I looked down at my armor. Another thing I hadn’t thought of. “I suppose back to our room, so I can change,” I said. “Can’t go out like this – “
“Oh, no, m’Lord,” she said, grinning now. I heard a step behind me to see two more steaming buckets, carried by the stable boy with my leather pants and shirt over one shoulder. “I would not be a lazy girl, to send my true love out of a stable with horse hair and manure on him.”
The boy dropped the buckets out of reach of my sword. Shela had already started unfastening my armor. I trusted she had made arrangements for it to be delivered. Knowing Shela, she had already determined as to where.
The sponge bath didn’t feel that bad, but she used hot water. She couldn’t risk her gown, of course, so she animated the sponge through Power and kept a safe distance away. Based on what happened later, I know why she made real sure that I didn’t get a cold shower.
I awoke the next morning, Shela in my arms and my head buzzing. I hadn’t drunk that much wine, but what we had drunk was good. The lovemaking afterwards was better. The bed felt wonderfully soft and warm with a goose-down mattress, and the brazier in the center of the room warmed it nicely. The sun streamed through white lace curtains onto a bearskin rug now; we had slept until almost noon.
An hour or so later we ate a late breakfast in our room when we heard a knock at the door. As usual we had no room servants (Shela wouldn’t tolerate them), so my slave girl donned her loose fox-fur robe and answered the door. I took a long pull of breakfast tea (not much the same as Earth coffee, but caffeinated, thank the gods) and waited. I heard some hushed conversation, then she re-entered the room with another man.
He was of the race of Men, thin, in white robes. A long white beard hung down to his chest, his scalp shining through and spotted. I saw no deference in his eyes, although he entered and greeted me politely.
“I am one of the four Eldadorian Oligarchs,” he said, nodding to me. I nodded back. I didn’t introduce myself because I figured he knew whom he’d come to see.
“You are required to come before King Glennen of Eldador at the Royal Palace on the day after tomorrow,” he continued without preamble. This came as a complete surprise – I hadn’t come here to see him and it didn’t fit into my plans.
“I am honored,” I said. I also didn’t come here to get thrown into whatever passed as a jail.
He nodded. “Court is from two hours before the noon and for three hours after,” he added. “Be prompt – Glennen does not enjoy a long court.”
He left without waiting for my answer. I looked at Shela, and she at me.
“Guess we know what we are doing on the day after tomorrow,” I said.
We spent the holiday sleeping in late and wandering the city. It reminded me of pictures I had seen of old London, bustling and affluent with men and horses fighting for right of way in the city streets. Cobblestones paved the roadways and were kept well tended. Glennen must either be generous or taxed mightily.
Our usual plan of attack would be to buy a big load of food and then act as missionaries of Earth, bringing gifts to the condemned. The double entendre always made me smile, and this way we would get to meet the locally incarcerated in a favorable light and decide whom we did and didn’t want to recruit, and who was available. Then we would make our pitch to the city Mayor or Duke or equivalent and (without exception) increase the membership of the Free Legion army.
We still bought the food and we still visited the jails, but if we weren’t required to see Glennen then we would have been out of here the next day. First of all, Glennen had a system of workfare in his capital city, which helped to explain why his city stayed so clean. He actively used his prison system to boost his economy with cheap labor for the State. This kept his taxes lower than I had previously thought.
Secondly, what couldn’t be trusted to work in the street also wasn’t fit to be recruited by us. Bloodthirsty killers, child molesters and worse – I had no use for them.
Shela had no idea why Glennen would want to see us and neither did I. We went to bed early and then arose to make the beginning of the early court. I doubted he would see us immediately, but I hoped that I could pick up something on the local court etiquette. Shela had my armor shining once again, and used the excuse to wear her new red gown once more. She bound her hair down one side and wove baby’s breath into it – I thought her a stunning beauty.
