King's Shield (40 page)

Tau huffed a tired laugh, beyond surprise. “I know Inda. I’m sure he didn’t ask.”

“Oh, he did.
Where were you,
he said.
You can’t vanish on us like that.
And Evred-Harvaldar said back,
I fell down the stairs. But I won’t trip again.
And they all laughed. Is that a metaphor that I have missed, or perhaps more of their private language?”

“Private language is my guess,” Tau said.

“Ah. The king added these words:
Your Runner caught the reins.
He went into his tent, the others dispersed, and that was all. What happened?”

Tau said, “Evred went to get laid. Why he didn’t take a couple of guards, I don’t know—he doesn’t usually seem stupid. Sure enough he was attacked, I think by an assassin. I recognized the fellow just before I killed him.”

Ahhhh.
Her mouth opened, shaping the word, but no sound emerged. Then she said with care, “If I understand right, the king used to assume the guise of a Runner when he wished to move about unnoticed. I overheard Vedrid making reference to that being the way he escaped the assassins two years ago.”

“Maybe.” Tau was too tired to hide sarcasm. “But even he should see that there’s a difference between a prince roaming around anonymously and a king leading an army to defend his borders.”

“Privacy appears to be very important to Evred-Harvaldar.”

“More than that.” It was a relief to talk, tired as Tau was. He needed to sound his ideas, to determine if his insight was only misunderstanding. “He sometimes gets even more lost inside his head than Inda does. But he’s a king, so no one can force him back.”

“I hope you tried.” Signi touched her fingertips together. “For his own sake.”

“I did.”

They turned away from one another and toward the hills, where mounted shapes hurtled in and out of the considerable dust. Evred was just visible beyond Inda, no more than a silhouette himself.

“I hope he won’t resent it,” Tau commented.

Signi’s green-brown eyes were wide in the strengthening morning sunlight. “You think he will? Why? Did you lay a debt upon him?”

Tau snorted. On the hill Cherry-Stripe emerged from the dust, yipping at the head of a tight flying wedge of young men on the chase of a scattering of Rat’s dragoons. “Gratitude wins great renown in ballads, not in real life.” Tau lifted a shoulder. “In real life as often as not people hate you for doing them a good turn.”

She did not deny it. “When the doer of the deed assumes moral superiority, but you have not done so. Do you think Evred-Harvaldar so small-minded?”

Tau shook his head. “The camp is here. And I found a horse waiting, when he could have taken it back.” He drew in a deep breath, feeling the first pangs of a headache as the sunlight glinted off metal and glared on the light-colored dirt. “Small-minded, no. Complicated, yes.”

A whoop went up from the other side of the hill and a moment later the war gamers galloped back. Tau gestured toward the Runners carrying his rolled tent to the wagon. “And certainly not rancorous.”

Signi opened her hands as the arriving warriors abandoned their mounts to be watered and strung with the remounts. Fresh horses were readied, and some waiting slices of stale nut-bread handed around; the supply wagons had already rumbled ahead. Signi walked toward the picket line to meet Inda, leaving Tau to follow.

They were on the move before noon, everything exactly as it had always been, as if the night before had never happened. Or as if Tau had dreamed it, but he had not dreamed the crunch of the assassin’s chin and the snap of his neck under his heel—nor had he dreamed the fire-charged beauty of blood-smeared, naked Evred, all muscle over long bones, and hard hazel eyes.

Tau’s own walls had nothing to do with physical privacy, but everything to do with the danger-fraught haunts of the heart.

He suspected Evred would not say anything to him or about him, that things would go exactly as before. So he would not question it, or even think about it. Because every step brought them closer to battle, where the summary cut of a Venn blade could resolve all questions.

But for now . . . he sank his chin down onto his collar-bone and dozed as his horse plodded behind Inda’s.

Chapter Thirty-five

LIET-RANDVIAR Arveas assumed a stern look. She knew very well how bitterly the children had been complaining, which was why she’d been firm. Girls of fifteen—old enough for the queen’s training—could stay to defend the castle. There was a single fourteen-year-old boy, the cook’s prentice, who had begged to stay, saying he’d be fifteen in two weeks. The other boys his age were down south at the academy.

