The Chaos Balance

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  Nylan turned his mare back to the place where he’d thrown his first blade, sheathing the second in the shoulder harness.

  An armsman, already looting the corpse, looked up, then quickly extracted the dark gray blade. “Yours, ser?” Nesru extended it sheepishly, hilt first. “You get his purse…”

  “You can keep it.” Nylan took the blade and wiped it on the cloth tied to his saddle, then sheathed it and massaged his forehead. The one man he’d killed had been enough.

  Then he eased the mare toward the burly subofficer who had reined up on the center of the road. Ayrlyn was guiding her squad from the east toward the rest of the group.

  “We got them all,” she said, just loudly enough for her voice to carry. Dark blotches stained her vest.

  Nylan looked closely at the stains.

  “Not mine. He got closer than I’d like. Those damned shields are distracting.”

  “I see.” He raised his eyebrows.

  “I’m not as good at throwing blades as you are. That means they get closer.”

  “The shields give me trouble. That was why I threw the blade. I only do that when I’m in real trouble,” Nylan confessed, turning his mount and nodding to Tonsar.

  “We’re always in real trouble… anymore,” she murmured.

  With that, he had to agree.

  “Form up!” Tonsar ordered.

  For a time they rode quietly through the mid-afternoon, the road dust muffling the clopping of hoofs, but sifting through every opening in Nylan’s garments, or so it seemed. He tried not to scratch too much, and concentrated on listening to the low comments that drifted forward from the squads behind them.

  “How did the angels know they were there?”

  “… we didn’t have any scouts…”

  “… you want to be a scout? White demons don’t take prisoners…”

  “… don’t care how they do it…”

  Nylan glanced at Ayrlyn. Despite the furrowed brow that indicated the same kind of splitting headache he suffered, he could see a glint in her eyes.

  “You’re getting better at sensing people,” he said quietly.

  “The weather’s easier.” She nodded. “I can almost ride the winds sometimes.”

  Nylan shook his head. “How you do that…”

  “To each her own-or in your case, his own. You can feel the grain of those metals you forge, and they feel like opaque blackness to me.”

  Nylan took a square of worn gray cloth from his belt and blotted away sweat and mud from his forehead and cheeks, then replaced it, and shifted his weight in the saddle. The mare whickered, but did not increase her measured pace northward.

  Nylan looked back southward.

  “There’s no one close,” Ayrlyn confirmed. “They won’t keep letting us do this, you know.”

  “The Cyadorans?”

  “We’ve been getting most of their smaller parties. Life may be cheap here in Candar, but even the Cyadorans are going to stop traveling or scouting in small groups.” The healer stood in her stirrups and massaged one hip. “Won’t ever get used to this.”

  “You already are.”

  “Not really.”

  “You think they’ll start attacking in force?” the smith asked. “Just in force.”

  “That’s what I’d do. I’d have started sooner.” Ayrlyn closed her eyes for a long moment, and Nylan could almost feel the relief across the few cubits that separated their mounts.

  “Why don’t they use white wizards?”

  “Maybe there aren’t too many.”

  “Even mighty Cyador has but few of the white mages,” confirmed Tonsar. “They do not wish to send them beyond the white walls. That is what my sister’s man said, and he once guarded the great Hissl.”

  “Could it be that there are limits to white wizardry?” Nylan’s tone was mocking.

  “Why not? There are limits to everything else.”

  Nylan nodded. But what were the limits to wizardry, or magery, or whatever it was called, whether white or black? He looked at the dusty road northward, leading back to Kula… and Weryl.

  LXX

  YESTERDAY, YOU BROUGHT back ten mounts and left ten dead scouts. Three days ago, we slaughtered twenty. For nearly three eight-days, we have bled them, yet they have not left Lornth.“ Fornal raised his eyebrows as his eyes went from Lewa to Huruc, and then to Nylan and Ayrlyn.

  The candle stub behind the glass mantle flickered. Lewa cupped an empty mug between his hands, his eyes darting from the regent to the angels and back to the regent.

