The Riven Shield: The Sun Sword #5 (94 page)

“They made poor use of a Radann.”

“They made the use that I desired, Tyr’agnate.” Mild rebuke. It surprised her. “She wore the first dress upon the day of her wedding to the kai Leonne. You saw it; all of the clansmen of the High Court, and many of the lower, saw it. They did not see her face; they did not see her eyes, could not hear her voice. But they marked her by what she wore.”

“They marked her by the husband.”

“Indeed.”

“And the other dress?”

Ah. She understood now.

“The Lord’s Consort,” Jevri replied.

“And when did she wear it?”

“At the Festival of the Sun.”

“And was it noted?”

“It was noted. It was a finer dress than her wedding dress; it was a significant dress.”

“A risk, Jevri.”

“There was no longer a Leonne to offend,” the servitor replied mildly. “And it can be argued that the Lord’s Consort serves
the
Lord, and not
a
Lord, be he the Lord of the Dominion.”

“It can. What occurred there?”

“She sang the lay of the Sun Sword, Tyr’agnate.”

“Bold girl. It is said that the man who claims the Tor Leonne cannot draw the Sun Sword. It lies in its haven, sheathed and waiting.”

“It is said that not all rumor is as capricious as wind. In this case, it is true: the General Marente could not pull the sword from its sheath.”

“And as proof of this?”

“The kai el’Sol drew the blade in front of the assembly of the clansmen; he stood in the waters of the Tor Leonne, and he made his challenge for all to see.”

“And then?”

“It consumed him utterly.”

Dry, dry words. His eyes would be dry, she thought, if she could see them. But beneath the thin flutter of those empty words she heard what he did not say.

“And then?” The anger in the two words.

“The Serra Diora entered the waters. The Serra Diora retrieved the fallen blade.”

“And?”

“And she asked that the clansmen hear the plea of a weak, of a foolish woman; that they choose for her no course that would dishonor the memory of her much loved dead.”

“Surely no woman is allowed such a demand.”

“Kai Lamberto.”

“And yet . . . the clansmen acceded.”

“Kai Lamberto.”

Now his gaze was upon her face with all the ferocity his words could not be allowed to contain. “You are, as you have said, a Serra, and ill-trained in the arts of war. Let me tell you then, Serra Diora, what you will not hear as
Serra
.”

She nodded quietly, attentively. Every gesture that she offered this man was perfect, for in perfection lay her only protection.

“The servants of the Lord of Night lay in wait within the village of Damar. They numbered ten.
Ten
. And within Sarel, it is said that two fell.”

She nodded again. Her throat was dry, and her eyes, dry as well; she could not blink. But she had suffered far, far worse in time of peace.

“Twelve, Serra Diora. Twelve of the Enemy’s servants. Not even in the oldest of our histories did nine walk abroad so openly. Nor do they walk openly now; it is not to serve the Lord of Night that the Terreans will take up sword and drum, banner and horn.

“I am curious. My wife, Serra Donna en’Lamberto, is a woman of some instinct and intuition, and over the years, I have learned to value that gift.”

Perfection was her only protection. But it was not enough.

“Tell me why you think the Lord of Night would send twelve of his servants into
my
Terrean. Tell me why they chose to hide within Clemente at the exact moment of your arrival.”

Jevri cleared his throat. It was graceless; it was beneath him.

She almost loved him for it.

“Jevri?”

“It is clear to me, from my brief conversations in the infirmary, that the Manelan forces could not have been aware of the Serra’s presence before they marched.”

“Ah. I see.” He smiled. It was a dangerous smile. “So they were not aware of her presence, and yet they were here, as is she. Serra Diora?”

“Tyr’agnate.”

“Why are you here?”

“This is where the Havallan Matriarch chose to lead us,” she replied. Careful now, embroidering her words with the patina of felt truth.

Ah, but he was a canny man. A powerful man. Such a difficult combination.

“And if you were free to travel, Serra Diora, where would you now go?” She took a breath, squaring shoulders, bracing herself, as she could, against the garden floor.

