by Court Ellyn
Azhien waited at one of the long tables with two trenchers. Carah took one, grateful, but before she could savor her first bite of the venison, a knot of dranithion entered the tower, carrying a wounded warrior.
Carah tossed the food aside and directed the dranithion to an empty cot. They laid a youth upon it. He cried out and reached for a leg. Both appeared to be broken below the knees. One shin was merely misshapen, but bones protruded from the other, piercing even the suede he wore.
“Tell this avedra,” Nashín said to them, shaking Carah’s arm for emphasis. “Dathiel’s niece. She helps.”
One of the dranithion, a young woman, knelt over the youth, trying to keep his hands away from his legs. “Please,” she said, “my brother. The naenion brought down our tree. We were too high. He landed hard. Lie still, Lassarien. The trance, use the trance.”
“No, you first,” the youth argued. Lavender-gray eyes pleaded with Carah. “Please, Elliona first. The na’in threw her. She could be hurt worse than me.”
His sister soothed him. “I’m fine. Just bruises.” Her fingers clutched her ribs. “It’s nothing.”
Elliona? “Rhian’s Elliona?” Carah hadn’t meant to ask aloud.
The woman glanced up at her. “Yes.” Her answer was matter-of-fact, and no one flinched or smirked or protested, which told Carah the relationship was long-established and accepted as commonplace by everyone they knew. Elliona seemed to be waiting for the point to the question.
Carah changed the subject. “Your brother’s injuries are obvious. Let me determine if you’re as fine as you say.” Her voice, her limbs felt wooden.
“Just hurry, please.” Elliona raised her jerkin under small breasts, revealing a bruise rising on her left side. Carah inspected each rib in turn, poked and squeezed. Elliona winced, but the bones felt sound. Delving inside with her awareness, Carah detected no internal bleeding either. Only robust health. She’d hoped for something dire, a wound that would produce life-long pain or disfigurement. When Carah realized her malice, she was horrified with herself.
Quickly she turned to Lassarien. “There, you see? Your sister is quite well. Will you let us tend to your legs now?”
He nodded and lay back, panting and groaning. Two of the orderlies held him down while a third seized his ankles and reset the bones. Lassarien didn’t have the opportunity to enter the trance. He fainted outright. Carah went to work, hastening the mending of the bones, torn veins, muscle and skin. When she opened her eyes, she found Elliona seated on the far side of the cot, smoothing her brother’s hair from his face. “You have my thanks, avedra.” A tear slipped down her pearlescent cheek. In the lamplight, her curls were honey-gold with hints of copper, her nose and chin delicate, her cheekbones high and smooth beneath the green stripes, her mouth luscious and trembling. Her voice was as soft as a morning breeze. “I jumped down after him. I thought we’d be crushed. The naenion ran at us, but I wouldn’t let them have him. We’re twins, did you know?” Rhian’s girl was not only soft-spoken, compassionate, and selfless, but a fierce fighter as well, as the bright blood on her clothes attested.
Carah had the fierce part down pat, but she lacked all the rest. Why should Rhian prefer her to this ethereal creature? With a despairing nod, she said, “I can tell.”
The tower door burst open. An archer cried, “Er naenion yessivan!”
A clamor of Elarion rushed for the door.
“They what?” Carah cried. “The ogres what?”
“They flee!” Elliona jumped to her feet and ran out with the rest.
“Come,” said Azhien, beckoning Carah. “We see, too.”
The two of them followed the crowd across the greensward. Night lay dewy under the forest canopy. Archers clustered along the southern ramparts, bows tilted high. Arrows flew long, in the hopes of snagging one last ogre. Taunts, curses, and cries like the triumphant shrieks of eagles sang under the trees. Somewhere a pipe played exuberantly.
The gate rumbled, the portcullis rose, and the sounds of celebration withered to a low murmur. The two avedrin entered, along with Laniel Falconeye and a dozen dranithion. In the torchlight, their sweaty faces were drawn with exhaustion, grim with grief. While many Elarion stopped Laniel to embrace him or ask about missing warriors, none spoke to Thorn or Rhian. The avedrin seemed to walk invisible through the crowd, but for those Elarion who made a point to turn away from them.
Offended on their behalf, Carah rushed toward her uncle, to shower him with kisses if need be, but he swept past her, aiming for the keep. She called to him, and he turned. A smile broke across his face. “There you are, love. You blend into this crowd.”