Glennen’s court seemed more spectacular than the ones I had seen before in Eldador. A longer hall with marble tiers along its sides showed the same Cheyak influence, but the columns holding up the ceilings had bases carved in the images of Dwarves straining to hold them against the weight of the ceiling. It reminded me of the craftsmanship of the Simple People, and for a moment I missed Kvitch. Did he have a ready laugh? Was he still alive, even? I hoped so.
Glennen proved to be a muscled warrior similar to the Duke of Steel, without having gone so far to fat. Like Rennin, his best years were behind him, his jowl starting to sag and his long, black hair shot with gray. He had ready eyes, brown and firm, with his eyebrows a single line across them. His had a hawk-like nose and his hands gripped the arms of his granite throne. A six-foot-long sword had been mounted horizontally on the wall behind him as if to remind everyone here of how he had won his nation, and how he meant to hold it.
I watched Uman men and women come forward in their best clothes and ask for justice or permission to start some enterprise, with the help of the State. Glennen obviously didn’t like to be asked for money and turned all petitioners away. None seemed overly surprised. Four old men stood to one side of the throne on their own dais, one of them I recognized from the day before. He didn’t consult them on any decision. From here I turned my attention to the muscled guards who ringed the throne and stood at attention at the doorway. Twenty in all, it made me wonder if all supplicants were turned away so easily, or if this might be a special precaution for me.
“Lord Rancor Mordetur, and his Lady, Shela of the Andoran Plains,” one of the Oligarchs said in a bored tone of voice. I recognized him from as the one who had come for me. The name they used for me sort of surprised me; obviously they had more on me than I would have thought possible. I stepped down dutifully and walked with long strides to the throne, Shela to my left, two steps behind me, as she had been summoned too.
Glennen watched me with cold eyes, emotionless, giving nothing away. The Oligarchs drew nearer to him, and the court stayed quiet.
The throne stood on a dais, raised seven steps above the floor. No one else had bowed or knelt, so I didn’t either. I looked into his eyes, and he into mine.
“You have invested heavily in the Eldadorian nation,” he informed me.
“It is a great nation, and therefore a wise investment,” I returned. Suck up to the king? Didn’t bother me.
“And so,” he continued. “You have recruited many men, and women too, I am told, and train an army on the Plains of Angador.”
“His Majesty is wise,” I said, inclining my head respectfully.
He looked to one of the guards next to the dais, who looked up to him and nodded. He stepped forward, six feet tall, thick armor like mine, a broadsword sheathed over his shoulder. He protected his head in a full helmet so that I couldn’t see his eyes.
Genna stepped out from behind him.
She’d dressed in her leathers, her red hair free. She wore a very mean grin on her face as she looked down at me with cold, green eyes. She wore her bandolier of daggers and had replaced the ones that I’d taken. She looked impeccably clean and pleased with herself.
“This man portrayed himself as a member of the Bounty Hunter’s Guild,” the man said, his Volkhydran accent revealing his nationality. “And I would kill him, your Majesty.”
“Do so,” Glennen said.
I pulled my sword in a flash, his no slower. He came at me in a crouch, making himself a smaller target. He’d expect me to chop down, the obvious move, but I didn’t let myself be baited. He w
ould have to strike first.
He did, a thrust to my middle. I leapt back and he pursued, a roundhouse spin of the sword letting him chop at my right shoulder, which I parried, then at my left side, which I parried, then from out of nowhere to ring my helmet with a jarring impact.
He stepped to my right and tried again for my middle, which I parried again, but this time turned my wrist as Thorn had taught me to push his sword to his right, leaving him open. Now I thrust to his middle, then to his face, then as he retreated and brought his sword up, cut a sweeping blow to his right knee, to take his leg off and end this.
He parried lightly and would have rung my helmet again if I hadn’t ducked. His sword jumped back in the en guarde before I could take advantage of him being off balance.
You could see that he had more experienced with the weapon than I had with mine. I’d been outclassed and, if this continued, I would lose.
