King's Shield (57 page)

Han slapped him down so hard he went tumbling. But when he sucked in a breath to yell, Gdir reached him first, and stuffed the hem of her smock into his mouth so hard he began to choke, legs kicking, hands clawing desperately though ineffectively, as they were pinned by her knees.

Into his purpling face and frightened eyes she hissed, “Shut it! Shut it! One noise and I’ll kill you myself.”

Billykid turned up both thumbs as best he could with his scrawny wrists pinned to the cavern floor. He looked more like a goat than ever when she turned him loose and he sloped to the back to pout and make vile gestures at Han and Gdir.

Somehow Billykid changed everything, even though he never got to throw a stone at the Venn. Maybe it was going to happen anyway, maybe it was the result of Billykid’s muttered threats and insults, but once the last of the Venn had vanished up the pass in the other direction, and even their marching
thrump, thrump, thrump
had stopped echoing down the pass from above, arguments burst out.

As always, Lnand was the loudest and most persistent, shouting everyone down until she had their attention. “We
have
to go check the castle. We just
have
to,” she began in a tragic tone, and went in an anguished, quivering voice: surely someone was there. Her father was smart, so was the Jarlan. Maybe they’d decided there were too many Venn, and they were hiding.

In Lnand’s mind, it was all over. She had an intense, bright vision of all the grown-ups crowding around, proclaiming the children to be heroes for staying put while the Venn . . . did whatever they were doing. She very badly wanted to get home, get praise, and maybe her father would make honey-topped cornbread for everyone.

But there was no agreement in either Han’s or Gdir’s faces. She stamped her foot. “You with
two
parents might not care, but
I
only have a
father,
and I might even be an
orphan
!”

Han’s mind had been wandering, the way it always did when Lnand acted the pug. So she was as surprised as anyone when one moment Lnand was standing in the center of all the children, her palm to her heart, and then she was tussling in the dust with Gdir, kicking, gouging, grunting and yowling in a horrible struggle that looked and sounded like the castle cats during mating season.

The children all gave voice, the older boys shrieking with laughter, shouting insults and encouragements, the smalls wailing and sobbing.

Han screamed, “Stop! Stop!” until her throat hurt.

No one was listening.

She looked around. No, she couldn’t use a weapon, though she wanted to. Ah! The ensorcelled bucket.

Five steps. Splash! Cold water hit squarely in the fighting girls’ faces. They rolled apart, Lnand’s fingers clutching tufts of Gdir’s pale hair. Gdir stood still, too shocked to make a noise. Her scalp felt like it had been ripped off her skull and her hair was filthy with mud, as were her clothes. Her front was sodden.

But everyone turned to Lnand, who was
bleeding
.

Beads of blood had welled where Gdir had scratched her face, running together in the splash. In the shadowy cave, to the excited children, the trickles looked like gouts of blood. Lnand commenced wailing and sobbing as she staggered toward her bedroll, pulling everyone after her.

When Han couldn’t see her face, she could hear the falsity in her voice. Oh, sure, that scratch had to hurt, but they’d gotten worse slipping on rocks during their stalking games when camping, and no one had peeped (including Lnand) because tears meant instant dismissal back to the castle and the lazaretto.

Han turned her back. Gdir stood where she was, trembling all over. She hadn’t even pushed her muddy hair, tangled as it was, out of her eyes. This was the girl who braided her hair twice a day—at dawn and before bed—because she couldn’t stand mess.

Gdir said brokenly, between half-suppressed sobs deep in her chest, “She’s even a pug about-about—!
Orphan.
L-l-like she’s the only—my father. W-w-with the Jarl.
Your
father, day watch captain of the outer gate. My m-m—” She shut her mouth so hard that Han heard her teeth click.

Han rubbed her itchy scalp. She hated to think about her mother up on the west tower. Gdir’s mother, as next arms mistress, in charge of the alter watch bow teams. Nobody knew if Gdir’s father, Captain of the Riders, had made it back with the Jarl and the rest of the Riders in time to defend the castle. After watching all those Venn march up the pass, Han didn’t know whether to wish they had or they hadn’t. Since she didn’t know what to think, she’d tried to think only about her orders, and what she would have to report. She didn’t let herself consider to whom she’d be making that report.

