Protector of the Small Quartet

by Tamora Pierce

  “Well!” she said finally, sitting back in her chair. “You’re in a unique position, I’d say.”

  Kel had thought of several descriptions for her problem, but “unique position” was not one of them. “How so?” she asked.

  “Why, most young noblewomen don’t have your freedom,” replied Ilane. “Our families are so determined to keep their bloodlines pure that they insist their daughters remain virgins before marriage, poor things. You don’t see that nonsense in the middle and lower classes. They know a woman’s body belongs to herself and the Goddess, and that’s the end of it.”

  Kel was trying to remember if she’d ever heard the matter put in quite this fashion. She hadn’t.

  Ilane leaned her chin on her hand. “I’ve often thought the nobility’s handling of sex and marriage in their girls is the same as that of horse breeders who try to keep their mares from being mounted by the wrong stallions.”

  Kel sat bolt upright. “Mama!” Hearing such things in her mother’s deep, lovely voice made them even more shocking. She expected this kind of phrasing from her male friends, not her mother.

  “You can’t say this to noblemen, of course.” Ilane got up and went to the small fire that burned in front of the tent. “Tea?”

  Kel automatically stood to get the cups. Before she realized she didn’t know where they were, her mother had placed a small table between the chairs and was setting out all she would need. Kel sank into her chair. “Why can’t this be said to men?”

  “The good ones are too romantic to like it, and the bad ones don’t care. My papa was the don’t-care sort. I overheard him once describing me to a potential suitor. Even though I had small breasts, he said, my hips were big enough that I should foal with ease. It would be easy to find a milk nurse once I dropped a healthy son.” Ilane deftly put a tiny scoop of powdered green tea in each of the large, handle-less cups, then added water from the iron Yamani pot. She took up the whisk, beating Kel’s tea, then her own, into a green froth. They bowed to one another Yamani-style, then sipped.

  Kel sighed with gratitude: she loved freshly made green tea. She enjoyed another sip, then asked, “So what’s my unique position?”

  “Since you’ve decided against a noble marriage, you may bed whoever you like,” Ilane replied. “You can choose, Kel. If you and Cleon want to go to bed, you can.”

  Goose bumps rolled down Kel’s arms. “But I don’t want to choose anything like that! I want my shield—I’ve given up everything for it. And—” She remembered how it had felt, knowing that she cared about Cleon. It had thrilled and frightened her. “I don’t want to be distracted,” she admitted, feeling small with guilt. It seemed selfish, put that way. “I don’t think I want to bed anyone, Mama. We were just kissing, that’s all.”

  “Kissing may lead to more serious things, my darling,” Ilane said, cupping Kel’s cheek in one cool, long-fingered hand. “A girl may be carried away. It’s not always love. Lust may feel wonderful enough to be mistaken for love.”

  “I just want my shield,” Kel whispered. “I’ll deal with the rest later. The—complications.”

  “Perhaps you should see a healer,” Ilane suggested. “Get a charm to keep you from pregnancy, until you’re certain you’d like to be a mother. Then, if you do get carried away, you can surrender to your feelings.” Ilane grinned wickedly. “Goddess knows your father and I did.”

  Kel gulped. She did not want to think of her parents getting carried away. “Well, I certainly don’t want babies,” she admitted when she could speak again. “But if you think I should get the charm, I will.”

  Ilane shook her head. “Think about it for yourself. Then decide.”

  They were finishing their tea when her father strode into the tent. He was a short, stocky man who stood only as tall as his wife’s shoulder, a man with Kel’s own brown hair and dreamy hazel eyes. Just now there were no dreams in his eyes, but crackling awareness. “Kel!” he snapped. “You’re jousting against Ansil of Groten?”

  “What?” cried Ilane, sitting bolt upright.

  Kel let a little sigh escape. More explanations—just what she needed.

  Fall-Midwinter, in the 18th year of the reign of Jonathan IV and Thayet, his Queen, 457

  twelve

  TOURNAMENT

  The night crept by. Kel lay awake, listening to the noises of the progress, until she finally dozed sometime before dawn. She slept late for one of the few times in her life. It wasn’t Raoul’s preparations for his day that roused her, or the activity of those neighbors whose tents were pitched on the same “street,” but the searing pain of sharp claws digging into her head. Kel sat up with a yelp, wide awake, as the griffin clutched her scalp harder still. Jump barked, the birds shrilled, and Raoul shoved through the flap between their tents.

