Treason Keep (6 page)

Adrina’s departure from Talabar was an occasion of some note, and Hablet was determined to see his daughter off in style. The hastily repaired wharf was lined with soldiers in their white dress uniforms, a band played merry tunes to keep the spectators entertained, and even Bhren, the God of Storms, was smiling on Fardohnya this day. The weather was perfect—a flawless sky, a calm sea. The sprawling city of Talabar glowed pink in the warm sunlight; the flat-roofed houses closest to the docks were lined with curious Fardohnyans come to see the last of their princess.

Hablet stepped down from his litter and looked around with satisfaction, waving to his people and accepting their cheers with a wave of his bear-like arms. He had just about everything he wanted from this treaty and was feeling unusually magnanimous. He had secured enough of the tall, straight Karien lumber to build the ships he wanted, enough gold to pay for their construction and, in a few months, with the Kariens and the Defenders embroiled in a war in the north, he would have a clear run across the
southern plains of Medalon into Hythria. Best of all, he would finally destroy Lernen Wolfblade, the Hythrun High Prince—and his heirs—for an insult over thirty years old that very few people even remembered.

Hablet never forgot an insult.

He had conceded surprisingly little to the Kariens in return. True, he had agreed to allow Karien ships unhindered access to Solanndy Bay, where the Ironbrook River met the ocean, but they would pay dearly for the privilege. He had granted the Kariens sovereignty over the Isle of Slarn too, but that measly lump of rock perched in the Gulf was hardly a prime piece of real estate and it had no value to anyone but the Kariens. Of course, the casual observer would never have guessed how little the island meant to him. He had the Kariens believing it was as dear to him as one of his limbs, and had made them pay accordingly.

As for the secret of gunpowder, he had promised that, too, but had wisely proposed sending an expert in the science to Karien to suggest an appropriate location for a mill, before divulging the formula. When Hablet finally got around to sending someone, it was a foregone conclusion that the search for such a location would take years. A lot could happen in that time.

But the unexpected bonus was that he had finally found a way to get rid of Adrina.

He loved his eldest child, it was true. In fact he had often lamented the twist of fate that had seen her born a girl. She would have made a fine son. Unfortunately, that fiery spirit, that biting wit, that
piercing intelligence, was positively dangerous in a woman. Adrina was, to put it bluntly, a troublesome, spoilt little bitch. Hablet was quite certain he would find it much easier to dote on his daughter from a distance.

His previous efforts to find Adrina a husband had all failed miserably. The last potential suitor, Lord Dundrake, had even suggested that he would rather face a century of Hythrun Raiders, alone and unarmed, than spend one night with Her Most Serene Highness. He claimed he would have a better chance of survival. Adrina had despised the man on sight, declaring she would never marry a man who couldn’t tell the difference between a dinner fork and his fingers. Dundrake was a little rough around the edges, certainly. Hablet had hoped his provincial charm would entice her. It had proved an idle hope. Adrina was attracted to power, and there was no way that Hablet would allow her to wed a powerful man. She needed a husband who would hold her back. There were other men who would have married her gladly, and she them—not for love, but the power they brought each other. Hablet had refused all such offers out of hand.

The Karien prince had turned out to be the perfect solution. He was a meek boy, so constrained by the edicts of his religion that Adrina would never be able to cajole him into anything. He was so inhibited by his religious distaste of all matters sexual, that even her legendary powers of seduction would be wasted. He believed in his God and little else. Poor Adrina. She would be the Karien Queen one day; she had agreed to go north for no other reason than the
power it might eventually bring her. She was going to be very disappointed.

The band finished their tune and struck up a dour Karien number, heralding the arrival of Prince Cratyn and his party. The brightly painted Karien brigantine was tied up at the end of the wharf, awaiting her prince. Hablet frowned at the ship and decided he probably had no one but himself to blame for its hideous design. Fardohnyan ship builders were the best in the world, but their secrets were guarded more closely than his treasury. The Kariens built poor copies that were vastly inferior to their Fardohnyan originals. The irony was, Fardohnya had little in the way of timber for shipbuilding. It all had to be imported from Karien. What the Kariens did not have, besides generations of skilled craftsman, was the Fardohnyan secret of hardening and waterproofing the timber.

