Squire (16 page)

“Shinko?” Neal interrupted.

Kel smiled. “It’s her nickname - she gave me permission to use it when we were little. Anyway, she wants to hear about that bandit hunt I was on this summer. Lord Raoul is in the book room - he’s really good at helping people to relax. If you lads - “

“I am a man, I’ll have you know,” Neal said loftily, putting a hand on his chest. “Five years older - “

Kel elbowed him, ruining his dignity. Yuki covered a giggle with her fan. “Hasn’t Lady Alanna taught you not to interrupt?” Kel asked. “Pay attention. Can you two” - she looked from him to Cleon - “get Roald interested? Otherwise he won’t come - he’ll think Shinko will be bored. And she won’t say anything to him. She’s worried he’ll believe she’s unmaidenly for wanting to hear about it.” Shinko had let a few interesting things slip during morning glaive practices. “If we get them together with Lord Raoul, though, and maybe Commander Buri, they’ll be so interesting that Roald and Shinko might relax.”

“Why would he think she’s unmaidenly?” protested Cleon. “His own mother hunts bandits.”

“Prince Eitaro told my lady that men with unconventional mothers want conventional wives,” Yuki said, her round cheeks red with vexation. “I don’t think it’s true - “

“Me neither,” chorused Roald’s three friends. They grinned at one another.

“This plan is good,” Yuki said, closing her fan with a decisive snap. She tapped Neal’s chest with it. “Signal me when you have Prince Roald’s interest,” she ordered him, and bustled off.

“Bossy little thing,” Neal said to no one in particular. “Let’s go hook Roald, Cleon.”

Kel went to talk with Raoul. He was eager to help, if it didn’t mean leaving the book room. Kel suspected he was also glad to have a good excuse if the king asked him where he’d been. She found Buri, who was more than happy to join them.

It was some time before Kel, Neal, and Cleon were finally able to join the book room gathering after the second shift of squires arrived to take their tasks. The prince and princess were caught up, asking sharp questions of the two commanders and of Kel herself. Kel noted Roald’s look of wonder and pleasure as Shinko revealed a thorough grasp of strategy, supply problems, and tracking. Pressed by Raoul and Buri to tell what she knew, she described Yamani battles and tactics. From there talk ranged over other battles against immortals, bandit chasing in Tortall and the Yamani Islands, and the latest round of trouble with Scanra.

Others came and left: Lady Haname, Kel’s parents, Sir Gareth and Lady Cythera, the queen. Roald’s knight-master, Lord Imrah, stayed for some time. Everyone groaned when Imrah’s lady dragged him away at last.

Slowly the group shrank to its original members. Neal and Yuki then left for a mages’ party. The prince and princess left together, debating the advantages of crossbows over longbows.

Raoul, Buri, Kel, and Cleon watched them go. “Who would have thought?” murmured Cleon. “She looks like she’d break if you touched her too hard.”

Kel got to her feet. “Come to the training yard the queen’s ladies use some morning and see how fragile she is.” She covered a yawn. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m asleep on my feet.”

Cleon got up. “Gods, I’ve yet to finish wrapping gifts.”

Buri and Raoul waved to them and continued their conversation.

“So have you survived your first night of squire social duty?” asked Cleon as they wound their way through the last partygoers in the Crystal Room.

“It could’ve been worse,” Kel replied. “I’m just sleepy.”

“You see Lord Raoul at parties and balls, and he looks like a piece of wood,” Cleon said as they walked down the hall. “But he isn’t, is he?”

Kel shook her head. “He’s completely different with me and the men.” She smiled. “Something he said once - I guess a lot of mothers with daughters to marry off come after him at these things.”

Cleon’s smile was crooked. “There are a lot of them, and they can be persistent.”

They had reached the place where their paths separated. Kel looked up at Cleon. “I wouldn’t know,” she teased. “I don’t have to worry about matchmaking mothers.”

Cleon leaned down and pressed his lips gently to hers. “Midwinter luck, Kel,” he whispered. He turned crimson, and strode down the hall.

Kel stood there for some time, completely poleaxed.

