Colors of Chaos (Saga of Recluce)

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

“Almost as good as ale,” said Faltar.

  “No,” said Leyladin. “But the company is good. How was your trip?”

  “Cold, especially west of Fairhaven. So cold that even Bealtur kept his mouth shut. I really didn’t expect to be here.” Faltar grinned sheepishly. “I’ve not been that industrious since you two left. Kinowin pulled me off gate duty and sent me off with the lancers. He told me to practice raising chaos and firebolts—if I wanted to get through the war. It is a war, isn’t it? I didn’t see that much going on, but we came through Gallos. The rest of the Easthorns won’t be clear for eight-days. There were places where we still had to dig through snowdrifts.”

  “It is a war,” Cerryl answered. “We still lose a few men every eight-day. The blues use archers and traps, and there aren’t that many of them. They’re hard to find.”

  “Do you have a place to stay?” asked Leyladin.

  “Me? They put all of us mages—the three actually—in the guest house beside the High Wizard’s headquarters. Jeslek met with us for a moment. He told us not to get comfortable in Elparta.” Faltar glanced around the study and back through the archway. “It’s hard to believe you’re the city commander or Patrol chief or whatever here.”

  “Until we start the advance north,” Cerryl answered.

  “You’re going?”

  “Jeslek has been most insistent on that.”

  Leyladin nodded in agreement.

  “You, too?” Faltar turned to the healer, eyebrows raised.

  “What good is a healer where she can’t heal people?”

  “You can’t heal everyone,” protested Faltar.

  “No…but I can hold back chaos for quite a few, and that way, more will recover.”

  How many? wondered Cerryl. And for how long? “Is anything happening in Fairhaven?”

  Faltar gave a crooked smile. “Redark always says that he’ll send a message to the High Wizard. Kinowin doesn’t say much of anything, but usually he does something, quietly. The Guild raised the tariffs on traders, and one or two of the smaller ones sold off their stuff—what they could—and packed up. Piotal said he was going to Sarronnyn. I don’t know what happened to Ziant. The poorer ale is up to four coppers at The Ram, and I wouldn’t guess what it is at Furenk’s.” The blonde mage spread his hands. “What else do you want to know?”

  “Who are the others who came with you?” asked Leyladin.

  “Buar and Kalesin. Bealtur, Myredin, and Ryadd are coming with the next group. Kinowin said others were coming later with Eliasar, but he’s still in Renklaar. I guess he has to set up a Patrol there and a council or something for Gorsuch to use to run the place.”

  “Gorsuch? I thought he was in Jellico.”

  “He was, but Jeslek sent Disarj to replace him there—and Lyasa as his assistant. She wasn’t too happy about that, said she’d end up doing everything.”

  Cerryl laughed. “She will, and that’s why she’s there.”

  “Having two mages around will make Rystryr more careful, too,” suggested Leyladin, brushing a strand of blonde hair off her forehead.

  Cerryl pursed his lips, worrying about the circles and the darkness under her eyes. Trying to heal too many…

  “Myredin’s not too pleased about being ordered to Spidlar, and you should see the new apprentice from Lydiar.”

  “Oh…?” asked Cerryl. “I take it this apprentice is a woman.”

  “She’s a redhead, and sweet, too.”

  Cerryl had to wonder about that. Faltar had fallen for Anya, once, as well. “Anya, without the…self-centeredness?”

  “Anya was never as bad as you thought, Cerryl, but Viedra…” Faltar smiled even more broadly.

  “I hope for your sake she makes it,” offered Leyladin. “What about Heralt?”

  “He’s gone to Ruzor to help Myral’s sister. You knew that Shenan was the Guild trade representative there, didn’t you?”

  “I’d heard something like that…”

  “Jeslek doubled the representatives in the ports where there happened to be just one mage.”

  “Has anyone heard what Sterol is doing?”

  “He stays to himself on the lower level of the White Tower. It’s like he waits for something to happen.”

  For Jeslek to fail? So he can claim the amulet again? Cerryl refilled the goblets. He had much to learn about what had happened in Fairhaven, and Faltar would report what happened as it had. Except for redheaded women.

