The Lady of Han-Gilen (15 page)

oOo

Mirain bathed almost leisurely, and ate with good
appetite. Her half of the bath, Elian was more than glad of, but she could not
eat. She tended Mirain’s hair instead, cursing to herself when it proved more
than usually intractable.

“Yes,” he said as if she had addressed him, “your game is
over. Even if you hadn’t betrayed yourself, there would still be Han-Gilen’s
army to face.”

“And my brother.” She knew that, beneath thought, as she
knew that her father had not come. She doubted that it was arrogance. She
wondered if it was wisdom. “Are you going to make me fight?”

“Would you?”

She breathed deep, to steady herself. “I swore an oath.”

“You did.” His hair was half braided; he freed the plait
from her fumbling fingers and finished it much more deftly than she had begun
it, and surveyed her, a swift keen glance. She wore livery as always, with her
sword girded over the scarlet surcoat.

“Come,” he said to her.

oOo

The keep’s wide hall was full of men and thrumming with
tension. Though some had come here on honest business with the king, most
seemed merely to be hangers-on.

Mirain’s own men mingled freely enough, but there were two
distinct camps set well apart and bristling at one another. Luian’s heir led
one. Over the other rose the tall form of Ebros’ prince. He came forward as
Mirain entered the hall, bowing regally, if somewhat painfully, as lord to high
lord.

Mirain smiled his quick smile and clasped Indrion’s hand.
“You look well, lord prince. I trust that you are recovered?”

“I am well,” the prince answered, smiling in return, his
eyes warming to amber. “Apart from an aching head. That was a shrewd blow, my
lord.”

“A simple one, and an old trick.”

“Ah, but it succeeded.”

There was a bench nearby. Mirain sat on it. Elian, taking
her place behind him, admired his art that turned the humble seat into a
throne, and in the same instant invited his new vassal to share the seat but
not, ever, the kingship.

Indrion hesitated no more than a heartbeat, then slowly sat.
His smile was gone, but he looked on Mirain in deep respect. “My lord,” he
said, “I regret that I challenged your kingship. But I shall never regret the
fight. It was a fine battle, and well won.”

“As well lost.” Mirain raised a hand. “Lord Omian.”

Luian’s heir left the ranks of his countrymen. To reach
Mirain he had to cross before the Ebrans.

He neither speeded nor slowed his progress for them, nor
acknowledged that they existed. He bowed to Mirain, and without perceptible
pause, to Indrion.

Mirain smiled warmly and beckoned. “Sit by me, sir.”

There was space on the bench, but only beside Indrion.
Ebros’ prince had made certain of that. Omian sat with perfect ease, and with a
smile, which was more than his enemy could muster.

Mirain seemed to see none of it, either hostility or forced
amity.

When Omian was settled, the king said, “The Hundred Realms
have risen, my lords, and come to meet us. They are close now to the ford of
Isebros.”

Neither of the princes would glance at the other. “Indeed,
sire,” Indrion said, “I had had word that Han-Gilen was rousing the princedoms.
I had not thought they would arrive so swiftly.”

“Had you not?” asked Omian. “Surely you were praying for
them to overtake us and cut us down while we were still in disorder from
fighting you.”

Indrion shrugged slightly. “I was a fool, I grant you that.
I should have held to my walls and waited and let you mount a siege, to be
crushed by the advancing forces. But I thought I could stop you. I chose open
battle, a day too soon. I am well paid for it.”

“Aye, and now you think to catch us with your Ebran
treachery.” At last Indrion’s temper escaped its careful bonds. “And what of
yours, dog’s son? You could not but have known what Han-Gilen called for. Yet
you and your hound of a father plotted to be first at the trough, to lick the
king’s feet and win all his favor, and to steal my land into the bargain.”

“
Your
land, cattle
thief? You knew you claimed what was never yours; you knew the judgment would
go against you. Thus you gambled. Either you would slay my king and win my
valley, or he would defeat you in combat and offer you his famous clemency,
which else you had no hope of.”

Indrion half rose; Omian bared his teeth in a feral grin.
Mirain’s glance quelled them both.

Ebros’ prince hooded eyes gone hot gold. Ashan’s heir sat
still, with but the merest suggestion of a smile.