Gdir said in a fierce, low voice, “I have to know. I have to go see. If they’re alive. What if they need help?”

Han’s body flared with warning. “That’s against orders! We were told to wait until the king comes.”

“The king isn’t coming, Hadand,” Gdir whispered. “He’s too late. The Venn will get to him first, and they’ll be fighting forever. You saw how many there are! If no one comes for us in a day, I think we should go see ourselves.” Her voice changed, pleading. “Not right out in the open. At night, on the stalk.”

“No.”

“You can lead us. You’re good on the stalk.”

Han wavered, then crossed her arms tight. “No. The Jarlan’s orders were to wait. Ndand’s orders were to wait. We have enough food back there for weeks. So Ndand thought we might have to wait weeks.”

“You don’t care,” Gdir began.

Han gave way to her own temper. “If you start pugging like Lnand—”

She never got a chance to finish the threat. Gdir’s hand came round so fast Han only registered it just before it hit her face.

Gdir backed up, staring at her hand, and at Han, who had staggered back, her face buzzing like it had been stung by a thousand bees.

Gdir whirled around and ran to the back, where the water trickled down the wall from a crack way up in the shadows.

Han ignored Gdir for the rest of the day. Her cheek throbbed as she got everyone to clean up and organize the cavern. Then she conducted warm-ups for the first time, and the snap of her voice got them all in line and working their best.

All except Gdir.

Lnand abandoned her languishing pose when everyone else was intent on warm-ups, and with a tragic air of sacrifice, she drifted to the front. She made what looked like the supreme effort as she took up the rhythm, favoring one knee and one wrist, and making faces of silent suffering. The younger girls and all the smalls moved closer to her. A few of the boys called the gruff, joking encouragement they got from their older brothers, now away at the academy.

When Han, who watched narrowly, saw the familiar small smile Lnand couldn’t quite hide, she picked up the pace, ignoring Lnand’s limping and posturing. She also ignored Gdir, who remained a silent hunched ball of misery at the far end of the cavern.

The rest of the day they played blind-stalk, the one with the blindfold having to use other senses to catch people sneaking slantwise across the cavern and back. It was a great training game, one of the favorites, and the winners got a lick of honey.

At supper time Han ordered no lighting of the Fire Stick, and no one protested.

Gdir did not speak to Han or to Lnand. In fact, they did not see Gdir speak to anyone, but suddenly the eights and Hal, the nine-year-old, swarmed around Han, asking variations on “When can we check the castle?” adding, “We’re cowards if we don’t go. They might need help!”

Han was tired, worried, and unsure about everything. She said angrily, “No castle! If you even bring it up again, then I’ll tell Liet-Jarlan that you broke orders! Now, lights out!”

Though everyone moaned and a few of the eights flipped up the back of their hand at Han (when she couldn’t see), Lnand was relieved. Even then it seemed to take forever to get the smalls settled, especially as they had no more milk and didn’t dare make a fire, so they couldn’t even make warm steep.

But at last the younger children were settled, and Han climbed wearily into her bedroll. The last thing she saw was Gdir lying in her bedroll, Tlennen just beyond. Gdir had moved them away from everyone. Her profile was a pale blotch against the dark stone. From somewhere the faintest gleam reflected in her wide-open eyes.

Han was just as glad not to have her nearby and curled up gratefully. But as disjointed images from the day mixed with memory and as her mind chattered imagined conversations with everybody—all the things she should have said—something bothered her. She kept remembering Gdir’s eyes open and staring in the dark. Was that it?

The creeping sleepies withdrew, and Han too glared upward at the shadow-hidden cavern roof. She didn’t want Gdir to see her checking on her, if she was still awake.

Besides, it wasn’t Gdir that bothered her. It was Tlennen, his bedroll on Gdir’s other side. They’d never done that before. Tlennen had always had his bedroll next to Young Tana, Rosebud’s six-year-old brother.

Slowly, so she wouldn’t be obvious, Han turned over. She eased her head up . . . to see two flat bedrolls.

