Oath of Fealty (43 page)

N
ext morning, Kieri arrived at the salle with Aliam, Astil, and Varñe to find more than four hands of men and women in forest-ranger green and russet waiting for him, Arian among them. Carlion and Siger, who’d been warned some applicants might come, eyed them with professional disdain.

“There’s too many to assess at once, Sir King,” Carlion said. “If you’re to get any training this morning, that is. I’d rather take groups of four.”

“We’ll rotate them,” Kieri said. “And to save time—Siger, take the others to the stables, and tell Sir Ganeth I want a riding assessment on both grays and browns. Carlion, when you’re through with the first four, send them to the stables, and Siger will send you another.”

“Will you want to spar with them all, Sir King?”

Kieri shook his head. “I haven’t time today; I have a Council meeting after breakfast. Today Aliam and I will work together.”

Kieri and Aliam went on into the salle and let Carlion make his choice of the first four. They began with stretches and other exercises that soon had Aliam puffing.

“You used to run me ragged with these,” Kieri said. “Is Estil right? Have you been sitting around too much?”

“She thinks so.” Aliam grunted as he clambered up from the floor. “But I’m getting older—see how much balder I am? It’s all right for her, but my joints ache.”

“You told us the best cure for aches was more exercise,” Kieri said.

“So it is, for the young,” Aliam said. “Or maybe I am just lazy. This morning, I will say, it does not hurt as much. King’s grace, perhaps?”

“You were never lazy,” Kieri said. “And the grace your king wants is a good bout—” He opened the storage bin and tossed Aliam a banda and practice sword, and took one for himself.

Aliam’s swordwork was as good as ever, though perhaps a touch slower, and he was quickly tired, but recovered between rounds. He and Kieri traded touch after touch.

“All you need is more practice,” Kieri said, as he finished. “If I were your physician, and not your friend, I would bid you work daily with your armsmaster.”

Aliam shook out his arms. “And as my friend?”

“The same, but with concern for your health. If you stayed here longer—”

Aliam shook his head. “I cannot. Cal is competent, but I need to be home—there is much work to be done. You know how land is, especially with so many feeding from it.”

“That, we hope to change—but I understand.” Kieri looked around
the salle. The second four, now fencing in the middle of the salle, were three men and one woman; Carlion paced about them, watchful.

“You will have King’s Squires enough,” Astil said, on the way back to the palace.

“Do you regret deciding to retire?” Kieri asked.

“No. I was glad to come and serve again—and so I always will be at need—but my life now is at the farm with my family.”

“I would like you—all of you current Squires—to help evaluate these applicants,” Kieri said.

“You have said you plan to use Squires more, and differently,” Astil said. “Can you explain, Sir King?”

“I will write it out for you,” Kieri said. “But it includes acting as couriers to carry messages and envoys to foreign courts when haste is needed. Think of the tasks those who came to seek me found necessary—weapons skills, woodscraft, palace manners, diplomacy. I need Squires who are flexible, able to act independently, as well as intelligent and hardy. And I want to include part-elves; we need to bring the peoples closer together.”

After breakfast, Kieri bade farewell to Aliam and Estil, then convened the first Council meeting since the coronation. The Siers looked wary and he wondered if Aliam’s brother had told them his plans. But their concern, it seemed, was different.

“Sir King, with all respect—how far into summer will we need to stay in Chaya?” That was Sier Davonin. “Growth time is here; I have duties at my steading I would carry out, if I am no longer needed. And truly, I believe you need our advice less than when you came.”

“What is your custom?” Kieri asked.

“A few of us stay in Chaya,” Sier Belvarin said. “When the former king was well, three or four, who met perhaps once a tenday. The rest lived on their estates—”

Kieri hoped his expression didn’t change. No wonder the realm had been sliding into disarray if that was all the attention its rulers paid it.

“We have had meetings every day since you came, but for the coronation and days of celebration,” Sier Tolmaric said. “I knew things would be different, but—”

“My pardon, Siers,” Kieri said, before Tolmaric said something he might later regret. “In my ignorance and my need I have overworked
you. But I wished to be fair, to assure you that I would not thoughtlessly overturn all your cherished traditions, or ignore your advice. You are correct, Sier Davonin, that I no longer feel as lost and incapable as I did, yet I do not believe you want a king who ignores you and does not listen to your concerns.”

