Firethorn (22 page)

King Thyrse stood on a tiered platform at one end of the field, and one by one the clans came before him to offer him their oaths and make sacrifices to the gods. So the morning passed. In the afternoon there was a farcical battle between the jacks, wearing armor of plaited straw and wielding weapons of swamp rush. The priests of Rift cast off the solemnity of the morning and joined the battle, riding donkeys so small their feet dragged on the ground. It was done for Rift's amusement, perhaps, but when six jacks were borne injured from the field (for they soon began to fight with blows and kicks), the crowd bellowed in delight.

After this false battle there was a real slaughter. The king ordered a herd of fallow deer driven onto the tourney field, and his war dogs loosed on them. The dogs, being kin to gazehounds, hunt silently; the deer leapt high and the dogs streaked low after them and pulled them down. After the man-hounds had tasted blood, the king and his clansmen of Prey rode onto the field to finish the hunt. There would be venison for the Blood that night. There was meat for the rest of us too, from the sacrifices; what we offer to the gods they share with us in turn.

When my tides ran dry, I came back to Galan's bed. He might have gone elsewhere when I denied him, but he had not. The binding had worked and he was mine as I had been his. I meant to take possession. I'd invoked Carnal's avatar of Desire when I bound him, and now she came at my call. I wanted her to give Galan a craving only I could satisfy. But it was hard to tell—he was eager enough, but he'd never failed to desire me, even when he dallied with that maid. It was me Desire scratched deepest, scratched where I'd gone numb, leaving behind a fiery itch.

ummons Day had passed and still the king kept the army waiting. At times I forgot we'd soon be going to war, forgot that the Marchfield wouldn't outlive the year, for it seemed as though this city might endure as long as one built of stone.

Prices climbed day by day and the weather grew colder. The Sun hid behind mists and a constant drizzle. The king hanged a few men for fighting out of the tourney field; deserters had their toes cut off so they could run no more and thieves had their fingers cut off so they could pinch no more. It made a show, and kept our minds off the cold water that seeped into our blankets, the fever running through the Marchfield, the insults that flowered into feuds.

The Crux kept his promise to work his men hard. In the stony hills north of the camp, he set them against each other on horseback and on foot, with real weapons, so they could learn to master their arms, their horses, their own fear and pain. They had to vanquish their appetites too, for they were fed scantily at midday on bread and jerky; instead of an after-dinner nap they spent most afternoons at the tourney field, skirmishing or watching. Often the Crux challenged opponents who dealt his men harsh lessons—lessons he thought needful. The cataphracts and armigers had battled since they were old enough to play sticks-and-stones; the Crux showed them they knew less than they thought. During the tourneys I could see his training taking hold.

The horse soldiers drilled too. Though they had little to do in tourneys, in war Spiller and Rowney, Flykiller and Uly would fight at Sire Galan's side. All the men returned to the tent at night exhausted and bruised, but the jacks cleaned muddy armor and the horsemaster and his boy tended to the mounts while Sires Galan and Rodela took their ease at supper and after.

The foot soldiers weren't taught how to war; when the time came, they'd be sent into battle to be an obstacle over which the opposing army might stumble. They had their duties, digging and hauling or emptying pisspots or any other chore a jack disdained to do, and now and then they were called to serve in the king's work gangs. When they were not worked too hard, they were too idle. They waited, huddling in their lean-tos under rain that dripped through the thatch, and they muttered about the stony ground and the foul weather and the fouler food, and they quarreled. But if you didn't listen for it, you might have thought them as patient and mute as cows in a pasture with their backs to a snowstorm.

As for Sire Galan, he never lazed abed in the morning as he used to do. He woke every day when the Sun was a mere notion to ready himself for fighting. Skill with weapons and horses had always come easily to him, perhaps too easily; now I saw him striving, pushing himself hard. He'd been bested in a tourney and it rankled. His broken rib had healed more quickly than his pride.

An edge is made as much from the steel taken away as the steel that is left. Just so Galan was growing keen; I could see it as I tended to his bruises and pains at night. He lost his sleekness, the smooth roundness under the skin. His sinews and muscles grew tough as hempen cords, knotting ribs to spine, limbs to trunk. His hands hardened, learning the fit of the lance and scorpion, sword and mace the way a farmer's hands know the sickle from the scythe. He bore his carapace of iron without complaint, as if it were no more of a burden than a surcoat of velvet stiffened with gold thread. Some of the cataphracts grumbled at such drudgery, but Galan wore his weariness out, teaching himself to be tireless. He hung five more banners before his tent and propped the weapons he won as trophies inside the doorway.