  “Kel—Mithros help us,” Raoul said.

  Kel reached up and closed her hands on feathers and steely muscle. The griffin let go of the hair he gripped so energetically with his forepaws and clamped his beak on her finger. He kicked at her scalp with his hind claws.

  “I’ll get his breakfast,” Raoul said hurriedly, and ducked back into his tent. Kel gritted her teeth and patiently unhooked the griffin from her scalp. The bite on her finger wasn’t so bad. The griffin had closed on muscle and bone, not a soft spot. She could endure that better than claws.

  Once she had him captive, she got up and carried him over to his platform. The moment she let go, the griffin hissed and launched himself into the air, clumsily chasing sparrows around the tent. Kel swore under her breath. He had learned to fly at last.

  By the time Raoul came back with food, Kel had created a leash from a strip of leather. While the griffin ate from his dish, something she had taught him several weeks before, she tied the leash around his leg. As soon as he finished, the griffin turned and bit the leather, severing it.

  “Chain?” Raoul asked.

  Kel shook her head. “He’ll rust it like he did the cage. Let’s see how well behaved he is.” She felt the top of her head. It was tacky with blood.

  Raoul took over, sponging away blood and applying the ointment Kel used on griffin wounds. She winced as it stung in the deep scratches, but didn’t try to pull away. The ingredient that made it sting would clean the cuts. There was never any telling what was on his claws, so she scoured all the damage that he did to her with the strongest cleaning ointment she could find.

  “He would pick today,” Raoul said as he finished and wiped his hands. “Did you sleep at all?”

  “Some,” Kel said with a shrug.

  “Well, get dressed and we’ll have breakfast.” Seeing she was about to refuse, Raoul shook his head. “You need a big meal now and a small one at noon,” he informed her. “What’s the point to a joust if you’re too weak to last?”

  Kel bowed to his experience and obeyed. The morning crawled by. So did the noon break in the tournament proceedings. At last, clad in tilting armor, a visored helm under one arm, Kel waited for the fighters ahead of her to finish their match.

  It’s a beautiful day for it, she thought as she squinted at the cloudless sky. Autumn was in the mid-September breeze off Lake Naxen, carrying brisk air that made the flags and pennants around the field crack.

  A beautiful day to fly into the dirt, she thought ruefully. That wasn’t important. Even if she lost, she’d have protested Sir Ansil’s poison-spreading. She had to try. It might force him to look twice the next time he bullied a young man, though Lerant must never know that. She had told him she would defend Raoul’s name so she wouldn’t hurt the irritable standard-bearer’s pride.

  The field was clear. The chief herald, who instructed the jousters, rode toward Kel. Sir Ansil was at the other end of the field with his friends. Kel had banished hers, including her animals, to the stands. She wanted silence before the fight, time to sink into her Yamani self and prepare.

  “You still mean to do this, Squire Keladry?” the herald asked.

  “I do, sir,” she replied c
almly.

  “Very well. You have three runs in which to knock your opponent from the saddle. This is considered a victory. If your lance breaks, and lances do, the field monitor will give you a new one. If your horse is lamed, you may either accept a mount provided by the Crown, or concede the victory to your opponent. If neither of you falls from the saddle in three runs, the judges”—he pointed to the box below the king’s where they sat—“decide the victor from the strength of blows delivered and accuracy of hits. Do you understand me?” Kel nodded. “Then take your place in your designated lane. Listen for the trumpet to start.” He rode off.

  Kel rubbed Peachblossom’s nose. “Let’s scorch him, Peachblossom, what do you say?”

  The big gelding stamped, ears pricked and alert. Kel gave her helmet to a field monitor, then mounted. Once she was in the saddle, she accepted her helm and put it on.

  She wanted an extra advantage today, more than she’d had in training with Raoul or knights like Jerel. When the trumpet blared, she told Peachblossom, “Charge.”

