Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles (10 page)

Efanor’s
convert. And my brother is Marhanen. Efanor will know exactly the stakes. Religious that he is, I shall have him simply to understand this is political—he will still try to secure Tristen’s soul, none could daunt him, but Efanor will see this act as exactly what it is, will know why it is, will defend Tristen as a point of honor. In my brother’s keeping, close by his elbow, there’s no way for Murandys to come at him, not a bit! And in the spring, once we launch our forces into Elwynor, then Tristen will ride with me far from the Quinaltine, for the summer long. By next fall, good gods, he’ll simply do what most converts do, attend only on holy days and at funerals. Blessed once is blessed, so far as the commons know and so far as serves His Holiness’s purposes. It’s the door by which we admit the whole oxcart. It’s the
gesture
His Holiness wants. And to get it, we make his Holiness accommodate the halfling Sihhë…

never
suggest that Tristen is more than that.
Halfling
is ambiguous enough for any negotiation; and after they admit the halfling Sihhë then they take the whole damned court of Elwynor.”

Next fall. Next
summer
had daunted him and he had seen
no
prospect yet that far ahead of him. Tangled and dubious as it all might be, it did serve Cefwyn, and protected Ninévrisë, and brought him to the spring and through the unimagined summer, even to the Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles fall to come with a
use
, a purpose, a duty to do. Gray space gave way to imagining a time yet to come, days and months ahead.

“Your Majesty,” Idrys said. “We should consider this at some length.”

“Do
you
have objections?” Cefwyn asked, looking at Tristen. It was clearly a request not to hear any. But Idrys’ doubts were not to disregard.

“There are shadows in that place,” Tristen said. “So you should know, sir.”

“I don’t doubt there are,” Cefwyn said, and gave a short laugh.

“Gods know my grandfather’s crypt is likely the bait for them—he feared the dark excessively. Chandlers have never been so prosperous as in his reign, good faith.” He patted Tristen on the arm. “But do you understand what we are about? My brave friend, my very brave friend, if you can do this—if you can do this… and not affright this priest… gods forbid the Patriarch should ever meet the like we met on Lewen field… then we can accommodate Her Grace and her whole realm in the exception we craft for you, who
are
the Warden of Ynefel, which
is
and has always been the legitimate title of a lord of Ylesuin. They have to regard the current Lord Warden, and to treat
you
as lawful and entitled, and exempt from requirements that bind other lords: we have a precedent, good gods, we have a precedent in Mauryl Gestaurien, what
was
done
can be
done, and our penny offering, if we can do this, will create this niggling little exception through which we can settle the whole question of Quinalt doctrine
and
the status of halflings, hedge-wizards, Bryaltines, sprites, spirits, shadows, ghosts, and gods know Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles what! Good great gods,
we have a precedent
!”

“Consult Emuin,” Idrys said. “My lord king, I beg you ask him before you undertake anything with His Holiness.”

“Ask Emuin to your satisfaction, but if he finds no urgent reason against it, and if Tristen can endure my grandfather’s ghost, —dear blessed
gods
, I would find it convenient if you could walk in with the royal procession.”

“I will, sir,” Tristen said, and Cefwyn proposed they go aside for a last cup of wine, a seal on their agreement. “Sit with me a moment,”

Cefwyn said, and, Idrys being absent about business with his lieutenant, and still less than pleased, the two of them sat beneath the tall windows in the hall, in this set of rooms so very vast the servants always arrived out of breath. Night had long since filled the high window above the little table, and candlelight danced on the imperfections of the glass as on the embossings of gold cups that were the ordinary of Cefwyn’s household in these days.

“You have been very patient in my neglect of you,” Cefwyn said,

“and I know how difficult it has been for you in Guelessar—

difficult for Her Grace, too, with no assured rank or title, gods know what her people believe is her condition among us. Yet I have had to leave my friends to fend for themselves for a while. It is so important, what we do, simply to assure I have the power to launch this war, this one chance to catch the moment. We have the rebels across the river, building forces by the day. If Tasmôrden moves to take either the bridges or the capital before the winter closes in, he will have all winter to consolidate his hold. He will gain followers and Her Grace will lose them, murdered the day Tasmôrden sets Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles foot in Ilefínian. But I have never needed explain war to you.”

