Arms-Commander (20 page)

“I can see what I see, Commander.”

That was all he was going to say, Saryn realized. “Where are you sleeping now?”

“I have a corner here in the shop. That seemed better.”

“It probably is.” After the briefest pause, she asked, “Dealdron…what do you know about masonry…stonework?”

“A little, ser. Sometimes, my da…my father, he had to redo some of the stonework when he was replastering older places. He spent a little time as a stonemason's apprentice. He didn't like it. So he became a plasterer's apprentice. He taught me some stoneworking because my brother had trouble handling the heavier stones. Getting the stones cut right is hard, and when they're not finished proper-like, over time they can settle and crack any plaster laid over them…”

As she listened, it appeared to Saryn that plastering in Candar included what she would have called outside stucco as well as interior wall finishing. “It sounds like you know more than a little about stonework.”

“I know some things.”

“In another eightday, or so, once you finish more of the foot chests, and your leg is stronger, you'll start working with Siret on stonecutting.”

Dealdron frowned, and Saryn could sense his concern.

“No…you haven't done anything wrong,” she replied to his unspoken question. “We need to finish at least part of the barracks before winter. If we don't, we'll lose horses to the cold because we're using parts of the stables to shelter refugees—”

“Refugees?”

Saryn realized that the Rationalist word for “refugee” wasn't in the local vocabulary. “The women and children who fled Analeria because Arthanos tried to kill them.”

“What is the word the angels use?”

Saryn told him the word in Temple, then asked, “Are you trying to learn Temple?”

“As I can, Angel,” he replied in Temple.

“Keep at it. Istril or Siret will tell you when you're to start at stonecutting.”

“Yes, ser. What ever you think best, ser.”

As she turned and headed out through the archway from the carpentry shop, Saryn was struck by what lay behind his words—or what did not. There was no feeling of resentment or anger, just a calm acceptance of her decision. She also realized how wasteful traditional low-tech cultures could be. Dealdron was intelligent and talented—and he'd accomplish far more in Westwind than he ever would have been allowed to do in Gallos…even with Ryba's concerns.

And Istril was right. For all his background, Dealdron was a good man.

Ryba did not return from the heights until late afternoon, and then she sent Aemra to fetch Saryn from the armory. Saryn set aside the blade she was sharpening and hurried up the stone steps that seemed to get longer as the day progressed.

Ryba was seated, waiting. The table was bare. She gestured to the chair across from her.

Saryn seated herself, and since Ryba did not speak, asked, “How are you finding the ice fields?”

“That suggests you want to know why I've been riding to the heights. Do you really think that knowing that would be useful to you as arms-commander, Saryn?”

“I couldn't say without knowing what you're accomplishing up there…besides returning with ice to preserve various foods.”

Ryba smiled, a distant expression. “Do you know why I need to ride up there?”

Wasn't that what I just asked, if more politely?
“I'd appreciate it if you'd tell me, ser.”

“Don't humor me, Saryn.”

“I already asked, politely…Ryba.”

The iron in Ryba's voice began to soften as she spoke. “The more bodies that are crammed into Westwind, the harder it is for me to sort out what I truly see from what I worry about. I find that in the quiet and the cold amid the ice, matters become clearer.”

Are matters ever really that clear? Or are they just clear for you?

“You will find, in your own time, Saryn, that clarity of vision and purpose are everything. You cannot be distracted by what might be, or what might have been. There is only what was, is, and will be. All the rest are either wistful thoughts or useless nightmares.” Ryba smiled, an expression filled with a mix of emotions that Saryn wasn't certain she wanted to know. “That doesn't mean you won't have both, in great measure. You just have to learn to know what they are and set them aside. One of the great weaknesses of most men is that they fail to recognize early enough which dreams are possible and will become real, and which are vain hopes.”

“Was the engineer that way?” Saryn kept her voice low.

