Tarja and Davydd followed the woman into the remains of the great hall, stepping carefully over the crumbling masonry. It had been a large hall once, but the roof had caved in and only the far end offered any shelter. Several children huddled around a small fire in a hearth so grand that he could have almost stood upright inside it. The children looked up at their approach, shying away from the Defenders.
“Don’t worry, my dears,” the woman assured the children with forced cheerfulness. “I’ll not let the red men harm you.”
“If it would be easier for you, we can stay outside,” Tarja offered, looking at the children with concern. One of them, a small girl of about five, was racked with painful coughs that made Tarja wince just to hear her.
“They’ll learn soon enough that there is no avoiding your kind, even in this remote place,” the woman replied with a shrug. “Perhaps if you leave without killing anyone or destroying anything, they may learn to hate the Defenders a little less.” She met Tarja’s gaze defiantly, but he refused to rise to her provocation.
“Why bring them out here?” he asked. “You can’t hope to survive the winter in such a place.”
“Where else do I take them, Captain…what’s your name?”
“Tenragan. Tarja Tenragan.”
The woman stared at him, her face suddenly pale, then turned on her heel and walked out of the hall. With a curious glance at each other, they hurried after her. She strode purposefully towards the trooper who was dividing the supplies.
“Don’t bother with that, soldier. I’ll not be needing any help from you, after all.” The man glanced at Tarja with a puzzled expression as the woman rounded on the two officers. “Take your provisions and leave, Captain. You are not welcome here.”
Understanding suddenly dawned on Tarja. “You know Joyhinia.”
The woman planted her hands on her hips. “You’re her son, aren’t you? I remember seeing you around the Citadel when you were a boy.”
Tarja was not surprised to learn that this woman had lived in the Citadel. Her accent betrayed her education. He nodded slowly, curious to learn what had turned her from the Sisterhood, and what his mother had done to provoke such a reaction.
“Is my ancestry so abhorrent to you, that you would refuse my help?”
“Ever heard of a village called Haven, Captain?” she retorted bitterly.
“It’s a village in the Sanctuary Mountains, southwest of Testra,” Davydd said. He had a good grasp of geography, as well as heathen customs, it seemed.
“It was a village, Lieutenant,” she snapped. “It no longer exists. Joyhinia Tenragan ordered it burned to the ground and all the adults killed three winters ago. They turned the children out into the snow and left them to perish. There were over thirty children in that village. Nine of these children are the only ones left. The rest I have collected since then, for similar reasons. I was a Sister back then. After that day, I swore an oath to every Primal God that exists that I would never wear the Blue again.”
“Why?” Tarja asked in astonishment.
“You don’t know?”
“Should I?”
“She burned it to keep a secret, Captain. She burned it to cover her tracks and bury her lies.” She gave a short, bitter laugh. “Looks like she succeeded too, by the expression on your face. Have you no inkling?”
Tarja shook his head, glancing at Davydd, but the young man looked as puzzled as he was.
The woman glanced longingly at the supplies and then sighed. “I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose. Nor should I let my anger get in the way of these children having a decent meal. I will take the provisions, you offer, Captain. It makes up, in some small measure, for the actions of your mother.”
“You’re welcome to anything we have,” Tarja assured her, “but I want to know why…What possible reason could Joyhinia have for burning a village in the Sanctuary Mountains?”
She studied him closely for a moment, as if debating how much she should tell him, then she shrugged. “I suppose you have as much right to know as anyone. Come, let’s get out of this wind and I’ll tell you the whole story.”
They went inside the crumbling great hall and sat on the floor near the hearth. The fire gave little warmth, but Tarja barely noticed.
“Nineteen years ago, your mother was posted to Testra, just as I was, to administer the town and the surrounding villages. It’s what they train us for, you know. The Sisters of the Blade are the best-trained bureaucrats in the world.”