Blood flowed out from under his helmet. He fell face-first to the floor, the sword clattering on the marble next to him. I had barely heard Shela speak a word. I looked up to the dais instead.
Genna’s face twisted from a smile to a snarl. Glennen might have been watching a boring TV show. The Oligarchs were non-plussed, although several courtiers gasped and two fled the room. One started down the long, red carpet, but a look over Shela’s shoulder sent him scrambling back up into the gallery.
“And so,” Glennen said, “this Free Legion is a force to be reckoned with.”
“I have no reason to argue with you, your Majesty,” I said, leaving my sword out. He’d been willing to let me die here – who said he had finished testing me?
“Surely the woman beside you has told you as much.”
Glennen acknowledged Genna. “She recommended that you would survive any trial at arms,” he said.
“How very clever of her,” Shela commented. “Perhaps you would like to see her so tested?”
Genna kept snarling. Glennen did seem slightly amused by this, looking sideways at Genna. “I may, in the future. But for now, your army is for hire?” he asked.
“It is,” I said.
“Then I would hire it,” he finished. One of the Oligarchs, a wizened man even older than the one I had first met, came up to me with a scroll. I reached out my hand to see what it had to say.
Welcome to my world.
Eldador had one problem trading on the Forgotten Sea, and that problem was Dorkan.
Dorkan ships traveled to several rich, outbound islands, trading wares. Eldadorian ships wanted to, but Dorkan ships sank them, and sank them easily. The port of Katarran lay strategically north of the mouth of the Straights. They could patrol the natural barrier at will and sink ships as they emerged. Eldador the Port would have to trade with Andurin if they wanted commerce from the Forgotten Sea. Because Andurin had the right to tax Eldador the port under Eldadorian law, this took a lot of the profit.
The war with the Dorkan nation provided Eldador with the perfect opportunity to eradicate Katarran, but the Eldadorian presence had to be limited under Fovean law. Eldador needed the other nations, also camped on the Katarran doorstep, to back them. However, Dorkan mines out-produced Eldadorian mines and Dorkan smiths were better. No one would alienate that nation so that Eldador could move its interests abroad.
I sat at a table with Glennen, Ancenon, D’gattis, Genna and the four Oligarchs. A month had passed since I had met Glennen for the first time. I had sent word about the offer to the Free Legion and Ancenon had been quick to respond.
In that time I hadn’t seen Genna one time. She had disappeared from court the day she had ambushed us, she hadn’t come to my rooms in the city. I would have expected something from her in that time, but there had been nothing.
“The siege ends in two months,” one of the Oligarchs told us. He, like the others, was an old man. In a month at Eldador, I had learned that all four Oligarchs were elders of Adriam’s church and personal friends of Glennen’s. They had come to him to unite the Eldadorian nation.
In this Glennen had failed. His friends who had received top positions, Earldoms and Duchies, had ultimately betrayed him for their own interests. Cities went to war with each other and left the Eldadorian state powerless to stop them without Glennen having to re-conquer his own nation. This left Eldador now and forever divided.
“Our army is in Andurin now,” Ancenon said. “Five hundred strong, armed and outfitted.”
“And unblooded,” said Glennen. “I would not have considered this at all, had I not needed you only to begin the battle. Then, it is nothing to me if all of your troops are slaughtered. By then, the fight will be on and Katarran doomed.”
“And yet,” Ancenon said, “our fee remains our fee.”
Glennen harrumphed. “Too steep. I could raise my own rabble for half of that.”
“Not in so short a time, Majesty,” one of the Oligarchs reminded him gently.
We were charging him two thousand gold Tabaars, the coin of the realm. We were demanding payment in advance so that he wouldn’t have the time to mint a batch with cheaper gold. He seemed happy with the arrangement, but we had met three times on the price.
“And you have to do nothing to support these men,” Ancenon reminded him. “We pay their food, we ship them there, we arm them. Your two thousand is a clean payment, Majesty. True, you would pay a ‘rabble’ a silver a week, but you would have to buy their armor and swords and feed them.”