  CXXII

  AROUND THE CIRCULAR table in the private library sat three White mages, a Black healer, and the High Wizard of Fairhaven. A low fire nearly guttered out in the hearth, sending thin intermittent trails of grayish smoke into the room.

  Jeslek rose from his chair at one side of the table. Despite nearly two eight-days spent recovering from his trip from Fairhaven, dark circles rimmed the sun-gold eyes, but those eyes retained their flaring intensity as he surveyed the room.

  “The plan is simple enough.” Jeslek pointed to the map pinned to the easel, a map redrawn to combine Cerryl’s screeing maps and older ones. “The combined lancers will sweep the two river roads. Once they have cleared the roads, or when they contact any massed enemy forces, we will use the river barges to transport the levies downstream to attack.”

  “What about all those traps the blues use?” asked Fydel.

  “Those are road traps.” The High Wizard smiled. “That is Cerryl’s charge on the west river road, and Buar’s and Faltar’s on the east. We will not subject the bulk of our forces to such devices and stratagems. Cerryl has some considerable skill in detecting Black devices. He and his light lancers will scout in advance of the main body of lancers. Cerryl is not there to fight. He is there to discover traps and stratagems. If large blue lancer forces are present, he is to call up the full lancer forces under Captain Teras and under Gallosian Overcaptain Grestalk. For now. Shortly Eliasar will be joining us to act as field commander.”

  Jeslek turned to Fydel. “You will command the lancer forces on the eastern bank and support Buar and Faltar as Teras will support Cerryl.”

  Fydel nodded slowly. “They are not so skilled as Cerryl.”

  “That is why I have put all three of you on the east bank. Lady Leyladin will remain with me and the bulk of the forces. Anya will begin with us, but she will handle the fast cavalry reserves, for anything unforeseen.” Jeslek cleared his throat. “Have you any further questions?”

  “How soon will we begin?” asked Cerryl.

  “Three days from tomorrow morning. All should be ready tomorrow, but it will not be.” Jeslek gave a knowing smile.

  “Do the blues expect us to move now?” asked Fydel.

  “They do not seem prepared,” answered Anya. “Most of their forces remain near Kleth, except for the few patrols that harass us here.”

  “Their commander may have something else in mind,” Cerryl volunteered. “So far, he has not been caught unprepared.”

  “Do you have any idea what that might be, Cerryl?” The momentary look of irritation on Jeslek’s face faded into an ironic smile. “While this Brede is a good commander, he is young, and he must defer to his superiors, the traders. They do not wish to hazard their few remaining forces far from Spidlaria.”

  “He is not that good,” mumbled Fydel under his breath.

  “We have moved more ships into the Northern Ocean,” added Jeslek, “to keep them from getting blades or supplies once their stocks run low. Their crops were not good last year, and they’re short on mounts for their lancers and light cavalry.”

  “Have you discovered more about the smith?” Anya asked Cerryl.

  “He has made some devices of black iron and carted them to Kleth, as I told the High Wizard an eight-day ago.” Cerryl paused to swallow. “I cannot tell what the devices are, except that they hold great order. They feel like the one you recovered last year, so far as I can tell.”

  “That is why we will scout all the roads first,” emphasized Jeslek. “Even our scouting forces sh
ould outnumber any Spidlarian horse you might encounter. This year, this year…we already have enough armsmen and horse to put them to flight, and we have more marching to support us.”

  You said something like that last year.

  Leyladin’s eyes widened, and Cerryl could tell she had understood the feeling behind his thought. He hoped no one else had.

  “If you have no other inquiries, you may go and prepare for our departure.” Jeslek nodded.

  Once outside the headquarters mansion, Cerryl and Leyladin mounted and rode slowly through the warm misting rain, back to the quarters they would soon be leaving.

  “Jeslek’s not as well as he could be,” murmured the healer.

  “Too much chaos?”

  “I don’t know, but I would judge so. He could still muster enough power to bring down Kleth and Spidlaria.” Leyladin eased her mount closer to Cerryl’s gelding. “He does not seem quite so close to Anya. Did you notice that?”