  “If we had attacked them three eight-days ago,” Nylan answered slowly, “you would have few armsmen left, and the Cyadorans would be marching toward Clynya. If they didn’t hold it already.”

  Fornal looked at the mug. “Hot… and sour, like your truths.” He set it on the rickety table, which wobbled. The shadows on the dingy wall wobbled as well. “So we have preserved Lornth-for now. The Cyadorans will do something. What think you, angels?”

  “Sooner or later, they’ll send a big force after us,” Nylan predicted. “They’ll have to.” The wine in his mug was almost untouched. One sip of near-vinegar had been enough, even if it deadened the smell of sweat and blood.

  Huruc took a quick and small sip, his eyes never leaving Nylan’s face.

  “I would have acted. You would have, I think, yet they have not. What do you judge they will do, and when?” Fornal took another sip from the mug, made another face, and set it down.

  “If you were the… lord of the Cyadoran forces, how would you explain how you keep losing men and mounts to a bunch of barbarians?” asked Ayrlyn. “They think we’re barbarians-that’s their attitude-and they have to do something.”

  “You think so?” asked Huruc.

  “What did they do to the people in Kula?” Ayrlyn raised her eyebrows, her hair glinting in the light from the single candle, despite the soot on the chipped glass mantle.

  “Killed them.”

  “They mutilated them,” added Nylan. “Even the children. Remember the lord of Cyador’s response to your scrolls?”

  “There is that,” mused Fornal.

  “When they send out large parties, we’ve managed to warn the locals, and we don’t attack. So they don’t get much. We’ve been pretty successful picking off their scouts and smaller forage parties. How would you feel?” pursued Ayrlyn.

  “I would be angry,” admitted the coregent. “You did the warning, though. Did the locals heed you?”

  “They said it wasn’t honorable,” admitted Ayrlyn, “but as soon as we left, so did they.”

  “Peasants… they talk…” Fornal took another swig of the wine, followed by another face. “You ask questions, angel. Why do you not say what you mean?”

  “Would you keep sending out smaller groups of lancers and armsmen if you had more armsmen than your enemy?”

  Fornal frowned, and Nylan wanted to grin. Ayrlyn, without making a direct point of it, was refusing to be intimidated by the big young noble.

  “Why…” Fornal nodded. “I see your point. What would you have me do?”

  “Be ready .to move,” Nylan said, “to another base. They can’t keep sending out their entire army. If they try it again, then perhaps-I may have some ideas-we can create some damage at the mines while they’re trying to sweep the countryside.”

  “Some holders would call that a retreat, at least behind my back,” Fornal pointed out.

  “Moving is not retreating. There is a difference. We take another position and keep fighting.”

  “I will think about how I must report this so that our actions are not mistaken.” The black-bearded regent stood and stretched. “Thinking and hot wine-enough to spoil anything for an armsman.” He offered a quick grin before he strolled out of the dwelling’s main room and into the warm night.

  “Good eve, angels,” added Lewa as he stood and followed Fornal.

  Huruc sat and looked down at the mug. After a moment, he turned his head toward Ayrlyn. �
�What you say makes sense, but I fear it.” He paused. “Tell me, angel healer, why I fear your counsel.”

  Nylan and Ayrlyn exchanged quick looks.

  “It appears I am right to fear,” added the armsman with a laugh.

  Ayrlyn nodded. “What we do has been effective, has it not? And it will become more effective. That will sting the lord of Cyador, and he will send more armsmen. It’s always that way.” She took a deep breath. “Then we will have to find out how to kill those men, and, if we succeed, he will send more. In the end, either Lornth or Cyador will fall.”

  “That was fated from the beginning,” Nylan said softly. “The mines were only a game for the lord of Cyador to see how he could conquer Lornth. Cyador is not ruled by grassland bandits like Lord Ildyrom. And Cyador does not believe in honor as Lord Fornal does.”

  “I have known that,” Huruc answered, “and it gives me no comfort.” He rose. “I thank you for your straight words, though many would not, if they knew them. Best they do not. Good night.”

  After the older armsman left, Nylan stood, as did Ayrlyn. “Now what?” he asked.