Which was true. We could buy our supplies directly from Sental, where Glennen would have had to buy them through Volkhydro. We shipped the soldiers ourselves – and Glennen still would have to conquer the Straights. Rennin sold us armor at a lower price than he sold it to Glennen. Glennen took armor as a tax, encouraging Rennin to inflate the price.
We were no less than a thousand Tabaars cheaper than Glennen could do it himself, and we were there now. Also, when we were done, we went away. No veterans to find work for.
We held to our price and he signed. Never any doubt in our minds.
After the meeting, Ancenon and D’gattis met with Genna and me. I had asked them to arrange this, having told them what happened.
“Genna, this is intolerable,” Ancenon said.
Genna regarded him coldly. We met on the street, having had to chase her down. We had asked her to come with us for a private meeting, and she had refused.
“He survived it,” she said.
“Quite obviously not your intent,” D’gattis said.
“I didn’t think his slave girl would let him die,” Genna said.
“The Bounty Hunter’s Guild might have other ideas about that,” Ancenon said.
“And the means to enact them,” D’gattis said.
“Which is an act against us,” Ancenon added.
“And yet, no word from Adriam,” Genna said. “Your logic is flawed, Ancenon.”
“Adriam will take you in his own time,” Ancenon said.
“Although we can’t know how much trouble she will do until then,” I said.
The incident in the throne room infuriated me. Genna must have thought we would ignore it in light of her winning us our first contract. Knowing Genna, she might have even thought it funny.
“You are powerless to touch me,” Genna said. “I am in your fealty. Act against me without cause and you will risk the wrath of Adriam.”
“But we have cause,” Ancenon said.
“No,” she said. “Lupus has cause. Let him, then, raise a hand against me.
“If he can.”
I looked down at the little recon marine. I had sparred with her. She couldn’t match me in a fight. Although faster and more experienced, she didn’t have my strength or my stamina, and she didn’t have the Sword of War.
I could kill her, but could I kill her?
“You want Lupus to risk Adriam’s wrath, thinking that there is no cause to attack you, that you have done nothing wrong,” D’gattis asked.
“And because I meant something to him, before his little And
aran whore turned his head,” she said.
“Well then I guess there is only one safe way to answer this.”
Genna spun on her heel. Shela had approached her from behind while we kept her occupied. This hadn’t been our plan – we had wanted her in a room, alone, where we could let Shela bind her.
Genna had refused, and Shela had adapted. Shela did that.
“Did ya miss me, baby?” Shela asked her.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Working for a Living
I spent a month in Eldador the Port, negotiating with Glennen and his Oligarchs. From the beginning he had requested Shela’s presence as well as mine. His eyes couldn’t hold enough of her image. The mix of beauty with danger intrigued him, and he asked her opinion on every aspect of our mercenary army.
Shela in turn made a point of making Queen Alekanna’s acquaintance through Glennen, claiming that she felt outnumbered by men and had no other friends. Meeting a woman who didn’t seek her company to further her own position had to be a rare treat for the lonely queen, and the two bonded immediately. Shela’s wardrobe expanded quickly under Alekanna’s tutelage, and my influence with the King, who saw the benefits of his wife having a friend with a husband other then one of his vassals, grew as well.
The same night that saw our agreement with Eldador approved, had us invited to the royal presence for a last good-bye. The queen had obviously made the request. This left “the girls” chattering about children and values and such while Glennen advised me on how to keep some part of our army alive.
“You’ll likely lose half your forces at the first volley,” he said, a wooden bowl held loosely in his hand. Glennen liked his mead and didn’t deny himself on occasions like this. I tried my best to stay sober, though the drink, fermented honey, tasted exceptionally good. While no more potent than a grape wine, it didn’t taste of alcohol and, as I had learned the hard way, could get me drunk before I realized it.
Indomitus Est (The Fovean Chronicles) Page 36