  “No,” Cerryl admitted. “He still turns to her.”

  “It is not the same.”

  Cerryl wanted to roll his eyes but refrained.

  “I felt that.” Leyladin laughed. “You think I’m silly, but I’m not. You need to watch her even more.”

  That—that Cerryl could definitely accept.

  CXXIII

  THE SHADOWS OF the trees to the west fell across the river road, covering the low brush and open ground between the road and the woods. In places, green sprouted through the few patches of dirty snow remaining from the long winter.

  For nearly two kays the road curved back toward the river and the higher wooded hills that separated the packed clay from the water. Cerryl studied the hills alongside the river, frowning. His head throbbed from a day in which he had struggled to extend eyes and senses out around the patrol, not always successfully. Something about the hills bothered him and had from the moment his patrol had followed the road away from the river. Yet some of the Gallosian levies had been following the river road, since not all the levies could be transported on the barges and flatboats Jeslek had commandeered.

  Cerryl glanced back over his shoulder. He hoped the forward pickets—half his force—didn’t have too much trouble during the night, but what use was clearing a road if you let the enemy return to it? Even so, the blues might circle the road. Cerryl shook his head. The ground was too soggy and the undergrowth too thick for much of that.

  His eyes dropped to the young lancer riding beside Hiser, who struggled to remain in the saddle, blood oozing through the shoulder dressing, his head lolling, then jerking into awareness—and pain. Hiser tried to wave away the circling flies.

  “…wish Leyladin or camp or something were closer…” Cerryl’s eyes studied the empty road. Still no sign of the camp.

  “He’s still with us, ser,” Hiser said. “Not too much farther…”

  Cerryl didn’t look back at the other saddle, the one onto which a body was strapped.

  The river ran to Cerryl’s left—eastward as his patrols retraced their steps back south toward where he hoped to find the day’s encampment. The advance had slowed. After making nearly fifty kays in the first eight-day, they had covered less than fifteen kays over the past three days. And lost four men already.

  Several thin lines of smoke appeared above the trees to the left, around another curve and apparently beside the river.

  “Can see the camp…not too much farther,” Hiser repeated.

  Cerryl turned to the lancer beside him. “Dyent, ride ahead and see if you can find the healer. Tell her that we have a lancer with a deep shoulder and chest wound.”

  “Yes, ser.” Dyent urged his mount away from the main body.

  Hope she’s not too exhausted…Is it fair to ask?

  Cerryl stood in the stirrups momentarily, trying to stretch his legs, to shift the soreness. He hadn’t ridden so much in seasons. One season, but it had been a long winter.

  Leyladin was waiting as Cerryl’s lancers rode in toward the fires. “Here! Bring him here.”

  The raggedness in her voice tore at him. “Can you help him?” he whispered as he swung out of the saddle, stumbling when his boots hit the not-quite-even ground. Please don’t do too much…

  “I won’t.” Her eyes and senses went to the dark-haired and pale young lancer that Hiser lifted out of the saddle and onto the pallet Leyladin had waiting—on the edge of an area holding more than a score of other pallets.

  What happened?

  “Too much.” She touched his hand and then stepped over and knelt beside the lancer.

  Hiser hovered over the pallet.

  Cerryl straightened. He couldn’t help either Leyladin or the lancer. Neither could Hiser. “Hiser, the healer will do her best for him. We need to get the men set up and the mounts watered and fed—and rubbed down.”

  “Ah…yes, ser.”

  “We need to make sure they get fed.” Cerryl took a deep breath and a last look at Leyladin. The healer in green looked frail, somehow. Cerryl swallowed, then forced himself away.

  Once the men were settled, the mounts on a tie-line, and Cerryl had set his lancers up to be fed at the end cook fire, he walked toward the more central fire where he saw Faltar and Buar standing.

  “What happened today?” Cerryl glanced up the gentle slope to where the wounded had been gathered. He could see a flash of green, but little more. “All those wounded…”

  “We lost almost a whole boat of levies and some archers today,” Faltar said tiredly, turning and pointing down at the river.

