Colours in the Steel (21 page)

‘Hail, Temrai Tai-me-Mar,’ Uncle An growled in his business voice. ‘May our Father Temrai live for ever.’ Then, in his normal voice, too soft to be heard by the ranks behind, he added, ‘You’ve put on weight, our Temrai. At least they’ve been feeding you properly.’

‘Don’t make me laugh, Uncle An, or I’ll fall off my horse.’ Temrai raised his right hand in a grand salute, and held it there while the five great and good men of the clan slid off their horses and knelt before him on the hard ground.
They’re doing this because they mean it
, Temrai realised, and for a moment he felt uncomfortable. But not longer than a moment. What it meant was that they wanted him to get it right, they were trying to help. The least he could do was try too. He took a deep breath and hoped his voice wouldn’t wobble.

‘I am Temrai ker-Sasurai Tai-me-Mar,’ he heard himself saying. ‘Rise, my children.’

Gods, what a performance!
He tried to call to mind the way his father usually coped with this sort of thing; but that wasn’t much help, really. After all, his father was the chief, and you tended to assume the chief knew what he was doing . . .

Then it occurred to him that his father was dead. And that he was the chief now. And, what was worst of all, his father was dead but Temrai couldn’t cry or even refer to it ever again, even to his family or closest friends, because of course the chief lives for ever . . .

I want to go home
, he thought.

I am home
.

 

He started to feel better again once the camp was in sight; then he felt a whole lot worse. What he really wanted to do was jump off his horse, run to the tents, cuddle the dogs, give everyone their presents, run off and see Pegtai and Sorutai and Felten and Codruen quickly, just to say hello before his father got back—

He slowed down and rode along the main avenue between the rows of tents, head up, back straight, the way he’d been taught. People were coming out to see him, but nobody waved or shouted; even the dogs hung back, their tails wagging uncertainly as if they were afraid he’d be angry. He’d never known the camp this quiet before.

Had his father . . . had Sasurai Tai-me-Mar felt this way, he wondered, the first time he rode into his camp as Father of the Clan, protector of his people, nephew of the gods? No, probably not; remember your family history, Temrai, you can’t afford to be careless about this sort of thing any more. Sasurai Tai-me-Mar had already been middle-aged and the established junior partner in the chiefdom when Jaldai Tai-me-Mar was cut down by Maxen’s Pitchfork on the Sela plains. Sasurai would have ridden back at the head of a defeated army, and the people staring from the tent flaps wouldn’t have been looking at him, they’d have been trying to catch sight of their fathers, husbands, sons, brothers among the riders at his back, trying not to scream and sob when they realised they weren’t there . . . It was probably safe to say that Sasurai had enjoyed this moment even less than he was, and probably made a far better job of it, too.

‘The next exercise,’ Loredan said, ‘is one you’re going to hate for the rest of your lives. It hurts, it’s boring, and if you make a mess of it I’m going to make you do it all over again. Ready?’

As his group of disciples glowered at him with combined fear and hatred, Loredan put his heels together at right angles, straightened his back and stretched his sword-arm out in the guard of the Old fence. A minute later (in this context, a long time) he said, ‘You should all have got the idea by now. You do it.’

The result was fairly predictable, so he made them do it again; and again, and again after that, and again . . . One of these days, he muttered to himself as he patrolled the line of foil-points waiting for the first one to twitch and wobble, I’m going to find out exactly what this torture is supposed to achieve. Must be some reason for it, or why the hell have twenty generations of fencers been made to practise it, three times a day, every day?

This time, Iuven the rich boy was the first to break down. Loredan knocked the kid’s foil first sideways then down with the back of his hand, growled, ‘And again,’ and walked on down the line. As soon as one of them failed, the others would inevitably follow suit. It was only the fear of being the first one to lose it that kept the rest of them going.

