Protector of the Small Quartet

by Tamora Pierce

  Merric’s archers killed two more Scanrans; a farmer shot the last. Merric rode up to Kel, sweeping his helmet from his sweat-soaked, flame-red hair. “Sorry to interrupt the plowing,” he said, ablaze with combat fever. “If I’d known your lot would do the heavy work, I’d have continued on patrol.” He looked at the farmers and grinned. “Nice to know you can do it without us, eh?” he asked them.

  “Next time leave us a few more,” the older woman informed him, coiling her bowstring. “We need the practice.”

  From the walls of Haven they heard the sound of cheers.

  May 6–June 3, 460

  Haven and Fort Mastiff

  eleven

  SHATTERED SANCTUARY

  About fifty of the enemy attacked from the east three days later. Sparrows got word to Kel, who had taken her young spear trainees to the riverbank. They raced back into Haven. Sergeant Yngvar took out two squads to support Merric’s patrol. While those squads fought the enemy—a mixed force with more foot soldiers than horsemen—on open ground, civilian archers held off twenty more Scanrans who tried to clamber over the boulders and up Haven’s west wall. Idrius Valestone was a cool head in that fight, calming the civilians around him as they steadily aimed, shot, and put fresh arrows to the string.

  When she guessed the enemy would break with a little extra push, Kel led a fourth mounted squad to the battle. What was left of the main body of attackers fled. There was no one alive to flee among those who had tried Idrius and the archers on the western wall.

  As the refugees piled and burned the Scanran dead, Stormwings circled above, jeering at them. More than one archer tried to shoot them down without success. The creatures were nimble on the wing, easily dodging all the arrows that came their way.

  Two days later couriers rode in from Northwatch to deliver reports to Kel before they pressed on to Fort Mastiff. Vanget’s words, set on paper in a clerk’s polished writing, were as blunt as ever. Giantkiller was being rebuilt. Until it was finished, the workers and soldiers lived in mines in the hills between the old Giantkiller and Haven. Vanget also wrote that King Maggur’s army had lost two pitched battles, one to Vanget, one to Lord Raoul and the King’s Own. It was good to read about victories, particularly after Vanget also wrote that the sieges of Frasrlund and the City of the Gods remained firmly in place.

  “Write a notice for our people about the battles won,” Kel told the clerks. “If folk ask for word on the sieges, just say that there’s no change.”

  Five days after the couriers’ visit, eighty-five more refugees came in from the south in time to join in the elections for the civilian council. Kel, who had looked forward to a decrease in civilian complaints, discovered instead that she now had a clump of angry, quarrelsome people in the shape of the elected council to seek her out day after day. Sorting their arguments out led to such long, late discussions that Kel had to wonder if it had taken as long to arrange Prince Roald’s betrothal to Princess Shinkokami.

  “This was your idea,” she accused Neal as the council left headquarters one night.

  “It seemed like a good one at the time,” he replied, yawning.

  “For two copper bits I’d toss the whole mess into your lap,” she threatened.

  Merric, reviewing supply sheets, commented in unison with Neal, “And let you miss such fun?”

  Kel scowled at them and went to bed.

  With the arrival of still more working hands, Kel found herself eased off the work rosters. Tobe, Loesia, and Gydo explained that Haven’s residents thought it was beneath their commander’s dignity to scrub pots and cut up wood, especially now that there were so many who were used to the work. “I was getting better at sowing,” Kel protested, wondering what she had done to make them think she had dignity. The youngsters only grinned and shook their heads.

  With fewer chores, Kel worked more as a weapons trainer. There she was welcome. The more trainers they had, the more civilians received individual attention and the better they got. Kel took pride in the improvement of Haven’s students, young and old. They were eager to learn self-defense. As their training progressed, they walked less like victims and more like people proud of their skills with staff, bow, spear, and sling.

  Kel also worked with the animals and humans together, settling on signals everyone could use. The humans had to learn what a dog’s circling, a bird’s string of peeps, and a cat’s sharpening her claws in the dirt meant. The animals had to learn what humans meant even when they spoke with various accents. The animals learned so quickly that some people would have spent all day talking to them if they could. Other men and women were nervous, though they insisted on staying to learn all the signals. “The starving can’t choose what tools to harvest with,” Sergeant Vidur commented. “Even when it seems plain unnatural.”