The next evening Cleon had duty at a different party from Kel. That’s a relief, she told herself as she offered sweetmeats to the heads of guilds and their wives. Of course it’s a relief, not to see him so soon. I need time to decide what to say to him, or what to do, when I see him. Particularly what I’ll do. Not that I plan to do anything.

Then they didn’t serve together at any other Midwinter parties. Kel only glimpsed him once, at a distance. She told herself that she was not unhappy that he hadn’t seen her.

She kept busy. She tended the griffin, who was quiet after his encounter with Daine. She practiced weapons with the queen, the Yamanis, and her mother, and rode Peachblossom and Hoshi. She wrapped and sent out her Midwinter gifts the day before the longest night of the year, and opened hers the next morning. Her unknown benefactor had not vanished with Raoul’s taking her on - among her gifts was a splendid brass-mounted spyglass, one that Raoul threatened to steal. Raoul himself had given Kel a beautifully made pair of armored gauntlets that were nearly as flexible as cloth gloves, and padded inside for warmth. Kel’s gift to him was the best feathers shed by the griffin, each bright orange and perfect. Kel knew she could have sold them, but the look on Raoul’s face when he thanked her was more valuable.

Kel had started something with the book room conversation. Others like it continued during the holiday parties. Raoul and Buri presided; Shinkokami and her Yamani ladies and Prince Roald and his friends always came, though plenty of others took part. Warfare wasn’t the only topic. The Tortallans were curious about Yamani customs and history; the reverse was true of the Yamanis. They could ask any question about the Eastern Lands and no one would laugh. Kel felt a little smug as she watched Roald and Shinkokami lose their shyness with one another. It was nice to end the old year with a good idea.

During the festivities Kel thought of those squires who faced their Ordeals that year. Each night one of them held vigil; each morning one entered the Chamber at dawn. Did they have visions in the chapel? Kel wondered as she filled glasses and served food. Did they touch that iron door in the night, or were they content to face the Chamber only when the time came to walk into it?

Despite her curiosity she never joined the cluster of family and friends that waited for the squires to leave the Chamber. It didn’t seem right, as if it were indecent for her to look on the squires’ faces just then.

That year ten of them entered the Chamber, three more than the holiday had nights. Afterward Kel waited three days, to allow for cleaning, before she went into the chapel alone. She didn’t think she broke any rules doing this, but she had to be alone in any event.

The chapel smelled of beeswax and cleansing herbs. The sun disk shone from a recent polishing. Only the Chamber door looked the same as it had that summer.

Kel shivered: the room was cold. She blew on her fingers, then pressed her hands flat on the cold iron.

Something bound her from shoulders to feet, locking her arms against her sides and her legs together. The binding was tight, though she saw nothing but the clothes she wore. Another band lay over her mouth, gagging her.

She stood at one end of a long room. Next to her was a line of people who passed - without looking her way. One at a time they advanced to a table nearly ten yards from Kel. She could smell them, it was so real: soap, damp wool, fear-sweat. She knew most of them: Lalasa’s friend Tian, Bernin from Owlshollow, the girl whose doll she’d found at Haresfield, the girl’s mother, Shinkokami, Jump, Peachblossom, Lerant.

Kel twisted frantically, trying to get free, with no luck. She could not move or utter a sound. Fighting to catch her breath, Kel stared at the table. Duke Turomot, the Lord Magistrate, consulted a long sheet of parchment; Ebroin of Genlith, the steward for the lord of Stone Mountain, manipulated a large abacus as the duke spoke. They sat behind the table. Joren of Stone Mountain leaned on it, beautiful in black velvet, his hair pale gold against the dense black. He smiled mockingly at the people in the line.

“Lalasa Isran,” Ebroin said clearly, taking up his abacus.

Kel wrenched hard at her bindings. A muscle pulled in her neck, sending a white-hot streak of pain into her skull.

“Dressmaker,” Turomot said, drumming his fingers on the table. Ebroin touched a bead on the abacus. “Breeding age, looks well when clean, strong enough for servant’s work, rarely ill.” For each comment, Ebroin flicked another bead on the abacus. “That is all of worth about her,” Turomot said.

