The Three Lands Omnibus (2011 Edition)

by Dusk Peterson

  I felt a crack of lightning go through my body as the cold fire inside began to rage out of control. I made one last effort to master my anger, saying through gritted teeth, "I will never betray the Chara."

  "Your very words reveal your disloyalty. Only a few minutes ago, the Chara instructed me not to start any conversations with you, and I assume that he gave you the same command. You have already betrayed his trust by your disobedience here."

  He walked past me toward the garden, but had not yet stepped off the pavement when he whirled around at the sound of hissing metal.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the soldiers frozen with their hands on their sword hilts, afraid to move forward lest they make matters worse. Lord Carle was frozen too, his gaze on the dagger that came slowly toward him. As I placed the dagger tip against his heart, his eyes rose to meet mine. I waited to see what his last words would be; I could read neither anger nor fear nor anything else in his look.

  He said, in a voice as serene as our surroundings, "I see that I am to become acquainted with a new Koretian custom, that of killing an unarmed man."

  The dagger ripped through a few threads of his tunic, then screamed and sparked as it skidded over the pavement toward the soldiers. In the moment that followed, I saw nothing except the smile beginning to form on Lord Carle's face.

  Then the soldiers raced toward me. I did not run; I was looking at Lord Carle, who was lying on the ground where I had struck him down.

  o—o—o

  The following evening, the palace guards brought me, hand-bound, to see the Chara.

  Each of my two escorts had a hand clasping one of my arms in an effort to ensure that their dangerous prisoner did not escape. Their other hands held unsheathed swords, ready at a moment's notice. We marched by the doorway guards, past the doors open to receive us, and into the Map Room, dark but for a single torch whose flame wavered in the nighttime breeze.

  The Chara was leaning over the table, examining a piece of paper there; his finger-tips rested lightly on the black wood. He was facing the doors, but did not look up as we entered. The soldiers jerked to a halt, saluting their ruler with their swords, and then the senior guard announced in a loud voice, "Great Chara, we have brought the prisoner."

  Still the Chara did not look up. His face and body were hidden in shadow. In an even, ordinary voice, he said, "You may leave the prisoner here and wait outside."

  The guards released me, and after a moment their retreating steps were followed by the sound of the doors closing, and then silence. Finally the Chara looked up. He walked slowly around the table until he was standing at its side and his body was once more in the light. His face was cold and formal, and on his chest lay the Pendant of Judgment.

  "Andrew son of Gideon, free-servant of the Chara," he intoned, "you have been brought here to answer charges made against you by Carle, Lord of the Great Council. The first charge is that you did willfully and with clear understanding disobey the command of the Great Chara."

  He paused a moment, and I found that without thought I had fixed my gaze straight forward, as I did in the days when I was Lord Carle's servant. The torchlight cast dark shadows beneath the Chara's eyes so that his face appeared mask-like.

  The Chara continued, "The witness in this charge is the Chara, and I have declined to give evidence. Therefore, the charge is dismissed."

  I did not move, but stood as though my whole body were wrapped in chains. The Chara likewise was motionless as he spoke.

  "The second charge," he said, "is that you did attempt to murder without provocation the same Lord Carle. The witness in this charge is Emmett, guard of the Chara's palace, and the sentence for such a crime is mercy or branding or the high doom." He stopped, waited three heartbeats, and said, "Lord Carle has withdrawn this charge, and instead charges you with striking a nobleman without provocation. The witness in this charge is the same, and the sentence for such a crime is mercy or branding or enslavement. Do you deny the charge?"

  I had had time, shivering in the cool cells of the palace dungeon, to think what my answer would be. Carefully phrasing my words, I said, "I do not deny that I hit Lord Carle."

  The Chara was still, assessing me. After a moment he said, "Do you deny that you struck him without provocation?"

  I was silent. The gold and ruby pendant that hung around the Chara's neck shimmered in the light as his chest moved with his breathing. When he spoke again, the Chara's voice remained even and formal. "Did he provoke you?"

  Again I was silent. The Chara moved his right hand slowly to his pendant. Then, in one swift and violent motion, he tore the pendant from his neck, turning to slam it down upon the table beside him. For a minute he leaned on the table, his palms fixed flat on the surface, and I could hear his heavy breathing. Finally he turned his head, and he said in his own voice, "Andrew, I cannot require Lord Carle to give witness against himself. Will you not tell me what he said to you?"

  My tongue felt like a dead weight in my mouth; my lips could barely move. I said, "No."

  Peter looked down at the table again and closed his eyes. He brought the fingertips of one hand up against his forehead and held them there. At last he spat out softly a brief and powerful curse that I had never heard on his lips.

  He stood up, walked toward me, and passed me. There was silence behind me. Then my back stiffened as I heard him unsheathe the Sword of Vengeance. Cold metal touched me, and my bonds began to loosen as he cut them with the blade.

  He said as he did so, "If you had used that dagger against Lord Carle, then I would have executed the high doom against you with my own hands for your being such a fool as to carry a weapon when you were angry. Most men can master their bloodthirst, but you cannot, and you ought to have realized that long ago."

