Banner of the Damned

by Sherwood Smith

  Three weeks after Lasva joined us in Altan fan practice, the Marlovens found the gunvaer’s new area of practice sufficiently uninteresting enough to overlook. Of course the peacocks would flock together—everyone thought that a very good joke.

  One rainy day, when practice was over and I’d left for my tower, Kaidas was aware of Lasva listening as he explained to Vasande and his friends how the Altan fan form was actually not Colendi at all, but far, far back in history it had come from Chwahirsland. The old stories were that Chwahirsland was great, back in the days of dragons, but that the great leaders and makers left when the dragons did.

  As soon as he finished his historical lecture, the children ran off (undoubtedly shedding most of his words unheard) and he found Lasva walking next to him. She said, “Before I left Colend I gave my dear tabby Pepper to Darva. How did you come by Anise?”

  “On my way out of the country I stayed with Darva, and here was the new litter. Darva asked if I might take one west.”

  “What made you decide to come?”

  Here was his moment at last, the one he had rehearsed all across the continent. Even dreamed about. But the Lasva in those dreams had been the young princess, tender and ardent, always on the verge of laughter, and not this woman more beautiful than marble, and about as warm.

  However, he did not see the indifference his father had predicted so easily, from the comfortable summit of experience. There was that in the tightness of Lasva’s upper lip, the tilt of her chin, that hinted at emotions immured behind a wall of stone as thick as these around him. Anguish.

  So he swallowed his words of love, and did not mention how court still talked with regret about back in the princess’s day, because her leaving had somehow taken all the sunlight and music out of Alsais, leaving only false glare and civilized noise.

  When you cannot say what is in your heart, what is left? “I gather Anhar did not tell you what happened New Year’s Week?”

  “I never question my staff about their personal time.”

  Kaidas took in her guarded expression, her hands gripping the fans, and knew he had it: talk of Colend hurt her. Begin easy. So he tried for a light tone. “It’s sordid enough that I felt it best to take my son on an extended tour. Very extended. Birdy made this kingdom sound interesting.”

  “Interesting enough to labor in a stable?” Lasva asked.

  “I may as well do it here as anywhere else,” he replied. “You’ll remember the state of Lassiter affairs. It has not changed, my father having run through both my marriage settlement and his current wife’s, and he convinced me years ago that I could never earn a living as a painter.” Kaidas hesitated, then took the greatest gamble of his life. “At some point we’ll take ship and cross over to Toar. Then onward.”

  And waited with sick certainty for her to invite him to continue his trip, or ask when he was going to leave, because anguish can turn to anger, and anger to bitterness.

  But she turned away—saying nothing—and he slowly drew breath. No conjectures. One hope: tomorrow he might see her again.

  She had thought that proximity would be the worst, and she could endure it. But no, talking—hearing his voice—seeing the subtle changes of his expression from delight to the quick lift of brows as he mused some inner thought, then the change in the curve of his lips from rueful humor to a flash of sorrow, quickly hidden again—oh, how it hurt! She tightened her grip on her hands until the ring cut into her finger, following Birdy and Anhar out as she talked to Anhar about some castle business, without hearing anything said.

  Ivandred and his First Lancer captains arrived at the gallop, horns blaring from tower to tower across the city. He showed up in my lair within a short time after his arrival, and, as always, asked me about the status of the wards.

  “I have four levels left,” I said. “They are so interlocked. This type of magic is new to me. But I discovered that it was taught by Adamas Dei.”

  Ivandred whistled softly.

  “I’m having to learn it on my own, because I haven’t heard from the Herskalt at all.”

  “I have,” Ivandred said as he looked around my tower, and I wondered if he was imagining the Herskalt there instead of me—a far more powerful mage, and someone who could advise on everything, from strategy to training. All I could advise on was styles in scribal writing.

  But then he turned back to me. “You won’t hear from him until you finish your task, and we can all meet here in Choreid Dhelerei to plan the future.”

  “Is Hannik the Herskalt’s brother, then?”