The king turned his attention back to the ceremony, smiling expansively at the young prince. For a moment, as Hablet studied his solemn face, he felt sorry for the boy. He was stuck with Adrina for life. The sorry fool was not even able to take a lover to console him. Ah well, that was the price one paid for being a Karien prince. Cratyn bowed politely to the king and began a rather long-winded speech, thanking the king for his generosity, his kindness, his hospitality, and so on—in the Karien language, as the prince didn’t speak Fardohnyan. Hablet only half listened to the young man, thinking that he looked a little inbred. They were always marrying their cousins up north. The Karien Royal Family would benefit from a bit of fresh blood.

“Her Most Serene Highness, Princess Adrina!”

The fanfare that accompanied Adrina’s arrival was not on the program that Hablet had approved. He smiled at her audacity, and she was handed down from her open litter by a handsome young slave wearing nothing but a white loin cloth and a great deal of oil on his well-formed muscles. She was planning to make her departure memorable, it seemed.

A number of white-robed young girls hurried to assemble in front of the princess and proceeded to scatter petals on the ground before her, so that her feet would not have to touch the grubby docks. Hablet considered that the ultimate irony, considering a week ago she thought she could sail a damned warship. He glanced at Cratyn’s disapproving frown and forcibly swallowed his laughter. The boy was only just beginning to discover what he was marrying.

Adrina trod the flower-strewn path regally until she reached her father and curtsied gracefully. She was a beautiful woman, and in her prime. Although she was not particularly tall, and lacked Cassandra’s delicate perfection, she had outgrown her sister’s awkwardness of youth and had blossomed into a stunning creature. Her eyes were her best feature: emerald green and wide set. Her body was voluptuous and well-toned, rather than the slender gawkiness of a teenager. Cratyn would be a lucky young man if he had the sense to appreciate what he was getting. Provided Adrina kept her mouth shut.

Lecter Turon waddled forward and presented Hablet with a slender blade wrapped in a jewelled sheath. He took the dagger and held it out to Adrina.

“This is the Bride’s Blade your mother carried.”

“I hope it brings me better luck,” Adrina replied, accepting the gift. Adrina’s mother was not a topic discussed at court.

“It breaks my heart to lose you, my petal,” he declared, almost, but not quite believing it.

Adrina’s eyes glittered dangerously. “It’s not too late to change your mind, Father.”

He knew that look. She had learnt it at his knee.

“Oh yes it is, my petal.”

“Then you will just have to live with the consequences, won’t you?”

Hablet smiled. Only Adrina would dare threaten him. He swept her up into a bear hug and the crowd cheered at this obvious display of affection between the king and the princess.

“If you cross me, I’ll personally see to it that you spend the rest of your life suffering in the coldest, most miserable place I can imagine,” he whispered affectionately as he held her.

“Think up a better threat, Daddy,” she whispered back. “You’ve already done that.”

He let her go and held her at arm’s length for a moment. She met his gaze evenly. Her mother had been like that. Fearless and ambitious. It was such a pity her ambition had run away with her. Had she learnt to control it, she might not have lost her head…But Adrina was everything her mother was and more. He felt overcome with love for his child. Hopefully, the feeling would soon pass.

He took her hand and ceremoniously placed it in Cratyn’s hand. The crowd went wild. Hablet suspected it had more to do with the idea of Adrina
finally getting married than any affection for the Karien groom.

“May the gods bless this great union!” Hablet boomed. “May Fardohnya and Karien, from this day forward, live in peace!”

The crowd cheered, although most of them knew Hablet’s declaration had little to do with his own feelings. By law, no Fardohnyan could declare war on the house of a family united by marriage. That law included the king. The Kariens knew about it too, which was no doubt why they had put aside their prejudice and accepted a foreign bride. A Fardohnyan queen was a small price to pay for the guarantee that Hablet was unable to make war on them.

Cratyn squirmed a little as he stood there holding Adrina’s hand. His daughter smiled and waved to the people. They liked the princess. She was an astute politician and had made a point of being generous to those lesser creatures outside the palace. She was a tyrant around anyone else, but the people remembered her small kindnesses and were probably genuinely sorry to see her go.

The guard snapped to attention as the Karien prince and Adrina walked down the dock towards the ship. Hablet watched them leaving with some relief. As they boarded the gangway, he waved his hand to the Captain of the Guard. Tristan dismissed his men and came to stand before his father.

“You can come back next winter,” he told the young man brusquely. “I should have forgiven you by then.”

Tristan grinned. “You are too kind, Sire.”

“Don’t take that tone with me, boy. You’re lucky I didn’t send you to the eastern passes.”

