The Swordsman's Oath (Einarinn 2) (63 page)

“What’s the purpose of this?”

Shiv’s eyes did not leave the twisting and tangled rainbow above our heads. “The Council does not make its judgments on mere numbers but on the strength of will shown by those called to give judgment,” he said softly. “Watch.”

I watched as the colors writhed and fought, casting strange reflections on the upturned faces all around the room. The shadows grew, thickened and dimmed the radiance but could not put it out, suddenly fading as color as intense as sunlight striking off gemstones burned through the darkness.

“Enough.” Planir banged his staff a third time and the colors vanished, leaving blinding white radiance that scoured the eyes. “The decision of the Council is for action. So be it!”

Chapter Ten

Taken from the correspondence of Leorn Den Lirel,

last Governor of Caladhria in the 7th year of Emperor Nemith the Reckless;

held at the Archive of the Temple at Col

Solstice salutations from Leorn to his brother Jahon.

I do not know how long this letter will take to reach you but I feel sure the Imperial Despatch will still fight their way through, no matter what calamities befall the rest of us. I don’t know what reports you’ve had of the situation here, but you can take the worst and double all the figures. It’s bloody chaos and without any support from home, there’s not a thing I can do about it, so I’ve given up trying. Don’t worry, I have a ship standing by and will sail for home as soon as the fighting comes south of the Ferl River. Amille insists on celebrating Solstice here but I’m sending her and the children home immediately afterwards. The damp may have got into my library, but not into my wits! Please tell Mother to expect them anytime around the turn of Aft-Summer; we’ll have to stay with her until we can move our tenants out, so make sure you give them notice to quit as soon as you receive this.

As I’m sure you can imagine, this is not how I had hoped my appointment would turn out, but with the Emperor withdrawing the Cohorts for his mad plan to conquer Gidesta I simply do not see how I am supposed to maintain Imperial rule here. None of the locals have paid their due taxes since Equinox and I can’t even get the records to make a fresh assessment. My officials are showing remarkable ingenuity when it comes to finding reasons for staying inside the Governor’s Compound rather than risking themselves on any of their duties in the countryside. I cannot say I blame them and I am certainly not going to send them out to battle with brigands and scavengers armed only with quill-case and inks. Most of them are spending their time drawing up highly dubious claims to supposed ancestral lands and planning how to go about seizing them when Tormalin rule officially ends.

I suggest you start liquidating your investments here, discreetly but rapidly; there are no profits in Caladhria anymore. It might be worth keeping an eye open for opportunities in Lescar; Governor D’Evoir’s murder will mean panic selling and there should be bargains to be had. From what I hear, the Reeves are planning to set themselves up in their old tax districts and work together to enforce their own rule. I don’t suppose they’ll be swearing allegiance to that wine-soak that calls himself Emperor these days, but frankly I don’t see why that should concern us if you see a likely chance to turn up some coin. Nemith’s idiot ambitions must have cost our House his own weight in white gold by now, and the sooner Poldrion ferries him to the Otherworld the better as far as I’m concerned. I’m planning to drop his Imperial Majesty’s statue down the privy pit when I leave.

I nearly forgot; no, I have no idea what Den Fellaemion was up to when he sailed last. In all the confusion that surrounds us these days, I couldn’t even tell you how many years ago it was. I can’t think of anyone else who might either. I think Den Rannion was somehow involved, but the present Sieur seems very keen to hush it up, so I can only suppose it came to naught.

The lost settlement of Kel Ar’Ayen, 42nd of Aft-Summer

This is rather different to our little excursion last year,” I observed to Shiv as the wizards’ ship swung slowly at anchor in the broad estuary. It was a relief to be out of the gales that scythed across the open ocean and I turned to the warmth of the late summer sun, noticeably hotter here than I would expect at home this end of the season. I smiled with pleasure at the sensation of the sun on my clean-shaven face.

“If I have to cross the ocean, I’d rather do it in a well-built three-master with the mightiest of the Council subduing wind and wave, I have to admit,” Shiv grinned back at me. “It’s a sight better than that fishing boat, isn’t it? Even Livak only got a little seasick.”

