Protector of the Small Quartet

by Tamora Pierce

  “Kel, where are you going?” demanded Neal. He’d been talking to the newly arrived refugees, soothing them as he looked for wounded among them and among the soldiers. “They’re all dead, whoever’s left.”

  “I know that,” she replied. “Neal, we need burial details, just as soon as you can organize them.” Someone prodded her arm. It was Gil, offering her a full, large, water skin. She murmured her thanks.

  “But where are you going?” Merric wanted to know. He’d just handed his own mount over to one of the waiting stable hands.

  Kel turned the mare and urged her through the gate. “To shoo off Stormwings,” she called back over her shoulder.

  April 30, 460

  Fort Mastiff

  nine

  MASTIFF

  Kel’s first emotion at the sight of Fort Mastiff was envy. Mastiff had a double set of log walls, the outer twenty feet high, the inner thirty feet high, with deep ditches before each. An abatis stood in the edge of the outer ditch, the sharpened logs offering an unfortunate end to anyone fool enough to try to jump them.

  As Kel and her companions passed through the first gate, she heard a voice yell her name from twenty feet overhead. She looked up. Owen sat atop the inner wall, waving frantically. A hand grabbed Kel’s impetuous friend by the sleeve and yanked him back onto the ramparts. Kel traded a head shake with Neal. Some people, like Owen, never changed.

  The last set of guards waved them through the inner gate. Neal whistled, which made Kel feel better: she wasn’t the only one who was awed. Mastiff housed three full companies of soldiers, plus an assortment of mages, clerks, healers, messengers, hedgewitches whose Gift could be turned to combat or medicine, and unimportant-looking persons in deep-woods clothing who looked like scouts, spies, or both. The barracks were military trim—no ropes of laundry flapping between buildings, no firepits and bubbling cauldrons at each barracks door, no debris or garbage on the ground. Chickens, ducks, and geese milled in pens instead of picking their way throughout the enclosure. There was no need to keep watch in case a toddler ran in front of the horses. The only raised voices she heard were those of sergeants shouting drill commands.

  Owen came rattling down the stair from the ramparts. As Kel and her companions dismounted, Owen collected the reins of Numair’s, Duke Baird’s, and Neal’s horses. He moved to take Hoshi’s reins, but Tobe, who’d been in charge of the packhorses that carried Numair’s and Duke Baird’s things, was quick to add Hoshi to his charges. Owen nodded to him and told the others from Haven, “My lord says, you’re all welcome to take your noon meal at the officers’ mess, over there.” He managed to point with a handful of reins. “Your men can eat at the common mess.” He pointed it and the stables out to Sergeant Yngvar.

  The squad dismounted and led their horses away, Tobe in the rear with Hoshi and the packhorses. Kel had brought the men as guards, but she had not been happy about removing over a quarter of Haven’s trained fighters. She’d made Merric promise to stay in camp and conduct no patrols until her return.

  “Hey, Rengar, c’mere,” Owen called. A boy dressed in civilian clothes trotted over to them. “Kel,” Owen said, “would you give your reports to Rengar? My lord says that way you can eat while he reads them, and he’ll talk to you about them when you’re done. Master Numair, Daine said tell you she’s up in the observation tower.” Owen pointed out the tall wooden tower at the highest point of ground inside the walls. Numair immediately went to her.

  “Daine’s here?” asked Neal. “The last we knew, she was on her way to Giantkiller.”

  “She came to us from there,” replied Owen, his face suddenly grim. Kel was about to ask him what was wrong when he trotted off in response to a call from the guardpost.

  Still puzzled by Owen’s change of mood, Kel passed her reports to Rengar and went to the officers’ mess with Neal and his father. Harailt of Aili, a powerful mage and dean of the royal university, was there with his lunch. He greeted Duke Baird with pleasure and invited them to join him.

  “I thought you were in Northwatch,” Baird remarked as he set his tray beside his round-faced friend.

  “I’m here for talks with Wyldon—the prince is, too,” Harailt explained. “He’s watch captain right now, but we’ll see him at supper. Vanget decided some fresh air and a change of scene might do his highness good.”

