The Guardian (6 page)

I dressed and went to find my breakfast, which I ate alone. I assumed Ryadne was with Ellyn, likely locked in further dispute, and melancholy settled on me. I had lost my sworn liege and now must desert his queen while she faced the horrors of siege, and most likely her own death. I was unsure where I should take Ellyn. I knew nothing of the coastal lands, and wondered if the Sea Kings would welcome us or take us prisoner. I could not go to my own clan, nor be certain of the Dur’s welcome. Naban and Serian would likely seize Ellyn as a pawn to hold against either Chaldor or Danant, and to reach the Styge we must traverse the Barrens. Worse, Ryadne had spoken of Ellyn’s talent burgeoning, and whilst I’d accept that magic if it were used on Chaldor’s behalf, I could not imagine the child using it well. It seemed to me that we must become outlaws, and when—as I was sure he eventually would—Talan learned of Ellyn’s flight, he’d send hunters after us. I wondered what hunters a Vachyn sorcerer might create with his conjuries.

By the time I finished eating I was in dour mood, so I went to find the armories.

My sword was cleaned of old blood and polished and given such an edge as it had not known since the war began. I was offered a splendid scabbard that I rejected in favor of my own old, worn sheath. We should be traveling incognito, I thought, and I’d not draw attention to us with any overly fine trappings.

I said as much to Ryadne when she found me, and she agreed, kitting me in plain but sturdy gear—a shirt or two of stout linen; good leathern breeches and durable boots; a tunic of cloth and metal sewn together and lined with silk so that arrows might be easier withdrawn; undergarments; and a good, warm cloak. She offered me the pick of the palace stables, and I selected a bay mare. She was deep of chest and long in the leg, and she’d the look of a runner—speed and stamina combined.

“Ellyn will want her favorite” Ryadne advised me, indicating a second mare whose coat was so white as to shine.

The horse was sound, but also very noticeable; I recognized her immediately. I shook my head and told the queen, “Favorite or no, she must ride another—this beauty’s too well known.”

“She’ll argue,” Ryadne said.

I looked at her. She smiled and said, “Choose her another then, Gailard.”

I picked out a dark chestnut mare the same size as my own.

“What else shall you need?” Ryadne asked.

“A horse bow,” I told her, “and a stock of arrows; provisions; coin; bedrolls.” I thought of the season. The summer aged and likely by the time we got to wherever we were going the nights would grow cold. “A tent. No!
Two
tents.” I could not imagine sharing a single bivouac with Ellyn.

“You’ll want a packhorse?” Ryadne asked.

I shook my head. “We’ll travel light. What we can’t carry between us we’ll forage, or buy.” I began to feel better. This was akin to planning a campaign and I felt on firmer ground. “And Ellyn must dress plain. No fancy trappings; no jewels or finery. She must not be recognized as your daughter.”

“No,” Ryadne agreed, and set a hand on my forearm. “Thank you for this, Gailard. I know it is not easy for you, and you’ve my everlasting gratitude.”

I sought fine words in response and could fine none, so I only shrugged and smiled and said, “You’re my sworn liege now, my queen.”

There was a sadness in her eyes as she answered, “Yet Ellyn’s mother still. Guard her well, eh?”

“My word on it,” I said. “And my life”

S
o it was that we quit Chorym in that hour before the sun’s rising, when the air hangs still and grey, seemingly undecided between the relinquishment of night and acceptance
of the new day. Ellyn rode the chestnut I’d chosen, dressed in boots and breeches, shirt and tunic, her cloak wrapped about her. Her hair was shorn as I’d advised, tucked beneath a peaked leather cap into which she’d set a defiant feather.

This last indignity she’d protested fiercer even than the rest. “I give up my home,” she’d cried, “and leave my mother to her fate. I must dress like some … some vagabond. I am told I cannot ride my own horse—and now you’d have me shorn. It’s too much!”

She had turned to Ryadne for support—and found none, for we had agreed this final measure. She’d not easily pass for a boy, surely not on close inspection, but she looked less like a princess than what our masquerade demanded—a wandering hire-sword’s surly offspring.