There were other women in the clan's tents now, other fodder for the men's gossip. Some lived there and some came and went for a night or so. The Crux tolerated us, knowing that when the troop left the Marchfield for war, most would stay behind. The only woman of the Blood was Sire Farol's wife, Dame Hartura. Being prone to jealousy and hoping, so I heard, to catch Sire Farol doing something he shouldn't, she'd persuaded her father to let her accompany his troop from the clan Growan. Sire Farol was crestfallen when she arrived. She kept to his tent with her handmaid and her own cook, except for tourneys, when she could be found under the awnings of Crux, screaming until she was hoarse.

There were mudwomen too, sheaths like myself. One crept about in a brown rag and never raised her eyes from the ground, and everyone knew she was shared by the men in Sire Erial's tent, down to the bagboy. I pitied her. Once I offered her some childbane, but she scurried off with a sideways look of distrust and fear and avoided me after. Sire Guasca had found a pretty sheath named Suripanta. She plucked her brows and forehead like one of the Blood, and though she lived in the tent next to ours, she had no use for me once she saw the cut of my clothes and learned I wasn't from Ramus. I detested her and her wandering eye; she liked to start fights among men who weren't allowed to touch her. Sometimes at night she screeched at Sire Guasca and we could hear her and the thumps that silenced her. If they quarreled too loudly, the Crux would send his armiger over to bid them be quiet. Sire Pava had a sheath too, for two days of every tennight. She was a whore of some repute, and he couldn't afford to buy all her favors.

Since Galan was busy all hours during the day, I was no longer constantly under his eye. I had few duties, and those few I'd taken on myself: tending the fire, making poultices and tisanes to ease the men's bruises and sore muscles, a bit of cooking and sewing. In the evenings I worked on my dress and a cloak for Fleetfoot with a hood lined in rabbit fur. Galan seemed incurious about how I spent my days, so long as I was in his bed at night. This suited me well, for idleness chafed, and I'd found other occupations.

I went to the shrines around the king's hall just after daybreak—to pray, I would have told Galan, had he asked, but he'd already risen, armed, and left for the hills and his exercises. I took Noggin, for Sire Galan couldn't spare his jacks to go about with me. I felt Ardor had naught to do with me anymore, being the god of that maiden I counted my enemy. But the bones had said otherwise, when last I'd thrown them, so I burned a lock of my hair at Ardor's shrine.

After, I found Mai at the shrine of Delve, where she paid her respects every morning.

“I have some visits to make,” she said. “Would you care to come with me?” She looked me up and down and clucked at my old dress and battered sheepskin cloak. Mai herself wore a gown of gray velvet with split skirts that fell on either side of her great belly, showing a red underdress. Her headcloth was piled high and wrapped with a silver chain. She courted a beating, for there were some armigers in the Marchfield who did not like to see a drudge dress too well—better than an armiger could afford. She said, “A pity your gown isn't finished. Well, we must make do. Can you be wise, I wonder?

“What do you mean?”

“I need you to be wise today. I think it would be best if you kept your lips sewn tight. The less you say, the more you'll be taken for a sage.”

“Am I so foolish when I open my mouth?” Indeed, I felt the fool, for longing to see Mai again and forgetting how her teasing was apt to chafe.

She gave me one of her hard hugs and laughed. “It's not that you' re foolish, Coz. But for certain you're greener than a pintle shoot. It's been a long time since I was as green as you.”

There is a world of women that men never see, and Mai was one of the powers in that world. I knew her for a canny—how could I not, when she'd given me the means to bind Galan?—now I saw her ply her trade. And she hardly needed to tell me to keep quiet, for my tongue was in a knot when she took me to the pavilion of a certain dame of Prey, the king's own clan. We left Noggin, Pinch, and Trave to hunker before the tent while we went in. The dame dismissed her guards and kept her handmaid. Soon we heard the men dicing outside.