“Quite so,” Davonin said. “But as your understanding of us has grown, so also our trust in you. I, for one, am content to let you ask for my advice, should you ever need it, which I increasingly doubt.” She gave Tolmaric a sideways glance.

“Well, then,” Kieri said. “Let us say I will release those who do not have specific duties here—as Sier Galvary does, and Sier Halveric as well—within the next few days. I still have one matter, on which I know you all have strong opinions, and I would not seem to be evading you when I act on it.”

“You said ‘act’ and not ‘ask,’” Sier Carvarsin said, scowling.

“Indeed so. And we might as well come to it now. I’m still convinced Lyonya needs a stronger defense.”

Scowls all around, except from Sier Halveric, who merely looked grave.

“As I told you before, we have unrest to the west and a known enemy to the north.”

“The lady from Pargun spoke to me of peace between us,” Sier Davonin said.

“And to me as well,” Kieri said. “I believe she may be sincere—”

“
May
be! You consider her a liar? That sweet old woman—” Sier Tolmaric bristled.

Kieri stared him down. “Siers, I have seen many old women who could poison an enemy with sweetmeats while swearing eternal friendship. You are all honorable; I am sure none of you would say one thing and mean another, but my life has been spent among those who thrive on conflict and controversy. I found Hanlin of Pargun delightful, and I am sure many of you feel the same—but even if she is sincere, she does not rule Pargun, and she did not claim to speak for their king, who has long hated me. I remind you that Pargunese troops entered Tsaia to kill me on my way here—”

“That could be the Verrakai’s fault,” Belvarin said.

“So it could,” Kieri said, “except that they must have had the king’s agreement. Would a king well-disposed to Lyonya have
cooperated with a plot to kill its new king?” Before they could answer that, Kieri went on. “Along the river, we have only three towns with any defenses at all; the rest is forest and small holdings that could be easily overcome—”

“You think Pargun will invade?”

“I don’t know,” Kieri said. “But north of the river, in Tsaia, they have tried repeatedly. Often, when defeated at one site, they’ve launched a second attack at another.”

“The Lady will not be pleased to know you talk of war,” Amrothlin said.

“I will not be pleased if I fail in my duty to protect my land and people,” Kieri said. “And I talk of war only to prevent it—in the words I used before, to give the lamb a safe haven from the wolf, as I am now the shepherd. It is my duty to see the danger and protect.”

“I am not so sure,” Amrothlin said, “that protection is all you intend. You have fought Pargun before, more than once, but under another’s command. Perhaps you only want the chance to do so unchained—as sheepdogs, loosed, may turn on their sheep.”

Now all the Council looked really scared. Kieri stared at Amrothlin, until, amazingly, the elf looked away. “If you truly think that of me, Uncle,” he said, “then you must question the Lady’s reading of my heart and her judgment in approving my kingship. That is a matter you may take up with her, if you wish.”

“You brought this up now so that you would be our crowned king, not our king-elect, didn’t you?” Carvarsin said. “Now we cannot naysay you, unless we all agree.”

Kieri looked at the Council again, one face at a time. “That is true,” he said. “But consider this: If it is not by Falk’s Will and the High Lord’s will that I am here, despite so many ill-chances, then I challenge you to explain why I am alive and in this seat. Why, when you were desperate for a king and sent a paladin to find one, I was there to be found, and proved by the sword.” He nodded to it, hanging on the stand. The jewel in its hilt flashed as if he’d touched it. “You swore you would accept whoever she found, and both when she first presented me, and again at my coronation you swore you accepted me. If you are so light in your thoughts that you would twice forswear yourselves before you grant the crown, why should I stay to be the plaything of your passions?”

A moment’s stunned silence as the councilors chewed that through.

“I support you,” Sier Halveric said, and slapped the table. A ragged chorus of slaps followed his.

Kieri looked at the two elves. Amrothlin shrugged. “It is not for me to accept or not accept: that is our Lady’s place, and she has consented. But do not push our Lady to the brink of her patience, Falkieri my nephew. Wiser heads than yours are at risk.”