  Four days before Kel and Neal were due for their next visit to Mastiff, a raiding party of sixteen mounted Scanrans tried their luck on Haven. They were dead before any soldiers reached them. Civilian workers placing stones on the height above the boulders shot the enemy off their mounts with arrows, then finished them with axes, staves, and even the rocks they carried.

  That night the refugees celebrated loud and long. They had fought for themselves and won! Kel didn’t mind if they made noise about it, but she did wonder if, with the enemy close enough for one attack, she ought to put off her trip.

  “Don’t do that, lady,” Tobe protested when she mentioned it to him. “Maybe himself will give you more soldiers. We’ll be fine.”

  “We?” Kel asked. “Weren’t you planning to go with me?”

  Tobe grinned. “I guess if you go away, you’re prolly comin’ back.”

  This was the nicest thing she’d heard in days. Kel couldn’t help it: she leaned down and kissed her young henchman on the forehead. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  He looked up at her with suspicion. “Are you goin’ t’act like a girl now?” he demanded.

  “No,” Kel said, stifling a giggle—something that really would have frightened him. “It won’t happen again.”

  When she broached the subject of a delay to the headquarters meeting room, Neal frowned. “I do need fresh supplies of the herbs that don’t grow locally,” he reminded her.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Merric said, covering a yawn. “You trained them to fight. How will it look if you won’t leave them for two days? Even with you taking a squad, I’m not staying inside the walls this time. We’ve got four squads, and your fighting farmers. Cut them off your apron strings, Mother.”

  “He’s right,” Neal said. “They’ll think you don’t have faith in them. We need supplies, and you know the Stump wants our personal reports.”

  Zamiel looked up from his work. “They take confidence in what they can do from the confidence you show in them, milady,” the clerk informed her. He smiled crookedly. “So do I. Give us a bit more confidence, and keep to your schedule. We can hold our own, should the enemy visit.”

  Kel knew they were right. She did no one any favors by acting as if they couldn’t manage without her. At dawn four days later she, Neal, Jump, a fistful of sparrows, and Sergeant Connac’s squad prepared to ride to Fort Mastiff. Peachblossom would come this time, as would Neal’s and Merric’s warhorses. Haven’s smiths could shoe all kinds of mounts for commoners, but they feared the warhorses. Mastiff’s smiths could handle them, and Peachblossom had thrown a shoe. The knights decided it would be good to have all three warhorses checked.

  “Don’t skip practice,” Kel warned Tobe, Gydo, and Loesia. “Loey, mind your footing on the long side cut. Tobe, practice that middle hold—a straight line—”

  Tobe rolled his eyes. “Aye, milady Mother,” he said, every inch an exasperated male. Then he colored. “Meanin’ no dis—”

  “And eat your vegetables,” Kel told him with a grin. She was flattered that Tobe might call her Mother, even in jest.

  “Me’n Gydo, we’ll watch ’im, milady,” promised Loesia. “Safe journey.”

&
nbsp; Kel nodded to them and clucked to Hoshi, leading their small group out of Haven’s gate.

  Owen was as delighted as ever to see them. He and his civilian friend Rengar made them comfortable as Wyldon read Kel’s reports. Afterward the two boys waited on them at table as they took their evening meal with Lord Wyldon and his officers. Most of the talk was about the war, news from the City of the Gods and Frasrlund. The City of the Gods, with its concentration of mages, was proving costly to King Maggur, and the Tortallan navy had gone to attack the Scanran ships that blocked Frasrlund’s harbor. If Blayce had been found, word had not yet reached Mastiff.

  So the war progresses without me, Kel told herself grumpily as she got ready for bed. And I’m no closer to Blayce than ever.

  Horses raced up the road to Haven. Kel, frightened, looked for her weapons, but she was naked. She opened her eyes inside Mastiff’s guest quarters. She’d been dreaming.

  If it was only a dream, why did the horses’ hooves continue to thunder?

  She jumped for the door and yanked it open. A soldier lurched in, hand still raised to pound again. “Lady knight, see my lord at headquarters.”

