The voice that had readied the crossbows boomed again. “Stranger, state your business and your name.”
Too far to pick out individual figures, Kevral could not locate the speaker. “I’m no stranger!” Kevral returned, but she could not generate the volume of the commander.
“Louder! I can’t hear you!”
“I SAID I AM NO STRANGER!” Kevral belted out, but her voice did not raise the echoes the other managed.
“What!”
“I’M . . . NOT A STRANGER!”
“You’re a what? Speak up!”
“I’M NOT A . . .” Kevral started again, then gave up. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, I’m coming closer so you can hear me.” Grabbing the reins, she led the horse farther down the road.
“HALT!” the man shouted. “Don’t come any closer.”
Kevral weighed her alternatives and chose to stop. Patience waning, she watched as a single form separated from the others and headed toward her down the path. At length, she identified the standard mail of the Pudarian castle guard, covered by a brown tabard sporting a silver wolf. He stopped at twice the polite speaking distance and examined her intently.
Kevral returned the scrutiny. Wisps of sandy hair poked from beneath an unadorned helmet, and he gazed at her through hazel eyes much like Darris’. A mustache sprouted from beneath a broad, scarred nose, and a neatly trimmed beard hid his chin. He carried a poleax, and a sword hung at his left hip. “The captain wishes to know what you claimed to be.”
Kevral blinked once and ran the first verse of a lullaby through her head. The calming technique managed to keep her physically inactive, but it scarcely dulled her tone. “I’m an angry, tired, irritated Renshai. If you don’t allow me to come close enough to talk like a normal person, you’ll leave me no choice but to plow through all of you like I did the Easterners who tried to keep me from traveling.”
The man’s mouth opened, but no sound emerged for several moments. “Oh,” he finally said. “I’ll relay that to the captain.” Turning on his heel, he headed back the way he had come.
Kevral watched him go, shaking her head, gaining some solace and satisfaction from the realization he would probably deliver her words verbatim. She watched as the soldier returned to Pudar’s gate and waited several moments for the ensuing discussion. Shortly, the commander called back. “Disarm yourself and approach.”
Kevral cleared her throat, forcing herself to maintain the calm dignity she had, so far, shown. If she was to train these men, she would have to retain their respect. “Renshai!” she reminded at the top of her lungs.
A quiet pause followed during which the men surely discussed the implications of requesting a Renshai to remove her swords. They might just as well have asked her to literally sever her arms.
At length, the captain amended his demand, “Approach!”
Having gotten exactly what she requested in the first place, Kevral seized her horse’s bridle and hauled the beast toward the gates. As she moved nearer, details became clear. She counted approximately two dozen bowmen on the wall, all with weapons readied. The closed gates looked uncharacteristically formidable and, for a moment, she actually doubted she approached Pudar. Half a dozen men, including the sandy-haired one who had communicated her message, stood in front of the gates. These wore swords or axes and carried polearms. At least a dozen more watched her from beyond the gate. She spotted the captain by the reverse colors of his tunic. He perched on the wall in a wide-based stance, a longbow slung across one shoulder and a broad-bladed sword on his belt. He stared at her, features at first a study in stony strength, then warping to obvious surprise. Stunned by her appearance, he missed his cue to stop her, and Kevral drew near enough to make the ground guards fidget.
“Halt!” the captain shouted belatedly. “You’re a child.”
The insult stung, but Kevral held her tongue until she felt she could reply with the pride of a torke. “Certainly not. Adult three years by Renshai law.”
Apparently Kevral’s voice revealed a second shock. “You’re a girl.”
“Woman,” Kevral corrected. “Now, if you could please stop stating your personal observations aloud, we could proceed with our business.”
“Which is?” the captain prodded.
“First, command your men to stop treating me like a bulls-eye. Then, I have business with King Cymion.”
“You do, do you?”
“I do, do I.” Kevral gestured at the parapets. “Please.”
The captain glanced from bowmen to Kevral. “At ease, men.”