Ryadne—cloaked and hooded that none recognize her—accompanied us to the East Gate. Our farewells had been said within the confines of the palace, and when we reached the gate she only ducked her head and raised a hand, then turned her horse away and left us to wait for the opening.

I did not see her again.

I felt a great sadness, and a curious excitement. I am no sorcerer—no seer or mage—but I sensed that I rode out toward some great adventure, and must I find it in company with the sullen girl who fidgeted irritably alongside me, then still it was as the gods willed. I only hoped Andur had been wrong when he told me the gods had forsaken us.

The dawn-bells tolled and the gate was opened; we rode through. I heeled my mare to a trot, glancing back at Ellyn. She scowled ferociously, but she came with me, and we took the East Road to whatever fate awaited us.

T
alan Kedassian, Lord of Danant, stood admiring his reflection as servants buckled on his golden armor. He made, he thought, a splendid figure, impressive and suitably military, as befit the conqueror of Chaldor—which soon enough, he had no doubt, he would be. He savored the title as he savored his own image: the Lord of Danant and Conqueror of Chaldor. Or perhaps, more modestly, the Lord of Danant and Chaldor. The armor was contoured to his slender frame, a snarling lion’s head embossed upon the breastplate and reproduced in smaller size upon the greaves and pauldrons. In the light that shone through the cabin’s window, the bejeweled eyes glinted ferociously. Talan beamed as his sword was belted around his waist, the jewels in the hilt matching the rubies that shaped the lions’ eyes.

He nodded approvingly, then shook his head as his helmet was lifted. He was too handsome, he decided, to hide his features beneath the casque, and opted to carry the helm; that would be more suitable. After all, he came ashore as conqueror, and there could not be any threat left in Antium—Nestor’s Vachyn magic and the blades of the advance guard had surely seen to that. So he tucked the helmet beneath his left arm and turned about, admiring himself
from all angles, then bowed mockingly to the head floating pickled in a glass jar.

“Think you I look well, Andur?”

The head offered no answer. The skin was very pale, like that of a drowned man, and the yellow hair and beard floated like tendrils of riverweed. The eyes that stared blindly back at Talan began to grow milky, spilling out cloudy streamers of ichor where the little fish Nestor had set in the jar nibbled. Talan chuckled. Andur of Chaldor had made a grave mistake when he invaded Danant.

“I am ready.” He waved the anxious servants away. “Nestor, do you accompany me?”

Across the luxurious cabin, the Vachyn sorcerer ducked his head, folding long-nailed hands into the cuffs of his robe. “As you wish, my lord.”

Talan smiled. The gods knew that Nestor cost him sacks of gold—but all worthwhile for the power of his magicks. Talan adjusted his expression to one of stern resolve, checked his image a last time, and strode to the opened door.

Trumpets blew a clarion as he came on deck, and his personal guard—all armored in lesser versions of his own splendor—raised their spears and shouted his name. On the dockside, soldiers clattered swords and spears against shields, and for a while Talan basked in the accolades.

“Hail, Talan the Conqueror!”

“Hail, the Lord of the River!”

“Hail, the Destroyer of Chaldor!”

“Hail, Talan!”

He paused at the gangplank, then raised a hand, bidding them be silent. His officers had assured him the town was emptied of defenders, so he felt safe. And Nestor was at his back. The Chaldorean army had fled wounded to the east, doubtless to mass behind the walls of Chorym, and what resistance had been left behind was slain. He could smell the sweet odor of the bodies burning in the torched houses, and
beyond the harbor could see the palls of smoke rising into the morning air. He smiled and spoke.

“Well done, my faithful soldiers. You have fought bravely, and I thank you. Now we shall go on to Chorym and raze that enemy city, and the land’s plunder shall be yours.”

That promise was met with a great shout of approval, a further clattering of blades on shields. Talan smiled wider and strode manfully down the gangplank to the fire-glazed cobbles of the wharf.

Nestor followed him, and Talan could not resist whispering: “It
is
safe, no?”

The Vachyn sorcerer answered, “None shall harm you here; my word on it.”

“Good.” Talan struck a posture and shouted for his chariot to be brought ashore, then turned to his generals. “Have we left any decent accommodation standing?”