  I heard him sheathe the sword as he moved over to my left side. Holding the cut rope in one hand, he said softly, "But since you were wise enough to throw away the dagger, then I will admit that I believe you had every right to strike Lord Carle, if not for what he said to you, then for the shameful way he treated you during the years in which you were under his care."

  He looked at me soberly, with gentle eyes. My expression did not change, but I felt something unknot within me, as though Peter had unbound not only my hands but my heart.

  "Nevertheless—" Peter moved back to the table, tossed the rope on it, and leaned back against the wood planks, facing me. "I am the Chara. I have passed judgment before in cases like this – palace guards striking their officials and other such troubles. In many cases I have dispensed mercy, and therefore I would feel no guilt in doing so to you – if this were my case. But it is not."

  I waited. Dimly, through the open window, I could hear the tramp of soldiers patrolling the city streets. Peter folded his hands but for the index fingers and brought these to his lips. He said, "My father was of the belief – and it was a good belief – that it is dangerous for the Chara to have too much power over his immediate servants. He believed that, if a palace free-servant committed a crime, someone other than the Chara ought to pronounce judgment on the servant. Therefore, since the council takes care of its own, my father bound over to the council the right to judge and sentence prisoners who are palace free-servants. And the High Lord has appointed as the council's judge one of his lords who has shown a great interest in matters of discipline."

  This time it was Peter who waited. I said, my voice flat and dry, "Lord Carle."

  Peter spread his hands in front of him in acknowledgment of my words. "You are under Lord Carle's care, and it is he who may judge you and pass sentence. I can give him my recommendation, but he has already told me in private that he believes you require once more the discipline of slavery. He has also told me who your new master would be."

  My chest tightened, and I felt my fists begin to clench. Peter continued swiftly, "And so my clerk and I spent all of last night trying to find some way out of this problem. And I believe that, in the end, we found something a solution
that will serve."

  I did not unclench my fists, but my breathing eased somewhat. The breeze from the window made the light shudder once more, and the shifting shadows revealed to me what I had not noticed before: the dark circles below the Chara's eyes.

  He said, "You are a palace free-servant; that is why you are under Lord Carle's care. But if you were under my care, I would be able to dispense the mercy I believe you deserve." He turned and pulled toward him the paper he had been reading upon my entrance.

  My fists were still clenched. I forced myself to wait two heartbeats more before I said, in a carefully neutral voice, "You wish me to be your slave once more?"

  Peter had been reaching for a pen. His head jerked up, and there was a moment's silence before he laughed and said, "I must admit that such a solution did not occur to me during my sleepless night. No, my idea is more devious. Prisoners who are palace free-servants are under Lord Carle's care, but prisoners who are palace guests are under my care. The Chara is reserved judgment in crimes involving men and women who visit the palace briefly, or men like that horrid bard Esmond, who stopped here one night during a rainstorm twenty years ago and whom we have not been able to get rid of since then. This document was prepared by my clerk – it is all clerks' language, but if you sign it, you will be resigning from the palace service and may remain here as my guest." He held out the paper and pen expectantly.

  Still I could not find a way to unclench my fists. I stayed motionless and asked, in the same flat tone as before, "And what would my duties be as a guest?"

  Peter put the paper carefully down on the table, placed the pen beside it, picked up the pen again, and stared at the quill for a second before his eyes met mine. He said simply, "To be my friend, I hope."

  During the silence that followed, his gaze dropped again, this time toward the floor. After a moment he raised his head and said in a low voice, "Andrew, my father often told me when I was a boy that it was impossible for the Chara to be friends with a free-servant or a slave. I have come to see that he is right. Neither a free-servant nor a slave-servant is someone with whom one can converse candidly, as one can with a friend. But eleven years ago, I walked out of Lord Carle's room sick with anger and filled with loneliness from the fact that I could tell no one what I was thinking. And then I met you, and you listened to my troubles and told me honestly what you thought I was like and even smiled at my joke. And since that time I have considered you my friend, though I have never told you so."

  He looked at me, and as I gazed at him I saw suddenly in him the boy-heir I had met long ago, courteous and quiet, afraid to speak openly, lest his words be used as weapons against him. He waited for me to reply. When I did not, he said in a voice even lower than before, "I do not speak my thoughts to many people – it is not wise for me to do so. Aside from you, I am candid with few men. As for you . . . Well, as far as I know, you volunteer your thoughts to no one. This too is probably wise. But if you would care to be candid with me tonight, I would very much like to know how you think of me."

  I opened my mouth finally, spoke a word that did not reach past my lips, tried again, and said, "Chara . . ." My voice trailed off, as though the formal title had dropped somewhere in the stretch of space between us, too heavy to reach the young man before me.

  When he spoke again, it was in little more than a whisper. "If you wish, you may call me Peter."

  I whirled around suddenly and walked almost blindly to a small window overlooking the southern part of the city. In the dim moonlight I could see the black mountains bordering Koretia; down below, hidden in the blackness, was the marketplace where I had revealed my blood vow against the Chara.

