A Hero Born

by Michael A. Stackpole

  I agreed with the choice of color, but I asked for the ribbon to be cut into strips that could be hung like fringes from the underside of my jacket arms and along the back of the yoke. In Stone Rapids no one had the money or the time to prepare clothing solely for use on Bear’s Eve, so we made things more festive by sewing on ribbons in that manner.

  The tailor mumbled a remark that ended with the word, “quaint.” He seemed to have no problem with the gold Imperials lames gave him for doing the job. James then took me to a cobbler’s, where we purchased a pair of boots in white leather. I protested that my brown boots were fine, but James pointed out that the color was wrong for the ball, and that put an end to the argument.

  The rest of the week became something of a blur. I attended parties every evening with my grandmother and Marija. I met more people than I had even imagined existed in the world, and many of them had daughters or nieces or sisters to whom I was also introduced. I would just as soon have remained in Marija’s company, but her status as a servant kept her segregated from the revelers. What had been acceptable behavior at my grandmother’s party would have been scandalous at these other celebrations.

  Because of the parties, the very nature of the Empire impressed itself upon me as never before. While Herakopolis was larger and more grand than any city I had ever visited, it was in the homes of the people we called upon that this point was made most emphatically. We attended celebrations in houses that dwarfed my grandmother’s house. While I had thought tsoerits to be exotic, at other parties I found them as common as chicken eggs. I tasted fruits 1 never knew existed before, drank wines of all different flavors and colors, and was enticed into trying all sorts of other things against my better judgment.

  Xoayya attended most of the parties I did and, in Marija’s absence, took it upon herself to introduce me to the various treasures the capital had to offer. She seemed to know where things came from, where they had been purchased, and trivial little facts about our hosts that amounted to gossip, but that 1 suspected were garnered through visions.

  “I want to thank you, Locke, for your suggestion about the song.” She regarded me over a crystal goblet of a blue wine that was only slightly darker than her eyes. “It is effective.”

  I smiled. “You’re only getting visions when you want them now?”

  “No.” She glanced down. “Inconsequential things appear to be sifted out. What does get through appears to be stronger and more intense.”

  “Is that good or bad?”

  “I don’t know.” When she looked up I read fear in her eyes. “I had a vision—a dream—that concerns us.” She pressed a hand against the breast of my jacket. “It wasn’t sexual—at least I don’t think it was—but it was very strong. There was a connection between us and another creature.”

  I did my best to keep my voice even. “What sort of creature?”

  “Something dark and decidedly evil.” She lowered her voice. “You heard of the slaughter, didn’t you? Whatever did that is what is linking us. It has something to do with our destinies. Through that thing we will find out why we are here.”

  “How do you know this?” I frowned. “I know it comes from a vision, but you’re placing a lot of weight on it. Have you seen what happens to us or… ?”

  “I do not know what happens to us, nor have I seen anything that would tell me what will happen. I know something will happen, though, because I feel now as I did before my father died. Some visions, the worthless ones, fly past my notice like an overheard comment or something seen from the window of a speeding carriage. Their brevity is a mark of their intensity and importance.”

  She set her wineglass down on a sideboard, then pressed her hands together. “The feeling I have of the linking is very strong. It’s like the ocean’s undertow. We’re being pulled along, and we can’t escape it. Our destinies are wrapped up in the destiny of this thing.”

  I slowly shook my head. “I’m not doubting anything you’ve said, Xoayya, really, I’m not.”

  Anger creased her brow. “What you’ve just said indicates you don’t believe me.”

  “Not true. I believe you’re reporting everything you’ve experienced accurately and completely.” I shrugged. “I’m just not sure I find the argument about destiny very compelling. We don’t even know what did the murders, much less that it’s some dark creature linking us.”

  She clutched my right forearm in both her hands. “You do know the creature I’m speaking about, though. Don’t deny that.”

  I coughed lightly behind my left hand. “Xoayya, I’ve had a dream, but it’s cobbled together out of stories and rumors. It felt real to me, but I know it was just a dream.”