“To the North,” she said softly. “And the East.”

“To Averda.”

She nodded, regal now, the compliance of her earlier posturing discarded.

“And what waits you, in Averda?”

“Duty,” she said softly.

“Duty. Surely, your duty is to Marano?”

“I am en’Leonne,” she replied evenly.

“So.”

He did not speak again.

Nor did she.

But another man did.

“Serra Diora,” Ser Alessandro kai di’Clemente said softly. He bowed.

She looked up at him; saw the shadow of beard across his jaw, the shadow of night beneath his eyes. He bled through the bandages that physicians had laid across his sword arm, but the wound served to strengthen his presence.

“I am in your debt.” He spoke as if he had heard none of the conversation that preceded his words.

“A man is not in a Serra’s debt,” Ser Mareo kai di’Lamberto said, neutral now, his face hooded.

“But even a man can stand in the Lady’s. I am beholden to the Lady for her intervention.” He paused and then turned to the kai Lamberto, the man who owned his oath. “And I swore to the Lady that if we had victory upon the field, I would see the Serra to her destination.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

S
ERRA Teresa slept, surrounded by the quiet elegance of a room that the Northerners would call empty.

Ramdan rearranged her sleeping silks with care. He patted her forehead dry, and when she stirred, he raised her head to his lap and dripped water between the cracked surface of her lips. All this he did in silence; the silence was oppressive.

But to break it required strength.

Serra Diora sat with a samisen in her lap. It wobbled when she moved; her hands stilled the strings. She had no heart, no voice, for song, and were it not for the presence of Yollana, she might have slept.

But Yollana did not sleep. She sat upon jade mats, her expression composed of the intricate lines of age and injury. She watched Ramdan.

Diora watched her.

The domis was not silent; beyond the screens that paid lip service to privacy, serafs toiled with lumber beams, with toothed saw, with oils and perfumes. She could see their shadows against the lattice of paper and wood that formed the interior face of a sliding screen. A roof had already been erected above the harem; it was the first roof to be so raised.

Thus did Ser Alessandro honor his wives.

“Well, Diora.”

She set aside the samisen and rose, clutching the Matriarch’s pouch in her slender hands. As Serra Teresa had done, Diora now did: she tended the Matriarch. Yollana might have demurred; she was not a woman who willingly exposed weakness, even when weakness defined her. But she understood why Diora saw to her needs, and she accepted the gesture.

“Will you tell them?”

Diora pulled the pipe from the cracked folds of worn leather. The bowl was dull with sweat and dust, but Yollana would take no other.

“Diora?”

A Serra would have understood the answer. Yollana was Matriarch; bold and blunt as a lowborn clansman.

“I will tell them nothing,” she said softly, “that they do not already know.”

“But the appearance of ignorance is a matter of life and death among the clans. You are no Celina; had you been raised Voyani, you would almost be my equal. What do you intend?”

“What I have always intended, Matriarch. I will go to the North, and the East. I will carry the Sun Sword to the only man who can wield it.”

Shaking hands cupped pipe; dried leaves caught flame that existed only in the pause between unintelligible words. “He is not happy.”

She did not pretend to misunderstand. “No.”

“Will he aid you?”

“I . . . do not know.”

Rings of smoke rose above them, gray halos.

Ser Mareo kai di’Lamberto was given rooms in the domis that were—slightly—beneath his status as the reigning Tyr. The need for this was plain, and he was generous enough to offer an acceptance of the circumstances that was deeper than the scant words he spoke.

His Tyran were given rooms that bordered his; his men were encamped on the eastern side of Sarel. Both awaited his word in silence, for they had seen the archers upon the walls of Sarel, and they understood what the presence of Northerners within the surviving Clemente forces meant.

He gave them nothing.

Instead, he retired to his quarters. He took food and drink from the serafs who had been handpicked to attend him, and he paid no heed to the subtle inferiority of their service; it was beneath a man of his rank.

But he did notice.

He noticed much.