  “No. He’s the Herskalt himself, using a family name, he says.” Ivandred flashed a brief smile at my astonishment. “He kept his identity a surprise. Said he knew I’d be pleased at the discovery, and his purpose was to bring my training to the north. Foster unity of purpose among the Marlovens. The rivalry with the south could be put to use on the training field. We are only as worthy as our opponents. I know that from my own training days.” He indicated my tower. “So your orders are clear: finish those wards. Leave the military training and commanders, to me.” He left.

  Was he angry with me? I had to know—and so I turned to the dyr. By the time I got to Darchelde and my listening post, he’d gone to Lasva. I found him just as he crushed her in his arms, whispering, “I had to be back for Kendred’s Name Day visit.” When he began kissing her, I left them.

  Later on, I revisited to find them lying side by side, Ivandred running his fingers up and down her ribs to her hip, a gentle but absent gesture. She was instantly minded of Kaidas’s clever fingers that gave pleasure as well as took it, but such thinking only cut deeper into her heart. I have to send him away… tomorrow. The weather is too bad now. It would be terrible for his son. I can be strong.

  Ivandred said, “I’m going to take all four divisions of the King’s Lancers north to meet the Herskalt—Hannik—and the northerners, soon as spring clears the plains. I wish you would come with me.”

  “If it’s a peace mission, I would most happily accompany you. But if your purpose is another of your interminable war games, I fear I would make myself a nuisance.”

  “Lasva, I will tell you again, I mean to keep the peace, but—heh! Was that a cat just now, running into your wardrobe?”

  “Her name is Anise.”

  “Colendi?”

  “From Colend, yes. I do not know ‘anise’ in Marloven.”

  “Someone sent you an orange cat all the way from Colend? We do have cats in Marloven Hesea.” He smiled.

  “I know. And perhaps you will see two Marloven tabbies when you go in to breakfast, as Patter is fond of egg. The runners named them Patter and Tuft. But yes, Anise was brought from Colend.”

  “Brought? By whom?”

  “Kaidas Lassiter. Who now works in the stable, along with Herald Martande. Back with us again.”

  “Why would a stable hand bring a cat across the continent? Who sent it?”

  “It was his own idea.”

  Ivandred rose on his elbow, frowning in perplexity. “A Colendi comes all the way here to work in our stable and brings you a cat.” His brow lifted. “He brought it for you.” His tone changed. “A former suitor, or lover?”

  Lasva had hoped that this conversation would never take place. But hope always betrayed one. “He was never a suitor,” she said. “Being at the time an indigent baron.”

  “I don’t remember meeting any Lassiter. But then I’ve forgotten most of their names.”

  “You were not introduced.”

  Ivandred said slowly, “There is one I remember. The day we scuffled with that northern king. The man who met us on the way back to your palace.”

  “That is he.”

  “A former lover, then. Here to see you.”

  “I believe so,” she said steadily.

  He sat up. There was a new scar on one shoulder, angry red, slanting below his collar bone. She had not even known that he had been wounded. Again. His hair fell over it. She brushed the lock aside and trac
ed her finger gently over the length of the scar, murmuring, “I think our souls scar as our bodies do.”

  Ivandred stared at her, wary, perplexed. “Your soul is free of… of scars and tarnish. I need that, Lasva. I need you.”

  “My soul is scarred, too,” she whispered. “But I am here.”

  Ivandred let his breath out. “Do you see him? Lassiter?”

  “See?” she repeated, thinking of the many varieties of the word in our language, and the dearth in Marloven. So she defined it. “Yes. Every morning, when we Colendi practice the Altan fan form. Then each of us goes about our daily tasks.”

  Ivandred gazed intently at her, then passed a hand over his face. “I do not want to become my father,” he said and reached for her. “If it pleases you to practice your fans with Colendi stable hands, including a former lover, then so be it.” She sat unresisting as he gripped her shoulders. “Lasva. Give me another child.”

  “I will and gladly,” she said steadily. “As soon as I know that that child will be born into a kingdom at peace. I do not feel it now.”

