Call Of The Flame (Book 1)

by James R. Sanford

  Everyone rushed forward into a melee of reaching arms and handfuls of straw, and when a straw arm came flying out of the center there was another rush and suddenly Kyric and Aiyan stood in an open space. Fifty paces away, where the edge of the audience had been, stood Kleon Morae.

  Aiyan and Morae saw one another, drew and readied pistols before Kyric could take one step, Morae dropping to one knee and Aiyan sliding to the side as they fired at nearly the same instant. A lock from Morae’s wig flew away, and Aiyan had a new hole in his collar, but neither man was hurt, nor were any bystanders hit. Amid the flurry of straw and firecrackers, no one seemed to even notice.

  A straw leg was flung backward from the throng and the crowd surged back, coming between Aiyan and Morae. Kyric managed to get both pistols out. Aiyan drew his sword, and holding it low began to circle the crowd, but everyone quickly got their handful of straw and ran to the fire with it.

  Morae was still there, a sabre in his hand, and far beyond in the shadow of a tent, stood Stefin Vaust drawing a bow.

  “Aiyan!” Kyric called. “Next to the tent.”

  “I see him.” Aiyan said, coming to a halt and raising his sword as if to strike.

  It seemed a very long shot for a pocket pistol, but Kyric took careful aim at Vaust. Morae started forward. Two figures were passing behind Vaust, and Kyric couldn’t risk hitting them. He held his fire. Vaust loosed his arrow. Aiyan cut sharply and the two halves of the arrow spun lazily in the air as they fell somewhere behind him. Kyric pointed his pistols at Morae and he stopped short.

  A few late-arriving girls, running to join in on the grab for straw, nearly ran into Morae, one of them screaming at the sight of his bared sword. A head turned, then another. Morae backed away, sheathing his sabre. Vaust nocked another arrow but didn’t draw back.

  Aiyan backed away as well. “Get behind me,” he said to Kyric. The crowd began to disperse as they moved away.

  “Morae’s role as gentleman financier is working against him — he can’t afford to be recognized sword fighting in the middle of the night. But if he didn’t have Vaust backing him, I wouldn’t give him a choice.”

  More people drifted into their wake. As soon as they lost sight of Morae and Vaust, Aiyan sheathed his sword and turned saying, “Now we run again.”

  They ran between bonfires and past dancing couples all the way to the far corner of the fairgrounds. A few cabriolets sat waiting across the street, and Aiyan ran to the nearest one calling, “Are you free, cabbie?” When the man nodded Aiyan tossed him a half-ducat as they climbed in and said, “To the river if you please, and hurry. We are pursued by a woman scorned.”

  The cabbie’s face brightened when he saw the size of the coin, and he urged his horse to a fast walk. “’Fraid this is quick as it goes on Solstice Eve,” he said.

  They weaved down to the avenue toward the river, the cabbie dodging foot traffic and cursing at those who got in the way, Aiyan looking behind the whole time. Kyric said to Aiyan, “How do you have so much coin all of a sudden? You even paid the bill at dinner last night.”

  “I wagered on you at the games.” He continued looking behind them.

  “You took money from honest men, knowing we were cheating?”

  Aiyan glanced at him. “I don’t know if those men were honest, but I would have made triple off them if you had won.”

  He smiled broadly and Kyric laughed, and suddenly it was the funniest jest he had ever heard. He laughed harder, the way Pitbull had laughed at the games, and this thought made him laugh even harder. “Aiyan,” he gasped, clawing at the upholstery, “I can’t stop laughing.” His eyes began to water. “It’s not even funny anymore . . . and I still can’t stop.”

  Aiyan placed his hand on Kyric’s shoulder. “It’s alright,” he said. “It’s just nerves.”

  By the time they came to the river Kyric managed to regain himself, and Aiyan told the driver to turn south. About half a mile along they stopped and got out, letting the cabriolet go. “I don’t think we’re still being followed,” Aiyan said, leading them down to the riverside jetties, “but this is a pretty good way of making sure.”

