Fortress Draconis (35 page)

The Draconis Baron closed his eyes for a moment. “I will stand corrected if I am wrong, but it seems to me that Chytrine could trigger a premature fulfillment of the prophecy by allowing this Norrington to destroy a scourge of the northand redeem Vorquellyn. She could bleed our forces white by contesting the island, then pulling out. This would eliminate the Norrington as a threat to her, and leave her more than capable to attack south. This is why we must strike at her, quickly and hard. I have prepared plans….”

Queen Carus rose. “I must object, brothers and sisters, to the presentation of any plans at this juncture. As you know, I am new-come to the throne and while I have attended these Councils before, it was my father’s clear intent to marry me off to one of you or yours before I ever got to occupy the throne. My military advisor, General Markus Adrogans, is on his way here, but is a half week out yet.”

Alexia frowned. She had very little reliable information about General Adrogans, so she tried not to judge him harshly. He did have a well-known aversion to traveling by water, and had found Chytrine’s gathering of a great fleet to be ample excuse to come to the meetings overland. He should have arrived well before the Council met but Chytrine had launched an assault from the Okrans March in anticipation of his absence. Adrogans had fooled her, however, by dispatching his baggage train south slowly. His army went with it, for two days, then rode fast north, using strings of horses to speed them. They caught the Aurolani forces unawares and routed them.

The queen continued. “With no disrespect to the Draconis Baron intended, his opinion about how Chytrine should be opposed is not the only one. While the baron has been very successful at keeping Chytrine bottled up to the north—save for those small units that slip past Fortress Draconis and gather in the south to lay siege to cities—his expertise is in the realm of defensive operations. General Adrogans has had a great deal of experience in attacking, so presents another viewpoint. He, too, will be bringing plans. And, fear not, Dothan Cavarre, for Fortress Draconis is vital to them, just as a smith’s hammer needs an anvil, so Adrogans will need Fortress Draconis.”

Cavarre smiled briefly. “My heart is warmed that your Jeranese military sees value in Fortress Draconis. I had begun to doubt that when the troops you were supposed to send to me never arrived.”

The queen nodded. “When the situation was explained to me, Baron, it seemed our troops were better used defending Jerana from the direct threat of Aurolani raids. You can ask our friends from Valicia and Gurol if we have been lax in our duty.”

“I have never suggested any laxity, Highness, just a lack of foresight. Chytrine stages raids here in the south, prompting you all to fear her. You keep your troops home, which means Fortress Draconis, which has kept her legions bottled up in the north, becoming weaker and weaker. If you believe her attacks here have been insanity or foolish, she has already defeated you.”

Tatyana raised both of her hands. “My lord and lady, this will do us no good. The Draconis Baron’s views are well known. He believes that if we can strike at evil’s root, the rest of it will wither. General Adrogans feels that if we prune back evil’s foliage, there will be little left to root out. Until we have the chance to compare both plans or, better yet, get these two military minds to fashion a plan together, discussion can only force people to choose sides. What should be a military decision would become a political one, and no one would find that acceptable.”

Alyx narrowed her eyes. Not only did she not like the fact that the Grand Duchess had abandoned the pretext of pretending she was speaking for the king, but the woman was urging caution and being reasonable. Granted she did not know that much about her, but everything she did know spoke to Tatyana’s political nature. In urging that they abandon politics in light of reason meant she must be playing a political game.

Alyx felt a compunction to warn the Draconis Baron about what was going on, but she hesitated. The simple fact of the matter was thatif the Jeranese plan held sway, the first point of attack would be to drive the Aurolani hosts from Okrannel. This would return to her the land of her birth, and permit her grandfather to be at peace. Whether or not that would be the best course for dealing with Chytrine, the desire to see her homeland free did tug at her.

But only for a moment. Something inside of her, something born of years of training by the Gyrkyme, pushed aside sentimentality. It was not that the Gyrkyme could not be a wildly passionate and emotional people. They could, and often were. Their life, though, had stressed for them how fragile existence truly was. Whereas a man might drink and fall to the ground, a Gyrkyme similarly intoxicated would die after taking to wing. The Gyrkyme mixed calculation with stoicism and a strict demand for the best from everyone; and these lessons had helped shape her. Later tutors came and taught her everything there was to know about the world and warfare—and she found their lessons fit very well on a foundation of Gyrkyme philosophy and training.