  “Nor do I,” he admitted. “That’s why I’m going north in spring. I want to see Danrid and the rest of them face to face. In the field. Every day. Not in a crowd for New Year’s Week. Find out what’s galling them under their saddles, and form them into unity of purpose, as Hannik says. He will be there to help. Strange, to think of the Herskalt as having a name. If it is his name. When I asked, he said that the name Hannik would suffice. A strange man, he is. Not ten years older than I am, yet he’s so knowledgeable. So good with command. Stronger than a tree, too. Sometimes I wonder why he isn’t a king.”

  Lasva had no interest whatsoever in Hannik. She took Ivandred’s hands from her shoulders and pressed them between hers. “Bring me peace, Ivandred. And I will do my best to keep it and to raise your children to propagate it.”

  Two days later, crowds lined the stone walkways around the palace. I hadn’t realized how highly people regarded the little prince. Rather than squeeze into the crowd, I took myself to Darchelde, and thence the garden, to watch with the dyr.

  I oriented myself through Lasva’s gaze, as she stood beside Ivandred to watch the Academy gate open. But her thoughts were turbulent, a dizzying mix of erotic memory, sorrowful awareness of Kaidas somewhere in the castle, and anxiousness to see her son after a year.

  Kendred walked out, thin, even weedy, his upper lip lengthened as he tried to suppress a self-conscious smile; I shifted to his thoughts. They were turbulent, too. He was pleased, but shy of all those staring eyes, after a year with only the Academy. His heart pulsed with baffled love when he spotted his parents. His mother with tears in her eyes. His father tall and strong. But neither had saved him from Them. (Image of towering instructor brandishing a withy cane.)

  Then he caught sight of Vasande—a boy his age, one he didn’t know—among some of his own castle friends, and his interest sharpened before his mother’s arms closed around him, and she smothered him with kisses.

  I disengaged, stepped out of that airless garden, and set down the dyr. As had become habit, Adamas Dei’s words about the idle eyes in the Garden of the Twelve prompted me to practice the mental shield. I already had the habit of shutting out the world, so the conscious building of a mental wall from within had come easy. Then I turned my attention to the magic over the dyr, but I assessed it using Adamas Dei’s magical approach.

  This time I could see the layers clearly. I could even have removed them, with no more difficulty than snapping a series of spider webs. If the Herskalt were to set that as a lesson, I would prove my prowess as a mage!

  After these experiments, I checked back with Kendred. He was not with his parents at all—his vantage made me dizzy as he lay on his stomach in a tower crenellation, his elbow jammed up against someone else as he stared down at the neat alignment of rooftops. “… and there. That last one? That’s where the scrubs sleep. Everybody is ten except me, but we’re supposed to have seven-year-olds in spring.” Kendred flushed with morose triumph. “I’ll still be a scrub, but they’ll be lower.” He envisioned himself thrashing a younger boy—faceless, weeping loudly.

  “We don’t have any academy. Not like that.” It was Vasande—and they were speaking in Kifelian.

  “Truth?” Kendred’s foremost emotion was scorn but under that was envy.

  “We have lessons at home.”

  “You must lose all your wars.”

  “We win them.”

  “All? Mother wouldn’t talk about wars, except that King Martande the First won against the Chwahir.”

  “All,” Vasande repeated, and though Kendred was not looking at him, so I couldn’t see his face, perhaps Vasande saw some of Kendred’s resentful anger, because he added, “My Aunt Tatia tried to kill me. That’s why I am here.”

  “She did? I only had one aunt, and she was old. How did she do it? Sword? Knife? How did you fight her off?”

  “I wasn’t there.”

  “Oh.” Kendred’s disappointment verged on disgust.

  “So show me how tough you are,” Vasande said. “Cam says you’re supposed to come out of there tougher than anyone. Let’s scrap.”

  “Behind the bake-house is where we always go.”

  I disengaged. The prince had obviously rejected the day of activities that Lasva had planned, and with the unthinking selfishness of children, had run off on his own pursuits. No matter how much it hurt her, she would never constrain him. I did not want to hear her emotional pain, so I listened to Kaidas, who was on duty. He and the stable hands were busy with the newly arrived horses, the latter bragging about the exploits of the First Lancers.