  “Still missing Princess Shinkokami?” Duke Baird asked the question Kel was thinking.

  “In part,” replied Harailt. “Mostly he chafes at the bit Vanget’s put on him. He has a full guard of knights when Vanget fights battles, and he’s not allowed to patrol. After Roald snapped at a few people, Vanget saw he should do something for him, before his highness did something himself. It does run in the family.”

  Neal listened in silence as the older mages exchanged news. Kel was distracted by her own worries. She didn’t want to give up Duke Baird or Numair, though she knew they had only been at Haven on loan and that they were needed elsewhere on the border. At least they had done all they could for her camp, Numair putting fire protections on the walls and roofs, Baird adding strength to the protections on their water and medicines. Kel would still miss the security two such powerful mages had given her. Neal would, too, though all he said within his father’s hearing was that he would be happy when Baird was no longer underfoot. Kel might have scolded her friend, but she saw the look on Baird’s face and realized he understood his son perfectly.

  Owen joined them after grabbing his own meal: cold beef, cheese, hearty soup heaped with vegetables, and a tankard of milk. “Did you hear the news?” he asked, sitting next to Neal. “Giantkiller fell.”

  “What’s this? When?” Duke Baird asked Harailt.

  “Four days ago,” the other man replied soberly. “The same day I hear you were attacked. The enemy there had killing devices and a battering ram. By the time Daine brought word of the attack to Lord Wyldon and my lord rode out to save the place, it was destroyed.”

  Kel shivered. In her mind’s eye she saw the faces of those she remembered from her few days’ stay at the fort. Dead, or taken?

  “Did they catch the Scanrans?” Neal wanted to know.

  “Our forces cleaned out the forest on both sides of the ridge, but the enemy had gone. You can’t leave soldiers in the wilderness forever, not in this war, anyway,” Owen said with brutal practicality. “Everyone stays on the move.”

  Kel looked at her friend. Her throat went tight. So Owen, too, had learned about what the soldiers called seeing the kraken—being at war. “Owen,” she began.

  He shook his head. “General Vanget sent a company in to hold the area. He wants a new fort built in the same spot—we can’t leave that gap unprotected—but my lord talked him out of it. He says the men will think it’s a curse place and desert. They do things like that, never mind that they’re supposed to defend their country.” He scowled, vexed with anyone who gave way to fear.

  “It’s hard not to believe in curses when you’ve seen a killing device at work,” Kel told him gently. “And it’s hard to be brave when you feel the gods have turned from you.”

  “Is there any good news?” asked Neal. “King Maggur got lung rot, say?”

  As the talk turned to the enemy king, Kel sent up a brief, silent prayer to the Black God for the dead of Giantkiller. Her post at Haven was rubbing her raw. Without Haven, without her duty to the refugees, she might have dared the Crown’s wrath to cross into Scanra alone. She stood a far better chance of avoiding capture that way. She knew the language, and surely the Chamber would guide her to her long-overdue meeting with Blayce. The chance to wrap her hands around the Nothing Man’s scrawny neck would be worth even disgrace and exile from Tortall.

  But this is daydreaming, she thought bitterly as she finished her meal. Daydreaming. I do have Haven.

  Owen raced off as soon as he finished eating. He returned with their supply lists just as Kel had begun to wonder what to do next. “Kel, my lord says he’s ready to see you. Neal, he sa
ys, present your supply requests to the quartermaster. He approved just about everything.” Owen gave Neal the lists that he, Kel, and Merric had labored on for the past three nights. “Rengar will show you where the quartermaster is.” Kel smiled at the youth, who had followed Owen into the mess.

  Neal got to his feet. “Time to earn my wage,” he said. “Lead on, friend Rengar.”

  The tall youth bowed and blushed, then escorted Neal out of the officers’ mess. Kel followed Owen to Wyldon’s office. It looked much like the one Lord Wyldon had kept as training master, right down to the stone hawk figure at the corner of his desk.

  “Take a seat, Mindelan,” he said. “Jesslaw, post yourself outside in case I need you. And don’t eavesdrop.”