The tent was crowded with heavy, carved furniture of a sort more fitting to a manor than a campaign. No doubt it would all be carted back again when the men left for war and the women of the Blood went home. The dame sat before a table with her face shadowed by a great horned wimple draped with gauze. I could see the tip of her sharp nose and the arch of her nostrils, reddened as if she'd been tippling or sniffling.

Mai took from her girdle a small wallet, and from the wallet an oilskin packet, which she unfolded on the table with delicacy, despite her swollen fingers, to reveal a handful of shriveled white berries: childbane. Enough for a tennight, at most. She said, “This comes all the way from the spine of the world, the Interminable Mountains. It can't be found in these parts—it's precious, very rare.” She gestured at me. “When Firethorn first brought it to me, after a long and arduous journey, I thought of you at once, my dame. “ I was not sure where the Interminable Mountains might be—each of our mountains had its own name, and none went by that one-but I nodded as if she hadn't just lied uphill and down.

The dame craned her long neck and looked down her nose to see what lay before her on the table. “What is it?”

Mai grinned and leaned toward her. She lowered her voice. “Childbane, my dame. It will preserve your figure and your reputation. Once before, you came to me, to make sure that your husband would sleep soundly at night and annoy you no more. But a cold bed grows stale after a while—don't you think? Now you can find another man to warm you—a comelier man—one who is neither so old nor so fat, one with an upstanding prick instead of a flabby old dangle. And he won't have to unsheathe before you've had your fill, eh? Or make you suck on him instead (though to be sure, a swallow of white blood now and then is good for the complexion). Chew a few of these afterward and never fear your secret will show in a few months.

The dame's nose grew even redder, and I blushed myself. I was shocked to hear Mai broach such matters so boldly, so coarsely, as if she spoke to another sheath or a whore, and not a woman of the Blood. I expected the dame to call her guards and have us driven off. And besides, I'd heard talk of pricklickers, but I'd taken it for a jape, a by-name soldiers used to insult each other. Spiller called Noggin one at least twice a day. Mai caught my eye and winked.

The dame sat demurely with her hands folded on her lap, her eyes downcast. She said, “How much?”

Mai said, “Five blondes.”

Five gold coins! I found my mouth gaping and closed it tight.

Most of the Blood scorn bargaining, which is why they're easy to cheat unless their servants bargain for them. This dame said, “Give me whatever four will buy. I can afford no more.”

“A pity,” Mai said, “to give up even a little pleasure.”

“There's something else I need of you,” the dame said, and hesitated.

Mai leaned closer and waited.

The dame said abruptly, “Can you give me something to make men desire me? A charm, something …”

“You don't need one, a fine dame like yourself! There are many as would be willing—Sire Celoso for one. Haven't you seen him stare? Blink at him and he'll come running.”

The dame looked up at Mai for the first time. She'd gazed down at the table before, or to one side or the other, or to the hands in her lap. Daylight coming around the edge of the door flap fell on her face. No starchroot could cover the burning of her cheeks. “It's Sire Brama I want, and I want him to grovel.”

I'd never heard of the man, but I recognized the need. It was shameful to see the dame lay bare a thought that should be kept hidden—and to recall I'd done the same not long ago. Mai had a gift for drawing out such secrets, for she appeared to understand any folly without scorning the fool. In truth, she did judge, but she hid it well.

I looked to the dame's handmaid, sitting on a stool behind her mistress. She had a hand over her mouth to hide her smile. She looked back at me and her eyes were merry.

Mai said, “Ah, I see. That's a different matter. You need a specific. But you say you have no money?”

“For that I can give another goldhead.”

“Usually it costs two,” said Mai. “But for you, my dame, I will strive to do my poor best. Can you get a lock of his hair?”

The dame shook her head.

“It will be less certain. But I'll do what I can.”

After we left the tent, Mai said, “I should have asked for eight; she's rich enough. One of these blondes is yours, you know.”

I thought,
Only one?
I'd found the childbane for her. Yet it was an astonishing fee. She made me rich, even as she made herself richer. I whispered my thanks, and then I asked, “Will you make a binding for the dame?” Perhaps it wasn't as great a favor as I'd thought when she'd told me how to bind Galan, if she'd do as much for anyone. Still, she'd taught me for free. I wondered why, now that I knew it was her trade.