  Kel stuffed her nightshirt into her breeches and pulled on her boots, leaving her stockings aside for the moment. She didn’t bother to comb her hair or clean her teeth; she just rattled down the stairs of the guest barracks. Jump was at her heels as she dashed to headquarters. Neal, Sergeant Connac, and seven other men, all dressed much as she was, ran with her. They raced into Wyldon’s office and halted, trying to catch their breath.

  Wyldon, also in nightshirt and breeches, sat before the hearth, helping a boy to grasp a heavy mug as the lad drank from it. The boy looked up, searching the eyes of the new arrivals. His face was dirty and scratched, his clothes muddy and tattered.

  It was fortunate Wyldon gripped the mug. Tobe let go of it and scrambled across the room with a cry of “Lady!” He wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in her nightshirt.

  Kel hugged her boy. Sobs shook his frame, though he refused to make any noise. Soothing him, she looked at Wyldon. That Tobe was here, at night, in such condition, told her what had happened.

  Wyldon stood. To the men of his command who’d come with Kel, Neal, and Connac, he said, “I’ll take Company Eight and Company Six. Battle mages, twenty scouts. Jesslaw?”

  “Sir!” Owen said behind Kel. He wore only boots and nightshirt.

  “Get me a clerk, and messengers for Northwatch, the garrison near Giantkiller, and Steadfast.”

  “Tobe, how long have you been on the road?” Kel asked the muddy head buried in her nightshirt.

  “Not th’ road, th’ woods. Since noon,” he said, his voice muffled. “They hit mid-mornin’. The iron mantises, with the knife fingers an’ toes, they climbed over the walls on three sides. Master Zamiel sent me out the hidden tunnel. I left Loey an’ Gydo an’ Meech an’ Saefas—”

  “Stop,” Kel ordered softly, her pulse beating in her throat and wrists. She was enraged, but it was a distant feeling, one that made her cold. “You did right, Tobe. You’ve been on the move ever since?”

  He nodded against her shirtfront, trembling from head to toe. As the boy continued, Neal came over to place a green-glowing hand on Tobe’s back. “I had t’go the long way ’round, t’keep ’em from catchin’ me,” explained the boy. Though he’d spent weeks trying to speak properly, fright and exhaustion reduced him to talking as he had when Kel first met him. “The sparrows led the way. I heard Sir Merric’s horn calls—they was fightin’, in the east woods. I kep’ low and kep’ movin’. I daren’t try the road, but the sparrows couldn’t go after dark, so they fetched me an owl. Th’ owl brung me here.”

  “Aren’t you glad Daine has friends everywhere?” Kel asked gently. Tobe nodded. She looked at Neal. “What’s the matter?” she asked her friend. “He’s cold and clammy.”

  “He’s chilled,” replied Neal. “His body’s in shock. He hasn’t drunk enough water, and he hasn’t eaten since breakfast, I’d guess. He needs rest.”

  Disentangling herself from Tobe, Kel knelt so she could look him in the eye. “I must go to Haven. You stay here,” she told him firmly. “Do as you’re bid.” His chin jutted out mulishly. Kel went on, “You’re no good to me if you’re sick. Obey the healers. Eat, drink, sleep. Understand me, Tobe? You did a man’s work today. Now you must still act the man and rest.”

  Grudgingly, he nodded. Kel guessed that he knew he couldn’t do anything else right now. His eyelids slid down and jerked up: he was literally falling asleep on his feet. Kel nodded to Neal, whose hand was still on Tobe’s back. A moment later the boy sagged, truly asleep. Kel caught him and passed him to a healer who’d just arrived.

  “Change and arm up, Mindelan, Queenscove,” Wyldon ordered tersely. “Your riding mounts are being saddled.”

  Wyldon led their force, leaving Mastiff in the hands of one company while two went with him. One company spread through the woods on either side of the road, beating the brush for the enemy, but the Scanrans were long gone. The forest was eerily silent, even after the sun rose. Wild creatures did not like the killing devices and fled when they were near, taking days to return to their homes.

  The scent of smoke and Stormwing reached them as they emerged from the trees onto the flat-lands where Haven’s fields lay. Kel’s instinct was to kick Hoshi into a gallop, to leave Wyldon and the others behind in her frantic need to see what had become of her people. She bit her lip until it bled and made herself keep Hoshi at a steady trot in the vanguard of Wyldon’s troops. She knew that what had taken place at Haven was over.

