Sword (22 page)

"
Lady Corwynall
," she tried, and finally Kyali's gaze drifted to her, light and indifferent as glass. Taireasa opened her mouth to say it, say all of it, but couldn't get the words out. She swallowed, tasting bitter defeat. "What are you thinking?" she said, instead of everything that needed to be spoken. She shut her eyes, hating herself.

"Take my oath," Kyali said. "Tonight. So the army can witness."

Taireasa opened her eyes and glared. "No."

They had carried this argument with them all the way up the mountain. Kyali wouldn't let it go. And she was right, so far as it went. There had been no coronation. They were both of royal blood, and Kyali's renunciation of candidacy for the crown held far less weight now that the kingdom she'd given her allegiance to was overrun by traitors. They were
both
still eligible for the throne. There were Corwynalls in the army behind them, and their mutterings had grown over the last few days. Kyali barely spoke to her cousins, a tactic Taireasa doubted was quelling their ambition. And the Lord General's soldiers, who watched her friend with increasing reverence, listened to them.

If Kyali swore to her, it would settle this before it became an issue that demanded challenge.

But she had done enough. Enough for a lifetime. Just the thought of asking more, however willing Kyali was, made her stomach twist and bile come to the back of her throat.

"I won't have it, Ky."

"You are
asking
for a challenge, Majesty."

"
Let
them challenge. I don't care!"

She'd spoken too loud, and without thought. There was a listening hush all around them as villagers and soldiers strained to hear. Beside her, Kyali drew a measured breath, apparently still capable of frustration, if nothing else. "Majesty—"

She was so very sick of that title. "
I
will not have it
. Leave me be."

"As you will," Kyali said coolly, and they fell back into a strained silence.

Taireasa put her fingers to her brow, trying to press the headache out of it—and nearly fell from the saddle when Devin's presence pushed into her thoughts with startling force, his heart full of panic. He was so bone-tired she felt her own shoulders slump.

"Devin," she gasped, and wrapped both her hands around the pommel of her saddle to keep from pitching out of it. He had never been so close, so strong. She could no longer see the trees that surrounded them or feel her horse under her. It was
his
horse she rode, his harp slung heavily across her shoulders, his terror beating in her veins. A dizzy height fell away from her, the Sainey river sparkling at the skies from a great distance, the stretch of the kingdom leveling out beyond an amazing drop. Taireasa made a shocked sound, felt hands close over her shoulders, weight pressing her back into her own saddle, her own bones.

But Devin pulled at her, wanting her attention, and she shut her eyes and gave in—saw, immediately, a stranger's face, brown like the men of Orin and noble, and beyond a crowd of similar-looking soldiers. They were not dressed like any soldiers she had seen before. The stranger looked alarmed. He said something she couldn't hear and the vision wheeled sickeningly to a forest-ringed valley nestled on the mountain's slope. A bright gleam of metal flashed in the trees. Taireasa gasped again, this time in joy, as she understood Devin was
looking at them
from that height. Soon she would have a friend by her side again.

Then the vision moved to the other side of the valley, where more metal sparked in sunlight. She strained to see through Devin's eyes, trying to understand that. There was a banner…

Taireasa frowned, feeling her weight slide in the saddle again. The colors on the banner came clear.

Yellow and green.

Sevassis.

"Oh no," Taireasa murmured as Devin let her go, leaving her with his lingering fear and his fierce love for her rolling through her head like some strange, wonderful perfume. Her heart began to pound so hard it was difficult to think. "Oh no, oh
no
." She pushed at the saddle, fighting for strength.

She opened her eyes and met two amber ones, very close. Kyali let her go immediately.

"What was that?" Kyali asked, all suspicion. She was rubbing her palms down her thighs, as though the contact had made her hands tingle.

"Is there a valley ahead of us?"

Kyali blinked once. "Aye. I'd intended for us to make camp there tonight. How—"

"There's a company from Sevassis on the northeast side, hiding in the trees. A
large
company. We have to ride around the valley."

