The Horse Lord (19 page)

“And why not?” she said aloud. Sliding one wardrobe open, Kyrin gazed longingly at the peacock fabrics. Silk, satin and velvet rustled seductively as she ran her fingers through them and then pulled one gown free, with a guilty glance at the bedroom door as she did so. It stayed shut, and she slithered hastily out of her everyday clothes before draping herself in the sendal over-robe. It was clinging, soft and heavy, pure snowfall white shot through with rainbow lustres which shimmered as she moved. Kyrin neither knew nor cared that it was meant to be worn over a contrasting mantle, but luxuriated in the sensuous feel of the stuff against her skin, twisting and turning before the mirrors in what was almost a graceful dance.

“You look very well,” said Aldric softly. Kyrin spun, one hand flying to cover her mouth. The
eijo
smiled, but remained where he lounged elegantly in the doorway. She recoverd quickly and nodded at his compliment.

“I’d almost forgotten I was a woman,” she explained shyly.

“I never have,” he replied with the beginnings of gallantry, then shook his head as if to clear it of a momentary dizziness. “Kyrin, what I…what I came to tell you was that the ship sails tomorrow. It’s one of Rynert’s fleet and he says—asked me to tell you—that he’ll put another vessel at your disposal if you wish to go home.”

“And you want me to go… ?”

“Light of Heaven, no! That is… it’s your choice now. You don’t have to keep following me to find your passage back. Unless you want to…”

“What do
you
want?” she responded. Aldric blinked rapidly, swallowed down a dry throat and avoided Kyr-in’s steady gaze. “Tell me, Alban.”

He was unprotected; out of armour and not even wearing the sinister black which had been his unfailing custom until now. Instead he was dressed simply in a white shirt nipped at the waist by a belt to hold his
tsepan
, and blue boots and breeches worked with silver along the seams. There was a clean-scrubbed look about his face which, when the scar was not visible and his haunted eyes were shadowed, made him seem almost innocent. The pinkness of his skin did not come from washing, however—more from embarrassment.

“I… want you to stay. Not just stay here, but stay close to me. Please…” He drew in a deep breath and in that instant Kyrin realised just how very scared he was. Her half-formed smile evaporated in case he thought it mocked him, to be replaced by a solemn expression more in keeping with the moment.

“You aren’t real, Aldric. Not enough for this harsh world. Keep it that way if you can,” she said, then leaned over and kissed him gently on the mouth.

“Kyrin, I—” he began to say. Then he dismissed the words and put his arms around her. Kyrin’s lips parted under his and he felt the intimate touch of her tongue entering his mouth, exploring. Her breath, her hair, her body all smelt bright and sweet, like apples in sunlight, warm and firm and curved. As his head bent forward, mouth opening over the soft hollows of her throat, Aldric closed his arms gently, drawing her tight against his chest and the pounding heart within.

They lay silent for a long time, arms entwined, still, peaceful and content merely to be together. Then Aldric rolled slightly and raised his head to look at her, fingertips delicately caressing the curve of one breast. She opened sleepy eyes and watched the silver at his throat glinting in the lamplight. “Did I hurt you?” he whispered hesitantly. Kyrin smiled at his concern, stroking the dark hair on his chest as she might have stroked a cat.

“No. Don’t worry. I… I wasn’t a virgin.” She felt his silent laughter against her cheek. “What’s so funny?”

“Because I was!”

“You were… ?”

“Yes. Thank you.” He kissed the palm of her hand; but there was something in his voice she did not care for and she sat up in order to see his eyes. They were hooded, languorous and as she leaned closer something flickered in the jade-green depths. An instant later it was masked by his long lashes, but Kyrin breathed out very slowly through her nose.

“Aldric… don’t get involved. It won’t work.” She cupped his face in both hands and kissed him lightly on the forehead, smiling at her own restraint. “You can stop pretending to sleep.”

His eyes snapped open. “What won’t work?” She could feel the words growling low in his throat.

“Anything between us. Behind that cynical mask you’re a romantic,
Aldric-ain
. I’m a realist—and a foreigner.”

Kyrin felt a spasm of something—anger perhaps, or awareness of what she meant—tense the
eijo’s
muscles. “You can’t fight tradition with a sword.”

