Earthstone

by P. M. Biswas

  “Remember that your spear is simply a staff with a sharp tip. If you cannot use it as a staff, you cannot use it as a spear. A hit with the shaft can be as disabling as a hit with the blade, if targeted expertly.”

  “You deem yourself an expert, do you?”

  “I do,” Maryada said. She wasn’t teasing Tam anymore; her focus on Tam was calm and assessing, the focus of a master on a student. “I have outlived dozens of battles. And I did so by exercising my mind, not just my body.”

  Tam spluttered. “Are you calling me a dunce?”

  “No, but you could benefit from strategy. For example, to deceive your opponent, lower your center of gravity by buckling your knees. Now leap into a high guard. Strike from above.”

  Tam did as Maryada instructed—and succeeded. A strike landed on Maryada’s cheekbone, and the crowd cheered again, but Maryada had obviously ceded that strike to Tam as a demonstration.

  “This isn’t a spar,” Tam spat. “It’s a tutorial.”

  Maryada quirked an eyebrow. “Do you deny that you need one?”

  Tam couldn’t. Dammit.

  They sparred until Tam’s joints had been all but knocked out of their sockets, and it was only Borik’s arrival on the scene that brought the impromptu spar to its conclusion.

  “Maryada!” Borik shouted as he advanced on them. “I leave for a routine briefing and return to find chaos! What are you doing to this child?”

  “Teaching her as she yearns to be taught,” Maryada said, but she stepped down, lowering her spear and saluting her commander.

  Tam, for her part, was doing her best not to crumple into a heap. Wallop after wallop had reduced her skeleton to jelly. She could barely stand—but stand she would, and she would walk, too, all the way back to the dorm, so that none would witness her frailty. Tam would rather wander forever in the Wanderwood, the bedeviled home of the elves that featured in every bedtime tale, than show her frailty to anybody.

  But for now she had to endure Borik’s scathing chastisement of her and of Maryada, although Maryada looked unrepentant. The onlookers dispersed, but only after slapping Tam on the back and congratulating her on how she’d fared.

  Tam swayed under their overenthusiastic slapping, wiping the sweat from her brow and sucking in heaving breaths. Maybe she hadn’t been a total disappointment. Maybe she’d been brave, even if she hadn’t been the victor. Maybe she’d improved under Maryada’s tutelage, enough that professional soldiers would applaud her for it.

  “Praise her, would you, Borik?” Dale said. “Our Tamsin is just about ready to join us. With a bit of instruction, she could—”

  “No, she could not,” Borik said firmly, snuffing out the spark of hope that had been kindled in Tam’s chest. “She has a year before she can qualify. I only ask that in that year, you not goad her into even more trouble than she gets into on her own. I’ll have to bother the queen herself to discipline this imp.”

  Dale had the grace to look guilty, but Maryada’s nod wasn’t as heartfelt. Tam had an ally there. An ally who might argue for enhancing Tam’s training and might yet make a convert of Borik.

  Before Tam left, Maryada clicked spears with her in a soldier’s salute—the sort of salute exchanged between peers.

  Tam’s heart swelled. Oh gods. This was her first salute. She’d never been saluted before. Emboldened, she saluted Maryada back.

  “Well done, hatchling,” Maryada said gruffly, ruffling Tam’s hair just like Borik did. “You’ll earn your wings soon enough.”

  Tam flushed. There was way too much hair-ruffling going on.

  A WEEK later, Tam was in the mess hall at the children’s dormitory, shoveling gruel into her mouth. Supper was simple at the dorm, but it was plentiful and nutritious, as Queen Emeraude surveyed and revised the monthly menu herself.

  The dorm had the same meats and vegetables supplied to them that the royal pantry did, although—and Tam was admittedly bitter about this—the dorm’s cooks weren’t as talented as the royal chefs. A quince pie from the palace bakery was flawlessly honey-glazed and dotted with raisins, while a quince pie in the dorm was a slapdash imitation, the far thinner glaze flaking off in patches, the raisins few and far apart. The dorm’s pie looked like it had the mange. Tam suspected the palace stewards were skimming raisins off the dorm’s allocated amount and independently selling the prized dried fruit for profit.