“To be honest, Father, I would have preferred that you did. I’d rather fight Hythrun bandits than play toy soldiers in Karien.”

“I need you to look after Adrina.”

“Adrina doesn’t need looking after.”

“Well, keep an eye on her, then. And don’t get mixed up in her schemes. I want you back in year, boy. I expect you to stay out of trouble.” He hugged his eldest bastard with genuine affection. “I’ll have a legitimate son by then.”

Tristan shook his head wryly. “Father, don’t you worry sometimes that one of us might want the throne for himself?”

“There’s none of you strong enough to challenge me, Tristan.”

“But if you were to die before you name your heir…”

Hablet laughed. “Then you’ll have Adrina to contend with, my boy, and I’m damned certain none of you are strong enough to challenge her.”

“Knights. About five hundred of them.”

Damin handed Tarja the small hollow tube he was using to examine the golden plain below. It had taken them most of the morning to climb up to this vantage on the side of the mountain that overlooked the border. Although rocky, the ledge was comfortably wide and he, Garet and Damin were stretched out on their bellies as they watched the tents of the enemy below, occasionally brushing away curious insects come to investigate the intruders.

Tarja put the tube to his eye and was enthralled to see the distant figures of the knights, their white circular tents and impressive entourage, grow larger through the lens. Damin called it a looking glass.

The knights camped on the Karien side of the border didn’t bother Tarja nearly so much as the infantry Jasnoff could throw against them. The knights were impressive, but they would be a minority in the final battle. More worrisome were the countless foot soldiers that the Kariens could muster. They had yet to arrive at the front. The knights below were as much an intimidating show of force as a
serious vanguard of any incursion over the border. With a sigh, he moved the looking glass around to examine the fortifications on their side of the border.

The Defenders only hope to keep the conflict manageable was to force the Kariens to attack down a path chosen by the Medalonians. Trenches filled with sharpened stakes scored the plain like sword cuts in the red earth. The ground was pockmarked with holes dug to hamper the movement of the heavy Karien destriers. Mangonels, protected by earth mounds, stood silently out of Karien bow range, waiting for the coming battle like giant insects. But they had a vast front to cover and their defences looked woefully inadequate from this height.

“I thought there’d be more of them,” Garet remarked as he took the looking glass from Tarja to study the Kariens.

“Ah, now that’s the problem with a feudal government,” Damin remarked sagely. “You have to waste an awful lot of time getting your army together. You have to call in favours, bribe people, marry off your children, and convince your Dukes that there’s a profit in your war. Monumental waste of time and money, if you ask me. Standing armies are much more efficient.” The fair-haired Hythrun frowned at Garet’s surprised expression. It was obvious that Damin neither liked nor trusted Garet Warner. “I’m not a complete barbarian, you know, Commandant. Even Warlords need an education. What were you expecting my tactical assessment to be? Me Warlord. Me kill Kariens.”

Garet smiled thinly. “Not exactly.”

Damin grinned suddenly and pushed himself backward along the ledge. He sat against the cliff, leaning comfortably in the shade, with his long legs stretched out in front. He crossed his booted feet at the ankles as he took a long swig from his waterskin.

“You underestimate me again, Commandant,” he said, offering Tarja the waterskin as Garet turned to face him. “But, for your information, I was educated by the finest tutors in Hythria. And I’m right. The Kariens don’t keep a standing army, for all that they can field a huge one, once they finally get organised. It’s a fatal flaw. Jasnoff’s vassals owe him sixty days each a year, which means that by the time they get here, it will almost be time to go home again, but they’re stuck here while the Church supports the war. Even fighting for the glory of the Overlord starts to pale when it’s costing you money and there’s no plunder in sight.” He swatted idly at an annoying insect. “You Medalonians have the right idea. Toss the nobility, promote on merit and keep a standing army.”

“Toss the nobility? If Hythria adopted that policy, you’d be out of a job.”

Tarja wondered if he should warn Garet about the inadvisability of getting into a discussion about the merits of various systems of government with this man.

“Worse, Commandant, I’d be the first in line to be beheaded. My uncle is the High Prince of Hythria. I’m his heir, unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately?” Tarja asked.

“Taking the Hythrun throne isn’t going to be easy, and keeping it will be even harder. The other
Warlords think I’m a bit…precocious. There may come a time when I call on Medalon for assistance. Assuming the Kariens and their Fardohnyan allies don’t come pouring over your border to wipe us all out.”