Han went cold all over. She scrambled out of her bedroll and groped her way to the back where Ndand had set their roll of weapons, with a whole list of terrible threats invisibly attached if they used them in any but dire need.

She unrolled the weave-reinforced canvas with its rows of wave slots holding weapons so they wouldn’t clatter together and nick. She felt her way down with shaking fingers and yes, two bows were missing from their hooks, and one pair of knives.

But Tlennen didn’t have a bow. None of the boys had their own bow until they were older.

Han’s chill turned to sickness. The knives were Gdir’s, of course, but who else was gone? Oh. Yes. Had to be Gdir’s first cousins, seven and eight. The girl cousin, just turned eight, would have her bow.

Han grabbed her own bow, and her knives, but they felt heavy and clumsy, and she knew she couldn’t fight a grown-up with them. But she strapped them on anyway, her hands shaking.

Then she turned away—and tripped over the lantern, set out ready to be lit. It jangled loud as thunder.

Lnand started up. “Who’s there?”

“Me,” Han said.

“Who?” Lnand crawled out of bed.

Han closed the distance, and drew Lnand away, toward the mouth of the cave. After the profound dark of the back, the cavern entrance seemed almost bright in the light of the stars and the rising moon. “Gdir left. Took Tlennen and her cousins. I have to go get them.”

“I’ll go,” Lnand whispered promptly.

Han had figured Lnand would love a night sneak—and a chance to fight Gdir again. “No. You stay here. If something happens to me and Gdir, then you’re in charge.”

Maybe Lnand thought it was dark, but the starlight lit her teeth when she grinned. Han saw that grin, and her annoyance hardened to hate.

She hitched her loose-strung bow over one shoulder and her quiver over the other. She hopped over the low wall and walked out. Lnand called a soft question, words too low to make out. Han ignored her, feeling her way to the trail that led up over the ridge.

The air was soft and warm. Somewhere high up, wings flapped, and a wheeling shape crossed the low half moon. After the cave dark, Han’s eyes had adjusted enough for her to pick out the animal-made ridge trail. Not the one that led down to the pass, but the one that ran parallel to the cliffs. From below you’d be outlined against the sky—the children had discovered that on their campout night sneaks—so they only used that one to travel fast, but never on the sneak. But now, at night, with the Venn gone and no teams of children out roaming, she hoped no one was around to see her.

Still, she remembered Lnand’s pale face, and when she crossed a small stream winding down the mountain from the thunderstorm just after sunset, she stopped and scooped up the soft, silty mud, rubbing it over her face and the tops of her hands. She took off her brown sash and tied it around her head, tucking her braids into it. Then she smeared mud down the bleached muslin of her summer smock. That felt cold and nasty, but she was used to that from their stalking games.

She bent to the trail and stalked over the big ridge that jutted into the pass, forming the first big bend. When she topped that, she caught her first glimpse of Castle Andahi down at the bottom of the pass. It was reassuring to find it just the way it always looked, except for the familiar landslide slanting down to the inner wall on the east side. Relief welled inside her until she realized the ruddy glint of the night torches was missing.

A vague sense of motion caused her to squint at the base of the landslide. Four ghostly blobs were just beginning to climb the long dirt spill.

Had to be Gdir. So she wasn’t marching right up to the castle at least. Looked like she was going to scout by going up the landslide to peer down inside. Han began to scramble down the ridge, her bow bumping on her back. Twice she tripped over unseen roots and fell flat.

She moved faster then the four. Gdir was treading cautiously. Her brother and cousins weren’t very good at night moves yet. Gdir had Tlennen by the hand.

Gdir was a good scout. She spotted Han just as Han reached the landslide, which was disappointing: Han wanted badly to scare Gdir as she deserved.

At least Gdir halted the others about a hundred paces up the steep incline. Little rocks pocketty-pocked down the slope toward the castle, making Han wince as she bent lower and lower, almost crawling.

As soon as she reached Gdir, she put her mouth up to her ear. “I don’t like it. No torches, and I can’t see any sentries.”

Gdir’s wide eyes reflected the moon. “I saw that. Something happened. We need to check.”

Han shivered, though the air was warm. Everything felt wrong now, and not just because they were breaking orders.