They were off-balance, Ser Alessandro, Marakas par el’Sol. They were grateful for his intervention, and concerned enough with staunching their own losses that neither had come forth to ask him the only question he himself would have considered of relevance in their position.

Why did you travel to Sarel with an army
?

Ah, but the old woman knew. He allowed himself a smile in the privacy of his chambers, protected from the gaze of the Lord. One eye covered in a dark patch, legs useless, hand cupped around an obscenely masculine pipe, she had met his gaze, held it, demanding the answers that men had not yet demanded.

She was the heart of his problem; of all the people he expected to see within the confines of the Clemente harem—and he was canny—Yollana of the Havalla Voyani was not among them. He would have been only marginally more surprised to find Alesso di’Marente there, although his welcome in that case would have been less measured.

That would have been too simple. Marente, by the nature of his occupation of Damar, he could afford to offend; it would cost him nothing. But Yollana of the Havalla Voyani?

No.

He was almost certain that this was why the Voyani had always chosen women as leaders—they knew how badly it discomfited the more powerful clansmen.

He reached into the folds of his robe and touched the crushed and folded scroll that he had carried this distance with him. It was a letter given him by his wife.

His wife was a Serra of the High Court, but she was also a woman; she was not so canny or harsh as the Serra Amara di’Callesta, nor was she as shrewd as the Serra Teresa di’Marano, the woman who—rank or no—ruled the Serras of Amar. Even in her absence.

Perhaps especially in her absence.

Where is the Serra Teresa di’Marano, Mareo? Surely they would not keep her from her kai
.

It was not that his wife was a lamb. It was not that she was, as the Serra Celina, given to the foolishly feminine. But when she joined him in his war room, she felt no need to deny the grace and the softness that defined her sex. She did not trouble herself to hide her horror or her anger; did not consider it demeaning to plead or beg for compassion or pity if she deemed it just.

He had said as much, before he had left her to travel to the South.

And she? She had offered him a momentary frown, a longer silence.
Mareo
, she said at last,
surely you must understand the reason for this
?

With Donna, there was always reason. Before there was anything, there was reason, and it was sweetly and gently offered.

“No,” he told her, taking her hands in his and kissing her palms. There were no serafs present, no other wives, none of his sons or daughters. He often found that the example she must set before the people she loved and fretted over introduced a distance between them, and he desired no distance.

She smiled, but the smile was tinged with sadness. It moved him; it always had.

And he had no doubt that she knew it; had no doubt that she hoarded some of that sadness against future need; afraid in the hidden part of her heart that to use it freely would be to destroy its power.

He had never asked.

“I trust you,” she replied, freeing one hand and running it along the side of his face.

“And the others?”

“The Serra Teresa has no husband.”

“She has father and brothers.”

“A father—or a brother—must in the end choose one of two courses: to keep his daughter or sister, or to offer her in marriage to another clansman. But a husband? If he is not a man to kill wives, never.” She retreated a moment into silence, and then said, “She would have been different, had she been allowed to marry.”

“Ah.” He shrugged. It had long been a source of discontent for his wife, but she was wise enough to hold her peace in the presence of the kai Marano, past and present. None of the jealousies that plagued lesser Serras had ever troubled his Donna.

“The Serra Alina likewise had no husband.”

That chilled him; annoyed him enough that he withdrew. Mention of his sister was guaranteed to have this effect, and he knew that she was aware of it. But she spoke; he listened.

“So this harshness is something that men are wise enough to avoid.” He shrugged.

“The Serra Amara has a husband,” she continued quietly. “And perhaps, in the privacy of their harem, she offers him what I offer you.”

“You don’t believe that, Na’donna.”

“She and I are not the same. Had I the choice, I would never have married Ser Ramiro kai di’Callesta—and what choice, in the end, are we offered? Our fathers decide. Our brothers. And they decide for reasons that a Serra’s heart and sensibility count little against.”

“She would never have refused him.”