All the parents had backed her up, some so intensely they’d frightened their children, who stood before the Jarlan now. The littlest ones were very small and bewildered, clutching the hands of older sisters or cousins. She was grateful there were no babes in arms. Sending three-year-olds to hide out for who knows how long was heart-wrenching enough.

“Your orders,” the Jarlan began, studying the oldest three girls in turn—expectant Gdir, stone-grim Han, chin-lifted Lnand. The latter furtively watched the others for their reactions. “Your orders are as follows. Hadand, you are in charge.”

Han straightened up, her spine rigid. When anyone used her full name, they were serious.

Gdir flushed with anger.

The Jarlan saw that and sighed inwardly. She’d tried so hard to raise a tough future Jarlan, maybe too hard. Or maybe Gdir would have been . . .

I am out of time.
“My choice is not a judgment on any of you. You’re too young for anyone to be certain how good you’ll be in the future as leaders,” the Jarlan said, not looking at Gdir. “I picked Han for this mission because she’s closest kin to me. That happens in command. It’s not fair but it’s a clear, easy chain of command. Get used to this. When there’s an emergency, people will make things as easy for themselves as they can, and sometimes that means ignoring all the expectations of rank.”

The girls listened, each face giving tolerable clues to the thoughts behind it. Gdir’s resentment did not abate. Lnand stood in a chin-raised pose she thought heroic, spoiled by the lizard-flicker of her eyelids as she watched the others for reaction. Only Han seemed to comprehend how serious the situation was as she glanced doubtfully at the three-year-olds.

“Second order. You are to hide out until the king comes. Hiding out means you will not attack the Venn. I don’t care what happens here, and I know you’ll probably hear sounds of battle, since the robbers’ cave is just beyond the first ridge. Sounds might carry that far. You will ignore them. Understand?”

She waited until childish fists struck skinny chests all along the row, right down to the five- and six-year-olds. The half a dozen younger than that were bewildered, and would remain so, the Jarlan thought with another spike of dread.

“Your third order. If the king hasn’t arrived yet and the enemy finds you, use the goat trails and run to the south. And report to Tdiran-Randviar.
No. Raids.
You fight back only if you’ve been discovered. This is not a war game. Understand? I want to see those salutes, which means you understand your orders.”

Thump!
Fists hit ribs, Gdir and Han at the same time, Lnand with dramatic reluctance, her lips tightening to deliver some heroic speech she was surely formulating.

The Jarlan forestalled it. “Now line up at the tunnel. You’re going to go up that way and cross the pass under cover of dark. Then use the goat trails to get up to the old robbers’ cave.” She thought of the report of sails on the horizon, so many the fisher had said they looked like the teeth of a comb. They were as yet not visible from the castle. But everyone knew they were there.

“Now!” she barked.

Ndand began to follow, but the Jarlan stuck out her hand. “Something is wrong, I feel it.” Her gut seized and she sucked in a breath. “I mean more than the obvious. I didn’t expect to see Flash back. His orders were to go straight to the beacon as soon as the ships were sighted. But why haven’t we seen any of his men come down? And where is my husband and the Riders? Where are Barend’s men?”

Ndand’s skin roughened with an inner chill. She worked to sound practical, unemotional. “You want me to light the beacon, if . . .” Her throat tightened on that last word, and she forced the words out: “He didn’t reach the beacon.”

“Yes. Then go out onto the viewpoint. If I’m running the red-black flag, you are not to come back here. You are to go to Tdiran in Ala Larkadhe.” Liet’s gut tightened again and she took her daughter-by-marriage’s arm, and squeezed with all her strength. “Ndand. I don’t care what you see or hear in this castle. If I run that signal and see
you,
I’ll break your marriage myself. Throw you back to Tlen. Stable wanding. Rest of your life.” She ended on a trembling whisper; the Jarlan let go of her arm and hugged Ndand so hard her lungs labored for air, and Ndand felt the tremor of a hard-suppressed sob go through the woman she thought of as a second mother.

But she knew better than to say anything except, “Orders received.” She summoned Keth with a jerk of her thumb, picked up her gear, and left.