Bereth, that was the woman’s name, had shooed the children out to do their chores and help bring in the supplies that the Defenders had offered to leave them. The only child left was the little girl with the painful cough. She crawled into Bereth’s lap and stared at the Defenders with wide, frightened eyes.
Tarja tore his gaze from the child and looked at Bereth. “I remember. She enrolled me in the Cadets and left me at the Citadel. I was only ten.”
Bereth nodded. “Joyhinia arrived in Testra with quite a reputation. She’d already had you and it was rumoured that your father was Lord Korgan, although he always denied it. Four or five months after she arrived my mother died and I was called back to Brodenvale to settle the family’s affairs. Joyhinia volunteered to take over from me, doing my rounds of the outlying villages. We all thought it strange at the time. She loathed being away from her creature comforts and despised the cold. Taking over at that time meant wintering in one of the mountain villages until the spring thaw. But she had her eye on a seat on the Quorum, even in those days, and we weren’t exactly swamped with volunteers, so she got the job.”
The child in her lap began coughing again, and Bereth stopped her narrative to gently rub the child’s back. When the coughing fit subsided, Bereth resumed her tale.
“By the time I returned to Testra, it was spring and Joyhinia was on her way back from the mountains. She had wintered in Haven, which was a remote village populated with loggers and furriers, mostly. Hardworking, decent people, every one of them.” Bereth’s voice trailed off for a moment, as if she was lost in the past, then she looked at Tarja, her eyes hard and bitter. “Joyhinia returned to Testra with a child. A babe of a few weeks, which she claimed was hers and Jenga’s get, although anyone who knew Jenga doubted her claim. He was never a man for casual relationships, particularly with anyone as ambitious as your mother. And she’d shown no signs of being pregnant before she left for the mountains. Nor did she act the part. She had lovers aplenty, rumour had it. She called the child Rochelle, or something like that.”
“R’shiel,” Tarja corrected softly, afraid that if he spoke to loudly, Bereth wouldn’t finish her tale.
“R’shiel,” Bereth repeated, as if the word carried special meaning. “That’s a mountain name, by the way, not the name given to any child of the Citadel.
“Anyway, Joyhinia returned claiming she had been pregnant, and the child was of the right age, so nobody thought much more about it. Jenga never formally acknowledged the child, but his silence was confirmation enough for most, I suppose. To this day, I don’t understand why he has never denied it.
“So, I went back to my duties and thought little more about it. Haven is very remote, and even I only managed to visit it every couple of years or so. By the time I returned to the village, it never occurred to me to ask about Joyhinia’s visit or the child.”
“You said the village was burned only three years ago,” Tarja reminded her. “What happened?”
“I learnt much of the story from a woman in Haven, a furrier named B’thrim Snowbuilder. She was a widow who had lived alone for years, ever since her younger sister, J’nel, died the year Joyhinia wintered in Haven. The rest I learnt from the survivors, some of the older children. B’thrim had an accident about eight months before the village was destroyed. She got caught in one of her own traps and lost her left foot to frostbite. It meant she could no longer trap the snow foxes and the season before had not been a good one. She was on the verge of destitution. The last time I
saw her, she told me she had sent a message to Joyhinia at the Citadel, asking for help, in return for the favour she had done her years before. Joyhinia’s response was to send a troop of Defenders to burn the village. B’thrim was one of the first to be killed.”
“What favour?” Tarja asked. Bereth had told him much, but in reality she had told him nothing.
“B’thrim’s sister, J’nel, died in childbirth, Captain. She died giving birth to the girl you know as your sister.”
Tarja stared at the woman, stunned.
“Who is she, then?” Davydd asked, giving voice to the question Tarja was unable to ask.
