The False Martyr (50 page)

As he cleared the final
trees, stepping cautiously from the rope and plank bridge that
delivered him over the rock-strewn, white-water stream that was the
Camps final border, he realized that this was yet another fantasy
that had somehow come true in all the wrong ways, for all the wrong
reasons. He stopped in his tracks and ogled at how truly
unimpressive a fantasy it was. As children, they’d imagined the
Camp as a magical place, a kind of military wonderland. The fact
was that it was exactly what its name implied, a camp. Arrayed
around what barely qualified as a clearing were a dozen
semi-permanent structures. The largest was a pavilion tent large
enough to serve as the command center for an army on the move. Made
of heavy, black canvas, it looked like the gaping entrance to a
cave. The only thing that clearly marked it from the shadows around
it was the Legion’s symbol – two swords crossed over a rising sun –
that had been embroidered in yellow across the length of the gabled
roof.

“
Hey, we’re almost there.
Keep movin’” brought Lius from his daze. The soldier finished with
a gentle shove that was enough to send Lius sprawling into a nearby
tree. “Sorry. You alright?” the soldier, one of Joal’s men, asked
and came immediately to Lius’ side. “I didn’ see who ya were and
didn’ mean ta push ya so hard anyway. I just wanted ta get off that
bridge. Please, I’m real sorry.”

Lius looked back at the
man – a boy really, younger even than himself – and called upon the
serenity that he had learned in the Hall of Understanding. Since
Jaret had introduced him as the closest thing to the Xi Valati, the
soldiers had somehow ignored his appearance and treated him with a
reverence typically reserved for someone much closer to that rank.
Being only a student, not even a counselor, Lius found that even
more disconcerting than if they’d have ignored him.

“
It was my fault,” Lius
forced himself to smile as he came to his full height – a head
shorter than the soldier – and wiped his hands together. They were
sore from scraping on the tree but not injured. “I should not have
stopped. Thank you for reminding me of my place.”

“
Ah, sure.” The soldier
seemed confused and wary at being thanked for nearly upending the
Order’s highest representative.

“
There you are, Lius” and
the appearance of an even more prominent figure ended any
possibility that the soldier would put more thought into
it.

“
Lord commander,” he
stuttered and bowed as Jaret strode through the trees. The other
men who were streaming off the bridge behind them nearly tumbled
into a pile as they stared at the commander rather than the trail
or man in front of them.

Jaret ignored them all. “I
am sorry, Lius. I didn’t realize you had gotten so far behind until
I arrived and started looking for you.”

“
It’s my fault. I was . .
. ah . . . meditating and didn’t realize that you had already gone.
Nearly everyone had gone by the time I returned. These gentlemen
were kind enough to escort me.”

Jaret’s eyes turned to the
soldiers. The most ragged remnants of the army, young,
inexperienced, illiterate, they stared like half-wits at the living
legend before them. He nodded to them and clapped the arm of the
one who had pushed Lius. “Thank you,” he said with honest
conviction. “You are dismissed. Find a place on either side of the
stream to sleep. We’ll have food at the mess in an
hour.”

“
Sir, yes, sir, lord
commander,” the boy replied with a salute then walked away rubbing
his arm where Jaret had touched him. His fellows followed in a
seeming daze.

Jaret watched them go with
a sigh then returned to Lius. “The others are anxious to debrief on
everything that’s happened. We are only waiting for you.” He
started to lead Lius into the clearing before continuing beneath
his breath, “Did you learn anything while you were
meditating?”

“
I was reading the . . .
the book,” Lius whispered back and scanned for any ears or eyes
that might catch his words. “I think I am beginning to understand
it. I mean this power I have to see the Order. Valatarian could do
the same thing, and he describes it in the book, but it is all
extremely . . . .”

“
That’s fine,” Jaret cut
him off. “But can you see anything about what’s happening outside
the forest? We need every possible advantage. Anything you can tell
us or do to swing things our way will be critical.”

