Susan Mika—Susan Clever Raccoon—came walking up with a slightly bowlegged stride, amid a powerful odor of horse. She made a knee, and gave a tired grin at the same time. Using relays of horses wasn’t the fastest way to travel overland, not where hippomotives were available, or the fastest way to send a message when you had heliographs . . . but it was considerably less conspicuous than either and left far less of a paper trail. And if you pushed it you could cover well over a hundred miles a day, which was fast enough.
Fast enough for government work, Órlaith thought with a trace of whimsy.
“Your Highness, from Dun Fairfax—” Mika began.
“Lakhotiya Woglaka Po!” Órlaith replied.
And blessed the Sword; she’d had only a little of the language before, since all of that folk spoke English too, and a fair number had only ceremonial Lakota. Especially the ones with a lot of white-eye in their background; people had moved around a good bit in the years right after the Change, and settled and married where they could. Whatever their myths and stories, few could trace all their blood from any one tribe or folk.
She remembered that Mika was fully fluent, though, and the chances of anyone being able to understand them were only marginally greater than it would be with Japanese. The courier dropped into that sonorous swift-rising, slow-falling tongue:
“—from the Dun below the sacred hill in the Mackenzie dùthchas: Let the old man say what he will, we’ll skip the harvest and meet you where the fairies dance. From Larsdalen: You’re on! From the steading of your friend in the land of the McClintocks: We’d have been at feud if you’d left me out.”
The grin got a little wider, and she went on: “From the lady with the garland in that place: Don’t get him killed and forbye keep your princessly hands to yourself the while.”
She tried and failed to put a McClintock burr to the last.
“And from the tall trees: I may not live while the slayer of my kinsman walks beneath the stars.”
Then with an oddly catlike expression, she added: “Those two are real enthusiastic types.”
Dicun came back with a tray in his hands and a boy carrying a little folding table behind him. The lad set out the table and whipped a coarse brown linen napkin over it; the varlet set down the tray and removed the cover on a big bowl. That proved to be a dense chicken stew with peas and carrots and potatoes, accompanied by slices of thick-cut buttered brown maslin bread and a wedge of a strong-smelling yellow cheese and some dried apricots. A turned-maple mascar of beer stood beside it.
“Go ahead, you earned it,” Órlaith said. “And I’m going to ask you some questions while you do. This is about as private a place to talk as I can imagine.”
She gave Dicun a glance. He smiled, bowed, and as he left grabbed by one ear the lad who’d been helping him; the ears in question had been fairly quivering with curiosity. Mika sat on the end of the bench and plied a busy spoon.
“Wopila! Been eating jerky and trail mix in the saddle,” she said around a mouthful. “I must’ve lost weight and I don’t have any to spare.”
The questions were few and to the point, mostly about the condition of the trails.
“And I’m coming too,” Mika mumbled at the end of the conversation, after she’d mopped the bowl with the last heel of bread and swallowed the last apricot. “No way will I miss this.”
Órlaith nodded and slapped her on the shoulder; the feel beneath the leather was boney, but the slender muscle was like iron wire.
“Of course not, cousin. I may need someone who can really ride.”
“Instead of being a blacksmith’s shop strapped into an easy chair mounted on a horse’s back,” Mika said, slandering Associate knights and Bearkiller cataphracts alike, and yawned enormously.
“Go get a bath and a bed,” Órlaith said.
The courier nodded, lurched up and stumbled away. Dicun met her at a discreet distance and lent a helping hand. Reiko’s hand was tight on her sword as Órlaith translated, the thumb pressing against the guard in that unconscious gesture.
“That’s got us a dozen each of Mackenzies and McClintocks, and a couple of Rangers, who’ll all be waiting at Stath Ingolf,” Órlaith said. “And at least one A-lister. Now I have to get us some men-at-arms.”
“And I some samurai,” Reiko said.