  “How do you know that?”

  1 hesitated, then shrugged my shoulders. “I just do.”

  A frosty tone entered her voice. “I see.” Her blue eyes narrowed. “What if 1 could prove to you that your dream was real?”

  “How can you do that?”

  Xoayya looked left and right to see if anyone was watching us before she answered me. “The reason my grandmother knew to come rescue me is because she is a powerful clairvoyant herself. Not many people know this—I doubt even your grandmother does. My grandmother gave up magick when she met and married my grandfather, so those who know her secret outside our household are few. She could convince you that what you dreamed was real.”

  “You want me to speak with her?”

  “More than that, I want you to sit with her and have her divine your future. She will be able to tell you things about yourself that no one but you could know.”

  I shook my head. “Not interested.”

  “You will be.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Xoayya smiled confidently. “Oh, you will meet with her. I have seen it.”

  “Perhaps.” I reached down and freed her right hand from my wrist. “Have you also foreseen my asking you to dance right now?”

  Her smile grew. “I did see that you would try to deflect me.”

  “Did I succeed?”

  “We’ll see.”

  1 did, but only temporarily. As it was, that was enough because my grandmother tired somewhat quickly at many of the parties, requiring us to make our departure rather early in the evening. Returning home, I was able to meet Nob for an occasional game of chess and still get enough sleep so I could rise early and put myself through the regimen of exercises Audin had forced on me for as long as I could remember.

  Part of me would have been happy to forget the training and discipline with which my grandfather had made me greet each day of my life. Being out and on my own for the first time, I wanted to rebel to show that I was better than he imagined and that I did not need his exercises. After all, here I was in the capital while he was stuck back in Stone Rapids. What could he know that would benefit me here?

  The truth was, though, that the capital was so alien to me that 1 needed an anchor. Waking before the sun slipped over the horizon, I forced myself out of a warm bed and into the weapons chamber. There, the cool air puckering my flesh, 1 paced myself through stretches and sit-ups, push-ups and balancing myself on my hands. Choosing the rapier I had worn, I took myself through various guards and worked up a sweat fencing against shadows.

  One morning, as i recovered from a lunge that had spit a foe, I heard my door open and solitary applause. I spun and saw Kit leaning against the jamb. “Audin’s training has taken root deeply in you, Locke.”

  1 wiped my forehead against my left forearm. “It has, indeed. You speak as if you disapprove.” I pointed the rapier at the rank badge of five arrows shaped into a pentagram that he wore. “What would you know of him or his methods? You clearly studied beneath another because Audin would not touch a bow if his life depended upon it.”

  Kit smiled like a fox. “You Garikmen are fools for letting a foe get as close as needed to finish him with a sword.”

  “And you Herakmen are cowards for not daring to feel your foe’s breath on your face when
you kill him.” 1 sheathed the rapier. “I do not think provincial insults suit us, cousin. We can do much better.”

  The lanky scout laughed lightly. “No need for insults at all, Locke, for 1 am not your enemy. To answer your question, like my father before me, I was sent off to Garik to train beneath Audin. I endured a month of his harsh treatment—during which time I did not so much as finger even a dagger—then I decided 1 wanted nothing to do with him or his skills. I ran away and convinced a caravaner that I had been kidnapped. I told him that if he returned me to Herakopolis, my grandmother would pay him a vast reward.”

  I frowned as a distant memory started to bubble up through my consciousness. “So, you are the student who chose to flee. You were used many a time to frighten me into compliance. I had heard you were devoured by wolves or killed by bandits or frozen to death in the wilderness. Whatever skill I seemed not to be able to master was somehow linked to the doom that had befallen you.”

  “Better that, then, than to be scourged with our fathers’ deaths in Chaos. Audin asked me if I wanted to end up like my father. So much so, in fact, that I decided I did not want to be like him at all. That included being trained by a man who obviously had failed to keep my father safe with his training. I decided to find myself a Bowmaster to let me kill my enemies at a vast distance.”