  When I looked to my side, I saw that Peter was standing next to me at the window, his eyes on me, and his fingers tenderly cradling the pen. My gaze fell, and I said in a quiet voice that matched his, "Peter, before I struck Lord Carle, he told me that I was a traitor to my people. He said I had broken my vow of loyalty to Koretia, for I had sworn when I first met him that I would never become Emorian and that my blood was dedicated to the slaying of the Chara. He pointed out that I now wore Emorian clothes, that I was free-servant to the Chara himself, and that I had no plans to return to my homeland. He said that the luxuries of my life here had led me to forswear my duty to my Koretian brothers."

  My eyes were still cast down; I could see Peter's hand clenched about the pen, as though he were holding a weapon. I looked up and gazed into the Chara's eyes. "It is true, what Lord Carle said, that I have broken my vow and that I am a traitor to my people. But I did not do this for love of the riches here. I did it for love of the Chara, whom I never considered my friend, because I dared not aspire that high."

  Peter's eyes remained solemn, but the corners of his mouth crooked upwards into a slight smile. He took a step forward and held out the pen toward me. "Dare."

  Slowly I reached toward the pen. As I took it from him, I felt for a moment his wrist beating against mine, blood next to blood. Then his hand dropped for a moment, and when it rose again, it made a gesture I had not seen him make since his enthronement, a gesture that no Chara had ever made, because the Chara has no equals: he touched his heart and his forehead.

  I returned to him the greeting, and then walked over to the table to sign the paper.

  Blood Vow 4

  LAND OF THE JACKAL

  CHAPTER NINE

  Late-afternoon light landed on the trees above us and then stole its way slyly through the translucent skin of the leaves to dapple our path, gold on brown. I raised my head to look at the cloudless sky peering at us through the leaves, and to feel upon my face the moist stroke of the sun-heated air. It was warmer than any fire I could remember sitting next to during my fifteen years in Emor.

  As I lowered my head again, I saw that Lord Carle was watching me with narrowed eyes. We were riding along the Koretian forest path three abreast, with Peter in the middle; the Chara had shown his usual formal courtesy in acting as though he welcomed equally the company of both of us. By the rules of rank, I should have been riding behind with the servants, leaving the noblemen to talk together, but Peter had insisted on having me by his side during most of our fortnight-long journey, and Lord Dean, I could guess, was willing to take advantage of the time in order to glean bits of gossip from the servants that he could later use to his advantage.

  Lord Carle paused from his persistent watch of me only in order to answer a question I had not heard Peter ask. The council lord said, "If I needed one word to describe the nature of this land, it would be blood. All of the oaths in this land are sworn on blood, the gods of this land can only be placated through the blood of animals – and frequently that of humans as well – and the traditional form of Koretian justice, if I may call it that, is the blood feud. It says something about Koretia that its most famous institution is ritualized murder."

  I opened my mouth and closed it again, but Peter caught the motion out of the corner of his eye, and he pulled back on his horse's reins so that we were moving at a less rapid pace than before. He had driven the six of us to travel at a rate which Lord Carle had complained was faster than that of the Chara's vanguard, but now we were approaching the capital city, and Peter's anxious look was beginning to ease.

  "What would you say, Andrew?" he asked. "Is Koretia founded on blood, as Lord Carle says?"

  "I think that Lord Carle has noticed Koretia's outward rituals without understanding their inward significance," I said, carefully phrasing my words so that the council lord could not accuse me of insulting him. "Blood is a sign of sacrifice in Koretia. The Koretian people believe that loyalty to the gods must be shown through offerings of sacrifice. It is true, as Lord Carle says, that the blood feud was used as a form of justice in the old days, but it was not considered a form of private justice, a way to achieve vengeance on one's own behalf. Rather, it was a way to avenge deeds that broke the commands of the gods."

  "That hardly reassures me," said Lord Carle, and then paused momentar
ily to swat a small butterfly that had taken his green and gold tunic to be a flower. Probably, I thought, struggling to remain just toward Lord Carle, he had mistaken the butterfly for one of the Koretian blood-flies that had been feasting upon us since we crossed the black border mountains.

  "The bloodthirstiness of this land's gods is a model that I imagine the Koretians strive to imitate," continued Lord Carle. "Take this man, the Jackal. He first appeared during that blood feud to end all blood feuds, the Koretian civil war. I don't suppose that he could have chosen a more fitting moment to make his entrance, considering all the times since then that he has slaked his thirst on the blood of men. He has certainly fashioned himself after your god."

  I pulled my horse's reins tight – I think that it was only a reflex action, but once I had done so, I discovered that my horse was standing still, and both Lord Carle and Peter were watching me. The Chara was unconsciously stroking his horse's mane, reassuring it as to our sudden delay, and at sight of Peter's characteristically gentle and affectionate action, I felt my resentment flame within me at Lord Carle's typical harshness. "They are not my gods, Lord Carle," I said. "I wish that you would remember that."