  Kaidas’s thoughts veered. He remembered the single glimpse of Ivandred he’d had so far, when Lasva rode on his horse after the rescue from the king of the Chwahir. Now a king of a huge kingdom that was about to become bigger, if the gossip was right. If I can see them together, I’ll know what hope I have, that was the gist of Kaidas’s thoughts, over and over. The rest was a confusion of what he’d say in this instance or that…. I left him, as by then my head was panging.

  But the yearning to see more had not abated. So I worked through the layered wards on the dyr again, a soothing task, until the headache abated enough for me to look again.

  To be hit with Lasva’s heightened distress as she stared down at Kendred, who said proudly, “He’s nine, he’s bigger’n me, but I thrashed him good.” He turned his head, and she reacted with pain at the blossoming bruise on his cheek. “Da, what They teach us, it works, it works.”

  “Did this boy challenge you?” Ivandred asked. “You did not attack him?”

  “Yes,” Kendred said. “He said, let’s scrap. He said he didn’t think the Academy was any good.”

  Lasva left them. She ran down to the stable, where she found Vasande being cleaned up by his father. Kaidas gazed at her over Vasande’s head, but she did not address him.

  She knelt down beside Vasande. “I beg your pardon on my son’s behalf,” she said, working hard not to let him see the sorrow that filled her heart. “You are a guest. Fighting is uncivilized behavior.”

  Vasande had been holding a cloth to his bleeding nose. “I said we should scrap,” he mumbled. “I didn’t think he would hit so hard, he’s so puny.”

  Lasva looked at Kaidas and Carola’s child, helpless, grieved.

  It was this grief that Kaidas saw.

  Lasva sensed his scrutiny. She turned her attention to the boy’s wide black eyes framed by long lashes, fair hair, bones already showing the planes of his father’s, the same cleft in his chin. “Are you happy here?” she asked, though she hadn’t meant to.

  The parallel to Kaidas’s thoughts unsettled him, and he walked out in search of healer’s steep.

  Vasande jerked up a shoulder. “I hate my mother,” he told Lasva calmly.

  Her throat ached. How unbearable it would be if her own dear son said such a thing! Guilt for sending her own son to that horrific Academy, combined w
ith memory, prompted her to say, “Please don’t hate her. I know she loves you, though maybe you do not yet see it.”

  The boy regarded her steadily, his face unchanged—melende. “She hates everybody,” he said. “She hates you.”

  “I think she did,” Lasva responded and then spoke a secret thought, and not about Carola, whom she had never known. “Sometimes… ah-ye, how to say it. Sometimes hate is misplaced love.”

  But she just confused the boy. “Did she lose love? For you?”

  “Not for me, though I did try to become her friend. But I wonder how much love she learned from her father. Though she inherited great wealth, as you know. Perhaps it makes more sense to say it this way, that I think her inheritance of love was very small. You probably know that when people have little of a thing, it’s soon spent. And they cannot find any new.”

  “We don’t have any money,” Vasande stated, in the same matter-of-fact tone he’d said Let’s scrap. “Not anymore. We did in Alarcansa. My father says that maybe I can go back and be a duke, but he can’t go back.”

  “Do you want to go back?”

  “My Aunt Tatia tried to kill me.” Now he was bragging, though his tone was morose. “Ow.” He winced when he daubed his nose. “I’m supposed to have healer steep.”

  “Your father went to get some. Shall we find him?”

  As they walked out together, I left them, as by then black spots swam before my eyes. I stumbled out of the garden and put my head down on the table. It took a long time to recover enough to transfer. I’d listened far, far too long with the dyr.

  The next morning, I felt as if I’d fallen down stairs, but I forced myself to the fan practice so that no one would remark on my absence.

  The result?

  “What did you do to your eyes?” Anhar gasped. “They are red as cherries.”

  “Translating an interesting text,” I said. “Very late.”

  At her shoulder, Birdy stared in horror and disbelief.