“Oh no… ?”

“No. Because you’re an Alban
kailin-eir, ilauem-arluth
Talvalin, heir to lands and ranks and titles.”

“What the hell difference does that make?” His voice was quiet, but it thrummed with controlled rage for all its softness.

Kyrin laid one finger across his lips to still whatever outburst was building up behind them. “Enough,” she said.

“But your father Harek—you called him
ur’lim
. That means ‘lord.’”

“It means ‘chieftain,‘“Kyrin corrected flatly. “He can reckon his lineage back for six generations. Two hundred years. He’s very proud of that. How far does your clan go back, Aldric?” The question seemed artless.

His mouth opened and then closed again over clenched teeth as he realised the true significance of what she had asked him. Six generations—two centuries perhaps. But there had been
yrloethen
Taelvallyn, the brothers Shar and Hachen, with the Horse Lords almost two thousand years ago. More than fifty generations past. His Elthanek ancestors went beyond even that into an age almost impossible to comprehend, where written records mingled with stories and legends until they were no longer told apart. Aldric turned his head away, mind reeling under the weight of uncounted years.

“It goes back… far too long,” he answered thickly.

“You see. What does a line of six chiefs count for now?”

“It counts. I’d make sure it counts.”

“Don’t be foolish, Aldric.” She lay back and their fingers slid apart. “Hush now. You and I have said enough. Go to sleep.”

Although she slept almost at once, Aldric stayed propped on one elbow and wide awake for a long time. The creases of a frown smoothed from his face eventually and a thin, wistful smile took its place. Very, very gently he touched her white-blonde hair, letting each silken strand drift across his honourably scarred left hand. “Perhaps you’re right,” he murmured, drawing the quilt up and across them both. “And perhaps I am. Perhaps…” Curling up close to Kyrin’s warm body, he looped one arm tenderly about her waist, then closed his eyes and slept like a child.

The vessel,
En Sohra
, was an Elherran gallon, a big, burly ship with galion complicated rigging. Her crew was also Elherran, folk of a trading nation which had so far kept its balance on the tightrope of neutrality, and while they looked askance at Kyrin—disapproving perhaps of her wearing men’s clothing—they made no open protest.

The galion was towed early into deep water and was well under way by mid-morning, bowling along down the Narrow Sea before a stiff north-easterly breeze. Though her cargo of roofing-lead ballasted the ship and made her ride low and steady, Aldric was unsure whether he liked sailing very much. Not that he was sick… just not terribly interested in food.

The queasiness lasted only for a day or so and once he recovered and learned to cope with the rolling deck, he and Kyrin spent much of their time on the poop, screened from prying eyes by sails and rails and cabin. Dewan, who by his profession noticed things, found the way they were always holding hands rather amusing, in an innocently romantic way—but he remained, for a foreigner, honourably discreet.

For the first two days of open sea they encountered nothing but several fishing dories and the usual circling gulls; but on the third morning breakfast in the great cabin was interrupted by a yell from the lookout, in tones of such urgency that the meal was abandoned without a second thought. With her sail taut and filled by the wind whistling in over her stern rail, the galion was making excellent speed, but breaking the grey horizon on the port quarter was a sail.

“What is it?” Dewan demanded when he reached the poopdeck. Somebody passed him a long-glass and he stared through it long and hard, but no matter how much he hoped the image would change his first impression remained the same. The sail was red.

“Well?” asked Aldric, squinting a little in what promised to be a bright, clear day.

“Red sail,” the Vreijek said shortly. “That means the Imperial Fleet.”

“There’s always the possibility it’s just a merchant captain who likes the colour red,” suggested Kyrin hopefully.

Dewan favoured her with a withering glance. “Maybe so… but given the price of that red dye, I wouldn’t bank on it.”

Within an hour the other vessel was running slightly astern, close enough for them to see an occasional flash from her deck as someone turned a long-glass on the scudding galion. She was a warship; that much was all too clear. What remained obscure was why, no matter what manoeuvres she executed, only her masthead pennants shifted to match the changing wind; both big sails remained square-set and full.