Egor Dival, who owned twice his liege’s years, said bluntly, “No. What the Vachyn’s magic didn’t burn, the defenders did.”

Talan frowned. “Then where do I sleep this night? Where shall I find my breakfast?”

Dival wiped a hand through a greying beard that was stained with recent blood and said, “Tonight, in your pavilion. Now? Why, I suppose you might go back on board and eat there, or here with us.”

“Here?” Talan gestured at the wreckage of Antium. Now that he saw it closer, he could see that little was left standing other than smoking hulks ready to topple under the weight of their own smoldering and charred timbers. “What’s left here?”

“Little enough,” Dival said. “My advice is that we see the army ashore and move inland. Make camp beyond this place.”

“But I’m hungry,” Talan complained.

“Then eat on the ship,” Dival returned.

Talan’s frown grew darker. “I’ll eat with my loyal men,” he declared. “I owe them that, at least.”

O
n the dockside, where Nestor’s magefire had scoured the cobbles and men had died, tables were set up, chairs around them. Linen cloths were spread, platters of silver and gold, goblets of cut glass, ornate cutlery. Decanters of wine were brought from the ships, and great plates of meat and eggs, bread, cheeses and fruits. Talan ate with Nestor seated on his right, Egor Dival to his left. The men who had fought the battle—the ordinary soldiers—were gifted with ale, and small measures of bread and meat. And were those measures insufficient to fill their hungry bellies, then they must forage through the ruins of Antium for what they could find; the commanders ate well. And before them, on a small table, stood the jar containing Andur’s head.

“How do you do that?” Talan stabbed a fork in the direction of the little fishes gnawing at the dead face. “How can they survive in there?”

Nestor smiled and stroked his black beard. “Magic, my lord.”

“But he’s pickled. And no living thing can survive in that liquid.”

“Perhaps,” Nestor said, “they are not alive. Indeed, perhaps they are only illusion. Or can live—thanks to my magic—in such liquid as must kill all else.”

“So are they dead or alive?” Dival asked through a mouthful of roasted meat and scrambled eggs.

Nestor shrugged.

“Can you,” Talan asked, “defy death?”

“I am a Vachyn sorcerer,” Nestor answered. “And life and death are not so much different—perhaps only alternate aspects of existence.”

“Dead’s dead,” Dival grunted. “There’s surely a large difference.”

“Is there?” Nestor turned his saturnine face to the grizzled general. “Shall I show you?”

Dival scowled and shook his head.

The wind had turned as the day aged, and the debris of
Antium blew across the harbor, the air gone grey with the detritus. Dival swilled rich wine around his mouth and spat onto the cobbles.

Talan laughed. “Does the taste of victory offend you, Egor?”

“No, my lord.” Dival shook his head again. “But there are better places to eat.”

“Where?” Talan spread his splendidly armored arms. “We sit in a vanquished town, ready to conquer the land beyond … where better to take our breakfast?”

“In Chorym,” Dival answered.

Talan’s smile faded; his face grew dark. “We shall take Chorym,” he said. “We shall confront the walls, and does Ryadne deny us, then we’ll siege the city and tear it down around her.” He turned to the Vachyn sorcerer. “Eh, Nestor?”

The Vachyn smiled. “Magic shall bring her to heel.”

“And I’ll have her for my bride?”

Nestor said, “Yes, my lord,” and cast a sly glance at Dival. “Can might of arms not give you what you want, then my magicks shall.”

Talan nodded approvingly, then beckoned a servant to wipe his armor where falling ash discolored the gold. He wondered if it stained his hair. Perhaps he should have it washed again, then thought that that was not seemly in a conqueror. No; better to go dirty into battle. He tossed his cutlery aside and rose, signaling the end of the meal.

“We advance! My chariot?”

Two grooms brought up the prancing horses, both stallions, matched for their jet hides. The chariot was all beaten gold, with jagged daggers jutting from each wheel. It bore nine javelins and a jewel-mounted quiver in which stood seventeen silver-headed arrows and a bow of lacquered jet. Ceremoniously, Talan Kedassian settled his golden helmet on his dark-oiled hair. He latched the cheek pieces and took a spear in his hand, raising it dramatically as Nestor clambered in.