  I smiled. “And 1 would bet that you did not touch a bow for a month or more under his instruction.”

  Kit shook his head. “In fact, you are quite wrong. Herluf took me out to the gallery he had prepared and shot a single arrow into a target at fifty paces. He then gave me a piece of string and pointed me toward the forest behind his cottage. ‘Go, boy, and build yourself a bow. Come back with it and three arrows.’”

  He crossed the room and seated himself in one of the chairs. “I did as I was told and came back with a wretched piece of wood and three reeds. Herluf invited me to shoot, and even if the arrows had flown straight, they would have gone nowhere near the mark. My Bowmaster turned to me and said, ‘Now you know you know nothing. When I am finished with you, you will know everything.’”

  “Did he give you a new bow?”

  “No. I worked with my little toy for over a year. I kept it with me at all times and got so I felt strange without it in my left hand. Herluf again sent me out into the woods to get a piece of wood for a bow and, this time, I made a better selection, but it was still not good enough. Finally, the third time he sent me out, I stopped and asked him his advice on my selection. At that point my true education began.”

  I slipped the rapier off and returned it to the rack. “And now you are a scout, just like your father.”

  Kit nodded with resignation. “It must be in the blood, like father, like son.”

  Like father, like son. That is a tall order for you, Lachlan.

  My cousin must have read my mind. “1 shouldn’t worry if I were you, Locke. Filling our fathers’ boots may be difficult, but they had two decades to build their legends. We should get at least half that to create ours.”

  1 felt uneasy about taking money from James for buying Bear’s Eve gifts, but he said my grandmother insisted, and after a quick stroll through the bazaar down near the docks I knew I could afford nothing with the money I had left over from my journey. As it was I found myself selecting things offered by merchants from Garik over bits of finery sold by folks from other parts of the Empire. The prices asked were high, but I managed to haggle them down to an area where I found them scandalous, not utterly outrageous.

  1 bought my grandmother a knitted shawl of good Garik wool that 1 knew would keep her warm. For Marija I bought a scarf with blue and red flowers on a background of green and for Kit chose a belt buckle of onyx and coral with an arrow motif. 1 got Rose a hairbrush and James a small book of poetry that, somehow, struck me as quite appropriate for him. For Nob I found a hardwood dowel that I planned to carve into a likeness of the Emperor to update his chess set. Lastly 1 found some red cloth and blue ribbon to wrap my gifts.

  Upon returning to the house, I wrapped my presents and set them on a shelf to await presentation the next day. James had already laid out my clothes for the ball, and I dressed quickly. The silk tunic felt cold on my bare flesh, but 1 warmed it quickly enough. The jacket and pants fit perfectly, and I was pleased at how the ribbon fringe looked, though I did note that the tailor had run ribbons down the sleeves and pants in addition to hanging them the way I had desired.

  I pulled on my new boots and could feel where they would rub against my feet at heel and across the top of the foot, but I decided I could endure the discomfort for at least one night. I fitted my dagger sheath to the belt and strapped it on, then pulled the slender blade from my weapons belt and slid it home in the costume sheath. I knew being allowed to wear a ceremonial dagger in the presence of the Emperor was an honor, but walking out of my suite without my father’s rapier made me feel uneasy.

  I met Kit downstairs in the foyer and marveled at his uniform. His silver jacket and pantaloons were regulation military, as was the white tunic with stiff collar he wore beneath it. As his accent color he had chosen black, which manifested itself in his knee-high boots and the thick black ribbon that circled his neck and was pinned in place by a pearl at his throat. A silver cloak and tall, white woolen hat completed his uniform and made him look every bit a dashing hero of the cavalry.

  “I can see, Kit, why you believe it will only take ten years for you to become as much of a legend as your father. You already have the poise and the heroic profile.”

  He smiled and looked back down the hallway. “I must at least attempt to look suitable for escorting the two most beautiful women in the capital.”