Ebroin calculated a sum on the abacus and wrote it on the slate, which he passed to Joren. The young man looked at it.

“Not interested, “Joren said. “Cull her.”

The centaurs Gray streak and Iriseyes walked out of nowhere to grab Lalasa’s arms. They dragged her to one side. There another centaur clubbed her with a spiked mace. Lalasa fell into a pit in the floor.

“Shinkokami, Yamani princess,” Turomot said, reading from his parchment. “A good bride price, connections, and an alliance with the Yamani Islands. Embroiders, dances, knows the use of weapons.” Ebroin flicked abacus beads and wrote a new total on his slate.

Joren inspected it. “Fifty gold crowns. Not a copper more. It’s risky, taking a woman who uses weapons.”

Turomot nodded. Graystreak and Iriseyes took Shinko’s arms to lead her out.

Bernin stepped up. “Bernin of Owlshollow,” Turomot read from his parchment. “Trained shepherd, a guide - “

Joren raised a hand. “I have no need of shepherds or guides,” he said. “Cull him.”

Kel fought her bonds to stop this, whatever it was, without success. Joren kept Haname and Kel’s mother, sending them to some unknown place, then ordered that the Haresfield girl, Yuki, and Jump be culled. They were clubbed down as Kel fought to do something, anything. She was trying to scream to Peachblossom to run when she fell.

She was in the Chapel of the Ordeal, pouring sweat, her throat raw from smothered screams. Her body ached furiously.

Trembling, she staggered to her feet and stared at the Chamber door, fists clenched. You won’t beat me this way, she told it silently. You will never beat me.

She stalked out, letting the door slam behind her. Only when she reached her room did she allow herself to cry. The sight of those familiar bodies in a bloody heap would haunt her for weeks.

ten
THE GREAT PROGRESS BEGINS

Third Company took to the road just two days after Kel’s encounter with the Chamber door, to escort the outgoing Tyran ambassador to his own border. They rode south on a trip Lerant mockingly described as “departing the land of snow and sleet for the land of rain and sleet.”

Kel was relieved to be away. She hadn’t seen Cleon privately since that astonishing kiss. She couldn’t decide if she wanted to see him or never to see him again. She didn’t know which would be worse, finding that he’d done it on a dare or that he’d done it because he’d wanted to. Either reason meant a rat’s nest of problems.

At the Tyran border they said farewell to the outgoing ambassador and welcomed the new one. Third Company got ten days to recuperate before they escorted the new ambassador and his lady to Corus. Kel, seeing all of the goods in the Pearlmouth marketplaces, did some of her shopping for next Midwinter. The way things went with the Own, she wanted to do such tasks when she could. An emergency might interfere later.

In February after they returned to Corus, Third Company headed down the coast. They were accompanied by Baron George Cooper of Pirate’s Swoop, a man people both pitied and looked down on for marrying Alanna the Lioness. Kel watched him intently. She wanted to know why the Lioness had married this man, who wasn’t even handsome, for all that he was well muscled for someone in his late forties. The only attractive thing about him was a pair of humorous hazel eyes. Nice eyes hardly seemed to Kel like grounds for marriage.

The baron had heard of pirates who spent the winter near a town called Bay Cove. He led Third Company there over a series of goat trails. It gave them a good vantage point from which to scout the pirates’ nest and plan their attack. There was a short, pitched fight, which Third Company won easily. Kel did little more than stand by Raoul, listening to the orders he gave and the reports he got. With pirates in tow, they sought the Port Legann magistrate. That meant another series of trials, another set of executions. More than once she wished there were a different way to handle murderers.

In March they stayed with the Bazhir. Kel, Lerant, Dom, and some of the others raced against the Bazhir, though Kel seldom won. Hoshi was fast and strong, but she was no match for the dainty-boned Bazhir horses, called by their proud owners “children of the wind.” Raoul gave her more jousting lessons, something that puzzled Bazhir men and amused Bazhir women. They would gather around Kel afterward to put balm on her bruises and tease her.

They spent April on the banks of the Drell River, which flooded when the winter snows melted. Kel’s back was a solid ache as she labored with Raoul and the men to shore up the flood walls.