I didn’t want to discuss Livak at the moment. “When will the rest of us be going ashore?” I nodded at the ship’s row-boat, which was unloading a group of mercenaries on the nearby beach.

Shiv frowned. “There still seems to be some disagreement about that. Most of the mages want to stay aboard for a while, let Halice and her—er—‘associates’ scout out the terrain first.”

“Surely the search would get done faster and more effectively with magic to help?” I turned to Shiv, puzzled.

He shook his head ruefully. “I think it’s going to take a while for my esteemed colleagues to become used to working cooperatively with fighting men, whatever Planir may require of them.”

I looked along the rail, to where Halice stood with the commander of the mercenary force, a massive man called Arest with an uncompromising attitude and an ill-educated Dalasorian accent. Lack of education didn’t mean lack of intelligence however; his narrow eyes were alert with practical cunning, and from what Livak had told me he’d been a major player in the endless games of the Lescari wars for a good few years. More importantly he had no problem treating Halice as an equal, leaning his blunt head close to hers as they discussed their next moves. I wondered briefly if they might have been lovers at some stage; they had that air of familiarity about them but discarded the notion as irrelevant. I looked at Halice’s leg, now much straighter and able to bear some weight, though still far short of being fully healed. I wondered what part she would be playing in this particular game.

When Planir had got his decision from the Council and instantly set about organizing this voyage, he had been momentarily wrong-footed by the discovery that all his own most valued agents, men whose skills and sword arms were retained for his use by liberal amounts of coin, were absent on other commissions. It had been Halice who had suggested looking for mercenaries spending the Summer Solstice in the Carifate. It seemed the battles of Aft-Spring and For-Summer between Parnilesse and Triolle had been bloody, vicious and inconclusive, hardly a surprise in itself, and the self-declared neutral region around Carif had been full of the disgruntled remnants of scattered corps, looking around for a hire that offered them a better than even chance of ending the summer with coin in their hands, instead of as ashes in an urn.

Halice had made herself extremely useful to the Archmage, using her many contacts to weld together a troop of hardened fighters sharp enough to have seen the way the fish were running and get clear of the futile slaughter that was overwhelming the central dukedoms. The roll of Raeponin’s runes had brought bloody chaos back to Lescar once more after a few years of comparative peace. I spared a thought for Aiten’s family, hoping Messire’s gold was giving them either a measure of security or the means to flee.

Shiv and I watched a second group of fighting men and women getting their gear together, tightening straps and adjusting sword-belts. The mercenaries were a battered lot, I had to admit, which was probably what was disconcerting the wizards. Nearly all bore scars on faces and hands, old and white as well as new and purple, some ugly and puckered, betraying a lack of the skilled treatment a sworn man can justifiably expect. Their clothes were mostly leather, black and brown with only rare touches of color, covered with cloaks of fur and crudely tanned skins rather than the good broadcloth that a true patron provides. 1 stifled a pang of muted sorrow, remembering Aiten arriving to take service with Messire in similar rough attire.

“Halice was saying these are among the best she could hope to find.” Shiv smoothed his own immaculate tunic unconsciously and adjusted the ornate silver belt buckle that Pered had given him before we left. “It doesn’t look as if they spend much of their loot on clothes, does it?”

“Who needs to look smart to fight? I reckon their money goes into their swords.” The quality of the weapons each warrior carried had been the first thing I had looked for. “Workmanship like that doesn’t come cheap.” The ragged and stained garments worn by the mercenaries contrasted sharply with their armor and weaponry, ready for anything they might discover in this untrodden land. Most wore two swords as well as daggers in belts and in boot tops, while many carried bows, a mace or a spear and more besides. Well-honed metal scattered bright reflections from the hot sun, in sharp contrast to the dull sheen of plate and chainmail, newly scoured free of the biting rust that had gnawed at the metal on the long voyage, fed by the damp, salt air. I was having to burnish the steel of my mirror almost daily if I wanted to shave without cutting myself, but at least my own armor required little maintenance.