The arrows bobbed downward, no longer aimed at Kevral. The captain continued to study her. “I haven’t figured out your game yet, but I have a pretty good idea.” He spoke to the nearby guardsmen, too softly for Kevral to hear. Soon, those on the outer edges dispersed around the wall, leaving only the captain and three others on the parapets. Some of the courtyard soldiers disappeared as well. “You’re a distraction, aren’t you?”
“A distraction?” Kevral repeated.
“You keep the guards busy while your father and his companions attempt to assault the opposite gate or climb over the walls.”
Kevral stared. “You’re paranoid.”
“Paranoid?” the captain repeated. “For months, no one has penetrated these roads. No one. Not even heavily armed caravans. Then, a single girl-child comes to the gates alone, not even bloodied. Not even cowed.”
“I’m Renshai,” Kevral reminded.
“Even Renshai are mortal.”
Kevral sighed. The only way to prove her claim would leave corpses, perhaps even her own, and enrage the king she had come to serve. “Look. I made a vow to King Cymion. Only he can release me from that vow. If he says he doesn’t want me in Pudar, I’ll go peacefully. Otherwise, you leave me no choice but to demonstrate how I cut my way through the Eastern hordes.” She added pointedly, “They had crossbows, too.”
The captain drew breath for a reply, but a winded voice from below cut him short.
“Captain Larrin!” Bootfalls hammered against stone as a man climbed the parapets, hidden from Kevral by the wall. At length, he drew himself to the top, dressed in the same mail and tabard as the others. He exchanged several short phrases with the captain, both glancing at Kevral at intervals.
As the soldier clambered back down the steps, Larrin addressed Kevral again. “What’s your name?”
“Kevral.”
Larrin nodded. “It seems the king does wish to see you.” Even as he spoke, several of the courtyard guards worked the latches and drew open the heavy gates.
That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you! Kevral kept her irritation hidden, duplicating Weile Kahn’s careful expressions. She could not blame Pudar for its caution. They had reason to mistrust, and cause to protect their city. The current problem handled, she turned her attention to watching them move. Most lacked the natural grace that helped to shape soldiers into warriors, and she saw little of the excited spark kindled in Renshai from birth. The way they carried themselves, how they moved, even how they wore their swords, polearms, and axes told her much about them. And she found them wanting. The task to which she had bonded herself seemed like a hovering tedium rather than the challenge teaching Renshai would have evoked. It might well prove a very long year.
* * *
The instant Kevral stepped through the gates, the attitude of Pudar’s guardsmen underwent a staggering change. Appending “ma’am” or “lady” onto their every utterance, they swept her through the city streets to the castle. Though surrounded by men, Kevral noticed the quiet solemnity of a market once gaily thronged by locals and travelers. More than half the stands lay closed, despite the early hour; and the open ones held foodstuffs and necessities. Gone were the silver-tongued salesmen hawking glittering gemstones and clothes wound with silk and filigree. The few patrons strode directly for their purchases without the milling and gaping that had always seemed a permanent part of the city.
Ushered to a guest room as
fancy as any in Béarn, Kevral had no time to do more than glance at the furnishings before female servants flocked to measure every part of her. Only after she rejected seventeen dresses on their hangers did they finally accept her plea for a simple tan tunic and breeks, much like the clothing Renshai wore when in service to Béarn’s king. The servants left in the same flurry they’d entered with, clucking at the strangeness of the king’s new guest.
Nearing exhaustion, Kevral collapsed on the bed, only to be interrupted, seconds later, by a new whirlwind of servants ushering her to a feast in her honor. Hungry and certain refusal would prove useless, she accompanied them to the dining hall. After a brief argument over whether or not she could bring weapons to a royal function, she arrived with both swords in place and her clothing scarcely ruffled. Introduced to too many guests to recall any, Kevral examined the few who mattered: General Markanyin, a graying, robust man with a beefy face and callused hands and his three lieutenants, Darian, Chethid, and Nellkoris. The names of civilian nobles flowed past her, mostly unheard, soon replaced by a series of scribes and ministers who seemed bent on questioning her at exactly the moment she placed a morsel in her mouth.