Lius opened and closed his
mouth several times as Jaret stared at him with those piercing
eyes. He desperately wanted to share what he had learned with
someone, to discuss it as he would have in the Hall of
Understanding. For the first time since the slaughter two weeks
ago, Lius was not running for his life and had the time to think
about what he had lost that night. He missed his fellow students,
his teachers, the books, the time, the ability to think and
discuss. That was exactly what he needed now to understand the book
he carried and the powers he had discovered. He needed time, but
even more, he needed a likeminded person to discuss it with.
Unfortunately, Jaret was not that person. “I will do everything I
can,” he said, trying to hide his resignation.

“
Very good. Let’s get back
to the others. But don’t forget that they know nothing of your
powers. We’ll show them in time, but for now, you are a simply the
last survivor from the Hall of Understanding, witness of a massacre
perpetrated by the false Emperor, and representative of the
murdered Xi Valati. No one knows the status of the Church, but if
what you said is true about Nabim’s henchman in the Hall of
Understanding, it may be our most effective way to rally the people
to us.”

“
I understand,” Lius said,
but his mind was already lost in that night two weeks gone, the
night he’d been trying to forget ever since.

Shaking his head to dispel
the images, he looked out at the buildings around them. There were
only a few of them, and they were positioned at the edge of the
trees to leave the clearing in the center open. A big open tent
with tables was a mess hall. Pits of coals glowed behind it – the
heat rising from them shimmering the air – with pigs slowly turning
above them. Animal pens were visible through the trees on the other
side – what looked like pigs, a few milk cows, and a flock of
chickens. Another tent with smoke rising from the only chimney was
a smithy. An armory – the only building built from logs – was next
to it, identified by the men loading the captured weapons into it.
The few men injured in the battle were already gathered outside
what was clearly a medical tent. Beyond that were a dug out hill
that was probably food storage, a few other tents whose purpose he
could not discern, and, in the center of it all, a dais for
Teaching Day lessons. The Camp had only the most basic requirements
for the men it trained, but most surprising, there was no
indication of where the men lived, trained, or slept.

“
The men spend almost all
their time in the forest,” Jaret answered Lius’ unasked question.
“They train and even sleep there.”

“
Where?” Lius squinted,
studying the trees.

“
You’d never find them,”
Jaret laughed. “It is part of the training. The Camp is surrounded
by the stream you crossed. It splits a couple of hundred paces
north of here and reforms farther to the south. Everything inside
the streams is safe, but the men must sleep outside that
area.”

“
Safe?”

“
The men have a
competition. They make a yellow dye from a moss that grows in the
forest. Any man marked with the dye is eliminated. The last man
unmarked is the winner. Those are the only rules. It is a great
honor to win, so the men go to enormous lengths to find and make
the dye, to build weapons or traps to disperse it, then to hide
their sleeping places and find those of their opponents. It is, in
many ways, the most important part of their training.”

“
And the men who came with
us? The ones who aren’t legionnaires?”

“
I suspect a great many of
them will be marked with yellow tomorrow,” Jaret said as he turned
back toward their destination with his feet and his words. “Now,
Yatier and Ewon are the ones we need to watch. I’d let Joal and
Corwin give me a shave after they’d watched me screw their wives. .
. .” He stopped as he realized what he’d just said and to whom. “My
apologies. It is obviously just an expression.”

“
I’m not the Xi Valati,”
Lius reminded. He would have laughed if there were anything funny
about it. “Not even close. I wish you’d stop treating me like one.
Who is . . . .”

Jaret turned again and hit
him with a hard glare before he could finish the question. “You
need to understand, Lius. This war will be won with perception, not
pikes. You know that Nabim will have replaced Xi Valati Maciam,
that he will have his own man atop the Hall of Understanding, that
he will be spreading lies about what happened that night. Well, we
need someone to speak for the Order too, someone to tell the truth
about the Xi Valati’s murder. You were sent by Xi Valati Maciam.
You saw him murdered. You are the only one who knows the truth. And
you can read the Order. I can’t believe that Xi Valati Maciam’s
last act was a mistake. He sent you for this purpose. And part of
that is being our Xi Valati. You have to give us the Order’s
blessing and speak out about what happened or we might as well
build our homes here because we’ll never get out of this forest. Do
you understand? The only thing that is more important to an army
than morale is food – and that’s only because a hungry soldier is
an unhappy soldier. So even if you don’t want it, you have to be
both our connection to the Order, and our moral justification. And
even if you see no way for us to win, you have to keep saying that
the Order is with us. Is that clear?”