Uwen and the guards had told him Ylesuin would not wage war in winter. But Tristen himself wished the contrary… nor at all the hesitant, difficult sort of warfare he kept hearing proposed as winter raids. He knew who and where Tasmôrden was: the strongest of the rebel claimants to the Regency of Elwynor camped on the road that led equally to Guelessar or to the Elwynim capital of Ilefínian.

Tasmôrden was thus able to go either direction, and to go quickly.

Cefwyn hoped Lord Elfharyn in the capital, loyal to Ninévrisë’s father Uleman, could hold the capital in her name through the winter… and divide Tasmôrden’s attention. But if Tasmôrden ceased to believe their feints at the bridges, and if Ilefínian fell to Tasmôrden quickly, and he was then able to secure himself behind Ilefínian’s walls before the snows, then… then it was a far grimmer situation, with many of Ninévrisë’s people in a way to suffer for it, and many to pay with their lives.

“We should have camps across the river,” Tristen said to Cefwyn.

“We should cross the bridges now. We should make the threat so strong he will have to regard it, and not dare move on Ilefínian.”

“
If
Lord Brysaulin can find me wagons. I have had some moved in.

But how many others might I rely on? Gods know. My chancellor counted haystacks, not wagons.”

Wagons. Always there was the consideration of moving in force, never striking with the light cavalry, which Tristen would have wished, against this quick-footed enemy. He had believed from the first day in Guelessar that they should move at once and not delay for marriages and swearings and musters and the objections of all Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles the northern barons. He had thought the first time he had heard of Tasmôrden rising against Ninévrisë’s claim to the Regency that they should be straightway across the river on the southern bridges out of Amefel, march to the capital with light horse, receive it from Elfharyn, who would almost certainly yield it to Ninévrisë as soon as she appeared at the gates, and only afterward hold the land by drawing heavy forces across from Guelessar… but, no, Cefwyn had to receive the oaths first. Then it was deep autumn. Then they dared not launch a campaign, because it was bound to be laborious and slow in rainy autumn. Tristen frowned at what he heard now, which only confirmed what he had already thought; and now he saw the map as if it were before him, the bridges that led from Amefel to Elwynor repaired this summer; likewise those that had once led from Murandys to Elwynor in the north repaired this fall. “We might still move. Open an attack from Amefel, now. Cevulirn can carry it. You have the oaths. The north may be unready, but the south could march and the north could move as soon as they can. In the meanwhile Tasmôrden will not have Ilefínian.”

“We have to move as planned. The eastern and northern barons must come in…”

“No.”

“No?” Cefwyn looked wryly astonished, not angry; but only then did Tristen recall that no one said no to Cefwyn these days.

“No, sir,” he said doggedly, compounding the offense, such as it was, out of his friendship and the fact that for a month he had had no chance to give his views. “Move Ivanor in from the south, out of Amefel. That would save Ilefïnian. It lies far closer to that border.

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles Tasmôrden would
know
a force out of Amefel could come at his back at the river, and he would race to reach the capital to prevent us taking it. We could move faster, with only the light horse, out of his east. If he besieged the town, that would put him between two and even three forces if you brought in the heavy cavalry from the north and the Lanfarnessemen came in from the southwest.”

He thought that Cefwyn would agree. The resolution seemed there for an instant, the fierce enthusiasm of the summer. But worry and doubt worked there, too, and he saw Cefwyn’s deep unhappiness and disbelief in his own answer.

“We cannot.”

“But if we had the Guelen cavalry and the Ivanim, moving quickly

—before the snow—would the north object to winning the war, sir?”

“The south must not be the source for a move across the river.”

“It only makes sense—”

“The south is tainted with sorcery, do you see?”

