Knights Magi (Book 4) (74 page)

Rondal almost reached out to Tyndal, mind-to-mind, during their long, lusty night, but something held him back.  This moment was to be shared without magic, he decided.  He could feel Tyndal’s participation in the tryst, and he even reacted when his rival counseled a change of positions and manner of fulfillment.  But the feelings and emotions were too intense for mere words.  Ishi’s blessing, Rondal decided, was to sand away such rough emotions under the relentless refreshment of the pleasures she ordained.

They lay together late into the night, enjoying the safety and security and the intense intimacy of each other.  But in the morning, the three were quiet as they dressed in the chill and prepared to return to Maramor to reunite with the rest of the unit.

That was fun, last night
, Tyndal sent to Rondal as they saddled the horses.

Yeah,
Rondal replied, non-commitally.  Then he had to grin despite himself.  It had been a whole lot of fun, he admitted to himself.  He felt . . . renewed. 
I enjoyed it.  I think Belsi did, too.

I know she did,
agreed Tyndal, confidently. 

So why did she go to your bed first?
Rondal asked, hating himself for feeling compelled to.

You want to know the truth?
Tyndal asked, after a pause.

Rondal considered.  He wished he was the kind of man who could just accept convenient fictions, but he wasn’t. 
Yes, I want to know the truth.

Well, she said she didn’t come to plead for her life,
Tyndal said. 
She said she was just scared, she felt rejected and depressed after Alwer’s death, and she was looking for comfort.

With you,
Rondal finished, dully.

Tyndal paused and considered. 
Yes, with me,
he admitted. 
I’m sorry, but that’s how it happened.  I didn’t ask her to.

So why didn’t she stay with you?  Why did she come to my bed?

Because I told her I wouldn’t even consider such a thing with her after she had treated you so cruelly.  She knows you have feelings for her, but she stepped all over them the moment I showed up.  That touched my sense of honor.

You have a sense of honor?  But wait, you told her no . . . because of how she treated
me?

I told her that I wouldn’t so much as speak with her intimately until she was square with you.  I won’t favor a girl who treats my friends like that.  It’s disloyal.

I . . . thanks,
Rondal replied, for want of anything else he could think of. 

And she does like you, you idiot,
Tyndal insisted. 
She just likes me more. 

Asshole!

“Lady Arsella, your mount is saddled and waiting,” Tyndal called formally.  He turned to Rondal.  “You scryed the route?”

“It’s deserted,” he said, taking the saddle.  “We should be back at Maramor in a few hours.  Less, if we have to run for our lives.”

They walked the horses, keeping them on the dry edges of the road and not the muddy channel in the center, and barely spoke in the cool autumn morning.  Rondal welcomed the silence.  As pleasant as the previous evening was, he had a major decision to make about the girl who had been so giving of herself.  And he realized how he had complicated his decision even further.

The short journey back to Maramor passed without incident, until they came to Maramor Village.  There they were challenged by a sentry, an armored man with a crossbow hiding in a blind made from a burned-out hovel.  He accepted their passwords and blew a very short single note on the horn he carried before letting them pass.

Maramor looked almost like home, when they saw it.  But once they passed the gate, it looked less like home and a lot more like a military camp.  While the lads were on their mission, an unexpected party arrived from the south: Marshal Brendan, on a surprise inspection and re-supply  tour.  The guard at the gate informed them of his presence.  He had arrived with a hundred commandos, part of the Third, who would be temporarily based at Maramor before spreading out to other outposts in Gilmora. 

Rondal looked around in amazement.  The courtyard bustled with activity, and the stables were beyond capacity. And with Marshal Brendan here . . .

“Take . . . Lady Arsella to her quarters,” Rondal ordered Tyndal in a low voice.  “Keep her there, for now.”

“But I—” Belsi began, her eyes open wide at the press of activity.

“I have to brief the Marshal,” Rondal explained quickly, in a low voice.  “I have a lot of briefing to do, actually, after that raid.  It might be awhile before we discuss your case.  Just . . . stay in your room and stay quiet while I handle this.”

