by Guy Estes
Easy now, she told herself in a tone she’d use to steady a nervous horse. If you are going to accuse a man of such a crime, you'd best have some supporting evidence acquired through logical deduction. All you have is intuition. What else could explain his presence?
Perhaps he gives instruction to promising gladiators. But if that is so, why am I just now meeting him? I've been here for months. I would have seen him sooner. In fact, he probably would have been sent to give me further instruction.
Perhaps he simply likes to watch the games.
Then why was he sitting in Marcus' personal box? Marcus almost never allows anyone to join him in his box, and those he does allow are always women.
Perhaps he wishes to learn by watching the gladiators.
Hardly. He is Chosen. Few of the gladiators so far have presented me with a real challenge, and those that have were defeated soon enough. I have to assume that Anlon's skill at least equals my own, and it may even exceed it.
Her dark side roiled with fury at the very thought. Regardless of how great you are, Madigan had taught her, there is always someone greater. No matter how strong, fast or skilled a warrior was, there was always someone out there who was stronger, faster, more skilled or just luckier. It was an immutable law of the cosmos. Aleena had contemplated defeat, but never had she suffered it, and she knew no amount of contemplation could truly prepare her for the real thing, and she knew the real thing was inevitable.
But I suppose it is like death. It is inevitable, so it is a bit academic to worry about it. When it happens, it happens. All I can do is my best.
CHAPTER 17
“An insincere and evil friend is more to be feared than a wild beast; a wild beast may wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind.” - Buddha
Anlon called on her the next day. Aleena was more pleased than if she’d been crowned queen. It was so refreshing to talk to someone who knew precisely what it was like to have the weight of the world thrust upon you at birth. Still, Ilian and Ivarr had done well raising her. Her childhood had had its rough spots but, until Cormac’s death and the slavers had entered the equation, she hadn't had much to complain about. The isolation she experienced when Gwendolyn and Shannon moved away had been difficult, but some good did come out of it. It had started her down the path to self-reliance, which was an integral part of a warrior's spirit. It prepared her for the times when she'd have no one to call upon but herself. Anlon's childhood sounded quite wretched. His accounts of Jase tripped a familiar chord within her heart. What would she have done if Valkira or Dirke had been given authority over her? How miserable would that have been?
“Was there no one to help you?” she once asked Anlon.
“My father abandoned me when it was discovered I was Chosen. My mother…” he sighed. “My mother just made things worse. She constantly doted on me for being Chosen, she pushed me to excel, yet when I achieved, she would hardly notice and point out some higher achievement I should make. Comparing me to Jase or Cahir. Constantly hounding me not to disappoint her. Not to embarrass her. She even tries to decide which girls I love and which ones I don't. The day I am rid of her meddling presence will not come soon enough."
"And when it does, you will wish you had not judged her so harshly. No one is perfect, Anlon. Not even our mothers. If you are intelligent enough to see the mistakes she makes with you, you are intelligent enough to correct them."
Anlon gave her a truly chilling look after she'd said that, half of his face in shadow and half in orange lamplight.
"I know you do not like to hear it, dear brother, but if you lack the strength to accept the presence of your faults, you will lack the strength to erase them. Getting angry at me will not change that truth."
Aleena maintained a calm facade, but her spirit was engulfed in a whirlwind of contrasting emotions. It felt good to call this man brother. It felt good to have a kindred spirit, but while she felt the warmth of his admiration, she also felt the chill of his anger. Aleena did not know how to handle this man, or the feelings he produced within her.
The look faded from Anlon's face and was replaced with a wan smile.
"You are right," he said, carefully placing his palms on the table. "I apologize."
There was no trace of that black rage that had been obvious a moment ago, but Aleena refused to allow herself to forget about it, despite the fact that she desperately wished to.
“What about Cahir?” she asked in an attempt to make a more harmonious atmosphere. “From what you've told me, he faces the same troubles you do. He was born to take control of the Charidian. He had that pressure thrust upon him at birth. It seems to me that is why you two became so close.”
“Cahir has always been my closest friend and best ally. At least until I met you, Sister.” Aleena thrilled with warmth when he called her that. Then Anlon went on. “But the affairs of state leave him little time for anything but ruling the tribe. He was the only one who could begin to understand me.”
Aleena huffed out a quick laugh. “No one in the whole of the League understood me.”
“Are your parents also mad?”
Aleena laughed. “No. They’ve been very good to me, but only one of the Chosen can understand what it’s like to be Chosen. No, Brother,” she again felt the warm thrill, “as wonderful as my teachers and friends were, none of them could truly grasp what I felt.”
Anlon laughed. “I suppose that’s what my archery instructors felt.”
“I hadn’t yet gotten around to studying archery before I was taken.”
“Well,” he said, rising, “perhaps we should remedy that.”
Aleena followed him as he walked through the corridors of the stadium. All of the staff deferred to him, even though their prize gladiator was freely accompanying him.
“You seem to have no small amount of influence here,” Aleena remarked. Anlon only shrugged.
“Perhaps you could get me out of here,” she quietly suggested.