  “We figure out how to change the world-or we die.” Her words were cold, and so were her hands, despite the evening heat.

  LXXI

  THEY SKULK AROUND and watch,“ snapped Miatorphi. ”If we ride out with less than twoscore lancers, they wait, and then they attack, and run. We’ve lost half our scouts, ten at a crack, twice, and more than a few in some skirmishes, and that one time where we lost nearly a half company.“ He scowled. ”Three men left.“

  “They only attack when they have an advantage in numbers,” added Azarphi, his narrow face shimmering in sweat. “If we ride out with more, nothing happens.”

  “One on one, they’re no match for a Mirror Lancer,” said Miatorphi.

  Majer Piataphi frowned. “Some must be. One of their war leaders sliced right through a blade and a shield. Funssa brought back the shield. Another shattered a lance and a sabre with a short blade.”

  “So… we move in larger groups.”

  “That’s not the point,” countered Piataphi. “That means they’re using blades with sharp edges, and not just those metal bars they call swords.”

  The two captains waited.

  After a moment, the majer continued. “The sooner we get rid of them the better. Have you located their camp?”

  “It’s here, we think.” Azarphi pointed to the map. “One of the smaller hamlets where we removed all the contraries in the first sweep.”

  “Take the entire Fourth and Sixth Lancers.” Majer Piataphi frowned. “And the Eighth. Attack their base. Their ‘honor’ will make them defend it if we attack-and that will be the end of them.”

  “What if they show some common sense and retreat?” asked Miatorphi.

  “We lose nothing. Destroy the camp. Raze it to the ground. Then they will have a less suitable base. We will keep doing that until they have no place suitable.” The majer smiled grimly. “And we only move in forces of two companies or more. That should put an end to these efforts to whittle away our men.”

  LXXII

  NYLAN LOWERED THE hammer and turned the cooling blade, but it looked and felt right. From the partial shade under the eaves, his eyes strayed toward the trampled grasslands beyond the corral, where Ayrlyn again worked the levies in the already hot mid-morning sun.

  He smiled. No longer, not after the skirmishes, was there such reluctance to the drills. Some of that was doubtless because several of those who had been clumsy or reluctant were dead or wounded. Still, neither the other levies nor the professionals drilled, and, after a while, it might be a problem to keep upgrading the skills of the angel-led squads.

  “You can stop pumping,” the smith added to Sias. ‘Take a quick break.“

  Fornal strolled toward the makeshift smithy as the apprentice trotted toward the well and as Nylan slipped the blade into the cooling tank, not much more than brackish water, and not nearly so effective as what Hie had used on the Roof of the World.

  “I see why you didn’t allow your trainees to practice with blades,” said Fornal. “Don’t the narrow blades break more often, though?”

  Nylan set the blade on the forge stones to anneal before turning to face the black-bearded regent. “They might. We work on how to avoid taking a big blade straight-on. That’s hard on both the armsman and a blade. Besides, the point is to take out your enemy, not bang up his blade.”

  Fornal nodded. “You have a different view of arms.”

  “I suppose so. We don’t like to fight.” The smith shrugged. “If we have to, we want to get it over as quickly as possible, with as little injury to us or to our armsmen as possible.”

  “Are all angels that way?”

  “Most of them. Ryba likes to humiliate her personal opponents as quickly as possible, I think. She’s good enough that it’s never been a problem.” Looking over Fornal’s shoulder, Nylan could see a line of dust on the south road. “Do you have scouts out? Someone’s riding hard.”

  The dark-haired regent glanced south for a minute, then back at Nylan. “Ours. Perhaps the Cyadorans are on the move.”

  “I’d be surprised if they weren’t. Empires don’t like being stung by wasps, especially barbarian wasps.” Nylan grinned.

  “You are pleased to think of yourself as an insect?”

  “Fornal… as you pointed out, I’m more interested in what works than in how I look.” Except that you like to be well thought of as much as the next person. Nylan repressed a frown at the inadvertent self-correction. Whatever it was about Candar, he was having more and more trouble deceiving himself-about much of anything. “Not that I mind looking good,” he added to quiet the twinges in his skull.