When he couldn’t bear to watch any longer he snapped, ‘All right, that’s enough,’ and knocked all six foil-points down in turn. ‘I’d just like to remind you,’ he added, ‘these practice foils you’re using are much shorter and lighter than real swords. And in future, we’re going to do four minutes, not two. Right, now you’re going to learn the backhand retreating parry of the City fence. Start with the front foot on the line, both knees well-bent, like you’re sitting on a chair that isn’t there. Master Teudel, you look just like a constipated spider.’

The female, now; she was no less awkward and cack-handed than the other five, but there was something almost frightening about her determination. It was as if - well, would-be advocates learn fencing with the objective of earning a living without getting killed. This one wanted to learn how to kill. Ten years in the racket, and he’d never come across one like this before. He wasn’t sure he liked the idea.

‘That one,’ he confided to Athli as the class clumped and swished through its newly learnt manoeuvre, ‘is going to be a menace.’

‘Good,’ Athli replied. ‘Best sort of publicity, a successful graduate.’ She was sitting on a folding chair with her nose in a pile of wax tablets; lists of names, as far as he could tell by reading them upside down. ‘You know what these are?’ she added.

‘No idea.’

‘They’re the names of all the students who enrolled this term, with the schools they’ve joined, where known. There’s over thirty who don’t seem to have found places yet. Once I’ve finished this I can go out and start recruiting.’

‘Keen, aren’t you? But I’ve already got a class.’

‘Ah.’ Athli smiled. ‘But what if you were to take two classes at once? Several trainers do it,’ she went on as Loredan’s face contracted into a frown. ‘It’s no big deal. Take now, for example. While they’re practising what you’ve just shown them, you could be teaching another class. We could double our turnover.’

Loredan shook his head. ‘It’s running me ragged just looking after this lot,’ he said. ‘Two classes at the same time’d kill me.’

‘Ah, but you haven’t got into the swing of it yet. Once you’ve had a chance to work out the most efficient way of teaching—’

‘Nice idea, but no thanks. I could cope with one class of twelve, but two lots of six’d be too much. Besides, we’re aiming at a reputation for quality through individual tuition. Means I’ve got to watch ’em all the time if I want to spot their mistakes. Couldn’t do that if I was giving my full attention to another class for half of the time.’ He glanced down at the carefully written tablets and thought of all the wasted effort she’d put into them. ‘You should have checked with me before you started doing all that.’

Athli frowned at him. ‘All right, then,’ she said, ‘what should I be doing? I finished all the stuff you told me to do hours ago.’

‘I don’t know, do I?’ Loredan replied. ‘Oh, no, will you just look at that clown Valier. If he’d only listen occasionally to what he’s told—’

He bustled back to work, while Athli sighed and dropped the stylus she’d been writing with into the satchel at her feet. She had made a point of watching nearly all the other trainers in the Schools and, looked at objectively, Loredan was more or less completely average. True, he shouted less and explained more than some, but between his six charges and all the others doing practically the same thing all through the building there was no appreciable difference.

She let her attention wander. One of the grand schools had its pitch nearby, and the trainer was drilling the advanced class in the use of the Zweyhender. Rather an esoteric skill; the heavy two-handed sword was virtually obsolete, being used only in such outlandish jurisdictions as libel and witchraft - it survived there only because cases were so infrequent that nobody had yet bothered to repeal the laws. In her time in the courts, Athli had never seen it used. She knew Loredan had a Zweyhender put away somewhere, though she hadn’t seen it at his apartment (and something that size would be hard to miss), but she had no idea how it was actually used. She watched.

The instructor started off by showing his class how the sword was held. He produced one; it was over six feet long from point to pommel, nearly a quarter of its length being the handle. The quillons of the crossguard were each almost a foot long, and in front of them, about six inches up the blade, was another smaller guard comprised of two wing-like projections from the blade itself. Athli watched as the instructor took a silk handkerchief and wrapped it round the blade between the two handguards; he gripped this with his right hand and positioned his left halfway down the handle proper. Then he demonstrated the basic moves.