Quietly the king said, “When I have done what needs doing
here, I shall ride to meet the army.”

“My forces are at your disposal,” said Indrion a little
tightly still.

“And mine,” Omian said, “my lord.”

“My thanks,” said Mirain. “I shall take twoscore men; and
you with them, sirs, if you are willing.”

Omian laughed, incredulous. “Twoscore men against five
thousand?”

“It will suffice.” Mirain did not ask him where he had
learned their number. “If you will pardon me, my lords, I have duties.”

oOo

It seemed to Elian as she kept to the squire’s place that
every man in the hall watched her and whispered and wondered. Eyes flicked
toward her, held, flicked away.

They had always done that: bored, or intrigued by the
brightness of her hair, or caught by the beauty of her face. Now they strained
to see if it were true that the boy was indeed a woman; they peered at the slim
erect form in the king’s livery, searching for curves no boy could claim.

Maybe they laid wagers. Surely they sniggered, recalling
that she spent every night with the king, and wondering if she would turn her
eyes elsewhere. Bold as she was, how could she be aught but wanton?

In a pause between petitioners, Mirain touched her hand. “Go
free,” he murmured. “You’ll know when it’s time to ride.”

Her brain blurred, shifting from her own troubles to the
danger he faced. “You want me there?”

“At my right hand, you promised me.” He smiled a little.
“It’s not a fight we go to.”

No. No prince would attack a mere twoscore men, if they rode
with care. Certainly Halenan would not. And he would talk to Mirain, if only
for memory’s sake.

She bowed. “I’ll ride with you, my lord.”

Mirain’s smile followed her from the hall. So too, and much
less warmly, did the stares. She straightened her back and stalked away from
them.

It was an hour’s ride from the town to the ford of
Isebros. The road was wide and well kept, running past villages whose folk hid
in their houses, and farmsteads barricaded against invading armies.

The word had spread abroad that the Sunborn had swept out of
the north, and that the Hundred Realms had massed against him. And when princes
struggled for mastery, it was the land and its people who suffered most.

A goodly land, this vale on the marches of Ashan between
Ebros and Poros. Its fields were rich; its villages seemed prosperous even in
their fear.

Where the river swept wide round the last low outrider of
Ashan’s mountains, its ford offered passage from Ebros into Poros. No town had
grown there on either side, but walled villages stood in sight of it; somewhat
upstream of it on the Poros side, a bold soul had built a watermill.

Oddly, when Elian remembered after, the mill came first to
her mind: the turning and the clacking of the wheel and the washing of water
through it. How foolish, she thought. Any marauder could overrun the mill, and
hold it or destroy it as he chose. Yet it was built of stone and well
fortified, and folk from leagues about could bring their grain to it to enrich
the miller.

Perhaps she focused on it to avoid what could not be
avoided. All the green land between the mill and the village was lost to sight,
overspread with the camp of a great army. The banners were banners Elian knew,
every one a royal standard, sigil of a prince from the north of the Hundred
Realms; and beneath each one ranged a city of tents. Not since the war on the
Nine Cities had so many princes come together into a single force.

Now as then, the center and command post, first among
equals, was the flameflower of Han-Gilen. Elian sat very straight on Ilhari’s
back. She might yet have to draw blade against her own kin; but as she rode
beside Mirain to the river’s bank, she knew no shame of her lineage.
Han-Gilen’s princes had ruled in the south before ever king or emperor rose to
challenge them; kings and emperors had fallen, and they remained, stronger than
ever.

And they would remain, she knew with sudden certainty.
Whatever befell between this hour and the sun’s setting, the Halenani would
endure.

Mirain raised a hand. His escort halted. The Mad One stepped
delicately down the bank into the swift shallow water. There he too was still.

Their riding had been marked. A line of men had formed on
the camp’s edge, arrows nocked to bows. Beyond them others crowded, a manifold
glitter of eyes. Mirain’s banner was clear for them to see, whipped wide as the
wind swept down from the north. Ebros’ and Ashan’s unfurled on either side of
it but slightly behind, in token of subjection.

Behind the archers a horn rang. As one the bows lowered,
Elian loosed a faint and involuntary sigh of relief.