  They hadn’t gone ten paces along the jetty when a boatman called, “Ferry you across for a penny apiece, gents.”

  Out on the river, in the dark, they floated quietly between two shores of fire and tumult. The bump of the boatman’s oars echoed on the water. Aiyan watched behind them the whole way across, but no other boat followed. They landed at a tiny riverside quay and climbed the steps to the street, quickly hailing another cab.

  “New Market Square isn’t far from here,” he said, “Would you like to see if Jela and the lion wrestler made it there, or do you think she’s seen enough of us for one night?”

  Kyric smiled wistfully. “I don’t think I’ve seen enough of her for one night.”

  They were in the new city now, with its wide, straight boulevards, and they went all the way to New Market Square at the trot.

  The square was big and loud, with dancing and an orchestra on one side, and a bonfire with straw and shredded cloth scattered all around on the other side. Across the enclosing streets, hordes of laughing, talking, drinking, smoking people spilled out of cafes onto the sidewalks.

  Kyric stood on a bench and looked over the square. “We’ll never find her in all this.”

  “It will be hard to miss Jazul,” Aiyan said. “So go and find her and have some fun. I’ll be lurking about, keeping an eye on everything.” He waved Kyric away. “Go. Enjoy yourself.”

  Kyric started across the square. Well past midnight, he thought, and the night still seemed young, endless rather. He swept up some loose straw with his hand and fed it to the bonfire with no small sense of irony. There. I’ve cast out my bad luck for the rest of summer.

  He easily found Jazul, dancing with a girl Kyric didn’t know, and from there found Jela and all her friends at a sidewalk table. Jela had quite gotten over her pouting about the royal reception. In fact she was still enjoying a bit of celebrity with her friends at having been there.

  They recognized Kyric from the archery tournament. The girls wanted to know if he had been at the reception too. The guys pushed goblets of wine at him and proposed toasts for everything they could think of, and he found himself not declining.

  He was a little surprised when Jela’s friend Sercey suggested that he ask her to dance. When he told her he didn’t know how she pulled him aside and spent some time showing him the basic steps before dragging him to the open pavement. The music here ran lighter and more lively, the dance steps more loose, and all the young men swung their young ladies by the arm.

  It reminded him of a summer dance in the village when he was younger. Mother Nistra had allowed, nay, made him go to it. The one dirt street had been crossed with strings of paper lanterns like the ones they carried here, and all the young folk of the village had danced and flirted and sipped lemonade and had played games like blind pony and sleeping bandit. Kyric had stood the whole evening in a deep shadow where no one could see him and watched it all.

  Sercey counted time at first, to get him going, and then suddenly he was dancing, and it wasn’t so hard. Sercey was pleasant to dance with, but he felt his own clumsiness held her back. He couldn’t swing her as smoothly as the others did, but it was fun anyway.

  He was surprised again to find Jela waiting for him when his dance with Sercey ended. As he took her hand and waited for the next song to begin she said, “This is what it’s like to dance with someone who knows how.”

  It was true. Rather than he lead and she follow, it was as if they both led and followed at the same time. He spun like a wheel and she floated like a feather. He didn’t know that two people could move together like this. Perhaps this was what Aiyan had felt with Aerlyn. New horizons began to open to him. The fellows at the table had liked him. They didn’t mind that he had little to say. And it hadn’t been so hard to talk to Sercey or the other girls either.

  He looked into Jel
a’s eyes and saw an unexpected future there. This business with Aiyan would be over in a few days. Kyric could sell his silver arrow and find a place to live. With this nice suit he now had, he could get the work as a teacher that Aiyan had mentioned. He knew that Jela felt something for him, and he realized that she was the best thing that had ever happened to him. He would court her. He would have friends and a sweetheart and a normal life. All he had to do was keep placing one foot in front of the other. Yes, it was possible. He could see it clearly as he spun deeper into the night and the stars sped away from the coming dawn.