  Owen bowed and left, closing the door behind him. Kel sat and remarked, “How can he avoid eavesdropping?”

  “He can’t,” replied Wyldon. “But this way I will know how well he can hold his tongue. You requested more soldiers.” Wyldon’s lean, handsome face was expressionless as he looked at Kel.

  “My lord, the request is reasonable,” Kel pointed out. She refused to whine. “Merric takes a squad on patrol, leaving me with twenty-five trained soldiers to man the walls. The civilian fighters are coming along, but they’re mostly fit for defense, not rescue work outside Haven. And—”

  Wyldon raised a hand to silence her. “You’ll have two more squads and five replacements for the men you lost,” he said evenly. “I know twenty-five isn’t much, but it’s what I can spare. Our patrols meet the enemy every day up here, and there’s Giantkiller to rebuild.”

  “So I heard, my lord,” Kel replied, bowing her head.

  “We repaid the enemy for some of that,” Wyldon told her. “Not enough, but some. Vanget beat roughly three thousand of the enemy two days ago, on the Vassa plain.”

  Kel knew the area he meant from the maps: between the border and the great bend of the Vassa River lay as broad a plain as could be found here in the north. “What were our losses, sir?”

  “Fewer than we could have hoped,” Wyldon said, pouring out two cups of amber liquid. Kel took one. It was cider. She drank gratefully. “Vanget lost ninety-eight men as the enemy attacked, so he started falling back,” Wyldon explained after a swallow from his own cup.

  Kel winced. That was nearly an entire company.

  “The enemy gave chase,” continued Wyldon, “and broke their formation. He turned and hacked them up.”

  Kel unconsciously clenched her hands. Why hadn’t she been there, fighting the enemy, giving them a taste of all the ill they had doled out? She had become a knight to fight the realm’s enemies, not to be a nanny for civilians!

  “Maggur still hasn’t made soldiers of his men,” Wyldon remarked, not seeing Kel’s frustration, or ignoring it if he did. “The moment they get excited, they break ranks and act each for himself, Mithros be thanked.” The man shook his head, then looked at the papers before him. “You’re up to four hundred and five refugees?”

  Kel took a moment to register the change of topic. She unclenched her fists. “The day after Giantkiller fell and the Anak’s Eyrie folk arrived, we got a mixed group from Hanaford and Riversedge, and more from Fief Jonajin a day later.” She recalled something Numair had told her. “My lord, I’m told there are plans to get the refugees out, with the danger from Blayce the Gallan?”

  Wyldon sighed. “Even if the councils agree and vote funds for it, I doubt we’ll get transport until summer’s end.”

  Goose bumps rippled on Kel’s arms. “Can’t they move their behinds? Don’t they see the danger? Blayce makes killing devices with captives!”

  “They see danger everywhere, including at home,” Wyldon told her. “We can’t force action from them. The nobles fear the Crown will use the war to drain their purses, to make them dependent on the Crown should things go amiss on their estates. The commoners fear building the war up is an excuse to start pressing their sons into army or navy service. The king will wear the councils down, but not this week, or next.”

  Kel slumped in her chair. How would she last the summer penned up at Haven?

  “Now, these letters of complaint from your civilians, particularly this Valestone fellow . . .” Wyldon began.

  Kel sat up again. This was it. He would see she couldn’t handle the refugees’ constant squabbles and their demands on her time. This was the reason why she’d agreed to carry written complaints from Idrius and the other malcontents. It was silly to be pleased that Fanche hadn’t written such a letter when it might have helped convince Wyldon to replace her, but Kel hoped that it meant Fanche had decided Kel was doing a good job. The respect of a woman like Fanche was surely worth one less complaint.

  “Complaints go with command,” Wyldon told her, not unkindly. “You’ll never satisfy them all. You’d be foolish to try. Troublemakers come with every group, be they camp or company, village or palace. Valestone says you left him in the stocks for hours?”

  So Wyldon would send her back after all. “I had other things to see to, including the dead,” Kel replied steadily, trying not to show disappointment. “I couldn’t approach without his starting to yell at me, so I left him until he shut up long enough to let me explain why I put him there.”

