by DAVID B. COE
As the day progressed however, Lenvyd began to wonder if there would even be a battle. When he heard that Kearney had ridden forward to sue for peace, his hands began to tremble so badly that he had to leave the other healers for a time in order to compose himself. But at last, late in the day, after the king’s attempt to forge a truce failed, the armies finally began to ready themselves for combat.
The sun had already started its slow descent toward the western horizon when the first arrows flew. Screams went up from both sides, the Braedony swordsmen commenced their charge and were met by Kearney’s warriors before they had covered half the distance between the two armies. In moments, the battle plain was in tumult and Eibithar’s healers were called upon to mend shattered bone and repair mangled flesh. As always, their work took them dangerously close to the front, and just this once Lenvyd didn’t mind at all.
He could see the king from where he tended to the first of the fallen, but the distance was still too great. Others were struck down closer to the fighting, and Lenvyd hurried toward them, continually marking the king’s position, doing all he could to narrow the gap between them.
“Lenvyd!” one of the other healers called to him. “You’re too close! It’s not safe there!”
“What choice do I have?” he called back. “This is where the injured are!” He turned his back on the man.
“You’ll get yourself killed!”
He ignored the healer, kneeling down beside a wounded soldier and placing his hands over a deep, bloody gash high on the man’s chest.
“Thank ye, healer,” the soldier whispered.
Lenvyd nodded, but he was watching Kearney, who steered his mount skillfully, first to one side, then to the other, his blade rising and falling with terrible grace, the steel stained crimson.
He was almost close enough.
Another man dropped to the ground several fourspans ahead. Lenvyd glanced down at the soldier he was healing. The wound had nearly closed.
“That should hold for a time,” he said quickly. “Make your way back to the other healers. They’ll do the rest.”
“Yes, healer. Again, my thanks.”
Lenvyd was already scurrying forward, his head held low. Yes, this one would get him close enough. His heart pounded in his chest, fear and elation warring within him. Old Lenvyd. He’d be so much more than that after this day.
He had hoped that this next soldier would already be dead, but he wasn’t. The soldier bled from a cut on his temple, and his leg was broken, but he was alive, and, worse, awake.
“Ean be praised!” the warrior said, as Lenvyd knelt beside him. “I though’ I was goin’ t’ die here.”
Lenvyd didn’t answer. He was watching the king, waiting for the right moment, gathering his power. Not healing, of course, but his other magic. Language of beasts.
* * *
Keziah strained to keep Kearney in view. As long as she could see him, she told herself, he was alive. So she watched, her fists clenched so tightly that they ached, her throat dry, her stomach feeling hollow and sour. Yet even now, struggling with her fear, she couldn’t help but take pride in what she saw.
She had never been a woman to be impressed with a man’s brawn or prowess with a blade. She had been drawn to Kearney by his wit and his intelligence; she had fallen in love with his tenderness and compassion. But seeing him now, his sword a gleaming blur in the golden sunlight, his mount whirling under his command like the Sanbiri horses that danced in Bohdan’s Revel, Keziah felt as though she were watching Binthar himself. This was the stuff of myth and song. She knew that she and the king would never again be together, but she knew as well that she would always love him, that his death would kill her as well.
A moment later she saw the healers making their way toward the front, and she wondered where her brother was, and who had fallen. Where were Tavis and his father, Fotir and Evetta and the other ministers? Where was Sanbira’s queen? With the Weaver and his army bearing down on them, they could ill afford to lose anyone.
Once again, she had to fight her desire to mount her horse and ride to Kearney’s side. He’d get himself killed trying to protect you, a voice in her mind told her. You serve him best by remaining here. Realizing this did nothing to reassure her or lessen her frustration, but it did keep her from doing anything foolish.
Look at him, the voice said, as her gaze returned to Kearney. Do you honestly believe that he needs your protection?
