Limits of Power (25 page)

“You got no right to drag us in here to scold like an old granna,” Sofan went on. “I'm a Marshal; you gave me the touch yourself. If you think I done wrong, I want trial of arms. It's my right.” He leaned back again, folding his arms across his chest.

“Child killers have no right,” Arianya said over the rage fizzing in her ears. “You'll face a tribunal of Marshals.”

Sofan laughed. “Tribunal of Marshals—Marshals you handpicked, I don't doubt. I'll tell you what it is—” He leaned forward a little and tapped her desk with his forefinger. “You're
afraid
to give me my rights. Afraid to fight, old woman as you are.” He looked at the knights and then at his yeoman-marshal, nodding as if they'd all just agreed with him. “A woman's not fit to be Marshal-General, anyway. It's a man's job, ruling men. Wasn't a woman led us against the magelords. Gird was a man. This magery's come because the Fellowship's gone all to weakness: evil attacks weakness.”

Arianya felt her control slipping but tried once more for reason. “And
you
attacked a four-winters boy. Evil attacks weakness: you said it yourself.”

“Words!” Sofan waved them aside. “Magelords is evil. Magery's evil. Doesn't matter if a mouse squeezes through a tiny hole, it's still a mouse. Same with magery.” He stood up abruptly; his yeoman-marshal stood with him.

Before the knights could move from the doorway, she was on her feet, hand on the hilt of her sword. Sofan's expression wavered; she had surprised him. That only fueled her rage. “Fine,” she said. “If you demand a trial of arms, a trial of arms you shall have.”

“Marshal-General?” That was one of the knights, frowning a little.

“Out of their own mouths,” Arianya said. “They admit their deeds. Marshal Sofan does not trust a tribunal of his fellows. It is my choice to grant him the trial of arms he requests. High Lord's Hall. Now.” When the others hesitated, she said, “Witnesses to the High Lord's Hall.”

She did not miss the gleam of satisfaction in Sofan's eyes. He had intended this all along; he was sure he could take her. He meant to kill her … or his yeoman-marshal would. Both ten years or more her junior, both fit and weapons-skilled, as all Marshals and yeoman-marshals should be.

“Marshal-General—” The other knight, looking back and forth from them to her. “What orders?”

“Marshal Sofan,” Arianya said loud enough to be heard in the passage, where she knew others listened, “has demanded a trial of arms to settle whether I am fit to lead the Fellowship.”

“An' me!” Rort said.

Arianya ignored him. “See them safe to the High Lord's Hall. I will come with the required witnesses—”

“An' don't be takin' all day about it,” Sofan said, sticking his thumbs in his belt. “If you think you can tire us out waitin'…”

“Within the glass,” Arianya said. She turned back to the knight. “They are not to wander alone. They may have water at need. Escort them to the jacks at their request.” And to Sofan, “I suggest you pray, Marshal and yeoman-marshal, asking guidance of Gird.”

“You need it more than we do,” Sofan said.

That was possibly true, Arianya thought, especially since Sofan wasn't going to take guidance of anything but a blow to the head.

O
n her way through the complex toward the High Lord's Hall, Arianya gathered witnesses: the Marshals waiting for the tribunal, two High Marshals, Camwynya to represent the paladins, three yeoman-marshals, three Knights of Gird. She also considered weaponry. Traditionally, Girdish trials of arms used the weapons Gird himself had used: hauk, staff, and unarmed wrestling. But Gird at the Battle of Greenfields had a sword and used it. He wore a sword through the last year of the war, in fact. And Sofan had challenged her, insulted her … which under the Code meant she could choose any weapon she wished. Or, she corrected herself, that Gird wanted her to use.

Sunlight poured into the east window and south windows of the High Lord's Hall, painting splotches of color on the platform. Sofan and Rort, arrogance in every line of their bodies, stood on it already.

“Come down from there,” Arianya said. “You know the ritual: first we pray.”

Sofan shrugged and stepped down; Rort merely scowled and followed his Marshal. Arianya led them to the altar, where all the light was blue or silver. The witnesses knelt with her. Sofan and Rort waited and knelt after. Arianya ignored them, fixing her mind as best she could on Gird and the High Lord. Was there a way to end this without violence? She could think of none. Then how was she to proceed? She let the weapons run through her mind: hauk, staff, pike, sword, bow, ax … a phrase from a later revision of the Code came to mind:
Whatever
custom
is
for
a
grange
or
group
of
granges, it is always meet for the commander to bear a sword.

She sensed a touch on her head and then a presence moving away, but still within the hall, and stifled the part of herself that wanted to ask the outcome.

When she rose, the others did as well. Prayer had left her clearheaded, her anger cooled to a reservoir of determination. “You have challenged me,” Arianya said to Sofan. “Do you renew that challenge in this holy space?”

“I do,” he said. “And further: I intend to prove with your life's blood that you are no fit Marshal-General.” A murmur rose from the witnesses, and he shouted at them. “She is
not.
She has brought magery on us by her weakness. She punished my aunt's daughter, Marshal Haran, for naught but telling the truth to that so-called paladin Paksenarrion. We saw that craven in our vill, saw her feared of the sheep she was hired to herd.”

“Do you dispute that Paksenarrion is a paladin?” Camwynya said, her light filling the hall as if a sun had risen inside it.