  “Very good,” Wyldon said with approval. Kel blinked. “Sometimes you need to hit a man on the head to get his attention. He and his friends must learn to obey orders.” Raising his voice he called, “Jesslaw!”

  The door popped open and Owen stuck his head inside. “My lord?”

  Wyldon offered him the sheaf of complaints. As Owen took them, Wyldon said, “Have one of the clerks write a single, general reply for my signature, saying that Lady Knight Keladry of Mindelan has my entire confidence and that all complaints in future will be addressed to her. She may rectify them or not, as dictated by the necessities of wartime. Have you got that?”

  Owen recited the words perfectly. Kel raised her eyebrows, wondering how Wyldon had taught Owen that trick.

  “Dismissed,” Wyldon told Owen. The squire bowed and left the office. “Now,” the man said, settling back in his chair, “you did not list their complaints in your reports. Why not?”

  Kel was surprised he’d asked. “They weren’t military problems, sir. Reports should include supply matters, the condition of the camp and its surrounding lands, military information and engagements with the enemy, and signs of possible mutiny. I did wonder about that last one, but”—Kel shrugged. She wasn’t going to tell him about all the times she’d heard refugees say that no green eighteen-year-old could protect them and that nobles had no common sense. She certainly wouldn’t mention the occasions her advice had been greeted with remarks like “What do you know, as young as you are?” or “The only reason you have this job is because they want you out of the way of the real fighting.” Instead, Kel told Wyldon, “People dislike Idrius and his friends so much that the only mutiny we’ll get is the others kicking them out. It may yet happen. I figure I have till the end of June before it gets that bad.”

  Wyldon smiled. He promptly covered the smile with his hand, trying to smooth it from his lips, but Kel saw crinkles at the corners of his eyes. She stared at her cup, her own eyes wide. She had made the Stump smile!

  Wyldon cleared his throat and refilled their cider cups. “Now, let me fill you in on a few things.”

  Once they were done, Wyldon turned Kel over to Owen for a tour of Mastiff. Everywhere Kel saw Wyldon’s firm hand on the rein. Of course it would be tidy and well organized, with him to run the place. She reminded herself that Wyldon dealt with soldiers, who were expected to obey when an order was given, but she also knew that civilians would not argue with Wyldon as they did with her.

  There’s no use pouting, she told herself as Owen showed her the mages’ workshops. My lord wants me at Haven, so there I’ll stay. I’ll just have to make the best of it.

  She tried not to drool over Mastiff’s superior equipment, space, and well-trained men. That would make her too m
uch like the many dogs who prowled the grounds or dozed in the sun. Owen told her most of the large, block-headed, brown and black war dogs and the scent-hounds with their drooping ears and wrinkled faces came from Wyldon’s own kennels, trained by him and his wife. They were handsome creatures, but she preferred Jump and the dogs at Haven. Thanks to Daine, those dogs now earned their keep as sentinels and as hunters. They required no human archers to help them bring in small game like wild geese, grouse, or rabbit. If they killed a boar or deer, the dogs would summon humans to carry the heavier load. Kel nearly pitied the Mastiff dogs, even though she knew Daine felt that she’d done the animals of Haven a great disservice.

  Supper was held in Lord Wyldon’s dining room, with all the camp’s senior officials present, as well as Prince Roald, Baird, Numair, Neal, Harailt, Daine, and Kel. Owen and his friend Rengar handled the service as officers and mages talked about the war, the killing devices, and the army’s next assault on King Maggur’s troops.

  “The problem is that the chief damage is being done by these raiding parties,” Wyldon remarked as the table was cleared. “Maggur sends his regular troops to nail down Northwatch, Steadfast, and Mastiff, then turns raiders loose in the country behind our lines to burn and loot. Some of those raiding parties fetch killing devices with them, and the humans kidnap more people than they kill. We’re assuming the adults are made slaves, kept or sold to the markets in the south. The young ones all go to Blayce the Gallan.”

  “We need more troops,” said one of the captains. “And soon. There’s just too much border. We can’t stop the enemy from crossing the Vassa. If we can get more men, we can turn the Scanrans away before they reach the back country.”