Shield of the People

by Marshall Ryan Maresca

  Had any Tarian Adept or Master? As she ran, pushing herself until her lungs burned, she wondered why the Order sometimes called themselves “The Shield of the People” when most of their energy was spent in service of nobility or members of Parliament.

  You know perfectly well why, she told herself. Because between the Constabulary, army, and King’s Marshals, there’s little place in this world for the ancient Elite Orders. Training and discipline and tradition mean nothing if no one supports us.

  By the time she returned, the sun was just peeking over the tops of the buildings to the east, shining off the high dome of the Parliament. The chapterhouse was unusually busy for this early. That was to be expected today, with formal training of Initiates beginning. The past few days had been in conference with Master Nedell and various Adepts to determine the third-year rankings. She wasn’t convinced that the final decisions were fair or correct, but it wasn’t an empirical process. Save intervention from the Grandmaster, it was ultimately Master Nedell who determined who was ranked where, and Amaya had to defer to that.

  “Vien,” she called as Vien Reston went by, coming from the dining halls. “You off to rouse the third-years?”

  “I am,” Vien said. “But—”

  “Have them start with a run, then a double cycle of strength work, and then—”

  “Well, I will, but the Grandmaster made a thing about not pushing the Initiates too hard in the early days.”

  “That’s why just a double cycle,” Amaya said, laughing it off. “We’ll give them a week before the hard stuff.” Even still, she had a bit of misgiving. Was the Grandmaster trying to undermine her authority with the Initiates? She was supposed to be in charge of the training regimen. Though it was possible the Grandmaster was specifically talking to Vien, who had been a bit extra zealous in her role as Initiate Prefect. But Amaya liked her energy.

  Vien chuckled. “If they can all keep their breakfast down, we’re being too easy on them.”

  “I’m all right with you pushing them harder, but you’re the one who’ll mop it up.”

  “See, that’s further training and incentive for them.”

  Amaya sighed and rolled her eyes. The Grandmaster’s admonition was clearly directed at Vien’s particular enthusiasm. “Well, go rouse them, run them down five miles, then we’ll do strength work in the training room.”

  “Five? Excellent.”

  “It’ll do them good. Also the first rankings are up. You remember how unnerving that can be.”

  Vien scoffed. “Not for me. I started at first place and kept it all year.”

  Lucky Vien. Third-year Initiacy for Amaya had been a constant competition, she and Dayne swapping first and second place the whole time. After Third-Year Trials, Master Denbar declared them tied, both the top of the cohort as they advanced to Candidacy.

  Even still, Master Denbar—family, her mother’s cousin—took Dayne with him to Lacanja. Where he died.

  And on his death, he had had a box sent to her, with nothing but a locket and the high trump cards of a playing deck: the Grand Ten. It was such a bizarre thing, she didn’t know what to make of it. And a message that she needed to find them, stop them, and save Druthal.

  It had her thinking: what was the Grand Ten? They were icons of history, heroes who worked to form the nation. What would that mean now? And why would she need to save Druthal from them? The only thing that made sense to her was that there was a conspiracy in Maradaine, powerful people who were wanted to reshape the nation to their ideals. People who chose the iconography of the Ten to give themselves the moral authority that their goals lacked. But that idea seemed patently ridiculous.

  Perhaps it was a mystery she would never solve.

  Vien was still waiting for a final order. Amaya keyed back into the conversation. “Get them going. I’ll meet you all in the yard in an hour.”

  “Ma’am,” Vien said, with a wicked grin. She went up to the barracks. That girl was definitely enjoying her job as Initiate Prefect. Perhaps a little too much. But Amaya wasn’t going to begrudge her that. The Initiates were going to need the push. Especially Jerinne Fendall, if she was going to make it.

  * * *

  “The sun is up and you aren’t!”

  Jerinne had been half-asleep, desperate for a few more moments before she had to wake up, but unable to rest when she knew that was about to be shouted.