Athli, who had imagined great haymaking sweeps and cuts, was disappointed to discover that in practice the Zweyhender was used more as a long-bladed poleaxe or halberd than as a sword. Employed in this way, with its nicely calculated weight and balance, it could be used for fast, accurate lunges, wicked little prods and intricate parries, all executed with a minimum of movement. Far from being a heroic weapon, she realised, such as a dragonslayer or mighty man of valour might wield, it was the tool of the man who plays the percentages, providing a solid and foolproof defence as first priority while allowing its user to go on the offensive quickly and with an acceptable minimum of risk when it was reasonably prudent to do so. At least with the slim, sharp law-sword there was a degree of grace and style, a residual trace of flamboyance in the ebb and flow of the fight. The Zweyhendermen trundled forward into a minimum-exposure scenario and negotiated rather than fought, tracing a series of formal measures which made it hard to lose and equally hard to win. It was sensible; it was businesslike and extremely practical. It was no fun. She couldn’t imagine why it wasn’t in wider use.

Four or five students sparred against the instructor for varying lengths of time - one surviving a whole two minutes, others being checkmated within a few passages. It was fairly easy stuff to follow; a flurry of neat little prods and pecks, the advantage established, the loser being forced to huddle behind his impregnable guard and tacitly conceding the exchange. The ease with which a complete novice could hold off the trainer explained why the weapon was no longer used; where the fight had to be to the death, each case could go on all day without a result, and the no-hoper could keep the moral victor four feet away from him even though he had no chance at all of winning. That wouldn’t serve the interests of justice, which demanded a short contest and an outright winner, unambiguously identifiable as being the one left standing.

The sixth student was taking a little longer. He was a short, stocky youth, not particularly well-dressed and patently out of breath after the first thirty seconds. Athli didn’t know the techniques and so couldn’t say for certain, but she had a fair idea that he was staying in the game by virtue of some recklessly imaginative improvisation, which was beginning to get on the teacher’s nerves. The class seemed to think he was being extremely clever; they weren’t cheering him on, of course. Cheering during a real fight counted as contempt of court, for which offenders got a week in the cells underneath the courtroom. It was obvious, though, where their sympathies lay, and as the trainer’s movements became stiffer and his blows struck with more force, Athli could see his fear of losing face and respect if this farce went on much longer.

The trainer upped his game, moving faster, throwing in some tricks he hadn’t included in his demonstration. The student’s reply made an enthralling spectacle - the boy was a natural, no doubt about that - but he was simply making things harder for himself; and besides, the whole thing was pointless, not to mention counterproductive, since the reason he was there was not to defeat his trainer in a duel but to learn orthodox swordmanship. Athli began to feel annoyed; he’d proved his point, it was time to concede gracefully and accept the applause of his peers.

But he didn’t. He fenced on, and Athli saw a gently pushed cut to go home, drawing a red line across the thick part of the boy’s forearm. The rest of the class gasped and muttered and the trainer took a step back, assuming that that would be an end of it. It wasn’t; the boy shifted his right hand back onto the main handle and swirled the massive blade round his head, aiming a blow at the trainer which would have split his skull like a pine log if it had connected. As it was, the trainer sidestepped and blocked, taking the blow awkwardly just above the lower handguard. The force of the strike pushed him back and his right foot slithered six inches or so before he regained a solid footing, during which time the boy had swung again - a devastating blow delivered from bent knees and an arched back, cutting from the side rather than downwards with the blade addressing his opponent at neck level. The trainer rocked back on tiptoe, just making enough height to get the forte of his blade in the way of the stroke before it sliced him in two. As it was, he lost his balance completely and staggered; and in that moment of real danger, instinct must have taken control of his mind, because he counterattacked with a full-blooded low thrust into the gap between the boy’s arms and sword blade, direct and uninterrupted passage to the heart—