Tarja had wondered what the price of Damin’s assistance would be. “I’m sure Medalon will remember your aid when the time comes.”

“You’re very free with your promises, Tarja,” Garet remarked. “You’re not the Lord Defender yet.”

Tarja glanced at the commandant, but didn’t answer him.

“Well, for the time being, I think we’re safe enough,” Damin said. “Jasnoff can order his knights to the border with little ceremony, but we’ve time yet before the bulk of his army arrives. Although if they don’t get here soon, winter will be on us.”

“That would be too much to hope for,” Tarja remarked. “The Kariens must know how hard a winter campaign will be.”

“Lord Setenton is Jasnoff’s Commander-in-Chief,” Damin agreed. “He’s too experienced to try campaigning in the snow.”

“You need to train your men to deal with armoured knights, too,” Garet added. “A man encased in armour can be hard to kill, and neither the Defenders nor the Hythrun have much experience fighting them.”

“But he’s easy enough to disable. Just knock him of his horse and jump up and down on him for a while. That’ll knock the fight out him.”

Tarja smiled. “I’ll let you inform the troops of that sage piece of tactical advice.”

Damin shrugged. “It sounds silly, but it works. Have you any idea how hard it is to get up wearing a suit of armour? Hell, they can’t even mount their horses without a block and tackle rig. Knock them on their backs and thrust your sword through the eye slit. Works like a treat. But the knights aren’t our problem. The true problem lies with Hablet and the Fardohnyans if he puts his artillery at Jasnoff’s disposal.”

“Cannon, you mean?”

Damin nodded. “I’ve never seen one myself, but I’ve spoken to a few who have. The only thing in our favour is that Hablet guards the secret of what makes them work as if it’s more precious to him than all his children put together. I suspect he’ll find it a lot easier to give away his daughter than his precious cannon.”

“I’d heard rumours of an alliance,” Garet added, taking the waterskin from Tarja. “But nothing substantial. I’ve also heard rumours that the reason Hablet guards the secret so closely is because his cannon are notoriously unreliable, inaccurate, and just as likely to kill the cannoneers as they are the enemy. Hablet’s weapon is his enemies’ fear of the cannon, not the cannon themselves.”

“Even if that’s true, I don’t want to face cannon fire with swords and arrows.”

“Even without cannon, if there is an alliance, Fardohnya could attack from the south,” Garet pointed out. “We can’t afford to split our forces.”

He said
our forces
, not
your forces
. Tarja wondered if the slip was accidental, or if it meant Garet had finally chosen which side he was on.

“We’ll need time,” Tarja agreed with a frown. “Until we gain control of the Citadel, the Defenders
we can put in the field are barely half the number we need.”

Damin nodded in agreement. “I can spare another three centuries of Raiders, but any more than that and Krakandar Province will begin to look a little bit too inviting to my neighbours. I can always send to Elasapine, if worst comes to worst. Narvell would send me five centuries of his Raiders if I asked him nicely. I imagine that many Hythrun troops garrisoned in Bordertown would make Hablet think twice about sailing up the Glass River.”

“Narvell?” Tarja asked.

“Narvell Hawksword, the Warlord of Elasapine,” Damin explained. “He’s my half-brother. My mother’s second husband was his father.”

“How many husbands has your mother had?” Tarja asked.

“Five, the last time I counted,” Garet remarked, obviously surprising Damin with his knowledge. He looked at the Warlord and shrugged. “I run the Defender Intelligence Corps, my Lord. I’m supposed to know these things.”

“Then you should know she might have married again, by now. She had her eye on a very rich Greenharbour gem merchant when I saw her last.”

Tarja shook his head in amazement. It was rare for Sisters of the Blade to marry or have more than one or two children. Only the farmers of Medalon, for whom children were a convenient source of cheap labour, tended towards large families.

“But even with a thousand Hythrun raiders, we still need the Defenders in full force,” Tarja pointed out with a frown, getting back to the problem at
hand. “At the moment, we’ve got your seven hundred Raiders and about six thousand Defenders here, and that’s less than half.”

“How many longbowmen do you have?”

“Five hundred. The rest are still at the Citadel. Why?”

“I’ve been watching them train. I doubt if I could draw one of those damned bows.”

“We train them from boyhood,” Tarja told him. “They’re selected from the cadets and they grow up with their bows. As they get stronger, the bows get longer, until they can draw a full-sized weapon. They’re very good, I’ll grant you, but they’re irreplaceable. You can’t just hand the bow along to the next man in line when a longbowman falls. And even with the others still at the Citadel, they number less than fifteen hundred.”