“That thought crossed my mind but I’ve no idea how to do it. Marcus is making a fortune off of you, so he would never sell you. If I took you by force it would bring mischief to my people. It’s an agonizing decision: free my sister and endanger my people, or keep my people safe and leave my sister in chains.”
“No,” Aleena quickly said, anxious to relieve him of any worry. “You cannot endanger your people for me. I’ll find another way out.”
“I’ll help you any way I am able.”
Anlon acquired two recurve composite bows and two sheaves of arrows and went out into the deserted arena. Two targets had been set up at Anlon’s orders. They were about thirty yards away. Aleena put on the three fingered glove to protect her hand from the bowstring and a bracer on her bow arm to spare her wrist and forearm the snapping of the bowstring when she loosed.
“Archery certainly has its uses,” she commented, “but it never appealed to me like swordplay did. It is a less pure form of combat. Archers must be used en masse. It would not work well for single combat. One would have ample time to raise a shield or step out of the arrow’s path.”
“That has been exactly my objection to it! The horsemen have proven the bow’s value in battle time and again, yet the ultimate combat is single combat between two champions.”
Anlon was pleased that his sister saw things his way, but before he could give her any instruction, she nocked an arrow, drew to her ear, and loosed. The arrow thudded into the target about six inches to the left of the center. Anlon looked at her for a moment, then drew and loosed his arrow. It struck the very center. Aleena loosed her second arrow and struck the center of her target. They matched each other for the next few shots, then increased the distance to one hundred yards. This time Aleena struck the center of her target with her first shot, along with all of her subsequent shots. Anlon performed identically. They drew their last arrows together. Anlon loosed first. Aleena loosed hers half an instant later. Anlon’s arrow arced towards t
he target and was on a perfect course for another bull’s eye. Aleena’s arrow looked to be slightly off course. Anlon started to smile as he realized he would beat his sister. His smile fell when Aleena’s arrow struck his in mid-flight. He looked at her. Aleena smiled at him.
“The targets were getting boring.”
Anlon’s expression showed he was clearly not amused. Thunder muttered as another storm approached.
“Then perhaps we should make things more interesting.”
The closing storm intensified. Two saddled horses were brought out at Anlon’s command. They mounted and began to ride in long circles, shooting at the targets as they came around them. Aleena’s first two shots missed the target entirely. Her next few were on its outskirts. With each shot after that she got closer and closer to the target’s center, finally scoring a bull’s eye with her last arrow. Again, they increased the distance, shooting from a full gallop. Each of them shot from the horse’s left side and straight ahead. Anlon then challenged her with the Amazonian shot, the one loosed backwards from a galloping horse.
Just as before, Aleena matched him for speed and accuracy. She again tweaked his pride with her last shot by hitting one of his arrows lodged in his target. He again gave her a withering look. Wordlessly, he returned the horses, bows and arrows and left. He did not so much as look at her. Aleena returned to her cell with a heart of lead as the gathering storm finally broke and rain came in sheets driven by the wind. She had obviously displeased him. She had failed to rein in her gift and might very well have driven away the only other one of her kind. Still, why did he have to get so angry? She had just been having a bit of fun.
She went about her practice sessions the next day distracted by her failure with her brother, though that did not stop her from excelling. She had finished her exercises and was about to go to the bath house when she found Anlon standing before her.
“I want to apologize,” he said before she could speak. “It was rude of me to get so angry yesterday. I suppose I am unaccustomed to seeing another perform as well as I.”
Aleena waved him off. “It is I who should apologize. I let my pride off its leash.”
“At any rate, I thought of something else we could do today. You once mentioned how you defeated your town’s militia. Tell me about that.”
“I began participating in drills with Sharleah’s militia when I was fifteen. All members of the Artisan League used militias for local security and professional warriors
to escort their trade caravans and ships, but we mostly ensured our security through
economics. We can do this,” she said, pride in her homeland swelling her heart, “because the goods and services we provide are of such superior quality. Any principality that got hostile with a member of the league would be boycotted by the entire league. Moreover, one of the league’s services was banking. This gives us enormous leverage with those states who took loans from us. If anyone did actually invade the league, the invaded provinces would either stop producing their goods or produce faulty ones to sabotage the invaders.”
“Would that really work?”
“The pride in one’s craft is so strong among the craft guilds that their members would usually die before surrendering their manufacturing secrets. All in all, invading the Artisan League is simply more trouble than it’s worth. The league’s terms of trade are
reasonable. It’s better, easier and more profitable to get along with the league than to
oppress it. Still, each region does feel the need for some token protection, and for this they use militias.”
“I should think the militia couldn’t wait for you to join.”
Aleena shrugged.
“The tactics they use are masses of pikes or shield walls. That type of fighting hinges more on the ability to maintain position in the line than intrinsic warrior skills.”
Anlon nodded
“You’re a warrior, not a soldier. You’re meant to be a lone fighter, not a member of a team. Your talent would be wasted in ranks of pike men or as a member of a shield wall. They would best use you to either act alone against the enemy and be free to use your gift the way the gods intended, or as commander, where your natural knowledge of strategy and tactics could best be used. Nor, I think, are you the sort to unquestioningly obey orders.”