The quiet around them grew into something strained and awful. The officers nearest—younger, inexperienced soldiers Kyali had appointed in haste, as their wiser leaders were all lost in the raid on the Corwynall estates—stared at Taireasa as though she'd declared that their new home would be on the moon. Kyali blinked a second time, then nodded, accepting this announcement with perfect aplomb.

"How close?"

Taireasa closed her eyes, thinking. "Very. We're at the edge of it now, and Sevassis is on the other side."

"Then we won't be able to dodge them," Kyali said simply, sending a chill down Taireasa's spine. "We have villagers, and wounded. We're too large and noisy a force to sneak about in here. We'll either meet them in the valley or in the trees, and we've no chance if we meet them in the trees."

Taireasa stared at her, speechless.

Kyali turned to a man who had been riding by their side the whole way up the mountain. "Ciaran," she said. "Marshal the men into two lines with the villagers in between. Tell them to arm. I want the cavalry staggered down each side. Get the wounded together and leave them by the stream, with four guards. Take their horses." She caught the man's arm as he made to ride past. "And put my cousins on the right flank to the fore," she added. "If we're ambushed, they can meet it first."

Gods.
Taireasa swallowed down a dry throat, as stunned by the ruthless practicality of that order as by the thought of riding into a battle. She allowed herself to be guided into the center, too shocked to argue. In another moment she was surrounded by soldiers on all sides. Kyali was an intermittent flicker of red braid far up ahead, riding faster, sword out and flashing in the sun. The whole line began to move quickly. Horses and men jostled around her. She tried only to breathe, to keep a calm expression. Her hands were white on the reins. She couldn't seem to fix that.

They broke through the trees suddenly and light struck her face like a slap, so bright after days in deep forest that it hurt her eyes.

There was a valley ahead, green and lush, sloping gently away from them. Taireasa squinted at it as soldiers began to spread out all around her. On the other side of the clearing, men in bright armor were pouring out of the trees, taking the low ground before their own company could hope to.

The first real battle in centuries would happen here.

I don't know what to do. Father, what do I do?

"Taireasa."

Someone had her by the shoulders. She blinked up into Kyali's grim face and bit her tongue when Kyali shook her. "Taireasa,
listen
. I am leaving you ten guards. Take the villagers into the trees on the northwest slope, as far from this as you can get. If we lose, you must head up the game trails to the ridge, to the Fraonir. Follow the river. They will protect you."

If we lose
, Taireasa thought, eyes darting helplessly to the valley. Then she heard the rest, and terror turned to fury as she understood: Kyali didn't think they would win.

Kyali was about to do it all over again.

"
No!
" Taireasa cried. The word, ripping out of her, came with an odd warping of the air that she recognized from somewhere. "
Not again
! Not for me, Kyali Corwynall! Enough!"

And Kyali—flinched.

The blood drained from her face. Her eyes first went wide and then flared a bright, glaring gold like the heart of a fire. She stayed that way for a moment, frozen in place, and then bent in the saddle, shoulders hunched, curled over herself like she'd taken a sword in the belly.

"Gods," Taireasa blurted, horrified, feeling something terrible and dark pressing at her mind. Her Gift: she had done something like this to Marta when she had gotten angry. She reached a hand out and set it on Kyali's arm, felt the tension there. "Ky, I'm sorry—"

"No," Kyali whispered, and again, barely a breath, in pure desperation: "
No
." The muscles in her friend’s arm shuddered, bunched. Kyali backed her horse away, trembling visibly.

Now
there was an expression on her face.

Seeing it, seeing the awful struggle there, Taireasa knew Kyali
did
remember. For a second, it was all there between them—the blood, the questions, the agony and rage and helplessness, all there. It blistered the air. It swallowed every good thing in the world. It took her breath, and all her words died unspoken.

Kyali bowed her head. Around them, soldiers looked on in justifiable panic as she clenched both hands over the hilt of her sword and fought for air, for sanity. Taireasa could only watch, mute and wretched, as Kyali put that cold mask of hers back together out of nothing but her iron will and the raw rage that was burning in her eyes.

And, guilt twisting sickly in her, knowing this might be the last glimpse she got of her truest friend, Taireasa let it happen. Their army was waiting. There was another army making its way across the valley toward them. There was a battle ahead. There was no fixing this now. There might never be.

