by Joseph Lallo
He gave her a sharp glance, opened his mouth, but closed it again. “Yes, that it true, Your Highness. You read the books well.”
“I thought I had better check the rules for what I’m supposed to be choosing.” And it was not as if she had so much else to do.
She leaned back in her seat on mock-relaxed fashion. Her heart was hammering in her chest. She’d been openly defying and needling him since she left her tower room. Would he punish her when they returned?
A wry smile played over Rider Cornatan’s mouth, also not a pleasant expression. “Pardon me for taking liberties, Your Highness. I should have said I can give you some good suggestions.”
Oh, indeed. “Go ahead, and give me the suggestions, then. I don’t know any of these Apprentices by name.”
So she listened to a string of middle-ranked Knights extolling the virtues of the young Apprentices who had just gone out to race. The name of the Imperfect boy was Isandor, and he was a native of the Outer City. Even the name made her shiver. She very much wanted to, but she didn’t ask about him and the Knights volunteered little information. Her mother had always said, If you want something that’s not in your power to have, keep quiet about it until it is. Several times, she found the question on her tongue, but one glance at Rider Cornatan stopped her.
She didn’t want to bring the Apprentice in danger with her questioning, but she had to speak to him. No one, not even her mother, had mentioned that there were other Imperfects.
Chapter 16
ISANDOR HELD the reins tight and gazed at his destination over the bobbing head of the eagle. Even though he wore goggles and a face mask, his face was numb from the cold. There was no sun today, only a mass of dull white clouds. Darker clouds on the horizon promised more snow.
Isandor and Carro led a group of eagles which had detached from the main body of competitors about the halfway mark. One Apprentice had since dropped the cylinder in the frigid waters of the sea, disqualifying his team. Now they were on the home leg, the cylinder had passed from Isandor to Carro and back ten times. They still had two changes to make.
The other riders, led by Jono and Caman, were uncomfortably close. Carro wasn’t flying well. He was using the reins too much to balance. He’d barely said anything since they got up this morning; he’d looked tired, but wouldn’t answer questions about what he’d done last night.
Carro’s eagle was fidgety and snappy, probably tired, too. What had Carro been doing? Yesterday was meant to have been a rest day.
They had to win, they just had to. The winners would be presented to the Queen, and her gaze still burned in Isandor’s mind. Those eyes were true royal blue. Her smile was more beautiful than he had ever seen.
The second last exchange of the cylinder was due. A Knight on a lazily circling eagle patrolled the change point. Isandor steered his eagle into a circle and swung the cylinder. It flew through the air, catching the light. Carro caught it neatly. He grinned, although his face was hard with fatigue.
“Now, come on!” Isandor yelled and pulled the eagle out of the spin. “We’ve almost done it.”
Jono and Caman were now circling the change point, only a few wingbeats behind, but Isandor could already see the festival grounds, and on the edge, the stands where the Queen was waiting.
Come on, come on, come on.
He saw her cheering—no not cheering, that was too undignified for a Queen—but clapping. He saw himself walking up to her to receive his medal. Queen’s Champion.
No, he’d better keep his mind on the job. The Senior Knights always decided who would become Champion anyway, and they always chose a boy from the noble families.
Stop daydreaming. Do you know how much power one fifteen-year old girl has over an ages-old institute of men? Tandor’s words came to haunt him.
The last change point. He brought his eagle into a tight spin so it circled Carro’s.
Carro raised himself in the saddle. He was shivering, Isandor could see that even from his position. He lifted his arm and threw the cylinder. It flipped through the air, catching the light.
Short.
Isandor reached as far as he could, but his hand grasped thin air.
No.
For one horrible moment he stared at the twirling cylinder plummeting towards the gleaming ocean and the ice floes.
No.
Another moment and he had pulled the reins hard. The eagle screeched protest, but it pulled in its wings and dived. It went hurtling towards the ground. Isandor’s stomach lurched. Freezing air cut into his face as the ground came up fast. His vision blurred from his watering eyes, but he focused on the tumbling cylinder.