  When they reached the crossing with the road to Fort Giantkiller, they halted. The Giantkiller road was a mess of churned and rutted earth bearing the marks of hooves and wagon wheels. The enemy had gone that way.

  “Company Eight,” Wyldon called. The captain rode forward as Wyldon added, “Couriers— Northwatch, Mastiff, new Giantkiller, and Steadfast.” Once the men surrounded him, Wyldon handed out orders. “Company Eight, follow the Giantkiller road. These tracks are nearly a day old. I see a lot of riders, but the wagons will slow them down. Maybe you’ll catch up. Pursue as far as you can, but be sensible. Return here to report. Couriers, take word to the district forts and Northwatch. Make sure right now you have your protective charms with you.” Each courier reached into his belt purse. Only when they all showed him their charms dangling from loops of cord did Wyldon nod. “Dismissed.”

  The captain waved his flag-bearer up. They turned onto the Giantkiller road, mages, couriers, and a hundred mounted troopers in their wake.

  Wyldon beckoned to Kel. “It’s your command,” he said. “Lead us in.”

  Kel set Hoshi forward, bound for the walled heights. Stormwings circled among the ropes of smoke that rose from inside Haven. Wyldon and his troops followed Kel as she rode to the rough bridge the enemy had thrown across the Greenwoods River. It seemed that the watch commander had used the mage blasts to blow up the original bridge, for all the good it had done. She saw bodies around the bridge’s ruins, Scanran by their clothes. The sour breath of smoke and the red stink of blood drifted down the high ground from the walls.

  Kel guided Hoshi up the inclined road, around the bodies of the dead, Scanrans and defenders alike. The mare snorted at the stench and rolled her eyes at the corpses but pressed on. “Good girl,” whispered Kel, patting her neck. “Good girl.”

  Looking at the walls, she saw pale chips in the dark wood, the marks of killing devices. From the look of things, three had climbed the east wall. One hung partway over the top, snared in one of the nets Kel had ordered made for the purpose. Someone must have cracked the thing’s head-dome while it was entangled, letting out the spirit that made it work.

  Kel paused at the ruins of the gate. Here the Scanrans had used a battering ram. One side of the gate tilted half off its hinges, logs dangling from its crosspieces. Two logs had been knocked from the other half of the gate. Around the gaping entry lay the d
ead.

  Haven was in ruins. Every building showed signs of attack. Doors were gone or hung crazily from their hinges. Shutters had been chopped off windows. Smoke streaked every opening. The enemy had tried to burn the place, but Numair’s fire protections had saved the walls, if not the contents of the buildings. The only place he had not protected, because the traces of his spells would interfere with the healers’ magics, was the infirmary. It was a burned-out ruin, a mass of charred, smoky wood. If she had felt anything at the sight, Kel would have prayed for anyone trapped there, but all her emotions were bound into a small, tight knot in her heart. If she prayed, the knot, and her heart, would go to pieces.

  On the ground lay a few dead sword- or axe-cut animals. Most of them were dogs; some were cats. All had bloody muzzles and, in the case of the cats, bloody claws. Changed by Daine to help the refugees, they’d fought alongside their humans, and they’d paid for it. Some of the other animals lay in heaps: chickens, geese, and ducks, animals that hated to be cooped up. They’d been trampled.

  Kel dismounted. She fumbled the reins as she looped them around Hoshi’s saddle horn. With Jump at her heels, she climbed one of the stairs to the ramparts.

  “Dismount and fan out,” she heard Wyldon order. “Let’s have the wounded and the dead laid out here by the gate. Search every building.”

  Kel stopped halfway up the stair. On one side of the hole where the gate had stood was a maroon-and -brown pile. There Oluf’s cold, dead face, his eyes wide, seemed to stare right at her. He lay on a stack of dead men, all in army maroon. A massive sword cut opened his chest, telling Kel how he’d died.

  I never liked him, she thought distantly. He beat the convicts until I stopped him. But he fought for us. He fought for us, and they threw him on a pile like trash.