  “It is good to know that a terrible angel has some vanity.” Fornal did not quite grin as he waited.

  “More than some,” Nylan admitted.

  Fornal did offer a faint smile.

  The rider guided his dust-streaked mount straight to Fornal, reining up, then swallowing as he looked at the regent. “Must be more than score twenty riding this way-still more than ten kays south, though,” panted the scout.

  “Score twenty? All mounted?”

  “Yes, ser.”

  “Go,” snapped Fornal. “Send Huruc, Lewa, and the other angel here.”

  The scout flicked the reins and turned his mount toward the barn.

  “Should we fight?” asked the regent after the sweating scout trotted toward the barn barracks.

  “Against that many? Why? We can keep picking them off, bit by bit. This attack just points out that what we’re doing is right.” Nylan paused as Ayrlyn rode up and dismounted.

  She tied the chestnut to a corner post and stepped toward the two men, her face impassive. “Bad news? A big Cyadoran force?”

  “Gifrac says there are score twenty,” answered Fornal.

  “We must have upset them,” observed Ayrlyn.

  “I don’t think it takes much,” said Nylan.

  The three waited as Huruc and Lewa strode across the dusty ground toward them. The sole chicken pecked at the ground along the east side of the old barn, ignoring the hurrying humans and the armsmen who gathered and watched the five.

  “Gifrac said the white demons were bringing score twenty against us.” Huruc’s voice was neutral.

  Lewa just bobbed his head and waited.

  “I do not like to retreat,” Fornal said. “You know that. But a dead commander does not fight again, nor does one without many armsmen.” He offered a grim smile. “We move to Syskar, and then… then we kill more white demons.”

  “I’d better get the men loaded out,” said Huruc.

  Lewa nodded once more and turned to follow the senior armsman.

  “Ours are mostly mounted already, because of the drills this morning, but they’ll have to get gear.” Ayrlyn inclined her head to the regent, then turned and untied her mare.

  As Fornal walked toward the dwelling, presumably to gather his own g
ear, Nylan turned back toward the smithy and an open-mouthed Sias.

  “Sias! Unfasten the anvil-knock it loose if you have to. We don’t have time to waste. Dump the anvil, the bellows, and the tools in the wagon. Any of the bagged coal. Forget the loose coal.”

  “We aren’t holding here?” A puzzled look crossed the face of the lank blond man, and he brushed back a lock of sweat-stained hair.

  “Not this time.”

  Sias shook his head. “I thought you angels…” Nylan paused. “Sias… we’re not gods. We’re people, and the Cyadorans have about twentyscore troops marching this way. If I got lucky and wanted to commit suicide, maybe I could stop a dozen-individuals, not scores. How many could you stop?”

  The armsman/apprentice looked down at the dusty clay. “… hoped…”

  “We’re not giving up, damn it! In a couple of days, we’ll be back killing Cyadorans.” Unfortunately. “Now, let’s get this packed up so that we have the gear to keep giving them fits.”

  He glanced toward the dwelling where Sylenia stood, Weryl in her arms. Her entire body posture reflected concern and confusion. “I’ll be right back. I need to get Sylenia moving, too. Start with the anvil and the tools…”

  LXXIII

  NYLAN LOOKED DOWN at the line of bricks and stone. This time his makeshift smithy was in the remnants of a chicken coop- but he needed some sort of roof as protection from a sun that kept getting hotter with each passing day. His eyes went to the tile-roofed and heavy-walled house that quartered two subofficers, the regent, two angels, and a nursemaid, and child. The thick walls kept the dwelling from getting more than hot enough to roast meat during the day, but the place was dark and smelled moldy, although how any place that warm could smell moldy was beyond the smith’s knowledge.

  Syskar was a few kays farther from the mines than Kula had been, and ten kays farther west, and ten kays more distant from Lornth. The hamlet was smaller even than Kula, and the stream was a mere trickle that barely sufficed for the more than a hundred horses. Nylan snorted. More like a hundred and several score. Before long, the way things were going with the captured mounts, they might have spare mounts for every Lornian.