  That had been the wake-up call in the barracks for the third-year Initiates since they had been advanced, even though formal third-year training began today. Vien Reston—now a first-year Candidate—had taken her assigned role of Initiate Prefect with a great amount of relish. Possibly because she was the only new Candidate from her cohort who hadn’t been assigned to another city. Two months ago she was Vien, an Initiate like everyone else in the barracks. Today she was Miss Reston and treated them all like sewage.

  As Jerinne started to rouse from her bunk, Vien slammed a staff between her legs.

  “Morning, Initiate!” Vien shouted. “Hope I didn’t disturb your foot at all like that. How is your foot, Initiate? Has it healed?”

  “It’s fine,” Jerinne said.

  “Oh, good,” Vien said, her tone oily with condescension. “I would hate to do anything that could break it again, forcing you to be excused from further exercises. You don’t need to be excused, do you?”

  “No, ma’am,” Jerinne said, getting to her feet. She made a point of putting all her weight on her feet, standing tall and strong. That gave her a few inches over Vien, looking down her nose to meet her eyes. It also made her ankle twinge at her, a sharp reminder of the injury. Just about everyone in the third-year Initiacy, as well as Vien and several of the other Candidates and Adepts, had made enough of a fuss about her limping about and being excused from certain tasks that she wasn’t about to give them an ounce of a reason to doubt her or her commitment. “I’m ready for anything you have for me.”

  “Anything?” Vien said. She turned to the room. “People, Initiate Fendall has issued us a challenge! We should all rise to the occasion. So instead of a two-mile run this morning, we will start with a five-mile one. But before you get too excited for that, on the slateboard outside are the rankings for your cohort. Starting today, those rankings will be updated daily. Learn where you stand and strive to be worthy of the name Tarian.” She strode out of the barracks. “Everyone be at the main gate when I ring the bell.”

  All eyes were on Jerinne now, just for a moment. Then everyone ran out to the slateboard.

  Raila Gendon hung back for a moment. Even fresh out of bed, Raila somehow looked luminous. “You better be ready for that run.”

  “I can handle it,” Jerinne said.

  “You better hope they all can as well.” She went out into the hallway.

  Jerinne followed, but as she crossed out of the threshold, something swept her leg and knocked her to the floor. Before she could react, someone else flipped her over on her back. She found herself staring at Candion and Miara, hovering right over her. Candion leaned in uncomfortably close.

  “Look out there, Fendall,” he said, his nose almost brushing her own. “Maybe your foot isn’t quite ready yet.”

  “Maybe she still needs more coddling,” Miara added. She almost bared her teeth at Jerinne like she was going to bite her. “I never imagined that a third-year Initiate would need coddling, but here we are.”

  “You would think such a person would wash out in their first or second year,” Candion said.

  “Especially when you look at the people who didn’t make it to third year,” Miara said. “You have to ask yourself how any such person would make it this far.”

  Jerinne had enough of that, but she kept herself from lashing out. As much as she wanted to act in anger, as much as she wanted to grab them both by their tunics and slam their heads together, she knew she couldn’t.

  She sh
ouldn’t. That wasn’t what made a Tarian a Tarian. And maybe Candion and Miara had forgotten that part.

  “It’s not yours to say,” she said, sitting up, pushing her face toward them. They had already tripped her, but she wondered if they dared to take a run at her when she was ready for it. They both yielded as she sat up, standing straight and hovering over her for a moment.

  “No, it ain’t ours,” Miara said. “But we’ve seen whose it is.”

  “Come on,” Candion said. “We all have a long run this morning. Better get ready.”

  They went toward the bathhouses, as did the rest of the Initiates. Enther—who had been a good friend and sparring partner for two years now—went by her, not looking down as he passed. Soon everyone was gone except Raila, who stood by the slateboard with her head held low.

  “Sorry,” she said quietly. “They’re just mad because Stancy washed out.”

  Jerinne got up. “Well, that’s between them and him. I had nothing to do with it. I’ve earned my place here.”