  “Said it was bad,” murmured the dark-haired Buar.

  Cerryl looked at the boats. The forward craft bore scars, as though it had been slashed with a blade, and most of the stain and varnish had been ripped off the upper deck. The right side of the upper deck railing and the pilothouse were both gone.

  “How?”

  “You know those slicer things they use on the trails…” Faltar glanced at Cerryl. “Stupid of me. I’m tired. Of course, you do…”

  Cerryl nodded.

  “The black iron ones that smith made…”

  “Dorrin,” Cerryl said, lowering his voice. “I told Fydel and Jeslek that he was making more black iron devices.”

  “Well…he did. They put something like those horse slicers along the river. Fydel and Jeslek are down there now—looking at it.”

  “So where were you?” snapped Anya, marching from the silk tent on the flat ground above the river. “They were set up on your side of the river, great Cerryl, and you were nowhere around.”

  “We were on the road,” Cerryl answered. “Taking arrows.”

  “They slipped up along the river, and you didn’t even see them?” Scorn dripped from the redhead’s voice.

  Cerryl sighed. “I have only so many lancers. The road splits from the river. I told you that this morning. Jeslek told me to follow the road because Eliasar has to send most of the Gallosians that way. I did.”

  “You were wrong. Eliasar was wrong. Follow the river.”

  “How?” asked Cerryl. “If I take a force through that underbrush without a road, the blues will take out most of my lancers before I can even see or sense them.”

  “You have an answer for everything.”

  You wish you did…at least for her. After a moment of silence, Cerryl said, “I don’t pretend to have answers I don’t know. There weren’t any blues on that part of the river when we passed where the road turns west.”

  “Of course not. They waited until you passed.”

  “If you know so much, Anya,” said Faltar tiredly, “why weren’t you there? Jeslek said you were in charge of reserves and supposed to take care of things like that.”

  Cerryl’s eyes almost popped out with Faltar’s words, words he’d never thought he’d hear. Maybe young Viedra was good for Faltar.

  Anya’s pale eyes turned icy gray. “You’d best concentrate on the east river road, Faltar.”

  “I will, Anya.” Faltar smiled tiredly. “It’s my task, a
nd I do my best at my tasks. I don’t have time to do others.”

  Buar’s eyes had traveled back and forth between Anya and Faltar, getting wider as the conversation went on.

  Anya turned full toward Faltar, and Cerryl couldn’t help but smile as he watched Jeslek approach from behind the redheaded mage.

  “Both of you will learn—”

  “I’m certain we have all learned a great deal, Anya,” said Jeslek smoothly. “Tomorrow, you will patrol the riverbank ahead of the boats in those areas where the road swings away from the water.” The High Wizard paused. “Unless you would rather take over Cerryl’s duties and have him patrol the banks?”

  Anya’s face was blank for a moment before the broad and false smile reappeared. “I would be most happy to patrol the banks. Now…if you would excuse me.” She turned and walked uphill, more to the north and away from the horses and the wounded men.

  “We should have watched the river area more closely,” Jeslek said mildly. “Try to think of anything else unusual, and let me know, if you would.” The High Wizard turned toward the white silk tent.

  That’s as much of an admission that he should have heeded your warnings as you’ll ever get. Cerryl’s mouth slipped into a crooked and cynical smile that immediately faded as Leyladin slipped out of the growing dusk to stand beside Cerryl.

  She touched his arm gently, and her eyes were rimmed with blackness. “I did…what I could. He…I think…if he’s still here in the morning.”

  The gray-eyed mage put an arm around her. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m all right.” She took a slow and deep breath before the deep green eyes fixed on him. “I can’t…heal all of them…just try to keep the chaos out of their wounds.” She sighed.

  “All of those I saw?”

  A slight sob escaped her. “So many…”

  “You need to eat. You need the strength.”

  “We’ve got rations over there,” suggested Faltar. “We had some earlier. Mostly bread and cheese, some mutton, could be cold by now.”

  “Cold or not…” Cerryl guided Leyladin toward the cook fire and the lancer standing there.