• • •
Reiko and Egawa Noboru knelt on the grassy level patch beneath the great chinar tree and looked out over the little lake where mist curled, pink dying to a glowing white as the moon shone brighter. The sun was setting behind the forested hills to the west, silhouetting the tall firs as the rim of red dipped beneath the crest, and birdsong fell silent above them. The night was mild but underneath it was a faint chill, the earth breathing a scent of falling dew. Dim yellow light shone through the slit windows in the castle’s tower and keep half a mile away, and the first stars spangled the purple above them. Mist curled over the water, and a frog leapt.
Egawa spoke:
“Furu ike ya . . .”
An ancient pond . . .
She took it up:
“Kawazu tobikomu . . .”
A frog jumps in . . .
The soldier completed it:
“Mizu no oto.”
The splash of water.
They both waited in silence as the sound of their voices faded into the dimness; the evening stillness was departing, and wind soughed gently in the branches. That poem was a work of the great master Basho. Egawa sighed and repeated another, murmuring softly as if to himself:
“Tabi ni yande . . .
Falling sick on a journey . . .
Yume wa kareno wo . . .
My dream goes wandering . . .
Kake meguru . . .”
Over a field of dried grass.
“I long for home as well, my bushi,” Reiko said, and spread her fan. “And wonder if I shall see it again, and bear my father’s ashes to his resting place beside my grandmother. We stand on the edge of deeds and times great and terrible, beyond the fields we knew.”
The sat in silence for a while longer, listening to the alien night—loud crickets, something that buzzed in the tree above them, then the familiar threefold yipping bark of a fox setting out on the work of the night.
My namesake, perhaps, Reiko thought. The Ghost Fox.
“Having thought, you must decide,” she went on, gently implacable. “The Grand Steward would, I think—with the best, the most selfless of intentions, thinking it only temporary—bind me to what he considers wisdom. And he would use you to do so. Setting you up as a new tent government, with a puppet Empress.”
Egawa pointed with his own fan. “Beyond this hill the sun paints the path homeward,” he said. “But my Emperor died on foreign soil. Am I to come so far, and outlive him, only to betray his heir? Yet what is true allegiance here? You are . . . forgive me, Majesty . . . still very young.”
“You must decide if I am a child, to be constrained, or truly what you call me, the Heavenly Sovereign One,” Reiko said. “Because if I am sovereign, General Egawa, then ultimately I—and none other—am responsible to my ancestress Amaterasu-omikami in this matter.”
They waited. Reiko let the silence and the sounds fill her. Having thought, I have acted, she thought. Let the arrow fly.
In the end, Egawa startled her by laughing. She turned her head to look at him, and saw him gather up his sheathed sword and tuck it through his sash.
“My only regret, Majesty,” he said, “is that I won’t be here to see Koyama-san’s face when he finds we’re gone. When we leave, at least; perhaps I shall see it, when we return with Kusanagi.”
He made his bow. “Majesty. I will have considerable work to do, to prepare all quietly.”
His feet padded softly into the night, almost soundless on the springy grass of the path. Reiko closed her fan with a snap, after an instant studying the razor edges of the metal segments. It quivered in her grip. There were things that you must be prepared to do that still made your so
ul clench with a relief so strong that it was also pain . . . if you found you need not.
When she had command of herself again she studied the moonlight and the frosted arch of stars overhead until they washed through her being, then said at last:
“Araumi ya . . .”
The rough sea
“Sado ni yokotau . . .”
Stretching out towards Sado
“Amanogawa . . .”
The Milky Way
“I will bring you home, Father. You and all our people.”
• • •
Heuradys thought Sir Aleaume de Grimmond was handsome, especially when he laughed, which he didn’t do all that often. He was smart enough, well-educated in the things considered important among his class and nation, a first-rate fighter, and extremely conscientious. The last was the problem here, though it would probably make him a good baron someday.
And it may be an opportunity as well as a problem. I certainly hope so.
She’d invited him—and Órlaith, of course—and Droyn Jones de Molalla for a morning of hawking. Falconry was the all-purpose social lubricant, and one that even conventional females—which neither she nor her liege-lady were, of course—could share. They’d had a successful few hours, with half a dozen ring-necked pheasants and a wild turkey in the game basket.