“We are all at risk,” Kieri said. “I seek to lessen it.”

“And unfledged birds seek to fly by falling out of the nest,” Amrothlin said.

“I shall endeavor to grow feathers enough before I fall,” Kieri said. To his surprise, Amrothlin laughed and so did the others, if a bit nervously.

“What, then, is your plan?” Sier Davonin asked. “For I am sure you have one.”

“We have unstable peace,” Kieri began. “It is unstable because only a river divides us from an enemy.”

“We have river forts,” Sier Galvary said.

“If the Pargunese were unwise enough to attack the river towns, the forts might hold them off. But why would they not go around the towns?”

“The forest itself—”

“Is a partial protection, but is also my responsibility. It would be better to find a way to live peaceably with the Pargunese. That is not something I expected to say, ever, as I was convinced the Pargunese had no interest in peace, but I am advised that I might be mistaken. If they are not interested in peace, then we have much to do before the land is safe from invasion.”

“You speak of an army.”

“Yes.” Kieri sighed. Through long association, the humans of Lyonya had absorbed many elven—he dared not call them notions—about conflict and war, most of them, to his mind, inaccurate. He had been where they had not. “The rangers are excellent at what they do, patrolling the forest and keeping our people safe from brigands and the occasional raid from Tsaia—something we won’t have as much of with the old Verrakaien gone. We have the small city militias in those river forts, and the Royal Archers … but we do not have a force fit to
meet even a single cohort of Pargunese, should they take it into their minds to invade.”

“But why would they?”

“Me,” Kieri said. “I warred with them on the borders of Tsaia; I killed one of their Sagons myself, and only realized much later it was their king’s brother. Moreover—and I found this out only recently—it’s possible their quarrels with us and with Tsaia come from very old wounds. The elves say their ancestors were driven out of their lands by magelords of Old Aare—they came to Pargun and Kostandan looking for refuge and then met what they saw as old enemies across the river.”

“Where did they come from, then?” Halveric asked. “I thought they were of mageborn origin themselves, probably crossed the river from Tsaia.”

“Not according to my elven tutor,” Kieri said, nodding at Orlith, who sat silent and still in his place. “He won’t say more than that they came from across the eastern ocean, and the same who tormented me tormented them until they fled.”

“Do you believe that?” Belvarin looked at Orlith and Amrothlin, then back at Kieri.

“In essence, yes. About the details, I don’t know. But if they had reason to fear and hate the Tsaians—the magelords, I mean, and know some of them moved here—and they’ve had me as their enemy these four hands of years and more, that could well be enough to bring an attack. We are less defended than my stronghold in Tsaia. That’s full of trained soldiers, and they’ve learned to let it alone.”

“So you want us to raise an army to make peace?” Belvarin said. The edge of scorn in his voice emphasized the apparent contradiction in that.

“I want us to raise a defensive army to make invasion less likely until—gods willing—I can convince the king of Pargun that I do not wish war.”

“Raising an army’s hardly likely to do that,” Belvarin said.

“Not raising one is likely to have our roofs fired over our heads,” Kieri said. They looked worried at that, as he intended. “It is true, I went to war year after year, and hired out my company to fight—but some of that, Siers, was garrisoning forts, defending and not attacking. I know what it takes to protect our river border; it will not be the
muster of such an army as could invade Pargun.” He paused, meeting every Sier’s gaze. “I have no intention of going beyond the bounds of Lyonya with troops ever again.”

“But will Pargun believe you?”

“Not at first. But with time.” Maybe. He still had doubts—no, he still had the firm belief that Pargun was up to no good and would always be up to no good. But either way, for the sake of his realm, they needed more than scattered rangers.

“So what do you think we need?”

“I want to move half the rangers off the west border—remember, that force was doubled because of concerns about Verrakai aggression—and use them to keep watch on the river. The Royal Archers have the potential to be a useful force—I’ve been observing them—but they’ve not actually fought for a generation or more. Yet we’re paying them. I want to give them some formal training in combat arms, and have them paired with rangers.”

“Will that be enough? That’s not so bad; it costs us nothing more than it does now.”