Ryba looked hard at Saryn before her expression changed to one more amused and enigmatic. “The engineer was the kind of man who is the most dangerous. Upon occasion, he could turn unreality of the most impossible kind into hard accomplished fact, but he never understood the longer-term implications of each of those transformations.”

“The longer-term implications?” prodded Saryn gently. “Doesn't every action have a consequence? Why would there be greater implications from a set of acts that appear at first sight to be less probable to result in success?”

Ryba laughed. “You've seen it, and you don't understand? How likely was it that a single engineer who barely understood the natural laws that enable magery on this world and a singer could destroy the mightiest power on the continent of Candar?”

“Rather unlikely, but they did,” Saryn pointed out.

“Precisely. And what has happened as a result?”

“Lornth is weaker, but it remains independent.”

Ryba smiled coldly. “Had Cyador taken even the southern half of Lornth and held it, Lornth would have been forced to accept a position as a vassal state to Cyador, and Suthya would not even be attempting designs on Lornth. In turn, Arthanos would not even be considering moving a force into the Westhorns. By accomplishing the improbable and what was considered impossible, the engineer created a set of circumstances that actually weakened Westwind.”

“Weakened us? We would have had Cyador as a neighbor.”

“Had Cyador taken Lornth, that would have returned the empire to its largest historical territorial borders. Cyador could not have afforded to expand any more, certainly not in the next century. Westwind would not have been seen as a danger, but as a buffer, a small land that neither Gallos nor Cyador would have wished the other to have, but which neither really would have wanted. In turn, that stability would have blocked the Suthyan expansion into Rulyarth and kept the Suthyans at bay, and we would have been free to trade with all three. Cyador would not have cared if women fled to us because it would have made Lornth more stable. Karthanos and his son would not have been able to complain if discontented women left their land for Westwind.”

“So you're saying, by destroying Cyador, Nylan threatened the survival of Westwind?”

“He increased the level of that threat. That much is certain.” After a pause, Ryba added, “That is why I struggle to see what will be, because the ripples in reality created by his acts distort what will now occur.”

Saryn certainly hadn't thought in those terms, but she'd seen enough of what Ryba had foreseen to know that the Marshal was no mystic and, in some way Saryn did not pretend to understand, could see pieces of a future that was unknowable to anyone else, at least so far as Saryn could determine. “What do we do now, then?”

“What we must, you and I together, and you and I separately.” Ryba cleared her throat. “We have at most four eightdays…”

Saryn listened intently, trying not to be distracted by all the implications of what Ryba had said earlier.

Saryn completed all the tasks and planning Ryba had requested, from assigning duties to various detachments to planning the logistics of transporting the various devices and explosives. Before dawn on fiveday, she and Ryba and second company's third squad were riding eastward along one of the approach routes to Westwind.

Ryba seemed disinclined to talk, and Saryn wasn't about to initiate either questions or conversation when the Marshal was so self-absorbed. While Ryba had been somewhat distant as a ship commander, over the years at Westwind she'd become even more self-contained. Not exactly withdrawn, because she trained with the guards and ate with everyone else, but there was definitely a space between her and others, even when she was in the middle of a group.

Midmorning came—and went—before Ryba spoke. “This is still the way they'll come.”

Saryn had her own idea as to why the Gallosians would take the road that Ryba and Saryn followed, the most northerly route out of Gallos toward Lornth. There were no truly narrow passes all the way to Westwind, although there was one valley surrounded by rocky cliffs, but the cliffs were a good half kay from the road. “Even though it's the most obvious, ser?”

“Obvious or not, after all we've done to harass them, they won't take a road where easy ambushes are possible. That's one reason why I ordered the attacks.”

“So that they'd take the most open road?” On the face of it, that made no sense.

“The road that
seems
the most open. Appearances aren't always what they look to be.”

Saryn could understand that, even if she didn't recall why that would be so on the route they were traveling.