While the push into Okrannel would be satisfying on an emotional level, it was all but indefensible on the military side. A campaign through the mountain valleys of Okrannel would be difficult. Even if they managed to force the Aurolani troops back, the terrain meant a small number of troops could hold off a larger army, which would give the Aurolani troops time to pull back into the Boreal Mountains or the Ghost March. Unless they were destroyed, they always would pose a threat to Okrannel. The freedom they fought hard to win would be fragile, and the loss of Okrannel to Chytrine would be trivial.

The Draconis Baron, however, did not seem to need her warning. “The Grand Duchess is quite kind in sharing with us the wisdom of King Stefin. Though I only knew his son for an all too brief time, Prince Kirill impressed me with the Okrans’ willingness to do what had to be done to guarantee success. It is not hyperbole to say that Kirill bought for all of us the last quarter century of freedom with his life. His sacrifice at Fortress Draconis will never be forgotten. It is my hope his selflessness will be taken to heart by all present.”

Augustus stood. “My friends, I believe this would be a good place to end this first round of discussions. We agree on two things: the Norrington must be found. I have people working on that already. And since he is one of my subjects, at least for the moment, I reserve the right to direct the search for him. In other words, he is not a prize you should have your people looking for. Let them enjoy the Harvest Festivalnow, because we know they will not have time to enjoy it later.

“Second, we agree that we can come to no resolution of the question of how to proceed militarily against Chytrine until General Adrogans arrives. Until then, we can occupy ourselves with questions of supplies and troops we can raise.” Augustus’ face took on a grim expression. “A quarter century ago we were warned of what was coming. Now is the time we deal with this problem, or everything we know will be buried in a blizzard of steel, fire, and fang from the north.”

T/ errigan wanted to smile broadly, but he kept his expres-K sion impassive as he strolled casually out of the tower in JAwhich he’d been given chambers. No one had said he couldn’t go to the Harvest Festival. No one had exactly given him permission, either, but he was pretty certain no one would stop him from wandering out. He pulled on a dark blue robe and a matching cloak to go over it and marched past the Adepts watching the tower’s door. He thought one might question him, but he sailed past unchallenged.

Once out in the street, he did let himself smile, and knew he’d gotten lucky. Orla had been called away to meetings with the Draconis Baron. She had no idea what the meetings would be about, but Kerrigan was not wanted at them. Orla had suggested he find something to do with himself and seemed utterly unconcerned about what that would be.

Her lack of concern annoyed him a little, given that he was her charge. Part of him wanted to go out and get into trouble, just to prove to her that she couldn’t take his levelheadedness for granted. He knew, of course, that to do such a thing was stupid, so he shied away from it. Heading out to the Harvest Festival, on the other hand, would be an adventure and wouldn’t be dangerous in the least.

Out in the street Kerrigan shivered, but not because of the slight chill coming with night.Yslin! It was a city, big and sprawling, with a seaside district and temples and towers and Fortress Gryps and the palace and so much more. On Vilwan everything was shipped in—and while there was a bit of commerce in the port, rules governed the conduct of merchants and customers alike. Fancies could be had, but generally had any indication of their source removed because the wizards wanted the people on Vilwan to feel they were citizens of Vilwan, not visitors who came to learn and then return to their own nations.

In Yslin, however, Kerrigan saw knots of people wearing what he assumed to be their native garb. By their masks he recognized people from Oriosa, or Alosa or Muroso—he wasn’t certain exactly where they were from, except that they were of the masked nations. Others wore colorful and uniquely styled dress, and spoke with thick accents that made their words all but unintelligible.

He found this both exciting and terrifying. Part of him wanted to run back to the tower and hide, but that part surrendered to the memory of braving a long road journey from Saporicia to the Alcidese capital. Traveling in the company of a Panqui had reduced many threats, but still it was an adventure. It had left him footsore and exhausted, so he’d slept for a day when he made it to the city. Even now his feet hurt, but the pain evaporated as he studied the wonders in the city.