“We can use them to our advantage. Assuming Hablet doesn’t arm the Kariens with cannon, your longbows out-range any weapon they can bring to bear against you. Kariens consider the bow and arrow a peasant weapon. They have archers, but nothing of the calibre of your longbows. If we concentrate on protecting
them
, you could cut down any advance like a farmer mowing hay with a scythe.”

“And your mounted archers?” Garet asked.

“We’re hit-and-run specialists,” Damin shrugged. “Any man of mine can fire three arrows into a target the size of an apple at a gallop in under a minute, but our bows are short-range weapons. There are too many Kariens for that sort of tactic.”

“What about the rebels?”

Tarja shrugged. “Another thousand at the most. Most of them have never held a weapon. Jasnoff can field an army of over a hundred thousand with the Church supporting him. With the Fardohnyans as allies…I’m not sure I can count that high. I suppose they could pray for us.”

“Never underestimate the power of prayer,” Damin warned. “If Zegarnald, the God of War, takes our side, we should do well. And we’ve yet to hear from the Harshini.”

Tarja didn’t argue the point. He had no faith in Damin’s gods.

“I thought the Harshini were incapable of killing?” Garet asked

“There’s plenty of ways to frustrate the enemy without killing him.”

“I suppose,” Tarja agreed, a little doubtfully. “Maybe they could bring their demons and scare the Kariens to death.”

“If the Kariens bring their priests with them, we will need the protection of the Harshini and their magic,” Damin warned. “When Lord Brakandaran returns, we will know more.”

Tarja frowned at the mention of Brak. “He’s been gone more than five months. What makes you think he’s planning to return at all?”

“He’ll be back,” Damin assured him.

“I wish I shared your confidence.”

The fact was he wanted to see the Harshini rebel very badly—and not simply because he needed to know what help the Harshini could offer in the coming battle. Brak would know if R’shiel lived. Months had passed since she had vanished, quite
literally, but he had seen enough wounds in his time to know that hers was fatal. Yet the Harshini were magical creatures and R’shiel was half-Harshini. A small spark of hope still burned in him that she had somehow survived Joyhinia’s sword thrust, but as the days, weeks and then months passed with no word from her, his hope was fading.

“Is something wrong?”

Tarja shook his head. “I was just thinking of someone, that’s all.”

“The demon child.”

“I wasn’t thinking of her in those terms,” Tarja said wryly. “But I was thinking of R’shiel, yes.”

“Her fate is in the hands of the gods, my friend,” Damin reminded him. “There is nothing you can do about her. On the other hand, there is something we can do about those damned knights.”

“What did you have in mind?” Garet asked, a little suspiciously.

“They’re looking a bit too comfortable for my liking. I think we should wake them up.”

“What does that mean exactly?”

Damin laughed. “It means putting aside your damnable Defender’s honour for a time and learning to be sneaky.” He climbed to his feet and dusted off his trousers. “We need to do something about their supply lines, for one thing. What about it, Commandant? Are you with us?”

Tarja glanced at Garet curiously, knowing there was much more to Damin’s simple question than whether or not he wanted to attack the Karien camp. The older man studied them both in silence for a moment.

“I’ll not be a party to anything thing that reeks of stupidity,” he warned, climbing to his feet and handing the looking glass back to Damin. “That also includes your ludicrous scheme for replacing Joyhinia, Tarja. Come up with something workable, and I’ll back you to the hilt. But what you’re planning is insane. And I plan to die in my bed a very old man.”

“That’s the most uncommitted excuse for an agreement I’ve ever heard.”

“Be satisfied with it. It’s the best you’re likely to get until you show me something devised by brains, not wishful thinking.”

Damin glanced at the two of them and shook his head. “Let’s just push him off the cliff and be done with it, Tarja,” he suggested.

“I hear you have a reputation as a cunning warrior, Lord Wolfblade. I can’t for the life of me imagine how you came about it.” He pushed past Damin on the ledge and began to climb down to the narrow trail where their horses were tethered below.

“If this man was not your friend, Tarja…” Damin began.

“He’s just testing you. We need him.”

“No, y
ou
need him. I’d just as soon see him dead. And I warn you, every moment I spend in his company, the idea becomes more attractive.”

Damin slammed the delicate looking glass back into its leather case and began to follow the path that Garet had taken.