  CHAPTER 12: Commitments

  The clopping beat of the horse’s hooves echoed in the deserted streets. It was already midmorning, the sun high and hot, and they drove through a city that had been abandoned to shards of paper and straw. Aiyan had had the cabbie raise the leather hood, supposedly for shade, but he sat low and kept his head back so not to be seen. Out in the harbor, dozens of ships fled their anchorages, raising sail and making for the open sea.

  They passed the Palace of the Old Kings and turned onto the avenue fronting the royal residence. The bleary-eyed guards officer at the gate mirrored Kyric’s pale complexion and wobbly stride.

  Kyric had drunk too much wine with Jela and her friends, but after they left New Market Square, Jazul insisted on treating the four of them to an early breakfast at the Hotel Abalone. That had probably saved him from the worst of it.

  When it became clear that Jazul intended to take them all the way to Jela’s door in his hired carriage, Aiyan had tried to decline the offer. But Jela spoke over him saying, “Jazul has a room on Coopers Street, behind The Peacock’s Tale — so he can be close to Bruli — my house is right on the way.” Aiyan said nothing more, but Kyric could tell that he was not comfortable with anyone knowing where they slept. They had stumbled into the house about an hour before first light.

  “Her Highness welcomes you,” the officer said with little inflection upon checking his list. After they were admitted it was still a bit of a drive to the main house.

  “I don’t like this,” Aiyan said looking around, taking in the grounds of the estate. “There’s too much ground, too many trees. In the dark of night you could sneak right up to the house.”

  Kyric saw that he was right. The grounds extended a quarter mile from the house in every direction, with three wooded parks and plenty of sculpted hedges and flowering plants. He never imagined that an in-town house would rest on so much land. He looked at Aiyan. “The wall around the place is twelve feet tall.”

  “It wouldn’t stop me,” Aiyan said.

  As they approached the house Kyric saw that it was the sort built in the Long Winter, with over a dozen chimneys and rows of large glass windows to let the warmth of the sun in. Those windows had long ago been set on hinges, and now stood open to the breeze.

  They were directed to the stables, and Princess Aerlyn was waiting there with Eren, Kaelyn, three beautiful horses, and two good-sized ponies. Aiyan and Aerlyn chatted about the horses and tack for a moment and then they all mounted, Aerlyn wearing a riding suit that was much like a man’s, with pants and boots. Aiyan had been able to wear Sedlik’s old brown sporting suit, but Kyric wore his everyday clothes with a sash for hidden pistols and ended up looking like one of the stable hands.

  “I can’t wait for the society pages to come out tomorrow,” Aerlyn said to Aiyan. “I can see it now: Her Highness was seen dancing with the mysterious cavalier, Sir Aiyan Dubern —” She imitated the wavering, piccolo voice of a lady Kyric had met at the reception. “— whom she afterward engaged in a secluded tête-a-tête.

  “If we are seen together in public again it will be quite the scandal.” She smiled in a way that said she couldn’t care less if they were seen together.

  But Aiyan couldn’t return her smile. “I must apologize, Princess. I never meant to impune your reputation. I don’t even know why I asked you to dance.”

  She gave him a level gaze. “I know why. And I am glad. That was the first time I have danced since my husband’s death. And even though we have only just met, we are already past this sort of conversation, Aiyan.” The knowing smile returned. “And if in private you do not call me by my name, I shall have to address you as Sir Knight.”

  “As you wish, Aerlyn.”

  The two of them rode in front, and Kyric stayed behind, flanked by the children on either side. “Your seat isn’t very good,” Prince Eren said to him.

  “Pardon?”

  “You need to lean forward a little and place more weight on your stirrups. It makes it easier on the horse.”

  “I see.”

  Eren was terribly serious for a nine year old. “That’s what a good rider does. He makes it as easy for the horse as possible, even at the expense of his own comfort.”

  “You must have a very good riding master to teach you such things.”

  ‘My father taught me how to ride. He died when I was five. He said the same rule applies to leaders and the led.”

  “He must have been a wise prince.”

  “He was, as I shall be when it is my time.”

  Kyric tried to hold back a laugh. “Eren, are you sure you’re only nine?”