Gradually, Kevral fell into a pattern of eating and speaking as messengers scurried between her and King Cymion, working out the specifics of what her teaching would entail, the timing, and the anticipated results. Stuffed with salads and soups, she scarcely had room for the main course, which seemed to consist of every meat, vegetable, and bread in existence. The warm room, the constant hum of conversation, and the long day following a mostly sleepless night drowned her in a dizzy exhaustion that grew unbearable. As servants collected the dinner dishes, preparing for dessert, Kevral excused herself for the night.
But it did not end there. The scribes and ministers trailed her to her room, still hashing out details. The rich, heavy food sat poorly in Kevral’s belly, and she added nausea to the expanding list of discomforts. Three times, she vomited into the pillow-surrounded hole that served as her connection to Pudar’s deep sewer while servants waited in the main bedroom to attend to the king’s business. By the time the main scribe brought a thick sheaf of papers for her signature, stars dotted the dark view through her window and she huddled, knees tucked to her abdomen, on the bed.
“No more,” Kevral groaned.
“This should be the last. Lady. Sign and you’re finished.”
Kevral opened bleary eyes, rolling her gaze to the sharply dressed man she had seen too many times that night. “I’ll sign tomorrow.”
“I’m sorry, Lady,” the man said without any true trace of regret. “The king wants this settled tonight. He believes it best for you.”
“The king,” Kevral returned, “is wrong.”
The minister looked taken aback. “Lady Kevral, the king is never wrong.”
“Of course.” Kevral raked the sheaf of papers to her, wincing at the size of it. A glance showed her most of the details she had discussed and the compromise reached. The idea of reading the entire pile seemed a torture far beyond her current reserves. She glanced at the papers, at the minister, and back at the papers. Her head buzzed and spun, foiling concentration. Logic dictated that signing without reading could prove dangerous, yet the king’s childlike excitement at her return seemed anything but feigned. The questions she had fielded suggested he believed she could train his men to recapture the roads. With or without Tae’s and Weile’s help, she might just manage to do so. Only one thing seemed important. Renshai law forbade her teaching any of the Renshai’s special maneuvers outside of the tribe, a pledge kept inviolate for centuries. Her loyalty to her people would always take precedence over any piece of paper, but it seemed prudent to forestall any possible misunderstanding about this matter. Any lesser error, she could handle or correct. “Where’s the part where it says I can’t teach the Renshai maneuvers?”
The minister took back the papers and studied the first page. “Here.” He poked a finger at the third paragraph of hundreds.
Taking back the papers, Kevral read. The eloquent, repetitive language, and her own tiredness, forced her to reread seven times before she felt satisfied that it protected her substantially. “Is this really necessary?” She grasped the entire stack and shook. The parchment rattled, and some pieces slipped out of configuration.
The minister stuffed the edges back into place. “I’m afraid so. You need to sign each and every page.”
Kevral sighed. “Tonight?”
“Tonight.”
Stomach lurching, head pounding, lids drooping, Kevral set to work.
* * *
On his seventeenth trip to the primordial chaos, Colbey finally learned to focus on the differences rather than seeking sameness in the ever-changing soup. With the revelation came knowledge, formless genius, and a means to navigate the instability that defined a world without true definition. With practice, he learned to keep himself whole with a bare thought and turn his concentration alternately to ideas once far beyond his reckoning and to attacking demons. Anticipating that the demons would assail him every trip, learning nothing from the one before, Colbey was pleasantly surprised to find them quick learners. Chaos gave them no basis for loyalty. They did not obey or follow, but they did come to fear him.
On each descending level, the demons grew more powerful, a new challenge for chaos’ champion. Had they learned to work together, Colbey suspected they could defeat him. But pattern and strategy did not fit the primordial derangement that comprised chaos’ world. Individually, he fought them and, one by one, defeated them into keeping a terrified distance. And, each time, fewer dared to challenge the Prince of Demons at all.
As the world of chaos grew more familiar, Asgard became ever less scrutable. The gods’ devices, sand clocks and water clocks, became vehicles, of madness. Their patterned sounds made him restless. Night and day lost meaning; and the solid, regularity of objects became a troubling tedium. Colbey found himself clinging to self, even on a world that once seemed natural and peerless. He turned rarely to the Staff of Chaos’ guidance. It grew stronger with the passing days, but it still seemed incapable of violating his mental barriers.