Confusion and violence swirled all around the king. Everywhere Keziah looked she saw men dying. Battle-axes and pikes and swords glinted in the sunlight, steel and flesh alike bore the stain of blood, and a thin haze of dust hung low over the plain. A thousand voices seemed to be screaming out at once, cries of fear and pain, battle lust and death mingling into an incomprehensible din.
Which is why, when Keziah first heard the name called out—“Lenvyd”—she knew she must be imagining it. How could she possibly pick out a single voice in the midst of this clamor? Unless it was the name. For she knew a man named Lenvyd. He was a healer who they had left back in Audun’s Castle, an older man whom the master healer had deemed too aged to make the journey northward. More than that, it seemed that the name had been shouted by another of the healers, a man who would also have known the old Qirsi. Looking at him now, she saw a second Qirsi beyond him, tall and thin, his back bent with age. And seeing this second man’s face as he turned for just an instant, a name—the full name—immediately leaped to mind. Lenvyd jal Qosten.
“He shouldn’t be here,” she murmured, her eyes following him.
Yet there he was, and hadn’t he been with them since they marched from the City of Kings? She had taken little notice of the healers during their journey. Certainly it was possible that the master healer had changed his mind about Lenvyd. Minqar would have known that there would be no shortage of wounded men; he might have decided that the addition to their company of even one skilled healer might well turn the tide in this war. Keziah had never seen Lenvyd minister to a patient, so she had no idea how fine a healer he was, but there could be no denying his courage. Even now, he was venturing closer to the battle line, braving the carnage to reach yet another fallen soldier. Indeed, it seemed this was why the other healer had called to him in the first place.
Only when Keziah had convinced herself that the old healer had been with them from the outset and had turned her attention back to Kearney, did she notice how close Lenvyd was to the king. It occurred to her then that every time the man had hurried to the side of another soldier he had also closed the distance between Kearney and himself.
This too, she was ready to dismiss as mere coincidence. But then Lenvyd stood. His back was to her, but she knew that he was staring at the king.
Terror seized her heart. She opened her mouth to scream a warning, fearing that already she was too late. But before she could make a sound, she sensed someone behind her, far too close.
“Archminister,” a voice said.
She spun, found herself face-to-face with Abeni ja Krenta.
“Archminister!” she said in return.
Unable to help herself, she glanced back over her shoulder in time to see Kearney’s mount rear. He clung to the beast, but almost immediately it reared again.
“You look like you’ve seen a wraith,” the woman said, forcing Keziah to look at her before she could see whether Kearney was able to withstand Lenvyd’s second attempt to unseat him.
“What? No. I … I’m just watching the … the battle.” She laughed, short and abrupt. She sounded mad to her own ears. “I’m afraid I’m not very well suited to war.”
Abeni raised an eyebrow. “No? What are you suited to?”
A cheer went up behind her, and whirling around once more, Keziah searched frantically for any sign of Kearney. After a moment she spotted his mount, but the saddle was empty.
“It seems the king has fallen,” Abeni said. “Surely you had hoped for that.”
Keziah faced her again, feelin
g dizzy and weak. Just because Kearney had been thrown from his mount didn’t mean that he was dead. He was a fearsome warrior, and there were as many of Eibithar’s men around him as there were soldiers of the empire. She needed to concentrate. The woman standing before her was dangerous; not only was she a chancellor in the Weaver’s movement, she was also a shaper. And just now, when she spoke, there had been something strange in her tone.
“What do you mean by that?” Keziah demanded, winning herself just a bit more time to clear her mind.
Kearney!
The archminister smiled, a predatory look in her yellow eyes. “I must ask you again, as I did earlier today, what is it the Weaver has asked you to do?”
“As I told you, I don’t think—”
“Yes, I know: the Weaver wouldn’t want you to say. That strikes me as being a very convenient excuse.”
She could barely stand for the trembling of her legs. “I don’t understand.”
“I don’t believe you.” Abeni eyed her briefly, her eyes narrowing, as if she were looking for a flaw in a newly forged blade. “Do you know that the gleaner has a sister?”