In early May they returned to the Bazhir and helped the headman of the Sunset Dragon tribe celebrate the birth of twins to his wife. After that Raoul led them back to the palace.

There wasn’t a noble in sight. The immense parade of the Great Progress, designed to introduce Tortallans to Shinkokami and to renew the people’s ties to the monarchs, had departed. With it rode courtiers, maids, hostlers, clerks, barbers, huntsmen, guards, cooks, errand boys, and anyone else who might prove useful. The palace was not deserted: while the nobles might be gone, hordes of workmen had arrived to fix anything that needed repair, apply fresh coats of paint and whitewash, and pursue other loud, dusty tasks. The kingdoms administrators still worked at their desks. The courts still met; the officials who ran the kingdom’s tax collections and postal service labored here. Still, compared to the palace at Midwinter, Kel found the place sadly empty.

“Peace and quiet!” Raoul said as his company rode into their courtyard. “I revel in it!”

“But we will be catching up?” prodded Flyndan.

“When we’re rested,” said Raoul gravely. “I myself feel quite tired.”

“And every time you get the bit between your teeth and decide you don’t care what the king wants, you two end up butting heads. One day you won’t be able to charm your way out of a royal reprimand.” Flyn kept his voice low - only Kel heard him, though she pretended she didn’t.

“He wouldn’t butt heads with me if he didn’t keep using us like a garland of pearls to dress up his majesty,” Raoul said, keeping his own voice down. “We’re a combat unit, not a dance troupe. We leave when we’re rested.”

Flyndan shook his head and dismounted.

They had two lazy weeks before a firm message arrived from the king. Third Company packed and rode slowly for six days. At last they topped a ridge that overlooked the city of Whitethorn, tucked into a delta formed by the rivers Olorun and Tirragen. There they watched the fat, glittering serpent of the royal progress come into view. The local people had the same idea: they lined the road in their festival best, all wearing some bit of royal blue ribbon. More people flooded onto the road through Whitethorn’s open gates, eager to see the realm’s notables.

The city was swathed in banners and garlands. Tortallan and Yamani flags waved atop every tower. Grave town fathers in long robes and elegant hats stood on the wall over the main gate. Little girls in white bearing flower garlands stood with them.

The procession came on. With her new spyglass Kel could see the riders behind the heralds. The king and queen rode with Roald and Shinkokami between them. Prince Eitaro scowled on the king’s right - Kel knew his arthritis must be bothering him - as his wife serenely guided her mount on the queen’s left. Behind Thayet rode her ladies, fourteen young women of good family and education, who could grace a party and ride and shoot well enough to keep up with Queen Thayet in an emergency. Yuki and Lady Haname rode with them. Kel smiled: her Yamani friends had been adopted.

“Don’t be greedy,” Dom said, elbowing her. “A chivalrous knight shares.”

His nearness still did mad things to her emotions, though lately she kept thinking about Cleon, wondering what it would be like to kiss him back. Kel handed over the spyglass. “Try not to steam it up looking for pretty girls,” she ordered. The griffin cawed and flapped from his post on the placid Hoshi’s saddle horn, as if he echoed Kel.

“You just don’t understand a fellow’s interest in females,” Dom murmured, glued to the spyglass.

“How many fighters are with them?” asked Raoul.

“Four Rider Groups,” replied Dom. “The Fourth - the Queen’s Rabbits. The… First. They don’t have a nickname,” Dom said when Kel made a questioning noise. “They’re just the First. The Fourteenth, Gret’s Shadows, and the Seventeenth, Group Askew. There’s Commander Buri. Oh, splendid - Captain Glaisdan and First Company. He looks as sour as a pickled beet.”

“If he’s wearing his old-style armor, probably his face is the same color,” Flyndan said. “Why couldn’t that fusspot stay at the palace? First Company’s all wrong for this.”

“If I pretend I like you, squire, can I use the spyglass?” Lerant asked Kel.

“Please don’t try,” she replied. “You’re not that good an actor. Dom, he can look when you’re done.”

“Some people are cocky ever since they killed a whole centaur,” Lerant remarked to the air.