On either world, loneliness became a haven.
* * *
The youngest of the elves, Oa’si, flew to his perch on the lowest branch of a doranga, while the others took their usual places as well. The coldness of the wood seeped through the seat of Oa’si’s britches, a chilly contrast to the stagnant, salty damp of Nualfheim’s island air. He studied the trunk’s jutting rings of bark, watching elves shift into position. Experience told him exactly when the door would open and Dh’arlo’mé would make his usual morning appearance from the common house.
The elves all found their places. Exactly on cue, the door swung open, and Dh’arlo’mé exited to the regular cadence of his followers’ chanting. Oa’si joined in, as he must, head bowed and mouth repeating “Dh’arlo’mé” without any need to consider the action. It had long ago become meaningless sound, a shortened form of a proper elfin name.
Over time, Dh’arlo’mé looked different to Oa’si, his tread more solid, his speech patterns more human, his bearing frighteningly confident. His face had turned ashen, almost gray. When his eye found Oa’si, it seemed to pin him in place, filled with terrible knowledge that no elf should ever bear. In Dh’arlo’mé’s presence, Oa’si always teetered between awe and horror, strangely attracted and, at the same time, repelled to the verge of panic.
Dh’arlo’mé raised his arms, the staff clutched in his right hand. “Elfin faithful!”
The chant died to a silence so sudden and absolute it seemed as if the entire world had ceased to function. Dread stole over Oa’si, as if the natural forces of the world also hung on the words of their leader. Then, gradually, the pounding of surf on the shore and the rattling of leaves in the wind returned to Oa’si’s hearing, their irregularity soothing.
Dh’arlo’mé spoke over the silence, his voice booming and colored with simultaneous,
universal khohlar. “It seems the disasters that should have befallen mankind have not wholly come to pass and need our assistance. For the good of elves, the world, and all its natural wonders, we need to use the skills the gods have given us.” The khohlar added concept the words lacked, and Oa’si received the idea that Dh’arlo’mé counted himself among the divine rather than the elves. “What we cannot directly conquer, we can spur into ruination.” The rest came only as khohlar, Dh’arlo’mé’s plans to choose leaders from among them and place them in charge of their greatest skills. Thinkers would find a niche as strategists, organizers and commanders, and those magically adept as warriors. Dh’arlo’mé’s sending whipped them into controlled excitement: a moment of change for a lifetime of stronger and better order.
Memories of freedom rushed through Oa’si’s mind, remembrances from the recycled soul that occupied his body. He had never lived on Alfheim, but he saw the bubble-fruited trees and felt the swish of rushing air. Giggles filled his head, ghostly echoes of a time when elves did only what they pleased . . . and when. It felt so right to him, the natural state of elfinkind. Yet the loyalty, the oneness, of elves went at least as far back as these ancient recollections. He was an elf, first and foremost; and whatever elfinkind chose to do could not be wrong.
And though the last thought felt more alien than its predecessors, Oa’si had little choice but to follow it.
* * *
An icy breeze glided through Béarn’s courtyard, sweeping down King Griff’s hood and spilling his black hair into fine tangles. Hardy perennials had replaced the annual flowers, their colors duller and rangeless and their aromas nearly nonexistent. Clever gardeners had replaced some of the living gardens with arrangements of amber, scarlet, and orange leaves. Now, these, too, faded to lifeless brown, curling like the fingers of an arthritic ancient. The statues remained, spotless and artistically displayed.
Not wishing to lose a moment of his break, Griff hurried toward the ceilinged bench garden where he knew Tem’aree’ay awaited him. His long legs carried him swiftly through the courtyard, and he did not notice that his pace forced Darris into an undignified trot. His thoughts remained on the elf and the gentle friendship she had extended to him since their chance meeting in the hallway. Somehow she managed to break through the barrier that held all others at bay. She spoke directly to his heart, without need for words; and her gentle khohlar had become an obsession. He had found many he liked among Béarn’s staff and nobility, but only this one seemed to define friendship.
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