  Tam knew that the queen would be dismayed if she was alerted to this, and that she would remedy the situation. But honestly, they were in the midst of a war. Who’d have it in them to bother the queen with these trivialities? Emeraude was justifiably preoccupied with war expenses, such as organizing weapons requisitions, commissioning blacksmiths for armor, and paying tanneries for shoes. Sturdy boots for the soldiers on the Axenborg front took precedence over raisins.

  Besides, given how meticulous the queen was about the accounting of provisions, it was inevitable that she would unmask the fraudsters among the stewards and would have them put in stocks. Emeraude always found out about secrets. Always.

  So Tam kept mum and spooned more gruel into her gullet, meagerly pea-dotted though it was. As she chased the peas in her bowl, the youngsters seated on either side of her piped up in chirrupy, babyish voices. They were about eleven. Tam was just relieved to be taller than someone for a change.

  “Have you heard?” said the boy to Tam’s left, hushed with awe. “About Timothy, who’s apprenticed at the kennels? He’s going around saying that a hound ran into the Wanderwood, and when it came back, it had horns!”

  “Oh my goodness,” said the girl to Tam’s right, just as hushed, as if elves might pop out of the woodwork and plant horns on her too. “Really?”

  “Yeah, like a demon’s horns. And it was breathing fire.”

  Tam smothered a laugh. Had she been that gullible at eleven?

  “Timothy’s saying the kennel keeper had to kill it and chop it up and burn it on a pyre to stop it from feasting on the villagers’ children.”

  “After eating this watery gruel,” Tam groused, “I’m still hungry enough to feast on the villagers’ children.”

  The boy and the girl gawked at her with wide-eyed horror.

  “What?” said Tam. “It’s impossible, what that Timothy’s been nattering about. He’s having you on. The elves live in the Wanderwood, remember? The hound wouldn’t have escaped from them if it had gone into the forest. It would’ve died in there. Or just vanished altogether. Nothing comes back from the Wanderwood.” Tam rapped her spoon decisively on the dining table. “Nothing.”

  “Th-that’s what the legends say,” said the boy, clearly displeased at having his fantastical story deconstructed so summarily, “but how do you know the elves didn’t ensorcell the hound?”

  “To stick a pair of horns on it?” Tam said with a chortle. “Much good that’d do. Mayhap the elves do have a sense of humor.”

  The boy scowled.

  Tam grinned. “Fear not, little ones. The elves don’t bother with colorful pranks. If they come for you, horns and fire-breathing will be the least of your worries. Then again, you won’t have any worries.” She lowered her volume dramatically. “Because you’ll be dead.”

  They were gawking at her again, even more horrified than before. Clapping them companionably on their shoulders, Tam whistled cheerfully as she got up to dump her bowl in the dishwasher’s tub.

  Educating the youth was important, after all.

  Scaring them was even better.

  AFTER SUPPER, a royal page barged into the dorm to inform Tam that the queen would see her. So Borik had indeed tattled to the queen. As he’d promised to do.

  Tam gulped. Borik, she could deal with. Queen Emeraude? Not so much.

  Borik’s protectiveness was very different from the queen’s. It wasn’t as intimidating, for one. Borik had the proportions of a titan while Emeraude was slender and wispy, and yet there was a genteel steeliness to the queen’s demeanor that frankly made Tam cringe. The prospect of facing
Queen Emeraude in all her sagacious glory was somehow more frightening than the prospect of facing Borik in a strop. And Borik could shatter rocks with his bare fists.

  Then again, Emeraude could shatter armies with her wits. She was famed in all the lands for her strategic genius; perhaps that was why Tam felt so very insignificant in her presence. If Emeraude had been a typical monarch, given to idle pastimes and opulent feasts, Tam wouldn’t be so tempted to bow and scrape before her. But no, Emeraude had a will of iron… and it showed. It showed in Emeraude’s unshakable poise and in her all-knowing face, a face that seemed to have seen it all and that had never, in Tam’s memory, showed surprise.

  It was like conversing with a divine being. That was why it was so daunting. Talking to Emeraude was like talking to an omniscient deity who knew all there was to know about anything—including Tam. Borik was bad enough, with his supernatural ability to ferret Tam out of wherever she was hidden. Emeraude could do that with Tam’s thoughts, even the thoughts Tam herself wasn’t aware of hiding. It was unnerving.