“Some people are annoying,” Dom retorted, giving him the spyglass. “So, Kel, about the Yamani ladies…”

The royal courier who had twittered at Raoul’s elbow all the way from Corus said, “My lord Knight Commander, why do we hesitate? The king was quite firm - “

“So you’ve said. Often,” Raoul growled, black eyes smoldering. He raised his voice. “My dears, there’s no help for it. Let us join in the panoply.” He urged Amberfire into a careful walk.

Lerant handed the spyglass to Kel and hoisted the Knight Commander’s banner, setting his mount forward. Flyndan joined him, his doughy face as gloomy as Raoul’s.

“Not too fast,” called Raoul. “Lets not scare anyone.”

“His majesty said with all deliberate speed!” chirped the courier. He flinched under Lerant’s glare.

“That’s how we’re doing it,” Raoul told him. “Deliberately.”

Kel hid a smile. Raoul had argued that one company of the Own on progress was sufficient. The king had overruled him and here they were. They merged with the progress, Third Company behind the ranks of nobles as Raoul, attended by Kel, caught up with the monarchs.

The king glanced at Raoul. In a less exalted man his expression might have been called a scowl. Prince Eitaro let Raoul take his place.

“Master Oakbridge has found you hosts to lodge with in the city,” Kel heard Jonathan say coldly as they approached the main gates. “Near the governor’s palace, so you won’t have any excuse for lateness at the social events.”

“As my king orders,” said Raoul, his voice blandly pleasant. Kel glanced at him. What was he up to? The griffin squawked, and she returned to their game: trying to wrestle a rawhide strip out of his beak. He rarely bit or scratched her while playing. The king was also suspicious. “It is, eh?” Raoul indicated the immortal, who growled as he wrestled with the leather. “Did Oakbridge mention our friend?” inquired Raoul. “Where Kel goes, he goes.”

“No one’s going to want a griffin in his house,” the king snapped. “Most folk don’t believe it’s just people who actually handle the thing who get attacked. She’ll have to camp with the rest of the progress.”

“I’m to attend balls and banquets without my squire?” demanded Raoul, all innocence. “I can’t handle things like requesting water to shave with, or getting my clothes pressed. I need Kel.”

“You managed for twenty years,” growled the king, blue eyes flashing in anger.

“This is different,” Raoul informed him.

Jonathan stared grimly ahead, drumming his fingers on his saddle horn. Finally he ordered, “Tell the Lord Seneschal to give you a place in the camp, then. And I expect you to be on time for social events!”

“Sire,” Raoul said, bowing deeply in the saddle. He motioned to the side of the road with his head, and turned Amberfire out of the main parade. Kel followed, her face Yamani-straight.

The Lord Seneschal nearly screamed when he realized he needed to find a place in the camp for the Knight Commander. Drawing up these camps required tact, diplomacy, and quick thinking. Obviously enemies could not pitch their tents side by side, and the most important nobles would not take it well if they camped cheek by jowl with soldiers. For a moment Kel feared the Seneschal was going to have an apoplexy as his face turned a rich plum color. He grabbed a map on a parchment and hurriedly drew a square, putting Raoul’s name on it. He squawked a servant’s name, then turned to his next problem.

The man he’d summoned did not turn colors or raise his voice. He gave a few commands, then led Raoul and Kel down a grassy lane between tents, explaining the customs and layout of the camp. By the time he’d shown Raoul and Kel the privies and open-air kitchens and escorted them to their assigned space, servants had set up a large tent for Raoul, connected to a smaller one for Kel.

“And they say a stolen griffin’s unlucky,” Raoul told her smugly as they inspected their new domain.

At Whitethorn castle a servant directed Kel to an assembly room. She joined other squires to await their usual spate of banquet instructions from the palace master of ceremonies, Upton Oakbridge. He was in hurried conference with a man in Whitethorn colors and a woman who bore the smears and smutches of a cook.

Neal wasn’t present. Cleon was, smiling at her in a way that made her feel odd, warm and shivery at the same time. She wasn’t sure that she liked it and welcomed the distraction of greeting the others. Her five year-mates were present. So were the newest squires.