A company made its way from the camp’s center, mounted and
apparently unarmored. Every man was clad as for a procession, adorned with
jewels that dazzled in the sunlight, but the only metal was the gold and silver
and copper worked into the embroideries of coats and trousers, the heels of the
riders’ boots, the saddles and bridles of their seneldi. Elian saw no weapon
anywhere.

No banner floated over them, but they needed none. The man
who rode foremost, tall on a tall grey stallion, shone in green and flame-gold;
his head was bare, his hair and beard red as fire.

Without Elian’s urging, Ilhari advanced to the very edge of
the water.

The Mad One had reached the middle of the ford. Like
Halenan, Mirain wore no armor and no weapon; only a light kilt and his scarlet
war-cloak and a glitter of ornaments, gold and ruby, and the heavy torque of
his priesthood about his throat. Any man of the southern army could have shot
him down as he waited there.

Free at last of the press of men, Halenan’s senel stretched
into a gallop. The prince’s eyes were fixed on Mirain, his face as stem and
still as ever his father’s could be.

The grey left the escort behind, leaping down the long slope
of the bank, plunging into the river. The Mad One stood his ground, horns
lowered slightly, but his ears pricked.

In a shower of spray the grey stallion halted. Miraculously Halenan
was dry, even to the high golden heels of his boots. His gaze never left
Mirain’s face, searching it keenly, suffering no secrets.

It seemed that Mirain yielded none. Abruptly Halenan said,
“It has been a long while. Brother.” He spoke the word as if in challenge,
daring Mirain to remember.

“Long years, my brother,” Mirain answered.

From the sudden light in Halenan’s face, Elian knew that
Mirain smiled. The air between them warmed and softened; Halenan essayed a
smile in return. “Will it please my lord to enter into Poros with me?”

Mirain did not move. “What if I do not enter as a friend?”

“You are my enemy, then?” asked Halenan amid a terrible
stillness.

“That depends on your own intent.”

There was a pause. At length Halenan backed his stallion and
turned, leaving the way open for Mirain to pass. “Let us judge that on dry
land, under my word of honor.”

Mirain bowed his head slightly. He raised his hand to his
escort; the Mad One moved forward. One by one the company followed in his wake.

oOo

North and south faced one another on the riverbank, wary,
forbearing to mingle. Elian, hanging well back, saw faces she knew, noblemen
all, all intent on the two who faced one another in their center.

Neither had dismounted; neither had touched, or ventured it,
despite the growing amity between them. Perhaps it was only that their
stallions would not allow it.

Again it was Halenan who broke the lengthening silence. “I
see that you have won Ebros.”

“Yesterday,” said Mirain without either gloating or
humility.

“Some might say that you should no longer be called king.
That you should name yourself emperor.”

“Not yet.”

“Perhaps. You have only lessened the Hundred Realms by two.
It could be a very long conquest, brother.”

“Or very short,” said Mirain. “I count a score of banners
yonder. If it’s battle you look for, I may win the north of the Realms at a
stroke.”

Halenan laughed suddenly. “Ah, kinsman! Your arrogance is as
splendid as ever.”

“It is not arrogance. It’s certainty.”

Halenan’s grin lingered, bright and fierce. “Test your
foresight here, King of Ianon. We have read your intent in your conquest of the
north; we have seen its proof in the taking of Ashan and Ebros. This is our
answer. The Great Alliance: all the Hundred Realms gathered together before you
under the command of Han-Gilen. Yonder sits its vanguard, the tithe of its full
strength. Is it not a fine brave number?”

“I have more, honed in my wars. But yes, it is fair to see.
Have you brought it here to challenge me?”

“To challenge you?” Halenan looked back at his men with such
a sheen of joy and pride and sheer boyish mischief that Elian dared at last to
understand. He leaped from the saddle, kneeling in the road, eyes shining. “No,
my lord An-Sh’Endor. To lay at your feet.”

For a long moment Mirain sat still, gazing down. All his
life he had waited for this. Now that it had come, he seemed stunned, shaken to
the heart of him. There before him in the hands of this bright-maned prince lay
the empire he had been born to rule.