  “I suppose,” Raila said, looking up at the slateboard.

  Sixteen third-year Initiates, their names listed up there in order. Their current rankings, which would decide their mentorships for the next months, were written plainly and boldly. Now there was no guessing who the best was, who the Masters thought had the most potential to be an Adept in the Order.

  Sixteen Initiates, and Jerinne was dead last.

  * * *

  Dayne preferred to wake up before the sun rose, so he could do his morning stretches and routines with minimal interference. Tarians—be they Masters, Adepts, Candidates, or Initiates—tended to be early risers all around, so having the training room to himself was nearly impossible, no matter what time he got up.

  Usually at this hour there were only one or two others in there. Other Candidates like Dayne, for the most part. Vien Reston, the first-year Candidate who had been assigned as the Initiate Prefect, was always up before Dayne, pushing herself through intense calisthenics that put Dayne to shame.

  This morning, though, the room was almost full. Dayne had never seen it this way unless there was a scheduled training session. It seemed like every Adept and Candidate living at the Maradaine Chapterhouse had woken up in the predawn to exercise.

  Dayne’s confusion quickly passed. Today was the formal start day for the new year of the Tarian schedule. Why the schedule of the Elite Orders had nothing to do with the calendar or the University schedule, Dayne had never understood, and his research had never yielded a satisfying answer. He had thought someone wanted it to line up with the Victory Days, but as far as Dayne could tell, the Elite calendar predated that by centuries.

  The Elite Order schedule did roughly line up with the Parliament’s cycle, but that was because Oberon Micarum was a Spathian, so he used the Elite calendar as the format for the August Body. The yearly cycle ended with the End-of-Year Trials and Advancements last month in Joram, the same time the Parliament Convocation ended. The past month had been, officially, for people to travel to different cities for their new assignments. The year started now, right after elections had finished.

  A handful of Adepts had come to Maradaine over the past month, and most of the Candidates had left, especially the first-years. Vien was the only first-year Candidate currently in residence, the rest heading out to cities across the country to work under the tutelage of specific masters. Much like Dayne had when he went to Lacanja with Master Denbar.

  Of course, that had ended in tragedy. Denbar killed by a lunatic, and Dayne’s own career all but scuttled by the scandal.

  “Morning, Heldrin,” one of the Adepts said to him. Osharin, just transferred from the chapterhouse in Porvence. “Tighter in here than I expected.”

  “Same,” Dayne said.

  “Fancy a spar to loosen up?” Osharin asked.

  Dayne nodded. “Happy to. Any preference as to weapons?”

  “I’m partial to nothing,” Osharin said with a shrug. “I don’t know how it is here out west, but in Acora we always focused on going unarmed above and beyond all else.”

  “It was less a focus here,” Dayne said, moving with him to a clear space on the floor. “But our training focused on that maxim that a Tarian might be unarmed, but never defenseless.”

  “Yes, exactly,” Osharin said brightly. “Begin?”

  Dayne nodded, and Osharin moved in with a tight and fast jab that almost cracked Dayne’s nose. A quick dodge kept the blow to just a slight graze. Osharin laid into his attack: rapid, hard, focused, yet controlled and calm. Dayne responded in kind—dodging and blocking each blow with practiced ease. They fell into a rhythm for a moment, and then Osharin switched tactics, mixing punches with attempts to grapple Dayne, get ahold of his arm and pin him.

  Dayne showed him that was pointless. Osharin got a grip on Dayne, but Dayne had nearly a foot over the man, and was considerably stronger. Osharin was unable to get the leverage he wanted to twist an arm behind Dayne’s back.

  Instead, Dayne used the man’s attempt to flip him over onto the floor.

  Osharin landed on his back, letting out a hard groan as he hit. Dayne wasn’t sure if he had hurt him, but before he could ask, Osharin spun and landed a hard kick on Dayne’s shin. That hurt hard enough to make Dayne’s leg buckle, and he stumbled back to keep from falling over. Osharin popped back up on his feet.