“R’shiel? She’s the child of an illiterate mountain girl and an unknown father, I suppose. The story I got was that J’nel had disappeared into the Mountains at the beginning of spring and returned just before winter, heavily pregnant. She was frightened, hysterical and covered with blood when she returned, but refused to name the father. Haven was a superstitious village, and while they profess adherence to the laws of the Sisterhood, there were many who believed the Harshini still inhabited the Sanctuary Mountains. As no man in the village would own the child, they decided the child must be a sorcerer’s get and rejected it. Joyhinia didn’t care what the villagers thought. The child was the right age for her to invent her deception and an orphan that nobody wanted. All she needed was Jenga to go along with her. She probably thought the villagers would forget all about the child after a while.”
“Until B’thrim sent a message asking for help,” Tarja said.
“Taking an orphan in is one thing,” Bereth continued, “but to claim that child is your own and try to foist paternity onto the Lord Defender, goes beyond the pale.” She glanced at Tarja thoughtfully. “The child must be almost grown by now.”
Tarja nodded. “She’s a Probate at the Citadel.”
Bereth shook her head. “So Joyhinia has a daughter to follow in her footsteps and I have a clutch of starving orphans, whose parents died to keep her secret. Most of those villagers in Haven would not have even remembered the child. That was her worst crime, Captain. It was so unnecessary.” The child in her lap had fallen into an uneasy sleep. She stroked her fine hair absently and looked at Tarja. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this. I suppose you have some affection for the girl, although if Joyhinia has succeeded in raising her in her own image, I doubt she is very lovable.”
Tarja shook his head. “Joyhinia tries, but she hasn’t succeeded yet.”
“That’s something to be grateful for,” Bereth sighed. “But perhaps now, Captain, you can understand my reaction on learning who your mother is.”
Tarja climbed the crumbling tower later that evening and looked out over the dark plain. The clouds were breaking up, revealing patches of blue velvet sky sprinkled with pinpoints of light. He leant on the cold stone, oblivious to the chill wind that cut through him, wondering what he should do with the information Bereth had given him. For that matter, would it even be his decision? Davydd Tailorson had heard the whole story and would report it to Garet Warner, without hesitation. That sort of information about a Quorum member was too important to keep to himself. He should have insisted on hearing the tale in private. He would have, had he any inkling of what he would learn.
The consequences to Joyhinia, when her lies were revealed, bothered Tarja not one whit. Joyhinia deserved whatever punishment the First Sister deemed fit and the more severe the better. Expulsion from the Quorum, at the very least. She might even be forced into retirement. That prospect filled Tarja with savage delight. To see Joyhinia’s plans crumble at her feet like the ruins of this keep, was almost worth it.
Almost.
There was R’shiel to consider. Joyhinia’s fall would drag R’shiel down with her. She deserved to know the truth, but did she deserve to suffer for it?
Tarja turned at the sound of a boot scraping on the stairs. Davydd took the last two steps in one stride and joined Tarja on the tower, glancing out over the plain, his arms wrapped around his body against the wind.
“Looks like it won’t rain, after all,” the young man remarked.
“Looks like it.” He waited for Davydd to speak again; he had not climbed the tower to talk about the weather.
“I have to tell the Commandant,” he said finally, breaking the uncomfortable silence. “It would be treason to withhold what I learnt here.”
“Treason?” Tarja asked.
“The Commandant might not…” he began, but his voice trailed off. Both he and Tarja knew that Garet Warner would use the information against Joyhinia, as surely as Davydd would have to report it.
“He will. But he has to know the truth. So does R’shiel, for that matter, although I worry more about her than Joyhinia. My mother deserves whatever is coming to her.”
“I’ve seen your sister at the Citadel. She’s very pretty.”
“She is,” he agreed. “And apparently she’s not my sister.”
“At the risk of sounding trite, there’ll be a lot of officers at the Citadel quite pleased to learn that, sir.”
Tarja laughed, despite himself. “Including you, Lieutenant?”
“I…er…well, it’s not that I ever…” Davydd stammered, the first time Tarja had seen him lost for words.
“Don’t worry, Lieutenant. I’m sure your intentions are entirely honourable. But before you tell Garet Warner what we learnt here today, spare a thought for R’shiel. Once this becomes common knowledge, she’ll be an outcast.”