“Not since Lewen field—”

“In Guelen minds it is tainted with sorcery. Amefel is full of heretics

—in Guelen minds. Her Grace must win based in the
east
. In the
east
of Elwynor are folk strongly kin to Guelessar and Murandys, Guelen in all but name, and even some Ryssandim. I know, I know you see the way clear, you do have a strong argument, and if it were all a soldier’s reasoning, Tristen, I would entirely agree with you. It would save lives, and very precious ones, particularly of Her Grace’s best advisers. But it is not a soldier’s reckoning; it never was. It is a king’s reckoning, and a new king’s at that. I must come Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles at this war from the north and east for the same reason I ask Efanor to make a staunch Quinaltine out of the least likely man in my kingdom. It is
appearances
, Tristen, all appearances. For very good reasons the
north
must win significant victories in this war. Then it will be their victory, not the south’s, and because it is their victory, and their
northern
glory, they will support the agreements we make and help me forge a peace out of this long war. No. It is not all a soldierly reckoning. But it is the one that will have a peace at the end of it.“

Not if Ilefínian falls first, Tristen thought to himself, seeing a walled city, a towered city as vividly as he saw it in his dreams. And for this instant he dreamed of it in hostile hands, and saw the war dragging on in what might
not
be easy victories for the Guelenfolk.

He saw blood flowing, and knew that the satisfaction of the northern barons would wait into summer, and into greater and greater hazard.

“Does Her Grace agree with the plan?” he asked Cefwyn pointedly; and Cefwyn frowned darkly.

“No,” Cefwyn said. “She does not agree. But the plain fact is, we simply must not seem to encourage the tainted south. The entire question regards Elwynor’s fate, Elwynor’s freedom, and the treaty.

It’s not a great war, it’s a little war, and we must run the risk to give the north its importance.”

He was entirely appalled.
The tainted south
, as of Cevulirn, and Sovrag, and Pelumer, even proper and rigidly Quinalt Umanon, who had stood with them at Lewenbrook?
The tainted south
? Cefwyn spoke in disparagement of others’ opinions of it, he was sure of that.

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles And, a little war? Men would die, and the longer they drew this out, the more men would die.

“The same as the penny,” Cefwyn said, “the same as our agreement with the Quinalt. It is appearances. And, forgive me, I have to command and lead the northern barons in the field. Because of appearances, since the Aswydds, I have appointed no lord in Amefel and left the province vacant. I will elevate
none
of the Amefin earls to power on that southern border, because I will not have the entire south, with an Amefin duke, playing ducks and drakes with policy by urging their views, meddling with those bridges—or leading armies and forcing a fight. I have a viceroy there, and I keep it so. I will
not
have help from the south, above all else.”

“Yet you had Cevulirn stay at court. Is he the tainted south?”

“Never! Never in my heart. I trust him. I do trust him. He knows the game. He knows what I have to contend with. As Idrys knows. As you are most surely learning. We cannot always do what is most soldierly. We have to do what is politic. And what is politic is a northern victory, and an advance through these specific villages that will settle
appearances
for the Guelenmen I lead; gods help me.”

He was not done with questions. Too much was cast in doubt. “You trust Lanfarnesse. And Olmern.”

“Lanfarnesse commits to nothing. Olmern…
far
too unsubtle.”

Sovrag was only recently a lord, and indeed, would not be at home in the Guelen court. Sovrag had nearly caused a duel in his few days here, except the king had forbidden it. Lanfarnesse, old Duke Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles Pelumer, would protect his own folk first, but even so, Pelumer would have been a strong support to Cefwyn, stronger by far than Murandys.

“No,” Cefwyn said further. “Believe me in this.

Hard enough that I swore all the south to me before I took the northern oaths, hard enough that I came back with a wedding sworn, sealed, and sure before the north ever had wind of it. And this last I say to you in secret, a thing that only Idrys knows… only Idrys.

Once the wedding is done, once we have the Quinalt seal on that document, we shall indeed advance to the river and set up martial camps, not only on this side, following
exactly
the path you suggest, and threaten Tasmôrden before the snow lies deep.”

“And shall we move in Amefel as well?”

“Not in Amefel. We’ll have men under canvas in the snow, come what may, making sure of those eastern bridges, distracting Tasmôrden and his conspirators from Ilefínian.”