  “Not bad, Heldrin,” he said. “More?”

  “Please,” Dayne said, and let Osharin launch another attack.

  “So,” Osharin said as he threw punches, talking as casually as if they were sitting down for breakfast. “You grew up in Maradaine?”

  “No,” Dayne said. “Grew up in Jaconvale, in the Sharain region. I came here for my Initiacy when I was fifteen.”

  “Jaconvale? As in the mustard?”

  “Mustard and cheese are what it’s known for,” Dayne said. “His lordship was always proud of that.”

  “Oh, you’re one of those,” Osharin said, slipping low and sweeping at Dayne’s legs. He had clearly decided that with Dayne’s strength and size, his legs were his greatest vulnerability.

  “Those?” Dayne asked, leaping over the sweep and diving into a roll. Show the man he was more nimble than expected.

  “You know,” Osharin said. “Child of service class, raised in the noble house. Singled out for talent and sent here.”

  “Sounds like you know the story,” Dayne said.

  “I know there is a story,” Osharin said. “I’ve not read it, but I’ve seen the pamphlets out there with your name and likeness.”

  Dayne wasn’t quite sure what to make of that. Osharin, despite his flurry of punches and kicks, seemed quite jovial and intrigued by the matter. Some of the other Tarians, especially the Adepts, were quite put off by the press Dayne had received after he helped capture Tharek Pell, The Parliament Killer. Master Hendron, just before he left for Lacanja to take the position left vacant when Master Denbar died—

  Killed, due to your failure, flashed across Dayne’s thoughts, almost making him miss one of his blocks. Osharin’s knuckles grazed his cheek, bringing him back to the spar.

  “Is it worth reading?” Osharin asked.

  “Depends who you ask.”

  Master Hendron told Dayne that he was a stain on the name Tarian, and hoped he would never become an Adept. Of course, Master Hendron was already getting his wish, but not for the reasons he thought. Dayne’s chances had already died on the same day Master Denbar did.

  “I have,” Osharin said. “And it sounds like a bunch of these folks are mad it wasn’t them.”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” Dayne said. Osharin came in with a heavy punch, and Dayne moved to deflect the blow and use Osharin’s momentum to send him flying. A simple twist-throw.

  Osharin, however, flipped his legs up with that throw—like he was anticipating it—and kicked Dayn
e in the face. Normally, this wouldn’t have achieved much, but Dayne had added his own strength to it, so the result was as if he had thrown the man at himself. That set him off balance, and Osharin pressed, wrapping his legs around Dayne’s neck and head before going limp. That pulled Dayne off his feet, falling back to the floor. Somehow, faster than Dayne could register, Osharin was on top of him, one knee pressed into his neck, the other leg pinning Dayne’s arm to the floor.

  “Nice,” Osharin said, grinning wildly while breathing just as hard. He popped up to his feet and extended his hand. “Hurt you bad?”

  “Just pride,” Dayne said, taking his hand and pulling himself to his feet.

  “Good,” Osharin said. “A guy your size, I have to use all my strength to subdue, so the line between disarm and injure, it’s . . . blurry.”

  “I saw what you were doing,” Dayne said. “I got cocky, thinking if I didn’t throw a punch, you couldn’t use my strength against me.”

  “I had to change up my strategy, once I realized you were on the defensive.”

  A loud rap came from the doorway, and all eyes turned to see Grandmaster Orren standing there calmly. “Good morning, all. I’m very pleased to see you all up so bright and early, and it is an important day. In addition to it being the first day of our cycle, with Initiates beginning the new year of their training, it is also a busy time in our city. I have spoken to many of you about specific duties, and if you do not have an assignment, speak to me this morning.”

  “Sir, if I may—” Dayne said.

  Orren’s eyebrow went up. “Actually, not at the moment, Dayne. I will speak to you shortly.”

  Dayne held back while others approached the Grandmaster. As he waited, he took up a practice sword and shield and went through his motions. No need to waste any time, when he should maintain his skills at the highest possible level.