It was like losing her all over again.

"Majesty," Maldyn murmured, close and worried, calling her away from this moment, this chance.

"We have no time for this," Kyali said finally, still trembling, but as cold as winter again. "You cannot fight. And we cannot guard you while
we
do. The villagers will follow you. Damn you, Taireasa,
get into the trees
." 

Something rose in Taireasa, past the terror that clamored at her thoughts and the mingled sorrow and guilt, something hard and determined and sure of itself. She brushed Maldyn's hand aside and urged her horse close, closer, until she was looking into Kyali's face from inches away and she could see the knots in her jaw.

"Then fight," Taireasa said. Her voice was shaking, but for once, she didn't care. "And
win
, Kyali Corwynall. I didn't come all this way to flee like a frightened sheep at the first sight of the enemy. I assume you didn’t, either."

Kyali opened her mouth to retort. Taireasa held up a hand. She had heard all she could stand to hear. This was worse than anything she had ever felt, this breaking between them. She could feel tears pressing at the backs of her eyes and she couldn't, for all their sakes, allow them to fall. "Win," she said again, the word barely a hiss, and kicked her horse around.

To meet a crowd of terrified villagers waiting for orders.

"To the trees," Taireasa said, sliding from the saddle. She didn't look back, though the soldiers who were about to die in her name deserved that much.

She couldn't make herself watch Kyali riding away from her.

* * *

"Aye, la—cap… aye," Ciaran stuttered, flushing red.

None of them knew what to call her.

She didn't care one way or the other and only stared, waiting for him to sort it out. Finally giving up, Ciaran rode away to pass her orders down the line and Kyali shifted her gaze to the valley, where Sevassis was moving with slow, taunting deliberation toward them.

Fools. They would have to climb to reach the battle at this rate, but they appeared almost stupid enough to do it. She wondered idly who was commanding down there, if he was truly arrogant enough to try such a thing. An idea began to take shape in her mind, one born of two years of fighting with the Fraonir. She waved Ciaran back to her before he could make it to the right wing cavalry.

These new orders chased the pinched look of desperation from his face. He even smiled. The expression faded when she didn't return it, though, and he rode off again.

The effort of acting normally was wearing her to the bone, and she wasn't even doing a good job of it.

"Form up," she shouted, pitching it to carry over the din. She could hear the echo of her father's famous battle-shout in her own voice, and it was like a kick in the guts: she couldn't find her next breath. Every soldier’s face turned toward her, like plants toward sunlight. They bunched together as instructed, presenting the sorriest possible appearance, making their numbers look even smaller than they were. Surprise was the only chance they had.

Jeers floated up to them, and a few arrows flew uselessly toward them, crashing down well out of range.

Still struggling for air, Kyali rode down the line of men, knocking the flat of her sword against their upraised blades in the old battle-blessing. She kept her eyes forward, because the hope she saw in her ragged, makeshift army made her want to strike every man who dared to look at her that way.

It was a bad jest, all of it. They were outnumbered, exhausted, poorly armed. There was little to hope for here. Many of these soldiers would die today, and probably she would with them.

And she didn't care, she didn't care, she didn't care at all.

If she kept telling herself that, maybe it would be true again.

Before this, there had been peace, a beautiful, cold distance from the world and everything in it. She had come to herself standing over Baron Cyrnic's corpse and not batted an eyelash, had dealt with all the things that needed to be done without a ripple of worry or confusion. Everything had been possible, and nothing mattered. But now—

Now she
remembered
.

The memory was a gaping wound in her mind, bleeding sick, black rage all over everything. Her hands shook. Her whole body shook. She lowered the sword before any of the soldiers could see and rode to the front line of the left wing, from which she planned to lead. Ciaran had the right wing. She had changed the battle order still further: Feldan Corwynall, cousin and would-be challenger for Taireasa's throne (as if she would ever let that happen) had the center now, where the heaviest fighting would be. He had understood that order clearly, by the pale, hurt fury on his face. She didn't need to explain to him whose claim she would be supporting, or how far she would go to keep Taireasa safe.