Then they’d retired to the edge of the field for lunch in the shade of the hedge and row of Lombardy poplars that marked its limit; they were hunting one of the demesne fields of Montinore manor, currently planted in grass and clover for pasture rather than hay. Those attracted game birds, for feeding and nesting and as convenient refuges to stage quick trips to the grainfields.
The guards were having their own lunch a little way off, in relays so that there were always four on watch, and the falconer and his assistants and the grooms in another group yet, since they weren’t even the lowliest of Associates. She and Órlaith were both in a noblewomen’s riding garb, jacket and divided skirt—something very similar to what Reiko and her samurai wore, which all three of the young women had had a good laugh over.
Reiko’s not bad company at all now that she’s relaxed a bit, Heuradys thought. Though the Gray-Eyed Lady knows she’s got reasons for that grimness. Still, she’s smart and well-read and she has a nice sense of humor if you like it extremely dry. She and Orrey are getting on very well.
Sir Aleaume had lost some of his haunted look, and if falconry didn’t relax a young Associate noble—Aleaume was the eldest here and he was still a young man—nothing would. Heuradys enjoyed it herself, even when done with an ulterior motive. It wasn’t exactly the most fun you could have with your clothes on; for that, she was divided between . . .
. . . well, music of course . . .
. . . steeplechasing and hunting tiger, with single-handing a small boat right up there, and dancing close thereafter, but it was definitely a pleasant way to spend some outdoor time in good weather. Not to mention controlling the bird and small game population and providing food.
They’d chatted about the differences between the sport here in the close-grown Willamette country and the open eastern ranges; the de Grimmond family’s barony of Tucannon was near the Blue Mountains, out in the County Palatine of Walla Walla. That was very similar to the Palouse just north of there where Barony Harfang was located, and House Ath had a hunting lodge in the Blue Mountains anyway—the Counts had given it to her adoptive mother after the Prophet’s War, as a thanks-gift for dealing with a Cutter assassination attempt.
The black-and-white birds were resting on T-poles driven into the dirt by the varlets, with their yellow taloned feet clutching the perches to which their jesses were tied and their hooded heads hunched between their shoulders, doing the Prairie Falcon equivalent of a post-prandial nap-and-belch on a couch after a good meal.
Raptors like these falcons were solitary by nature; they didn’t even like each other except in the mating season, much less humans. All you could teach them was that doing what humans wanted would get them more of what they wanted, which was to kill, eat, mate and sleep.
“Might as well be men-at-arms,” Heuradys said with a chuckle, and explained her reasoning. “Though at least falcons don’t drink booze.”
Everyone else laughed as well. The hobbled horses grazed contentedly, since this was the equine version of being turned loose in a field of pies and pastries, with one of the younger grooms keeping an eye on them to make sure they didn’t overeat and bloat. The nobles and the Crown Princess had a basket with sandwiches and pear tarts, and a flask of Montinore pinot noir wrapped in wet woven straw to keep it cool, with a striped alpaca-wool blanket to spread on the sweet-smelling clover and ryegrass. Birds were mostly absent—prey species had absolutely no doubt what a falcon’s outline meant—but bees buzzed about, butterflies with white-rimmed blue or bright orange wings fluttered, and clouds drifted in the fleecy sky.
She took a bite of the sandwich, and smiled as she chewed. Old Goodwife Pernelle in the kitchens knew her tastes; thin slices of roast pork loin with a strong-tasting cheese, capers, onion chutney and mayonnaise on crusty rolls fresh that morning.
With lettuce just plucked from the manor gardens, for the crunchy.
Heuradys strongly suspected they were going to be on plain field rations again soon and lucky to get that, and was determined to enjoy this while she could. When she’d finished the pear tart she untucked the napkin from the collar of her jacket, adjusted her Montero hat with the peacock feather, and cleared her throat.
“The yield? With your permission, gentlemen.”
“By all means, Lady Heuradys,” Aleaume said, and Droyn murmured agreement.
It was pro-forma, considering that both were guests of Barony Ath, but manners counted and you had to consult your fellow-hawkers before disposing of the kill. She called to the falconer.