“Listen to him, Belsi,” Tyndal urged, just above a whisper.  “He’s smarter than you and me put together, and he knows what to do.”

Rondal tried to look confident at the compliment – he was surprised at Tyndal’s assessment – but then he realized he was just trying to make
her
feel better.  He wasn’t trying to encourage Rondal. 

That was almost a relief – if Tyndal started being respectful and conciliatory to him, it might serve as proof of madness.  He relaxed, handed his reins to a stableboy – when the hell did they get a stableboy? – and entered the re-inhabited great hall of the manor.

With the additional men, the place was crowded.  Rondal wondered how the suddenly over-taxed kitchen would  struggle to feed them all.  Walven was standing near the fireplace, speaking with a group of men who Rondal assumed were his comrades from the Third Commando.  His squadmate saw him and beamed. 

“This is Commander Sir Rondal of Sevendor, gentlemen,” he introduced Rondal, pulling him forward by his hand.  “Sir Rondal is the knight mage in command of this outpost for the moment.  My lord, it pleases me to present Ancient Oskad, and sergeants Reithe and Drafan.”  Rondal found himself bowing to three men much older than he.  The point was noticed.

“Begging your pardon, milord,” Oskad – a large, well-muscled balding man in his early thirties –said with only a token trace of apology in his voice, “but aren’t you more of an age to be tending the horses, not commanding them?” 

Rondal could appreciate why the man was skeptical: there were plenty of young snots whose pedigree got them a command, he knew, not their experience.  It would be easy enough to assume that’s how Rondal got his.  But if Oskad didn’t know who Rondal was, then he must have just arrived.

There was a time for modesty and a time for boldness, as Sire Cei was fond of saying, and meeting a military subordinate you may command was a time for the latter.  Timidity earned you no respect, when meeting a man for the first time.  If he was a good Ancient – and Rondal could only assume he was, based on what he knew of the new Royal Commandos – then he was right to be skeptical.

“I’ve done my time with shit-work,” Rondal dismissed.  “I’m just an up-jumped bastard warmage, so don’t kiss my ass too hard.  I
work
for a living.”

“You’ve seen battle?” asked Reithe in such a conversational tone that it subtextually implied a challenge.  Rondal responded coolly, as he knew he should.

“Today?  No.  But my second and I just eliminated an enemy depot a half-day’s ride north of here yesterday.  And we destroyed a few patrols a few days before.  It’s been a quiet week.”  He was just as casual.  It seemed to impress the men – but it didn’t end the challenge.

“So you’ve only seen fights with gurvani, then?” asked Drafan, a slender, dark-haired man in his late twenties.  A veteran campaigner, if Rondal was a judge.  “Never against humans?”

Rondal fixed the man with a steely stare. 
Only
gurvani?  “Humans?  A few times.  And I understand why you might not think a few scrugs are very noteworthy.  But they’re just part of this war.  Soldier, may I ask how many
dragons
you’ve faced?  Or shall we limit our count to trolls?”

Drafan looked startled and had no reply – but his mates laughed uproariously.  Drafan joined in, after a moment.  He might be seen as merely a liar of the first order, but Rondal knew his presentation had been convincing even if the man doubted the truth of his deeds.

“No offense meant, Commander,” Oskad assured him with a grin.  “Just getting to know our officers.  Walven has mentioned you’ve run a model operation, here, he just didn’t mention your . . . lack of experience.”

He meant his age, Rondal knew.  “Ancient, I’ve been fighting goblins on and off for almost three years,” Rondal explained, “when I wasn’t learning magic on the fly or cramming my skull full of useful stuff.  I daresay I’ve seen more blood than most men twice my age.  But that doesn’t mean I know what the hells I’m doing.”

“If you and your mate destroyed an enemy installation yesterday,” Drafan observed, “you must be faking it pretty well.”

That caught Rondal short.  The last two days had felt like a running disaster.  But when viewed like that . . .