Serra Donna smiled. “No. I believe you correct in this. And she is proud of her husband. I am proud of mine. But Callesta and Lamberto are not the same.”

“Serra Amara and Serra Donna are not the same.”

“No.” She knelt then.

He frowned.

“Na’donna, it may be months until I next see you. Will you spend the scant hours left us speaking of things unpleasant?”

“Out of the most unpleasant things, gardens may grow, and peace and repose may be found there.”

She so seldom showed signs of steel. But it was there, if one knew her well enough to see it. “What is of such import, Na’donna?”

She rose. “I have a letter,” she said at last. Hesitance marred the pretty words.

“And is what you have to say so unpleasant that you trust it only to ink and paper?”

She met his gaze, her lashes lowering like half-veil. “It was not,” she said at last, “written by me.”

He was on his guard then. “Who sent you this letter?”

“The Serra Amara en’Callesta.”

He relaxed, but only marginally. “So,” he said quietly. “You wrote her.”

She nodded. He did not ask her what she had said. “And what does the Serra Amara say?”

“You might read it, Mareo.” She drew the letter from the folds of her sari and held it out to him; he could see the fine grain of the paper that the Serra Amara had no doubt made with her own hands.

His hands remained folded in his lap.

She waited; in that, she was as all Serras but the very youngest. After a moment, the words in the air between them lessened in force and impact by the quality of the silence, he looked away from the brush-stroked lines.

“Tell me about this letter,” he said at last, wanting very much to speak about almost anything else. They had so little time.

“It is political,” she said quietly. “And it was done by her hand. No other hand, save one, is both so bold and so elegant.”

Because he did not wish to hear his sister’s name spoken again, he did not ask her who the second person was.

“Were it informal, Mareo, she would have written it in ink, with feather or quill; she meant to make a statement.”

“A long statement.”

She said nothing.

“Humor me, Mareo.” She added delicate plea to the smoothness of voice; no whine here, no grating, annoying snivel.

“I have always humored you, Na’donna,” he said, relenting.

She knew that there was often a price to be paid for such surrender, and she was cautious now. Her eyes hid nothing.

“But humor me, Serra Donna. Translate for me.”

“She speaks of the Serra Alina di’Lamberto.”

“And the Northerners?” he said, hearing the name. Hating it. Always,
always
, she returned to haunt him.

“Yes,” she said, speaking starkly. Aware that her response was not the response he expected.

“So,” he said softly. “She admits their treachery openly. I am not a Serra, Na’donna. I am not given to delicacy and introversion. Tell me.”

“The Serra Alina was given leave, by the Northern Kings, to travel,” his wife said quietly. “And she chose to travel. The Serra Amara does not say why.”

“And she traveled alone?”

“No.”

“Does the Serra Amara choose to divulge the names of her traveling companions?”

Silence again; heavier now. “You might read what is written, Mareo.”

Yes. Yes, he might. But his hands closed the more tightly over the rolled parchment, changing the curve of its shape. It was so unlike Na’donna, to force him to admit that he could read what was written within.

“It is
not
in the Serra’s language,” she said quietly, as if divining the momentary pettiness of his dissatisfaction. Still, she spoke gently, almost apologetically.

“I do not think that the Serra Amara en’Callesta would have chosen to write
this
letter to the wife of the man who killed her son. She is . . . careful . . . Mareo. But she offers no accusation.”

“No. Of course not. Women have no place upon the field of battle.” The words were heavy with irony.

His wife rose. The incense in the brazier had burned to ash, but the sweet ghost of its scent lingered. She turned her back upon him, tending it with care. Showing him that grace had not left her hands, her arms, the gentle tilt of her neck.

“Na’donna, speak plainly.”

Back turned to him, face hidden by work that would have been better left to seraf hands, she obeyed.

“I think that it is no coincidence that you have gathered a third of your men. I think that it is no coincidence that you travel with Jevri el’Sol, and those men you could gather in haste. I think that the presence of the Havalla Voyani, here, in Amar, is proof enough that what we face—what
you
face—is not the battle that we had intended.”