  Walking slowly, but with stately grace, our grandmother made her way down the hall with only a walking stick to aid her. Her silver gown emphasized her slender height, yet managed to disguise the frailty of her age. Patterned with circles and triangles and other geometric figures, it also had worked into it her rank insignia. A white blouse rose up to cover her to the throat, but its floppy collar and cuffs showed beneath the main body of the dress itself. Her white hair had been gathered back tight against the nape of her neck and had been bound with a clip of silver and what looked to me to be sapphires. The blue stones likewise made up the buttons on her blouse, and one set in a ring of silver encircled the third finger of her left hand.

  Behind her came Marija, and she took my breath away. The low-cut gown she wore appeared white enough to have been the preferred garb of a ghostly bride. The bodice hugged her body tightly, and its stiff-boned front extended down past her waist. Her gown flared out from there to flow to the ground along with the two ends of the simple silver chain she wore around her waist like a belt. Bits of silver braid and silver satin ribbons decorated her gown to complete it and bring it into compliance with the directive issued with the invitation.

  Her accent color manifested itself in both the tiger’s-eye pendant she wore against her bosom and the matching earrings. She wore her black hair in a complicated braid that kept it bound against the back of her head so her earrings would not be hidden. The golden brown light glinting from them matched the hazel glow in her eyes. She smiled as she took pleasure in the effect her appearance had on the both of us.

  Kit turned and offered Grandmother his arm, while he pointed me toward the cloakroom. 1 found a gray woolen cloak for Grandmother, along with a thick pair of mittens and a similar set of outerwear for Marija. 1 helped both of them don their winter gear, then helped Kit guide Grandmother out the door lames held open, to the coach which Nob had at the ready by the front.

  We helped Grandmother into the coach, and Marija joined her, spreading out a blanket to cover both of their legs. Carl brought Stail over along with a black stallion that greeted Kit with a frosty snort. 1 swung myself up into the saddle, then the two of us followed the coach out the gate and toward the palace.

  The Imperial Palace occupied the highest hill in the capital. Magical light lit it as if it were noon
on a cloudless day, making it impossible to miss. While each of the eight wings had been built by artisans from different parts of the Empire, the eerie, pale blue witchlight made each wing all of a thing with the rest of them, unifying the palace as the Emperor unified the nation.

  This is not to make it sound as if the rest of the city were black. Bonfires burned at crossroads, and lanterns glowed from windows. People filled the streets more than usual for an hour past dusk on a cold evening. As we rode through the city I heard and returned greetings and best wishes offered by strangers. For this one night, bound together by highest hopes for the coming new year, all the various people in the city forgot provincial differences and petty squabbles. While I had seen that and thought it wonderful in Stone Rapids, here, in this sprawling metropolis at the heart of the Empire, I found it unbelievable.

  Nob brought the coach through the gate and right up to the front steps, while Kit and I dismounted near a crowd of men pressed into duty as stable hands. Some of them were from Kit’s own company and chided him about his dress, but he dismissed them with a mocking high-handed wave that set them to laughing. Walking away from them, we reached the red carpet running down the steps and climbed them right behind Grandmother and Marija.

  As we reached the doorway of the palace, Grandmother spoke to a military officer just inside the door. He consulted a list, then smiled at her. He also looked over at two other officers standing back away from the door, then glanced at me.

  “Lachlan of Stone Rapids?” one asked.

  “Aye.” I removed my cloak and draped it over my arm. “I am Lachlan.”

  “You will come with us.”

  Grandmother and Kit both looked surprised by the command. Kit interposed himself between me and the guardsman. “What is this, Sergeant?”

  “Begging your pardon, Lieutenant, but this is none of your business.” The heavyset fellow planted his fists on his hips in a wordless challenge. “I’ve been ordered to bring Lachlan of Stone Rapids to the Emperor when he arrives, and Bear’s Eve or not, no sorry scout will keep me from doing what 1 have been told to do.”