“She was not a paladin then. She was weak—”

“Let it be, Camwynya,” Arianya said. “His real quarrel is with me, not Paks.” Camwynya's light lessened.

“Indeed it is,” Sofan said. “But I am not surprised you bring in a paladin to take your part. You are afraid to face me alone.”

“No,” Arianya said. “The Code requires witnesses to any trial of arms between Marshals. High Marshals, bring forth the swords.” She unwrapped her own sword belt; Sofan and Rort had been disarmed already. Now Sofan looked uncertain for the first time.

“Swords are not traditional—”

“They are when you challenge a Marshal-General,” Arianya said. He made no more complaint. She took one of the three blades the High Marshal offered her after testing the balance of each. Sofan took one of the three offered him. They stepped up on opposite sides of the platform; the witnesses closed in around it.

Arianya expected Sofan to come in fast, but instead he shifted about, watching her reactions to his moves as she watched his. He handled the sword well, but how much experience did he really have with it? Was he able to analyze while moving? She began a slow circle to the left; he turned, balanced and almost in time with her. His previous behavior indicated a hasty man, a man who would want to bring this to a climax quickly. He had expressed contempt—would some instinct now teach him caution?

She closed the distance slowly, two steps on the circle, one diagonal that came closer. Again. Again. When would he notice? She let her gaze soften, and in that instant, as she expected, he charged at her … where he thought she would be with her next step. But she had moved the opposite way. He was not quite in reach, but when he whirled, their blades clashed.

Very fast, he was, and strong, as she expected with those shoulders.

“You're scared!” he said again, contempt in his voice, but his slightly puzzled expression revealed that she had surprised him. Then it hardened again. He thought he understood her now, Arianya saw. That had been her trick, the spiral in, the reverse, the softened focus of her gaze. His confidence returned, obvious in the way he stood, the way he held the sword.

Arianya said nothing but smiled. She continued circling to her right now, the mirror of what she had done before. This time he moved in first, only one step on the circle before the diagonal. She stayed on the circle, moving a little faster now. He seemed less concerned about his unprotected heart-side than most. Faster yet … but he charged again, his sword's blade a blur, this time blocking what he thought of as her retreat. And in his heart-hand, the knife he had hidden from everyone, the knife that could cripple her sword arm or kill her. She knew later that she had heard the gasp of shock from the witnesses, that someone started to move, to say something … but at the time she was not aware of these things.

It happened too fast for analysis; only experience saved her. She moved into him, a high sweeping parry that forced his blade down and away, between her and the knife strike, a long stride that took her past him, her blade on reverse drawing a line of blood across his thighs—he staggered—and finally, the stroke to the back of his neck that severed his spine as he fell. The little knife clattered to the boards, skittering almost to the edge.

A hand grabbed it; the yeoman-marshal Rort jumped onto the platform, eluding the hands that tried to stop him. “You must have used magery! He was the best swordsman I ever saw!” He had another knife—his own, she assumed, in his other hand. “I accuse you! I demand a fair trial of arms!”

“No,” Arianya said. “Your Marshal's death decided his claim; under Code, you are bound to that outcome. You will face the tribunal for your own crimes.”

For an instant, none of the witnesses moved. Then one of the yeoman-marshals from the training college swung a staff and knocked Rort down. A punch with the staff immobilized him, and the yeoman-marshals took him away.

“I apologize,” one of the knights said. “I did not find that knife on him; it is my fault.” He bent over the dead man, stripped back his sleeves, and found the strap from which the knife had come.

“Honesty is more easily deceived than dishonesty,” Arianya said. “And he was a Marshal. You could not expect it; I did not. We must clean this up and hold a ceremony to purify the hall.” And decide what to do about Rort, and convene that council, and consult the judicars about what new phrasing of the Code would exclude evil magery but allow children to grow up without violence if they lit candles with their fingers.

By nightfall much of this had been accomplished … not the solutions but first steps to what might become solutions.

E
xcuse me, Marshal-General—”

Arianya looked up from a report from Tsaia, where concern about the possible reappearance of magery was also growing.

“It's the elves, Marshal-General. They just … just appeared in the High Lord's Hall, and they say they must see you at once.”

“They traveled the mageroad from Kolobia?” Arianya asked.

“I—I don't know. They won't leave the High Lord's Hall … they're standing in a circle staring at the floor.”

“Gird's right arm,” she said. “I wonder what it is now. Come with me.” At least this was unlikely to involve another dead or battered child. She picked up the heavy chain of office she wore only when she had to and put it over her head, settling the links automatically as she strode down the hall, down the stairs, and out across the courtyard. Almost normal activity, she noted, except that the yeomen posted by the entrance to the High Lord's Hall were peering inside instead of keeping watch outside. At the sound of her boots on the stone, one of them whipped his head around and jabbed an elbow into the other's ribs.

“We have visitors, I understand,” she said to the more alert guard.

“Yes, Marshal-General. Elves. Just standing in there. Looking at their feet.”

“I doubt that last,” Arianya said. She passed through the entrance and into the main vault of the High Lord's Hall. Esea's Hall it had been in Gird's time; Esea's window lit the eastern end. Now light splintered through the window, cut by the blue and clear glass into streaks of silvery sunlight and blue like flame that patterned the floor. Far up, near the altar, she saw a cluster of tall figures that glowed with a different light, a softer silver.