Keziah opened her mouth and closed it again. The sky above her seemed to be spinning, the world falling away beneath her feet.
Abeni stepped closer to her so that when next she spoke Keziah could feel the woman’s breath against her cheek, warm and soft as the whisperings of a lover.
“I’m a shaper,” she said, so softly that Keziah had to strain to hear her. “If you call for help or cry out, I’ll break your neck.”
“But I—”
Pain lanced through her hand, making her gasp.
Abeni held a finger to her lips. “Shhhh,” she said, smiling again. “That was just the bone in your little finger. I can do far worse, but I’m hoping I won’t have to.”
“What do you want?” Keziah asked, sobbing, her eyes closed.
“Walk with me.”
“No. You’ll kill me as soon as you have the chance.”
This time she heard the bone break—same hand, the ring finger. She clutched the mangled hand to her breast, tears streaming down her face. Had there been food in her stomach she would have been ill.
“I won’t kill you unless you make me. You’re more valuable to us alive, Keziah. Surely you see that. Grinsa jal Arriet’s sister. The Weaver will be so pleased.” The smile vanished from her face. “Now walk, or you’ll die. And any you call to your aid will perish as well.”
Her hand throbbing, her sight clouded with agony and despair, Keziah made herself walk. It wasn’t surrender, she told herself. Hope remained so long as she still drew breath. She had only to find some way to escape the chancellor.
But she was addled with grief. Walking through the camp, past soldiers still recovering from yesterday’s wounds and the cold, blackened remains of the previous night’s fires, she could think only of Kearney and her brother, and how she had failed them both.
Chapter Eighteen
Grinsa had heard it said that a warrior who marched to war without passion—be it hatred of the enemy, or fear of death, or love of country—was doomed to walk among wraiths before the battles were ended. Clearly it was an Eandi saying, for his people, he still believed, were never meant to be warriors, and on this day he was proving that by relying on magic a man could survive a battle for which he had no enthusiasm at all.
The Weaver was close. Grinsa could feel the man’s approach the way a ship’s captain might sense a coming storm. This battle, born of stubbornness and pride and too many centuries of hatred, was weakening them just when they most needed to be strong. Kearney knew this. Despite his refusal to listen to reason at their parley earlier this very day, the Braedony captain who led the empire’s army might well have known it too. That they fought anyway reaffirmed for him once more Dusaan’s cunning; he knew the Eandis’ vulnerabilities all too well.
Grinsa had no desire to kill the men before him. He neither hated the empire nor so feared its warriors that he fought with the battle lust he saw all around him. He raised his blade only to keep from being killed himself and to keep the warriors around him from doing too much damage to each other and themselves. It was, he had quickly come to realize, a poor way to fight. His reactions were too slow. Each time he looked for some way to bring down one of the enemy without killing him, he left himself open to another attack. Several times already he had been forced to draw upon his shaping magic in order to shatter blades that would otherwise have bit into his flesh. And twice he had been left with no choice but to break the bones of men who persisted in attacking him even after he rendered their weapons useless.
Naturally, his efforts to save lives had no effect on those around him, who continued to slaughter and be slaughtered with terrible persistence. He should have given up and simply fought as he had been trained so long ago, but he couldn’t. That the battle was clearly going Eibithar’s way was of little consolation. Tavis was still alive, as was Xaver MarCullet, who fought beside him. But like the soldiers around them, they fought as men possessed, and though Grinsa was grateful for anything that kept the two boys alive, he couldn’t help but disapprove. Tavis, at least, knew what was at stake.