Down, down, faster, faster.
He plummeted past the Knight who patrolled the change point. The man yelled out but Isandor couldn’t make out the words.
He was not going to make it. He was not going to make it. The eagle couldn’t dive fast enough.
Stop, stop, stop!
Golden light snaked out of the air. It wrapped around his hands, cocooned the eagle and caught the falling cylinder, freezing it in mid-air. Just a moment, and then Isandor had reached it and clasped his hand around the cold metal. A sharp pull of the reins brought the eagle soaring into the air again, its immense wings flapping. It gave a piercing cry.
Isandor stood in the saddle, balling his fist around the cylinder.
Yes, yes, yes!
“By the skylights, how did you do that, Isandor?” Carro shouted from his beast. His eyes were wide, pleading almost, scared. His lips were blue with cold and he shivered worse than ever. Isandor on the other hand, was hot and glowing from his victory.
Isandor smiled, but felt uneasy. Carro couldn’t see icefire. But one day, Tandor said someone would see it.
“Never mind that, I’ve got it,” he shouted at Carro, trying to sound careless. “Just don’t fall off until we get there, all right?”
Carro returned a sharp look, and something flickered over his face. Worry?
Isandor didn’t like to think about it. He had to concentrate, or he would fall off himself, as shivers overtook him.
The eagle flew lower, spread its wings and stretched out its yellow feet. It landed in the snow with a thump. People were cheering, but he barely heard it. The truth hit him hard. He had just used icefire to win the race, not just bent it to hide his missing leg, but used it to his advantage. The old king used to do that, the old king, who had been the worst murderer the southern land had ever known.
In his mind, he heard Tandor’s voice. The Thillei blood is strong in you.
No, he didn’t want this. He wanted to be a good Knight.
The crowd had swelled since the start of the race. People were clapping and cheering. Isandor spotted his uncle in the crowd, waving wildly. He waved back, but felt sick. He had failed them all.
Isandor let himself slide from the saddle, clutching the cylinder against his chest. His heart was still going at a crazy rate. There was no escape. The bird handlers were hustling him and Carro out of the arena to the holding pens, where young boys threw steaming hunks of meat at the birds. He didn’t dare look at his friend. Carro had all the rights to be angry. They’d lose all their points. Isandor didn’t even want to contemplate what the Knights would do to him when he got back to the eyrie later today. Carro would never forgive him.
The crowd was yelling his name, and clapping and whistling and cheering. His eagle held its meat under a claw, but was hissing as the crowd, its wings spread. Isandor rubbed its head, burrowing his fingers in the feathers down to the hot skin. It was said that the animals were created through icefire and could feel its presence, and attached closely to those riders who could wield it. That’s what he was: a dangerous freak.
“Apprentice Isandor?”
A Senior Knight was standing behind him.
“Sir.” Isandor bowed, his heart thudding. This was it.
“Come with me,” the man said.
Isand
or followed him through the cheering crowd. He wished the people would shut up. There was nothing to cheer about. Hands were touching his arms, clapping his shoulder. Snatches of conversation drifted on the air.
“. . . Did you see that?”
“What about the other one?”
“. . . Queen is going to make him the Champion.”
Oh yes, one of the boys would be the Queen’s Champion, probably Jono, since he had the right family heritage. But first, his punishment, and the citizens of the Outer City loved that as much as they loved their bloodsports.
They stopped at the base of the stand. The guards moved aside, giving Isandor a view of the Queen’s legs, wrapped in thick bear furs. He bowed, unable to face pity in her eyes. “Your Highness.”
The furs moved aside. The feet in dainty boots descended the steps. Soft boots and a cloak of fur white as snow. He bowed more deeply.
“Do not be shy,” the Queen said. “Look me in the eye, Champion.”
Champion? His heart missed a beat. He blurted out, “That can’t be right.”