The Jarlan then picked up the knapsack she’d packed and searched through the castle, until she found Radran, the cook’s prentice. She looked at that frail body, the knobby neck knuckle, and met those anxious eyes.
It would take just one strike to kill you,
she thought.
The Venn would forget you before he’d stepped over your body.
But of course she couldn’t say that. Nor could she say that what she and the other adults faced could be borne if they believed their children might live. “No Runners have returned. I have a mission of desperate importance. Only you can do it.”

Radran’s eyes widened.

She handed him the knapsack.

“You are to sneak up Lookout Mountain. Right now. Under cover of darkness. Hide out in Spyglass Cave, where you can see the bay and the road to the east. You have to count all the Venn you see—I put a slate and chalk in the pack. The Jarl will need those numbers. Or the king. Whoever comes first. But don’t move until our banner rises over the castle.”

The boy struck his chest and was gone.

 

 

 

“Barend-Harskialdna!”

The triangular face in the Ala Larkadhe forecourt lifted, squinting against the sunlight. To Nightingale Toraca, standing in the tower just off Hawkeye’s office, Barend Montrei-Vayir always looked as if he’d been put together by someone with a strange sense of humor: a triangular, squint-eyed Cassad face framed by thin dark hair pulled back into a sailor braid instead of a horsetail. A golden hoop with a ruby dangled against his blade-sharp jawbone, his body covered by the Marlovan gray coat and riding trousers, but instead of boots he wore field mocs. Barend was thin, hard as wire-reinforced rope, tougher than anyone on the practice mats—but he rode like a drunk who’d never seen a horse.

Nightingale grinned as Barend flipped up a hand in greeting. Barend slipped from the horse, whooshing a sigh loud enough for the sound to echo up the granite walls to the weird white tower at Nightingale’s back.

Nightingale leaped down the stairs four at a time. Everyone gave way for the King’s Runner, though he seldom demanded precedence. But word had flitted through the castle that Barend-Harskialdna was back.

Nightingale made it all the way to the court before Barend had finished rubbing his scrawny butt.

Barend was secretly amused by Nightingale, who looked like a shorter and thinner edition of his brother Noddy, but he moved with exactly the same slope-shouldered slouch. His hound-dog face was split by a gap-toothed grin as they exclaimed at the same time, “Any news?”

A laugh, then Nightingale said, “I just got in last night from the Nob. Biggest news out there was another murder. I thought we’d seen the last of that.”

“Shit,” Barend exclaimed. “We can’t be rousting all the men out again—”

“No, no.” Nightingale patted the air. “This time not a secret murder. A gang of Olarans ’fessed right up. Said the fellow was a Venn spy. Caught him with reports written on the new defense plan. It was all there on paper.”

“You mean we didn’t get blamed?”

“Naw. It’s only down in Lindeth, and over the hills into Idayago, that they hate us. Up on the Nob they like us. We can fight, and they’ve been overrun and burned out too many times to squawk about who thinks they’re ruling ’em. In fact, worst complaining I heard’s been about the Idayagan Resistance. Talk, trouble-making, money-gathering, and no results.” Nightingale turned his hand up.

“We seem to get double the trouble down at this end.” Barend made a spitting motion. They’d had to waste time at Hawkeye’s request investigating a double murder in Lindeth Harbor just before summer. One body was supposedly a Venn spy, but the other was the well-respected guild mistress. Lindeth was still blaming the Marlovans for that, even though every single man had been accounted for. They may as well have saved their effort—the polite and noncommittal responses of the harbormaster and his council had made it clear that no one had believed them.

Nightingale said, “No news at the north end, I take it?”

He flapped a hand that took in the entire north side of the castle as he glanced ever so casually upward.

No one visible at the windows.

Barend slewed around, peering skyward past the strange white tower that looked so much like a block of ice. Beyond it soared the mountains that created the Andahi River, rank on rank.

“Nothing—” He lowered his voice, so that the watching sentries could not hear his words. “Unless the beacons lit over my head on the mountaintops. You can’t see ’em from below in the Pass.” Barend touched his coat over his locket, his brows rising in question.

Nightingale flattened his hand, palm down.

Barend went on quietly, “Last thing I saw was the dust way up over the cliffs after they collapsed the road.”