  “Nine and a half.”

  They skirted a patch of woods, finding some shade on the other side, and Aerlyn said to Aiyan, “I looked in the Book of Heraldry this morning and found the coat of arms of your order. I thought it was beautiful in its simplicity — a flaming sword held between two firebirds. I hope you don’t think ill of me for saying this, but I was relieved to find it.”

  “I’m relieved as well.”

  “So I sent word to the Royal Library for any history of the Knights of the Flaming Blade that could be found, and I received a tome simply titled The Book of Spring, but naturally I haven’t had time to read much of it.”

  “It details the last year of the Long Winter,” Aiyan said.

  “Yes,” she said. “I did read one part. It mentioned that your order defended the house of Quytis on this very spot when the forces of the warlord Fernoc broke the west gate and overran the city. It says that they fought with swords that caught fire — a misquoted reference to the heraldry I suppose, or something lost in the translation.”

  Aiyan bowed to her in the saddle. “Perhaps,” he said. “But I’m surprised they did not send you The Book of Autumn as well.”

  “What would I find in that?”

  “Stories from the last year before the Long Winter, some that you might find hard to believe.”

  She cocked an eyebrow. “Then I shall send for it with all haste.”

  They rode in silence for a time, listening to the chirping of birds and the creaking leather of their saddles. At length Aerlyn said, “I have decided to attend the Senate and vote against the formation of the Spice Island Company. If this is something that could invite war with the Baskillian Empire then another year of consideration is not too long.”

  Aiyan nodded. “I must admit that I’m glad to hear that. But it might be a good idea if no one else hears of it until the day of the vote.”

  “I can tell them today that I haven’t yet decided, but a clever politician will know that it only means I have decided against him.”

  “Anything that gives Lekon and Morae the slightest hesitation works to your advantage, Aerlyn.”

  “You never said which nation Morae served. The Kingdom of Jakavia is the only one that really makes sense. King Orstiano would be very pleased to see the Aessian and Syrolian states weakened by a war with Baskillia.” She looked to him for confirmation.

  “Let us say,” he replied, “that there is a faction within the Baskillian Empire which is shut out of the spice trade. Even if they possessed charts of the lost spice islands, they could not use them without the established spice clans calling down the Imperial wrath. But if they allied themselves with the military clan, then a war with Aeva and the western states would serve them well. They would have already established themselves in military
politics and would exert considerable influence, and should the lost islands be wrested away from the interloping Aessians they would no doubt become the military governors of the newly conquered territories.”

  “And Morae is an agent of this new faction?”

  “It is what I believe, based on the words of my fellow knights who have traveled in the empire. I know for a certainty he is not what he seems and that Lekon is his loyal servant.”

  Kaelyn guided her pony closer to Kyric. “Did you throw straw into the fire at midnight?” she said to him.

  “I was busy at midnight, but I threw some in later. Did you have a straw man last night?”

  “I fell asleep, and no one woke me up.” She made a face at Eren. “Now I have to keep my bad luck.”

  “No you don’t,” Kyric said with a grin. He took out the wooden coin he had saved and gave it to her. “There. Now you have all the good luck you need.”

  She held it up for Eren to see. “Good luck,” she said to him, throwing her head back in defiance.

  They rode a winding course across the estate, and when they came to a meadow Aiyan and Aerlyn broke away in an impromptu race, returning at the trot smiling and arguing about who had won. At the end of the morning, back at the stables, after the grooms had taken their horses and the children had run down to a nearby pond, Aiyan spoke quietly to Aerlyn.

  “You must know that by following my advice you place yourself at risk.”

  “So I’ve been told,” she said.

  Aiyan’s gaze turned hard. “I’m not speaking of business threats. These men are willing to do anything.”

  “Certainly I’m safe here,” she said. “A troop of royal guardsmen are assigned to me at all times.”

  “Most likely they would try to arrange an accident on your way to the Senate, and if you don’t mind I would like to accompany you there on Wineday morning. In the meantime I would have the guards captain increase the watch if possible.”