Arest started down the ladder into the ship’s boat and Shiv and I both involuntarily held our breath as rope and wood creaked with protest under his weight; the man wore a full hauberk and coif, greaves and vambraces, as well as carrying swords, a shield and a pack. He reached the boat and sat on a bending thwart without mishap and we breathed a sigh of relief.

“I wouldn’t fancy anyone’s chances of dragging that lot off the river bed if he went in!” Livak said cheerfully as she came to lean on the rail next to us. I turned to her with a smile. I’d seen precious little of her on this voyage as she’d rapidly allied herself with the mercenaries, leaving me tied by my oath to continued attendance on Planir.

“What do you reckon then? Do they look as if they’d be useful in a fight?” she asked me, a tentative smile on her face.

“I’d say so.” I had been watching the warriors covertly on the voyage, wanting to make sure of the quality of help I’d have at my back, if need be. Most had the cock-on-a-dunghill arrogance that any mercenary picks up along with a sword paid for by the season, but the intensity of the regular drills and exercises they had undertaken with unspoken consent during the crossing had won a measure of my respect. I certainly felt more comfortable with them than I would have with the Archmage’s agents, if the man Darni whom we’d met the previous year was anything to go by. Learning that individual was employing his abrasive arrogance in Solura to further Planir’s ambitions had been no loss. “They look as if they could take on most things and force a draw, if not an outright win. So, what’s the plan?”

“Let’s ask her,” Livak whistled sharply. Halice looked round, raising a hand in acknowledgment as two female mercenaries stopped her with some question. Both were shorter than Halice, one slightly built with masses of curly chestnut hair and a delicate, heart-shaped face curiously at odds with her chainmail vest and crested helmet. The other was one of the few mercenaries not in armor of some kind, wearing stained and patched black leathers with a surprising number of daggers about her person. Black-haired and with an open, friendly expression, she looked as if she should be running a market stall or a busy household rather than hiring out her services to the highest bidder.

Halice disposed of their query briskly and came down the deck to join us. Her gait was more even but still unbalanced, and I wondered again about the extent that her injury had been healed. Was this as good as her leg was to get? If so, her future looked as if it would be in organizing a corps rather than fighting with it. Perhaps this was her start in that line of work.

“So what’s the plan?” asked Shiv at once.

“Rosarn takes her scouts and begins quartering the ruins, trying to get a line on major landmarks and buildings, to get ourselves oriented correctly.” Halice waved at the woman in black who was now poring over a freshly pale parchment with a lad I recognized as one of Mentor Tonin’s pupils, called Parril or something similar. “Minare and his lads are to clear the wharf, try and get an anchorage prepared so we can bring the ship in close and not have to ferry people on and off with the boats all the time.” She looked sharply at Shiv. “That would be a cursed sight quicker and easier with some help from you mages, you know.”

I cursed and clutched at the ship’s rail as my vision suddenly swam and shifted, thickets of matted vegetation vanishing to show me stout wharves of dressed stone where now a crumbled bank slid crookedly into the water, sturdy houses lined up around a flagged market square, unsuspecting people busy about their everyday lives, all unaware of the approaching Elietimm threat.

“What is it?” Livak was watching me warily.

“D’Alsennin,” I said curtly, making a conscious effort to loosen my whitened knuckles. “I’m remembering things he knew here.”

A fleeting look of unhappiness came and went in Livak’s eyes.

“You really don’t like this, do you?” I challenged her, knowing it was probably a mistake but sick of the way she had been avoiding me.

“What do you think?” she spat back. “I know it’s not your fault and I’m sorry for it, but that aetheric magic killed Geris, and it killed Aiten. One of those Elietimm bastards got inside my head and nearly pushed me into madness as well. Just the thought of someone else’s mind lurking inside yours makes my skin crawl.”

“I’ve got it under control,” I replied, just about managing not to raise my voice in frustration and anger.

“I don’t think so.” Livak shook her head, her face pale beneath the freckles raised by sun and wind. “Last time we shared a bed, when you melted in passion, your eyes changed and you called me Guinalle again. I keep seeing someone else looking at me through your eyes, especially when you’re tired.”