He moved along King’s Way, heading ever south and away from the sea, moving up a gradual incline to Drygate. Beyond it, where plains stretched out toward the distant mountains, a small city of tents had sprung up. He could hear pennants snapping in the breezes, and saw people pulling cloaks closed against the night’s coming chill. The smoke swirling in from the festival grounds combined the scents of roasting meats and vegetables into something that made his stomach growl despite his having eaten a filling meal before setting out.

Most of all, though, the Harvest Festival provided him a feast for his eyes and ears. Harvest Festivals were not unknown on Vilwan. While they were held a bit later there than in Alcida, they were a grand celebration. New students were welcomed and sorted by skill and talent, while current students were tested to see where they would go next. Grand ceremonies were held to celebrate students moving from Apprentice to Adept ranks. More solemn affairs marked elevation to the rank of Magister, but the aftermath of all of them involved games and food, laughter, song, dance, and other entertainments.

Kerrigan had even been allowed to participate in the festivals, for a day at least, each year. His mentor always conducted him through. In the beginning there had been other students who seemed to be following his accelerated training track, but he’d not seen any of them for years. He didn’t know if they had failed, or just attended at different times than he had, but he didn’t think about that much.

With the distraction of the Alcidese festival, he didn’t think about it at all, nor did he think about what Orla would say if she knew he was there.I’m seventeen, and an Adept who destroyed a pirate ship. I’ve traveled through jungle and field with a Panqui. I have nothing to fear here.

Bolstered by that thought, he plunged into the festival. He took care not to jostle men with swords, and contented himself with standing at the back of crowds as they watched warriors battle with wooden swords for the right to challenge a champion and win a purse. It seemed obvious to Kerrigan that the paired challengers took enough out of each other that the champion would have little trouble beating them. He gathered the rest of the crowd knew it, too, but the champion fought with such blinding speed and skill that just watching him was a joy.

From there he moved on to a small theater with a puppet show. Children and a few adults had gathered on the ground and benches to watch the puppeteers do their work. The mage marveled at how lifelike they made the puppets appear—especially because they were using no magick at all. While he had learned spells that allowed him to animate such toys, his sorceries failed to give the wooden dolls so much personality.

Just to salve his ego he double-checked, and sensed no magick from the puppets at all.

The play seemed to be based on one of the Squab tales. They all followed a similar formula, and had been around for centuries and centuries, but in the last twenty-five years the comic villain had become the coward who survived the previous expedition to the north. In the puppet dramas Tarrant Hawkins had become known as Squab and would come to advise some stalwart young hero as to how he should handle a threat directed at him by Chytrine. Squab would try to betray the hero to the Aurolani tyrant, but would fail and the hero would prevail, driving Squab away.

Kerrigan didn’t know that much about the previous expedition to destroy the Aurolani threat. While Heslin, the wizard who accompanied Lord Norrington, had -been trained on Vilwan and even had ranked as Magister in combat and concealment magicks, he had not been representing Vilwan in that effort. The Vilwanese volunteers had gone with King Augustus on the Okrans Campaign. Of their performance much had been written in the official history of Vilwan. Because Heslin became one of the tensullanciri, almost nothing about him appeared in the Vilwanese chronicle.

The audience laughed and applauded as the hero drove Squab off. The puppeteers appeared from behind the little stage, then moved into the audience, collecting coins.

Kerrigan noticed some folks giving money, and others slinking away. He hesitated for a moment, then reached inside his cloak and opened the purse on his belt. He pulled out one of the dozen gold coins he had and deposited it in the sack.

The puppeteer’s eyes grew wide. “Thank you, my lord.”

Kerrigan smiled and nodded, then noticed how others were looking at him. He smiled at them, then turned and lost himself in a crowd. From their expressions he gathered he’d done something wrong, but the puppeteer certainly didn’t seem to think so. He puzzled over it for a moment, then let the clink of coins and clack of a stone on wood distract him.