitt skillfully combines credible
characters, an exceptionally well-realized alien world, plenty of action, and
as usual, philosophical discussions of power and the consequences of its
misuse, into the fast-moving plot."
- VOYA
on The White Order
L. E. Modesitt, Jr., is one of the standard
names in fantasy entering the new decade, and his most famous series is the
Saga of Recluce. Each novel fills in pieces of the history of this land where
Chaos and Order strive to maintain a magical balance.
Magi'i of Cyador marks the beginning of a
new tale from deep within the rich depths of the history of Recluce. This is
the story of Lorn, a talented boy born into a family of Magi'i. A fastidious
student of remarkable talent, Lorn lacks the single most coveted attribute
required of a Magus of Cyador: unquestionable loyalty. Lorn is too independent
for his own good.
So Lorn is forced to become a lancer
officer, and he's sent to the frontier to fight off the all-too-frequent
barbarian raids-a career that comes with a fifty percent mortality rate. His
enemies don't expect him to survive....
Lorn is a fresh, new character who will
enrich one of the most important fantasy series of the decade: the Saga of
Recluce.
"The author's skill in portraying the
humanity of characters who possess the power to destroy others with a thought
adds a level of verisimilitude and immediacy rarely found in grand-scale
fantasy."
-Library
Journal on Colors of Chaos
"Another entry in Modesitt's popular
Recluce series, one that upholds the saga's reputation for intelligence and
increasing originality.... This volume in the series stands unusually well on
its own as a classic and competent coming - of - age story."
-Booklist
on The White Order
L. E.
MODESITT, Jr., lives in Cedar City, Utah.
Jacket
art by Darrell K. Sweet
Jacket
design by Carol Russo Design
A TORŪ
HARDCOVER
Tom
Doherty Associates, LLC
175
Fifth Avenue New York, NY 10010
www.tor.com
Distributed
in Canada by H. B. Fenn and Company, Ltd.
Printed
in the USA