Her laugh sounded like the tinkling of crystal. “Oh, you Knights are priceless. Don’t be so humble. You won fairly. I have the honour of choosing the Queen’s Champion, and I have chosen.”
Next to her, the reedy man Isandor recognised as Supreme Rider Cornatan sniffed, his lips pressed together in a thin line. Oh no, he didn’t think Isandor deserved to be Queen’s Champion.
“I don’t deserve the honour.” I cheated. He let his head droop again.
A soft glove entered his vision and pushed his chin up. A strand of golden light seeped over her arm and into his face. He exploded in warmth.
Isandor looked into those dark blue eyes, and found himself drowning in her gaze. Her face was pale, her lips full and marked with just a touch of red paint. Long eyelashes were dusted with silver. She blinked.
Isandor had to look away. His gaze slid down her soft, white-skinned neck to the elaborately-worked fastening of her cloak. She wore a crude strip of leather around her neck. The shaft of a gull’s tail feather poked just above the neckline of the cloak.
Somewhere at the edge of his hearing, over the roaring of blood in his ears, she said, “You do deserve it, Isandor. I wish to declare you my champion. It is my title, and I choose whom I see fit.”
The barbs in that remark weren’t intended for him.
Again he heard Tandor’s words. How much power to you think a fifteen-year old girl has over an aged-old institute of men?
At this very moment, she had all the power in the world over him.
A junior Knight approached him with a box that contained the medal and Isandor was forced to step back from the stand to make room for the man. The Queen’s hand fell back from his cheek, severing the warmth between them. The Knight hung the medal around Isandor’s neck, but Isandor had only eyes for the Queen, and how she kept her left hand in her pocket. He knew the signs. She didn’t give him the medal herself, because she couldn’t. She had only one hand.
Supreme Rider Cornatan came to stand next to her. “Your Highness, there are some jugglers who would be honoured if you could watch their act.”
“Certainly,” she said, still looking at Isandor.
She took Rider Cornatan’s proffered arm and let him lead her away, but even while she disappeared amongst the Knight guards, she kept looking at Isandor. Her eyes were intense, and pleading.
Isandor stood there, numbed, barely aware that the Junior Knight was speaking to him. “As winner of the race you will also get the honour of making the first kill of the hunting season. That ceremony will be held this afternoon in this arena. Be here on time so we can instruct you.”
Isandor swallowed away that embarrassing, glowing feeling and met the man’s eyes, registering what he had said. “Don’t worry. I used to work in a butchery. I know how to kill a Legless Lion.”
“Be there on time,” the Knight repeated.
He turned away, leaving Isandor was alone amongst the Senior Knights, some of whom congratulated him with stiff nods.
Someone said behind him, “Well I guess you don’t need to have a drink with me anymore now you have all these new admirers.”
It was Carro, with more bitterness on his face than Isandor had ever seen.
* * *
Should I warn him, should I not warn him, should I warn him?
Carro glared at Isandor who was receiving yet more congratulations from random patrons in the meltery. The man, someone Isandor must know from the butchery, clapped a meaty hand on his shoulder.
They had advanced barely a few steps into the main room. The door was still open, as more patrons followed, couldn’t get it and then wondered what the hold-up was.
Carro jammed his hands in his pockets. He was tired.
Wan light slanted into the dimness, lighting up misty sections of heavy and smoke-tinged air.
The beefy man now left, towards the exit.
“Come on,” Carro urged, pulling at Isandor’s cloak. “You said we’d have a drink.”
He dragged back a chair.
Seriously, if one more person was going to congratulate Isandor, he was going to scream. What about him? Had he not won the race together with Isandor?
But if it had been up to me, we’d have been disqualified.
Carro slumped into the chair, clenching his jaws.
Isandor paid for two glasses of bloodwine from a passing waitress and sank down opposite him, plonking the glasses down. He leaned both his elbows on the table and sighed. His medal dangled from his chest, glittering in the smoky light.
“Oh, yeah, life as a champion is so hard,” Carro said and knew he sounded petulant.