Not until late afternoon did they reach the west end of a comparatively shallow valley running generally east to west, whose northern side was comprised of rocky hills that footed taller and snowcapped peaks and whose southern side largely comprised a long mesa with sheer cliffs overlooking the valley. As Saryn recalled, the valley extended almost eight kays, and at the eastern end, which she could not see, was a slightly deeper bowl-like depression, to the east of which was a moderately good-sized stream.

Ryba reined up at the top of the pass, just before the road began a straight and gentle descent. She studied the entire valley, then she nodded to the squad leader. “Forward.”

Halfway down the incline, nearly a kay farther along, the Marshal again halted and surveyed the valley, particularly the cliffs to her right, the ones buttressing the rocky mesa. To Saryn, it was obvious that the Marshal was comparing something she had seen—or foreseen—to what she was now seeing, measuring everything with her eyes. The Marshal gestured for Saryn to ease her mount closer.

Saryn did so, reining up when she was almost stirrup to stirrup with Ryba.

“The middle section of the road, down there.” Ryba pointed. “Right in the middle of the valley. You can see that there aren't any trees to the south of the road, just mountain meadows sloping up to the base of the cliffs. It looks like a gradual incline, but it's steeper than that. There's a mass of rock ready to break loose on the side of the mesa. When it does, it will reach the road and still be a good ten yards high.”

How can she be so certain?
“That much rock will make the road impassable.”

“Yes, it will.” Ryba could have been acknowledging that the sun would set every day.

Saryn understood. In addition to hopefully burying part or all of Arthanos's army, such an avalanche would reduce the number of routes through the Roof of the World to two, both of which had narrow passes that were far more easily defended and controlled.

“You see that overhang?” asked the Marshal. “Where the reddish stone bulges out?”

“Yes, ser. Is that where you want the explosive penetrators, or what ever you call the iron funnels that you had Huldran forge?”

“Precisely. How long will it take you to get them in place?”

“Two or three days, but it could take an eightday. It's hard to tell from here. We can cut across from the pass back there to reach the mesa, and there's a saddle that looks clear enough. But we'll probably have to use ropes to place them. The rock on top looks rugged and not too stable, and we don't want to trigger anything before Arthanos's army is down below.”

Ryba nodded. “You'd best get started as soon as we return. I'm counting on you to determine the optimum placement so that the entire overhang comes down.”

“How will we know when to set off the charges?”

“It will be sunny enough. We'll use mirrors. Smoke if it's not sunny. I'd prefer mirrors. I want the bastards to see what's coming.”

They're not all bastards. A lot of them are poor armsmen just following orders.

As if she had read Saryn's thoughts, Ryba replied, “We've been here ten years. We've never attacked their lands. We've never invaded. We've never threatened. But they keep trying to stop those who would join us. They've cut off trade and supplies. Even after we destroy this army, the winter will be long and hard. Destroying ten thousand armsmen will keep Gallos off our back for a good twenty years, if not longer, and we'll need every year.” She paused, then continued in a softer tone. “In your own time, Saryn, you'll see. You'll come to understand that there are times when any sign of fairness or decency is only perceived as weakness, that there are times when only being a tyrant will suffice for the greater good. You will wonder, time and again, if you're rationalizing when you do what must be done. Remember that when a male ruler does what is necessary, he is a strong and forceful leader of his people. When a woman does exactly the same, she's a cruel bitch who is extreme and unfair.” Ryba laughed, harshly. “Already, the world has begun to forget what Nylan did to Cyador and how many tens of thousands perished. You saw that with the Suthyans. Yet two lands and the holders of a third want to attack and destroy a single settlement of perhaps five hundred women and children. Why? Because Westwind is ruled by a woman for women.” After another brief silence, she finished. “It's better to be a just tyrant who provides freedom than a dead ruler who tried to be fair in an unfair world.”

Strangely, Saryn heard no bitterness in Ryba's tone. Her words had been delivered with a pleasant yet chilling calmness.

Abruptly, the Marshal turned her mount. “We've seen what we came to see.”

Saryn eased the gelding around and beside the Marshal. They had a long ride back.