“I’ll catch up with you gentlemen after I’ve spoken with the Marshal,” he promised, “and if there’s a keg of beer or a bottle of spirits in this dump, we’ll drain it.”

“One more thing, before you go, begging your pardon,” Oskad said, catching his elbow and speaking earnestly.  “Rumor has it that the scrugs are using mutts, now, in force.  Any truth to that?”  That was something Ron felt he could speak with with some authority, owing to his last encounter with them.

“All too true, and they are bigger than any cur you’ve laid eyes on,” Rondal assured.  “Fast, too.  Riders carry bows, javelins, swords, and bolos.  They work in packs.  We faced one yesterday.”

“Any advice?” the Ancient asked, thoughtfully.  Rondal appreciated that.  Here was a man of his craft.

“Remember,” he said, after considering a moment, “They’re big mean dogs, but they’re just dogs.  They act like dogs.  Apart from using magic, you can distract them or confuse them.  They hate high-pitched sounds, like dogs.  And even though they’re vicious, they have their weaknesses.  When they’re attacking in relays, you defend in relays.  Attack the mutts, not the riders.  Don’t let them get on either side of you.  Oh, and get your hands on all the demon pepper powder you can – they
hate
that stuff.  It burns their eyes and confuses their noses.”

He hoped the advice was helpful, he thought to himself as he tiredly mounted the stairs toward his office, where he’d been told the Marshal awaited him.  It had been dearly won, but perhaps if it saved some of his comrades, poor Alwer’s sacrifice might mean something after all.

The rest of the day was filled with meetings and briefings with the Marshal and the officers of the 3rd Commando, as well as a walking inspection of Maramor and an in-depth discussion about the local situation over maps.  By midnight, Marshal Brendan was satisfied that this advanced base was well-chosen and well-maintained, and he retired after commending Rondal on it.

But that did not end his day.  Then he had to make further detailed reports, mind-to-mind, to Commander Terleman and Master Minalan about the raid and its results, especially in regard to the siege worms and their capabilities.  By the time finished and he stumbled into his bed it was the darkest part of the night.

He did not wake until midmorning, when Tyndal brought him a plate and a bottle of ale.

“You’ve got the whole manor abuzz,” he confided in his fellow knight as Rondal gratefully ate breakfast.  “I don’t know what you said to those commandos when you came in, but everyone is talking about you like you’re a genius.”

“Me?  How so?”

“According to that big bald ancient, you had a detailed set of tactics for evading pursuit and combating the new enemy cavalry,” Tyndal chuckled.  “He was so impressed that he had me describe the whole procedure to the men at dinner last night while you and Brendan were in conference.  Now everyone thinks you’re a military prodigy.”

“Everyone must have been drinking heavily,” dismissed Rondal.  “Any sign of patrols still searching for us?”

“Falyar returned this morning from a sweep along the main road, but not one scrug.  I’ve scryed the area, too.  I think we lost them.  Brendan wants to send a squad of rangers to permanently occupy Farune, though, and find another such decoy refuge to the east.  And a place further south for a line-of-retreat, in case Maramor is endangered.”

“I know,” sighed Rondal tiredly as he sipped his ale.  “I’m the one who suggested it to him.  The idea is to set up a network of clandestine outposts of Royal Commandos all across northern Gilmora.  Decentralized, small, and easy-to-abandon little bases.  Using them for intelligence gathering, civilian rescue, and counter-insurgency – more or less what we’ve been doing the last few days.”

“That doesn’t sound like a very decisive measure,” Tyndal said, making a face.  He preferred an old-fashioned charge to all of this thoughtful consideration.

“It isn’t meant to be,” agreed Rondal.  “The gurvani are preparing for a push south into the rest of Gilmora next year, and the only castle big enough to stop them flat is Darkfaller, away to the south.  With those siege worms at their disposal, they’ll be able to open up anything smaller than a baronial castle like a chamber pot lid.”

“And a bunch of lightly-armed commandos hiding in the bushes is supposed to stop them?” asked Tyndal with a snort.