Isandor looked up, meeting his eyes squarely. It wasn’t anger Carro saw in that blue gaze, but something else Carro couldn’t place. It chilled him.
“Carro, I didn’t ask for any of this. You can have this medal if it makes you feel any better.”
A moment of regret passed between them. Carro knew he was acting like a jealous toddler, but he could not, he just could not . . .
“Carro, we are friends, right?” Isandor said.
“Yes.”
Friends, as long as Carro didn’t tell Rider Cornatan what Isandor was, as long as no one found out. Friends, as long as it was appropriate for a Learner Knight to associate with an Apprentice, and an Imperfect one at that. Yet, Carro had taken off his new badge, because he didn’t want any talk in the dormitory about being favoured by the Senior Knights. He wanted to have earned his promotion.
“You are my friend. You can tell me what worries you,” Isandor said.
“Nothing worries me.”
Only that he had awoken late this morning, sweating and his bedding tangled around his legs, plagued by that nightmarish image: Korinne and her father, Rider Cornatan’s advisor, at his father’s doorstep.
We need to talk business with you.
As the maid let them in, Korinne gave him a sly look from under her curled eyelashes, and placed her hand on her swollen stomach.
Payment. They wanted payment for his few moments of stupidity, and he wasn’t rich, and his father wasn’t rich, neither of them wanted a child, and as soon as Korinne and her father were out the door, his father was going to kill him.
What were you thinking, stupid oaf of a son of mine!
Carro wiped sweat from his upper lip. What was he thinking indeed. It had been a setup from the beginning. She hadn’t enjoyed it. He had, but he had known, even in his drunken stupor, that someone had ordered her to submit to him. Who was playing games with him?
And Isandor sat there looking at him with genuine worry in his eyes. Isandor, who had everything he wanted. His natural ability to fly well, his ability to make people listen, his innocence, and true innocent love. Oh no, Carro hadn’t missed the look that passed between his friend and Jevaithi.
And that, he knew, was the root of it all.
You’r
e jealous, Carro, simple as that.
Isandor slammed his glass down. He seemed to have taken to the drink just as badly as Carro had.
“You know,” Carro said, swallowing discomfort. “You know I wish it was still last year?”
“Why?” Isandor asked, and then his face cleared. “Did she refuse you again?”
The truth was on Carro’s tongue. Get out before I can no longer hide you. It’s the only way I can protect you. He licked his lips.
The meltery door opened, letting in flash of wan light. People scrambled aside. Rider Cornatan had come in. The Supreme Rider looked around, spotted Carro and gestured.
Panic rising in him, Carro met his friend’s eyes.
Rider Cornatan is after Imperfects. I don’t know what he wants, but it scares me.
Someone is trying to buy me, and I don’t know how long I can resist.
Treasure your virginity for as long as you can. Sex hurts and corrupts.
But he said none of those words. “Sorry, have to go.”
“Me, too.” Isandor rose from the table. His face looked drawn.
He faced Carro wordlessly, nodded stiffly as if greeting another Knight and left. By the skylights, was that what their friendship had become?
Carro drank the last of the hot liquid and set his empty cup on the table, clinging onto its lingering warmth. As he rose and crossed the meltery’s room, his knees turned weak with fear. It occurred to him that instead of his father, he now bowed to Rider Cornatan, who treated him far better, on the surface at least. But why? What did Rider Cornatan expect in return?
Carro met his leader in the middle of the meltery room.
“Good, boy.” Rider Cornatan put his hand on Carro’s shoulder and squeezed it briefly.
Together, they walked to the far end of the meltery’s room, where there were private alcoves against the perimeter wall.
As they settled in an alcove, Carro hardly dared meet the Supreme Rider’s eyes.
People on the main floor of the meltery pretended to ignore them, but Carro didn’t miss the furtive looks out of corners of eyes. Jono had been sitting at a table somewhere, raising his eyebrows as Carro walked past in the company of Rider Cornatan resplendent in his full uniform and riding harness.