  Muscles bunched under her. The gelding flew at his top speed down the dirt lane, hooves thundering in packed dust. For those brief seconds Kel felt like an army of one. She loved no one so much as her horse.

  Down came her lance, aimed at Sir Ansil’s shield. The long weapon was a feather in her hand. Ansil brought his lance down a breath behind Kel. He doesn’t think I’m for true, she thought, her focus narrowing to her target. He doesn’t think I’ll hit.

  She struck his shield dead-on; he struck hers. Her side went mildly numb. Her lance shattered; his didn’t. She turned Peachblossom and rode to her start point. This time she checked the lance that was handed to her. She was suspicious of a lance that broke on the first strike.

  “You needn’t worry, squire,” the field monitor assured her. “These is always under our eye. It’d mean a summer mendin’ roads if we was bribed to pass a flawed lance.”

  Kel smiled at him, feeling better. She lowered her visor and urged Peachblossom to their place, her grip on the new lance steady. Ansil gulped water as his friends slapped his legs in congratulation. His destrier did not like their closeness and snapped at them. Like most lone knights, Ansil rode a stallion. Kel thought that was a mistake. Peachblossom was stallion-mean when he wished to be, and he would never take off after the scent of mare.

  At last Ansil waved to his friends, rode to his place, and brought his visor down. He nodded to the chief herald, who gave the trumpeter his signal. As the call rang out, Kel told Peachblossom, “Charge.” He exploded down the lane.

  Kel rose in her stirrups, sure and calm. She had Ansil cold. She knew it from the position of her lance, from the feel of her saddle between her knees, and from the way the air rushed through her visor. Here came Ansil’s fraction of hesitation Raoul had mentioned. Kel struck her foe hard. The coromanel on her lance point rammed just under his shield boss. She popped him from the saddle and sent him flying. The stallion reared, screaming, as Ansil smacked the ground in a clatter of plate armor.

  Kel brought Peachblossom around and waited a safe distance from the stallion. She prayed she hadn’t killed Ansil, though she was fairly sure she hadn’t. Field monitors, including a healer, surrounded the fallen knight, removing his shield, helmet, and gauntlets. The healer peeled back an eyelid.

  Ansil snarled and cuffed him aside. He sat up very slowly. Joren and the Tirrsmont knight helped him to his feet. He swayed, then waited, eyes on the ground, feet planted wide. Then he looked up. Seeing Kel, he walked toward her. She thought he might collapse when he ducked under the barrier, but he hung onto it until he collected himself.

  When he reached Kel, he sneered up at her. “This proves nothing, wench.”

  Kel said icily, “That doesn’t sound like what you’re supposed to say, Groten. May I remind you that you just lost?”

  “Had we swords—” he began.

  “Do you think I don’t know how to use a sword?” she wanted to know. “You lost. All those traditions you like tell you what comes now.”

  Ansil swallowed. “I repent me of the calumny you took from my words with regard to Lord Raoul,” he began.

  “I took nothing that wasn’t there.” Something had gripped Kel’s tongue to make her most un-Yamani-ly frank. “You called my knight-master a dolt,” she continued. “I accept that you wish you’d kept quiet. You called Lerant of Eldorne cur and traitor. You will apologize to him, before witnesses, or we shall return here tomorrow and you can test my skill with a sword. Understand?”

  Ansil muttered something, until Kel thumped his shoulder lightly with the butt of her lance. He glared at her. “You won’t live until the Ordeal,” he snarled. “One of us will spear you through your bitch’s heart. I will apologize to Eldorne—need you be a witness?”

  “No,” she said. “But make sure one of your witnesses tells me he saw and heard you do it, today.” She turned Peachblossom, wanting to get away from this man and his poison. At her side of the field, she returned her lance to the monitor with thanks.

  He gawped at her. “Is something wrong?” Kel asked, wondering if she had missed anything.

  He shook his head and smiled oddly. “This is your first challenge, my lady?”

  Kel nodded.

  “Your first, and you won,” the monitor told her. “Well rode, Lady Kel, well rode indeed.”

  Kel waved him off, embarrassed. Looking at the stands, she saw that Raoul stood with Sir Gareth the Younger. He was holding out a hand. The scowling Gareth counted coins into Raoul’s palm.