  Tam would have to brace herself for another session of uncomfortable and involuntary soul-baring.

  And she’d have to be nicely dressed for it. It was only polite.

  Tam didn’t have an informal soldier’s uniform, let alone a formal, decorated uniform for court. All she could do was to tidy herself up as much as possible. The dorm’s communal bathing chamber had rusty, cracked mirrors aplenty, and its slick, mossy tiles would have anyone mincing like a courtier to prevent slipping and splitting their head open on the floor.

  Tam took her grooming kit in with her and headed to the mirror with the fewest cracks. It was the mirror closest to the lavatories and was chronically underused, because the children were driven to farther mirrors to get away from the stink. But Tam couldn’t afford trying to neaten herself in a broken mirror that displayed her face in fifteen million angles. She could only pray the stink wouldn’t cling to her.

  Tam hurriedly retrieved her comb from her kit, raked it through her coarse, frazzled hair, and plaited her braid anew. She’d hacked the sleeves off her summer tunics to give her freer movement with the spear, so her tunic was terrible, fashion-wise, but she liked to pretend it gave her a charmingly rugged air. Not that the nobles of Emeraude’s court would find ruggedness charming. Nor would they be charmed by the fading welts and bruises from Tam’s spar with Maryada, but Tam had no clue how to cover those up.

  Not to mention that she didn’t want to cover them up. To her, the greenish hue of her bruises wasn’t ugly at all; it was a sign of her valor. At least her bumps and scratches were no longer smarting like she’d just emerged from a whipping—Maryada’s spear-strikes had been light, but they’d hurt nonetheless. Tam’s nut-brown skin now bore as many stripes as a tiger’s, scarcely visible though the fainter stripes were through her brownness. Faint or not, they were the markings of a warrior. Tam paused to admire them in the mirror before remembering that she had to hurry. She had an appointment with a queen.

  Duly tidied, Tam rushed off to the palace, whose white spires glinted like knife points in the descending dusk. Tam supposed that was appropriate, given the amount of backstabbing that went on in there. Emeraude was moral to a fault, but her ministers weren’t.

  The sloping stairs leading up to the palace were lined with liveried wardens. After introducing herself, Tam was escorted to Emeraude’s study, where the queen welcomed guests who weren’t of the political persuasion or who weren’t involved in the state’s public affairs.

  Usually only the queen’s closest friends and relatives were ever allowed into her study.

  Tam was the exception.

  She tried not to dwell on the reason why.

  Tam stood in the archway outside the queen’s study. The minutes passed about as slowly as taffy being poured on a candied apple from the height of a thousand yards. Tam fiddled nervously with her scuffed leather belt, a belt that she’d had to poke additional holes in with her dented hunting sword. None of her clothes fit her just right, unlike the courtiers with their impeccably tailored outfits. Tam was reminded again of how out of place she was. She stared up at the archway, which was an arc of polished gems set into geometric patterns of colored glass. Everything glittered here. Everything shone. Even the nobles. In contrast, Tam was dull-hued and grubby, a sparrow among peacocks. She was as ill-suited to the palace as a mushroom was to a rose garden.

  Eventually a sentry opened the brass-knobbed door under the archway. The door’s ornately carved engravings gleamed as it swung inward.

  “The queen is ready for her next guest,” the sentry announced, then blinked down at Tam. He took in Tam’s size and threadbare clothing with confusion, as if Tam were a miniature gargoyle that had sprung to life. “You must be Tamsin Bladeborn,” the sentry said with palpable disbelief.

  Tam drew herself up, determined not to be cowed. “First of all, that is a ridiculous name, and I refuse to answer to it.”

  The sentry kept blinking. “Just Tamsin, then.”

  “Slightly less ridiculous. Still not answering to it.”

  A grudging smile tugged at the sentry’s lips. “If so, how should I call you?”

  “Tam, not Tamsin. I’m definitely not Tamsin Bladeborn.”

  “Isn’t ‘Bladeborn’ the name you inherited from your parents?”

  “They admitted it was ridiculous too. My father actually covered his face and mumbled whenever somebody asked him what his clan name was. He hadn’t wanted to inherit it either. It’s embarrassing, is what it is. Makes you sound like the hero of some balladeer’s dreamed-up quest.” Tam jutted out her chin. “My parents weren’t just Bladeborns. They shaped their own fates. They were their own people. Zara and Simion. Those were their names.”