Aleena beamed at his praise.
“My gift actually got in the way,” she finally went on. “It enabled me to see the flaws in the militia’s tactics and commanders. I was sitting with the rest of the militia listening to Commander Ratner’s praise of shield walls and pike formations. He was going on about how history has proven that pike men and shield walls to be all but invulnerable.”
Anlon snorted and shook his head. Aleena nodded.
“I know. I said nothing, but I guess I was unable to keep my opinion off my face, and Ratner saw me. ‘You disagree, Kurrin?’ he said. I told him that both formations have their uses, but to call them invulnerable is simply not true. ‘Oh? And perhaps you’d be so good as to tell us how you would deal with them,’ he told me, sneering and smug. So I did. I told him that archers could shoot down pike men at will. If an enemy can get past the tips of those pikes, they can cut down the pike men like weeds. Pikes are too long to be used in close quarters. He replied that they can drop their pikes and use their own
swords.
“In which case their defensive formation of a forest of pikes is now gone, leaving them vulnerable to an enemy advance. Archers can also work against shield walls, as can feigned retreats. And if a defensive formation does indeed prove unbreakable, I’d simply avoid it and lay waste to the surrounding countryside. Words continued and he ended up challenging me to prove myself right at the next muster, at which time I defeated both his pike men and his shield wall.”
“Single-handedly?”
She gave Anlon a devilish smile. “I’d spent the last month training some of my classmates. When the enemy was preoccupied with me, my troops fell on them. By the end of the day, I’d made another enemy – Ratner was relieved of his command and it was given to me.”
“They entrusted their defenses to a fifteen year old girl?”
Aleena shrugged.
“The Artisan League largely operates as a meritocracy. Performance was the dictating force in one’s success.”
“I’d be very interested to see how you did it. I’ll be the militia.”
In dealing with the pike men, Aleena simply walked up to them, armed only with a wooden sword and, when she was perhaps a foot or two from the tips of the foremost pikes, she dropped to the ground and rolled towards the pike men, too quickly for the pikes to follow, and passed safely under their tips. Then she rolled to her feet and knocked pike shafts aside as she closed with the pike men and scored what would have been fatal hits on five of them before the others dropped their pikes and went for their swords. She was able to ‘kill’ several more before her own troops arrived and the pike men were defeated.
Her answer to the shield wall was similar, only this time she had a shield complimenting her sword. The men stood abreast, armed with spears and protected by shields. They held their shields locked together to form a wall and held their spears over their shoulders to stab their enemy. The spears were much shorter than the pikes and therefore more manageable. When three men stabbed at her simultaneously, she used her shield to shove the spear tips up, her sword arm cocked back underneath her shield. Then she came in under them and executed a backhanded blow, perhaps the strongest blow possible with a one handed sword, to the legs of the man before. Her practice blade swooshed under his shield and caught him in the right calf with enough force to drop him. She stepped around him as he fell and went to work with her sword. The result was a repeat of what had happened to the pike men.
“Very well,” Aleena said. “You’ll need a spear and shield and I’ll need a sword and shield.”
They got their wooden practice weapons and went to the training groun
d.
“The members of the shield wall,” Aleena told him, “hold their shields before them and their spears overhand, cocked over their shoulders.”
“With their shields locked together they can then thrust at their enemies, forming a good line of both defense and offense.”
“Yes.”
Anlon got into position. Aleena continued talking as she walked towards him, her sword held casually and giving no hint as to what her intentions were.
“Though it can be used to advance on an enemy, in the Artisan League it is used mostly as a defensive position. By holding a steady line and stabbing assailants, they can inflict maximum damage on the enemy with minimal risk to themselves, although –“
Aleena started to shove his spear tip up with her shield, intending to slide forward to attack Anlon’s legs, just as she had when she did this against her militia, but she was stopped cold, knocked down and held in place, a heavy pain in her ribs. Anlon had stabbed down at her, his practice spear’s hard leather blade avoiding her shield and catching her in the side and pinning her in place. He gave her a handsome smile laced with triumph.
“Perhaps it works on craft guild men with their soft hands, but not with me.”
Other gladiators as well as some of Marcus’s employees had been about. They just saw the impossible. Ilyah Shkarr had been beaten, quickly and easily. Aleena lay there, trying to keep her anger from her face. She hadn’t realized how right she’d been when she knew she would not be prepared to cope with defeat. It hurt. Defeat in battle happened to other people, not her! Aleena Kurrin did not lose fights! Others lost fights to her!
I told you he was dangerous, her dark side hissed in her mind. I told you to be wary!
Thunder rumbled and the wind picked up, toying with their hair. Anlon continued to look down at her where she lay in the dust, that patronizing smile still in place. Aleena was absolutely livid, though she strove to keep her face from betraying her. She tried to get up, but Anlon held her down with his spear, his mocking smile broadening. Aleena knocked the spear away and shot to her feet, eager to smash that smile from his face forever, but she got control of herself.