The Drusalan ship was armoured; sheets of steel covered her upperworks and hull almost to the waterline, and by now even unaided eyes could discern where seven turrets rose from her main deck and her bow. The mainsail was vivid red and displayed the Emperor’s silver star-with-streamers, but the black sprit-sail bore a white-outlined four-pointed star: the Grand Warlord’s badge. A long ram broke surface now and then, although the ship was no galley; the rakish sides towering above
En Sohra
were smooth, unbroken by ports or oarlocks. Still the galion retained her lead.

Then the impossible happened. Under full sail, with no more room on her yards for even a silken kerchief, the warship accelerated. A white bone of foam surged up between the teeth of her ramming gear and in a matter of minutes she scythed past
En Sohra
in a hiss of broken water. The galion’s people could hear a clang of gongs sounding battle-stations and then a voice amplified and distorted by a speaking-trumpet. “This is the Imperial Battleram
Aalkhorst
!” it blared. “Heave to and prepare to be boarded!”

Leaning over the galion’s waist-rail, Kyrin glanced up at an outburst of sharp words on the quarterdeck above her. Aldric had given orders to
En Sohra’s
master which the sailor seemed reluctant to obey; then the
eijo
put one hand to his
taiken’s
hilt and the captain hastily did as he was told, addressing a string of Elherran to his helmsman. Kyrin knew only two words: “turn” and “run.” Consequently she was one of the few people not taken by surprise when the galion heeled over and away from the battleram. Her clumsy-looking lugsails allowed her to sail closer to the wind than almost any other rig, and by rights the big Imperial ship would now be reduced to sluggish tacking. In theory.

Aalkhorsfs
steersman had not been watching as closely as he should have been, for the warship stayed on course for almost three ship-lengths—in her case a considerable distance—before anything happened. Then she leaned over in a skidding, gunwale-submerged turn which brought her head straight into wind. There her sails should have gone slack and useless—but after a momentary flap they bellied out, ignoring the wind of the world. Then she came boring in at them, faster even than the first incredible dash which had brought her level. For a terrifying instant the spikes of the black star reared high above
En Sohra’s
stern lanterns, and the ram slopped cold brine across the gallon’s deck as it lifted on the swell and then came crashing back in a shower of spray.

Sliding back into place on the starboard beam,
Aalk-horst
blanketed the merchantman’s sails so that they hung limp and her pace faltered. Two of the armoured cupolas on her portside revolved until their shuttered slots faced
En Sohra
, and then the shutters snapped open. Across the narrow strip of salt water Aldric heard a crackle of orders in the guttural Drusalan speech, just before ar Korentin grabbed his arm and jerked him under cover.

There was a clatter and the deck where he had stood sprouted catapult bolts and splinters of chewed-up planking.

A moment later the gallon’s master had struck his colours and lowered his useless sails. Part of the battle-ram’s armour opened and a small boat was winched down into the sea. Shortly afterwards four soldiers in the red-and-green of Imperial marines clambered up
En Sohra’s
boarding ladder, with their officer following at a more dignified pace.

He was tall, lean, his eyes startlingly blue in a face tanned by wind and sun. The man took off his rank-barred helmet and cradled it under one arm, passing a hand over his close-cropped scalp as he studied the damage his salvo had inflicted. Then he called for the captain.

“You disobeyed my direct command,” he accused. “Why?”

“I… that is, we—” the sailor floundered.

“I ordered it,” interrupted Aldric.

The officer’s arrogant stare switched to him and one of the man’s eyebrows lifted quizzically. “I am
Hautmarin
Doern,” he rasped. “Who are you?”

“A… mercenary. Between employers—not that it’s your affair,” the Alban retorted frostily.

Doern laughed at him and swept a pointed gaze over the gallon’s grimy finery. “Indeed. Not a very successful one, if you have to sail on a tub like this. Why did you run?” He barked the question, hoping to startle an admission from somebody.

“I made some enemies,” Aldric drawled smoothly. “Powerful enemies. Using an Imperial warship isn’t beyond them. So I took no chances.” He turned his back and kicked at a hatch-cover. “But since you’re real I suppose you’ll want to search the bloody ship, so get on with it. I’ll not stand in your way. There’s been enough time wasted already.”

Kyrin was the only person who saw the glance Dewan exchanged with the galion’s master at Aldric’s words. With a nasty start she realised there was more to
En Sohra
than either she or the
eijo
had been told. Much more.