“Corbus!”
Corbus Cornelli was a lean brown-haired man in his thirties in huntsman’s green suede leather, wearing a huntsman’s falchion at his waist and the heavy gauntlet of his calling on his left hand.
“My lady?” he said, rising to approach the nobles and then doffing his hat and bowing.
“The turkey to you and your family, goodman. The pheasants to Father Abrahil.”
She nodded to the westward, where the spire of the church just showed over tree and hedgerow to mark the location of the village of Montinore. The parish priest would distribute the birds—probably in the form of soup—to the needy, mostly the ill and the aged without close kin. If he also had a pleasant Saturday dinner of roast pheasant out of it, that was perfectly acceptable. A village priest was usually a peasant himself, some bright pious lad selected for a few years of higher education by his predecessor, who’d often been his uncle or second cousin. Most lived rather plainly and they had a close touch on the pulse of commons; a wise lord took care not to alienate them.
And it never hurts for us in particular to make a goodwill gesture to the Church. Pagan lords aren’t so common we can afford to be needlessly brusque.
“Thank you, my lady!” Corbus said. “Shall we see the birds back to the mews?”
“By all means, we won’t be flying them again today. They’ve been gorged rather heavily for that.”
“So they have, my lady. It’s worth the trouble to feed them from the hand after a kill. You can’t make a falcon love you, but you can convince its little bird brain that sitting on your glove means a full croup.”
“Unless it’s a Harris Hawk.”
He snorted slightly. “Well, if you’re a beginner, they’ll do, my lady. Though they tend to breed unrealistic expectations for real falcons.”
Harris Hawks were the only raptors that hunted cooperatively in packs, up to a dozen birds at a time, like wolves with wings. Sometimes you’d see them standing on each other’s backs in stacks four deep atop a rock or tree to get a better look-out. They liked each other, and were affectionate to their human handlers if well-raised from chicks.
“They�
��re very agile, particularly with ground game,” Heuradys observed.
“Yes, but a Harris keeps trying to lick your hands and cock a leg to pee, my lady,” Corbus said with conviction.
“Ah, goodman, you’re a purist like my lady mother! See to it, then.”
Órlaith rose, an unconsciously supple motion of foot and knee without touching her hands to the ground.
“Come, walk with us, messires,” she said to Aleaume and Droyn.
The four of them strolled along the hedgerow, theoretically admiring the last of the hawthorn blossoms.
“First, I must have your oaths that you will not repeat what I’m about to say,” Órlaith said gravely, bending to smell a flower. “Please, think carefully, because you may be asked to violate any such oath by . . . highly placed people.”
Because her mother takes oaths seriously; but she also takes her children very seriously indeed. And Orrey’s not carrying the Sword right now . . . which as a gesture of trust is beyond tactful, it’s so reckless it’s cunning. Damn, but she is good at this!
Conflicts of fealty and oath—often tragic ones—were of course the staple of modern literature in the north-realm; they were how a troubadour put some dramatic tension in. Protectorate society ran on oaths, and they were important in many other parts of Montival too, if not quite so overwhelmingly or accompanied with so much ritual. The young noblemen looked at Órlaith, then at each other, then shared a single sharp nod. Then they crossed themselves, kissed their crucifixes, and murmured the form of the oath. After that they were quietly alert. Using falconry as a cover for intrigue was also a staple of the troubadour’s art, for the simple reason that it was a good way to have a thoroughly private conversation for unimpeachable reasons.
“Gentlemen, this has to do with why my father was killed—who was responsible, and what has to be done to frustrate their plots and begin avenging him. Also to assist our guest, Her Majesty of Nihon, who suffered the same loss as I, from the same foes, and who needs gallant swords about her now. Are we to leave all the honor and burden of that to her own vassals? I intend to help her on the search which brought her to us, and which her enemies and ours are trying their best to frustrate. There is no time for the ponderous official mechanisms of State. We must out steel and strike.”
The Golden Princess: A Novel of the Change (Change Series) Page 35