  “So he meant it,” Kel murmured to Peachblossom. “He said he was going to win money on me.” She hoped he wouldn’t bet on her too often. How many times could she fight someone as overconfident and careless as Ansil? Other knights would learn from this. Probably next time she would be the one to fly.

  She saw to Peachblossom first. Qasim offered to groom and feed him, but Kel wanted to do that. As she worked she murmured compliments to her wonderful horse. Only when she’d picketed him near enough to Hoshi to gossip but not so close that he could nip, did she return to her tent. There she stripped off her armor and plunged her head into a bucket of cold water. Feeling like herself again, she began to care for her things.

  Cleon found her testing her lack of fear of heights in a tree overlooking the lake. “You could have been—gods, Kel, you’ve seen how jousters get hurt! I thought I could watch, I thought, she’s just another squire, but when your lance went . . .” He shook his head.

  “He was overconfident,” she told him. “And I won, so the gods must have thought I was right. Otherwise they’d have made me lose. You know how trial by combat works.”

  “You won because you’re good,” he corrected her. “I find it hard to believe the gods sit forever about the Divine Realms betting on jousts and trials by combat.” He looked around to make sure no one was within earshot. “At least come down and let me hold you, make sure you’re in one piece,” he called softly.

  Kel shook her head. “You come up, and no holding. We have to talk about that.”

  The sparrows cheeped encouragement as he clambered out onto Kel’s thick branch. When she repeated what Raoul had said, he nodded. “He’s right. We should be careful about . . . anything that might happen. My sister had the same trouble. She’s in the Riders,” he explained. “I should have thought of that—and of your good name, for that matter.”

  “Have I got one?” Kel wanted to know.

  “You do with your friends, and you’d better with anyone who talks to us,” he said bleakly.

  His tone made Kel look at him. Someone had said something, she realized. Someone, or many someones. And my friends got in fights over it, but never told me.

  “I don’t deserve my friends,” she remarked quietly.

  “Sure you do, opal of happiness,” Cleon said. “We’d’ve failed mathematics to a man without you, for one thing.”

  That made her grin. A rolling grumble made her look at her belly. “I’m hungry,
” she remarked, surprised.

  Cleon dropped to the ground. “Me too. Let’s go eat, O queen of squires.”

  That evening as Kel ate with her friends, a servant gave her a note that bore the Tirrsmont coat of arms. Sir Voelden, who’d been with Ansil and Joren, invited her to joust the following day. This was a match, not a challenge in answer to insult—Kel refused it. That afternoon she had confirmed what she had always thought: jousting was serious business, not a game. As she and her friends left to return to camp, Voelden stopped them in Castle Naxen’s inner courtyard. He slapped Kel lightly with a riding glove.

  Cleon lunged for the knight with a snarl. Neal grabbed the big redhead. Jump seized Merric of Hollyrose’s tunic before Merric could attack, while Owen hung on to Cleon with one hand and Merric with the other. Kel looked at Voelden, feeling cold inside. “I accept,” she said quietly. “Ten gold crowns if you lose.” As the challenged she could name the penalty.

  Kel and Cleon wandered away from Neal, Owen, and Merric once they left Castle Naxen. It did no good. Every time they thought they were alone, others wandered by. They exchanged only two quick, clinging kisses in the shadows, jumping apart both times as people approached.

  “It’s like having a train of chaperons,” Cleon grumbled as he walked Kel to her tent. “Does anyone go to bed here?”

  They halted before Raoul’s banner. “Bed is where I should be, with a griffin to feed and a challenge tomorrow,” Kel pointed out.

  Cleon looked around. The lane where Kel’s and Raoul’s tents stood was filled with nobles returning from the banquet. He sighed. “G’night, moon of my dreams. Send him flying tomorrow.”

  I hope I can, Kel thought, watching him trudge sadly off. Her nerves, fizzing pleasantly after those kisses, twitched: she faced an unknown knight in the afternoon.

  The griffin was wide awake. Lion-like, he paced as Kel lit her lamps and opened a packet of smoked fish. He ate only half of his meal, did not even try to bite Kel, and flew-hopped between his platform and her cot as she cleaned up after him.