Grinsa’s fighting also wasn’t helped by all that Keziah had told him of the traitors among Sanbira’s Qirsi. He should have been prepared—the ministers on this battlefield were among the most powerful and influential in all the Forelands, just the sort sought out by Dusaan jal Kania for his movement. But for so many of them to have turned … Grinsa had seen the arrival of Sanbira’s queen as a source of hope, as a sign that the leaders of the Eandi courts were capable of reaching past old rivalries and antiquated practices in order to combat this new enemy. And while all of this might be true, it now seemed that the Weaver had been just as eager to have Olesya and her company reach the Moorlands. Grinsa didn’t care to dwell on what this might mean for their prospects in the coming war, nor did he have time to do so.
With so many dangerous Qirsi about, he had to be alert to the possibility of attack, readying himself to fend off enemy magic even as he parried Eandi assaults with his steel. As a Weaver he could sense not only what powers a Qirsi possessed, but also when they were used. At any moment he expected his sword to shatter, or, worse, one of his limbs or his neck. He had chosen to fight on the ground this day, rather than mounted, fearing that the horse would only offer his enemies another target.
So it was that he perceived the attack, knowing immediately that it hadn’t been intended for him. For a long time, he had sensed only healing magic—a good deal of it. When the other power intruded on his thoughts, as jarring in his mind as a sour note might be to an accomplished musician, he jumped away from his Eandi attacker, spinning around swiftly, locating the source of the magic almost immediately. Language of beasts. From the old healer standing near Kearney, just to the east of where Grinsa was fighting.
He reached for the man, trying to take hold of his magic before he could make the animal rear, or bolt, or whatever he had in mind. But the Eandi soldier was on Grinsa again, and the gleaner had to fight him off, parrying two blows before finally breaking the man’s blade. When the soldier came at him once more, this time brandishing a dagger, Grinsa shattered the bone in his leg, cursing the warrior’s stupidity. He whirled to look for the healer, turning just in time to see the king topple from his horse. Several Braedony soldiers shouted in triumph, surging toward the spot where Kearney had fallen. They were met, however, by an equal number of Eibithar’s men.
Torn between his concern for the king and his need to stop the healer from doing more damage, the gleaner hesitated, though only for an instant. The soldiers could protect their sovereign. He might well be the only person who knew that the healer was responsible. He strode toward the old man, who was still standing, staring at the king’s horse and the tumult around the beast, as if unable to fathom what he had just done. Reaching him, Grinsa spun the man around and grabbed him by his arms, forcing the healer to look him in t
he eye. He had a thin, angular face, with an overlarge nose and small, wide-set eyes. Grinsa didn’t recognize him.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
“I’m … I’m just a healer!”
“Liar! You used language of beasts on the king’s mount! Now tell me who you are!”
“How can you know that?”
“I’m a Weaver, you fool! Haven’t you heard your fellow traitors speaking of me? I’d imagine it’s all they can talk about.”
“I don’t know what—”
Grinsa slapped him hard across the face, leaving a bright red mark high on his cheek.
“Lie to me again and you’ll get far worse!”
The man started to say something, then stopped himself. For several moments he merely glared at Grinsa. Then he grinned maliciously, all pretense forsaken.
“What is it you think you can do to me? I’m a dead man no matter what I say, so the threat of killing me won’t help you.”
“There are other ways.”
The healer actually laughed. “You mean torture? I’m an old man. I’ll die before you learn anything of value.”
“Perhaps you didn’t hear me a moment ago, healer. I’m a Weaver. I have mind-bending magic.”
The man’s face fell.
“You’ll tell me everything I want to know, simply because I ask it of you. One way or another, you’ll talk. The question is, how much do you want to suffer for each answer you give. I’m told that mind-bending power can hurt when used too roughly. Of course, I don’t know for certain. The last man I used it on died before I could ask him.” This time it was Grinsa’s turn to grin. “So I’ll give you one last chance. Who are you?”
The healer didn’t answer at first. He clamped his mouth shut, his eyes still fixed on Grinsa’s face, as if he were preparing himself to resist the gleaner’s mind-bending power. After some time, though, he looked away, and gave a small shake of his head.
“My name is Lenvyd jal Qosten,” he said at last.