“
I’ll try,” Lius gulped
and wrung his hands.
I’m as far from a Xi
Valati as you could possibly get
, he
thought.

“
You’ll do better than
try,” Jaret stated without giving any indication of how. He turned
and walked through the flaps of the command tent. Lius had no
choice but to follow.

Inside the tent, Jaret
dropped the flaps and strode immediately to the head of a long
table, leaving Lius standing just inside as his eyes adjusted to
the sparse light of a single lamp. Eight other men jockeyed for
position around the length of the table, eyes bouncing between
Jaret, the men around them, and Lius.

The largest coalition
owned an entire side of the table with Joal as their focal. The big
man stood closest to Jaret with his sons-in-law cascading from him
in order of rank. Lius went through each, forcing himself to
remember their names and positions. Anders was first, oldest, and
most senior. He was tall and slight compared to Joal, but his
shoulders were broad and countenance steady. He had the olive
complexion and dark eyes of a southerner. His beard, speckled with
the first signs of white, was trimmed short as if a family
concession rather than a desired feature. Kon and Marcus, the
brothers, were next. They looked enough alike that Lius could not
tell which was first. Big and broad with round faces, bushy beards,
and light-brown eyes, they could have been Joal’s sons by blood.
The last of them, Quinn, was the farthest departure. He was well
shorter, slighter, and younger than the others – only a few years
older than Lius. He had the light hair and eyes of the Liandrin
nobility that had spawned him. A blond mustache, close trimmed and
waxed, was his only facial hair, but that on top was long, held
back in a tail tied with a bow. He smiled at Lius, seemingly most
as ease with his surroundings and refusing to take any of it too
seriously.

Turning to the other side
of the table, Lius found Corwin Thalim, Yatier an’ Pmalatir –
looking every bit the handsome, charismatic prince – and another
man that he had not yet met. He stared at the last, thinking he
should know him but unsure why. Finally, he seemed to notice the
attention and approached with a hand outstretched. “Ewon Valien,
Commander of the Southern Peace,” he said. “Jaret has told me of
your . . . journey. We are glad to have you with us.”

Lius just stared as he
remembered how he knew the man. He had eaten at Lius house a few
times as Lius’ father negotiated contracts to supply his men. One
of those time, Lius had seen the money his father gave the
commander through the crack in the office door as he walked past on
his way to bed. ‘The cost of doing business,’ his father had said
the next day with a wince, but it had been more than that. It had
been everything they had, and their whole family had suffered for
the months it had taken for Commander Valien to come through with
the contract – and Lius father to come through with another
payment.

The eight years that
followed had been good to Lius’ family as they had apparently been
good to Commander Valien. A stout man, far more than his fellows,
he was the only one dressed in silk – a lighter, shimmering version
of the same formal uniform – and the only one wearing jewels – a
ring each of ruby and sapphire and a pendant done in shimmering
diamond and black opal. His mouth was framed by a close-trimmed
goatee that only seemed to accentuate his round cheeks and nearly
bald head. Small, calculating eyes examined Lius from top to
bottom. “Do I know you?” he finally asked.

“
My father had the
contract to provide uniforms for your men,” Lius answered, then
remembered something far more important than the contracts and
bribes. “And my brother,” he added quickly, “my older brother,
Malcolm, commands the regiment in Aieta Da’. Do you know if he is
alright? I heard a lot of the officers were killed when Nabim took
over.” Lius knew that he sounded like the boy he was rather than
the inspirational religious figure he was supposed to be, but he
didn’t care. He was suddenly caught in memories of his youth that
he had not considered in months, was suddenly worried that that
world had been destroyed just as the one in the Hall of
Understanding.