  The sentry sobered, inferring that Tam’s parents were dead. “The nobles that visit the queen tend to be obsessed with their clan names.”

  “I’m not a noble.”

  “I can see that,” said the sentry, and it would have been an insult if it weren’t for the sympathy in his smile. “Go in. Her Majesty awaits you.”

  Tam stepped in. As she did, all her courage in dealing with the sentry evaporated.

  For there sat Queen Emeraude, on a richly upholstered chair before her writing desk, dressed in a satiny blue gown with silver embroidery at the sleeves. She wore no crown—she despised doing so unless she was on her throne to officiate events or to pass judgment at court. Instead, her auburn hair flowed freely over her shoulders, and her clean, delicate, alabaster hands were folded on her lap.

  Tam’s own fingernails were ragged and uneven, caked with dirt from the training grounds. Tam folded her hands behind her back, where they could not be remarked on. Not that Emeraude ever remarked on Tam’s appearance; she had the grace not to.

  “Tam,” Emeraude greeted her warmly, and it still jolted Tam that Emeraude was the only adult who addressed her by the name she preferred. It was overwhelming, that a queen engrossed in more important subjects would find it in her to be considerate of a peasant child. Because, when in the company of Emeraude, it was clear that Tam was just a child. Tam couldn’t even dispute it, like she could with Borik.

  “Your Majesty.” Tam bowed.

  “Come now. Such formality after years of acquaintance?”

  “Um. Em-mer—” Tam stammered. This happened every time she met the queen, and every time, it reduced her to incoherence. “E-Emeraude?”

  “Thank you.” Despite the warmth of Emeraude’s tone, her eyes were sharp. “I hear that your escapades grow bolder by the month.”

  Tam shuffled her feet. “I… I’m only… trying to help?”

  “I’m sure you are.” Emeraude regarded her serenely. “Have you ever pondered why that is?”

  “P-pardon?” Oh no. This was where Emeraude slit Tam’s soft underbelly open like a particularly beautiful dagger. A dagger with a bejeweled hilt.

  “You lodge in the children’s dorm, where the offspring—orphaned or otherwise—
of the soldiers are housed. Once, your parents had lodged in the barracks, and you were permitted entry to visit them, just as they were permitted entry into the children’s dormitory to visit you. Was that not so?”

  Tam straightened. “Y-yes, it was.”

  “Thus you became conditioned to visiting the barracks, and you understandably began to associate the barracks and its inhabitants with your parents, with home.”

  “I… yes, of course.” Who wouldn’t associate the building where their parents lived with home?

  “The other inhabitants of the barracks were the soldiers. That meant you also began to see these soldiers as home. So after losing your parents, you naturally adopted the army as your extended family. When you seek to fight alongside them, you seek belonging—a sense of togetherness to fill the void that the absence of your parents left within you.”

  Tam flinched.

  Emeraude’s serenity didn’t waver. “But does it do justice to your adopted family that you risk yourself unduly for them, as if you need to repay them with your own blood for the honor of calling them kin? Does it do justice to them that you believe sacrificing yourself is the only road to belonging among those who sacrifice themselves?”

  “But… but you just said it. That they sacrifice themselves too.”

  “They do it for their kingdom. For the children of their kingdom. For the innocence of those children. And what are you, Tam? To them, you are among the children they are sworn to protect. Would you take their sacrifice and throw it back at them as if it were nothing?”

  Tam’s gaze fell to her boots—her muddy, half-torn boots, in which she trained day and night to perfect her craft as a spear-wielder. It wasn’t just about proving herself. It was about what was right, about how skilled Tam was, about how she could be of use. If she could be of use, she should be of use. Even Maryada and Dale had acknowledged her capabilities, budding though they were. Why did her age lessen that?

  A heated, wretched sullenness bubbled up within Tam like lava, but she couldn’t argue with Emeraude. It wasn’t just because Emeraude was the queen; it was because what Emeraude was saying had the ring of truth. It was the same truth Tam had heard in her parents’ words—the words of those who would not spare her the truth, no matter how harsh it was. The words of those who loved Tam enough to tell her the truth. Now that her parents were gone, it was Emeraude who had taken up that duty. It was hard not to resent her for it.