“It’s hardly her fault,” Davydd objected. “You don’t think people will hold it against her, do you? I mean, she’s a Probate. She’ll be a Sister within a couple of years.”
“You’ve a lot to learn about the Sisterhood, Davydd,” Tarja told him wearily. “They won’t care that Joyhinia lied to them. But they’ll be very put out that she has played them all for fools.”
“It doesn’t seem fair, sir.”
“That’s life, Lieutenant,” Tarja replied, more bitterly than he intended. The young man was silent for a moment, surprised at Tarja’s tone.
“Will you report this to Lord Jenga?”
“Jenga has a right to know the truth, too. Joyhinia has been trading on her supposed relationship with him for years.”
“Assuming he doesn’t already know,” Davydd remarked.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, someone in the Defenders sent those men to destroy the village. Joyhinia didn’t do that alone. Besides, the Lord Defender could have exposed Joyhinia years ago, unless he had a reason not to.”
Tarja stared at the young man, appalled by his suggestion. “Jenga would never order such a thing!”
Davydd shrugged. “You know him better than I do, sir. But unless Sister Joyhinia forged the orders and the Defender’s seal that authenticates them, there is at least one senior officer involved. And you have to admit, Jenga’s refusal to deny he’s R’shiel’s father does look suspicious.”
Was it possible? Tarja shivered in the darkness, but the cold that chilled him came from inside. Ever since he had been old enough to recognise it for what it was, Tarja had watched the Sisters of the Blade grow increasingly tainted by the stench of corruption, like milk slowly souring in the heat on a hot summer’s day.
For the first time, Tarja allowed himself to wonder if that corruption had spread to the Corps and reached as high as the Lord Defender.
CHAPTER 10
Tarja spent a sleepless night in the ruined keep, listening to the heartbreaking coughs of the little girl by the fire and wondering who in the Defenders had followed Joyhinia’s orders to destroy Haven. Any Commandant, could, in theory, have issued the order. That narrowed the suspects down to about fifteen men, excluding Jenga, whom he was certain would never have countenanced such an act, despite what Davydd thought. Commandant Verkin, Wilem Cortanen, Garet Warner, and about a dozen more senior officers, had sufficient authority. It was a depressing train of thought. He resolved to question Bereth again in the morning before the
y rode out. Perhaps she knew the name of the officer in charge of the raid. If he could discover that, he might be able to track down the culprit.
They stayed in the keep longer than he intended. Tarja had hoped to get away at first light the following day. His mission was to check on the border villages and he had completed that task before riding out here on impulse to examine the ruined keep. It would be next to useless if Medalon were invaded. It was strategically ill-placed in the middle of an open plain, and had been built, hastily and poorly, by men with no understanding of war. An invading army would simply swing past it into Medalon, as if it were no more of an obstacle than a rock in the road. In future, any defences constructed would be further north, right on the border itself, where the plain narrowed and the open grassland was flanked by the Sanctuary Mountains on the western side and the Glass River, where it emerged from the Jagged Mountains, on the east.
But his men undermined Tarja’s plans for an early departure, subtly and deliberately. First, Sandar, the trooper responsible for the packhorses and the supplies, announced that he thought he could possibly spare even more for the children, given time to sort through their provisions carefully. Then Nork, his corporal, suddenly announced that his horse had bruised his fetlock and would need a poultice to relieve it. One of the children had told him of a herb that grew wild on the plains that was ideal for the poultice, and would it be all right if he took several of the children and went in search of it? It wouldn’t take long and a lame horse would slow their journey, he pointed out reasonably. By the time Ewan asked if the captain would mind if he made some repairs to the roof over the end of the main hall while they were waiting, Tarja threw his hands up in defeat. He climbed the tower again and looked out over the grasslands towards the border, trying to convince himself that he wasn’t wasting time. Davydd followed him up the crumbling steps.
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