She hugged him and asked, “How can they be so cold, after all you did to help them? They should carry you on their shoulders for arriving when you did.”
“Because they honor my request that they don’t. I asked it of them years ago.” He jabbed a finger toward the gate and the battlefield beyond. “I will not be praised for that. Ever.”
With a doleful turn of the lips, she said, “I understand.”
He raised an eyebrow, skeptical, but Carah looked at him with new eyes, with a depth of comprehension that she couldn’t hope to express in words yet longed for him to see. He sagged into her, relief, gratitude, something, so palpable inside him that his legs barely held him up. With his forehead pressed to hers, they stood a long time in the greensward, a calm island amid a storm of music and keening and searching for bodies beyond the wall.
Near the gate, Laniel called for his troop and they headed back out into the forest. Carah suspected they would find many of their brethren under felled trees, but she had her Uncle Thorn and that’s all that mattered.
Thorn sank onto a bench at the one of the tables beside his niece. He had run upstairs to wash the stink of ogre off him and returned squeaky clean, wearing charcoal-gray suede. Green stripes climbed well past his elbows. He might’ve slain that many ogres today alone, but Carah saw there wasn’t room enough on his arms for more. He didn’t have to wait long before a squire brought him a bowl of steaming soup, a gluttonous cut of venison, and a pint of hot mead. Thus did the Elarion silently show their gratitude. “Have you eaten?” he asked.
“I was waiting for you,” Carah said. While she waited, she had tended to the last rush of wounded. Blood stained the creases of her fingernails, though she’d scrubbed them. The healers among the Elarion, of whom there were plenty, treated the bruises and shallow lacerations while Carah saw to the deep wounds. The healers did not bother competing with her skill, though one said, “Watching you almost makes me wish I were avedra.” Almost. Like Thorn, the Elarion knew what Carah had discovered only tonight: with her gift came a great burden.
He slid his trencher toward her and his mug of mead. “I can’t eat that much meat in a week. Help yourself.” The squires promptly brought him a second mug and another bowl.
Carah ignored the venison. She felt queasy looking at it. Steel your stomach, girl, she told herself. You’ll treat these and worse in days to come. Still, she preferred the soup. The broth was creamy and rich with herbs and something strange. Ginger, perhaps?
Thorn grinned at her sigh of approval and gulped from his mug. “Laniel told me what happened this afternoon.”
“At the tunnel?”
He inspected the bruise on her forehead. “I’ve scheduled his execution for tomorrow.”
“Don’t be silly. It’s not his fault.”
“No, it’s mine. Whenever I try to protect you, I always make the wrong decisions. As soon as we return to Ilswythe, you’ll learn fire and lightning.”
Easier said than done, she suspected. She’d had no luck learning them so far. “At least I’ve got my motives straightened out.”
His arm gave her shoulders a playful jostle. “You can’t help having a vengeful temper. It runs in the family.”
They ate their fill, and when Thorn pushed away the leftovers, he stretched an arm, popped his neck, and groaned. “I’m too old for this.”
“It isn’t fair when you insult yourself.” Laniel rounded the table and swung a leg over the bench opposite them. A faint whiff of ogre clung to him. Blood smeared the front of his jerkin, but he didn’t appear to be wounded. A squire brought him food. He ignored it.
“What do you know about getting old?” Thorn retorted. “Go rot already, you thousand-year-old relic.”
Laniel’s grin was strained with weariness. “The older the wine—”
“The faster it turns to vinegar.” The insults had a forced quality to them. Exhaustion, perhaps. Or sorrow.
Laniel crossed his arms on the table and bowed his head. “We lost Amyrith.”
“No!” Carah cried. The Elari had shown greater friendliness to her horse, but the announcement reminded her of Bramoran, where men had danced with her, then died.
“Best we can tell, a stone struck him in the back of the head, and he fell from his branch. The naenion got to him…”
Carah covered her trembling mouth with a hand.
Laniel saw. “Azhien is shaken up about it, too. He understands now, I think. It coulda been him just as easily.”
“Where is he?” she asked.
“He holds vigil with the dead. He has much to think about. I doubt he’ll stay with the Guardians long.”
“Why ever not? He’s no coward.”
“No, not at all. But Azhien carries a different mark about him. I noticed it when he was a boy.”
“Mark?”
“Destiny.” His gray eyes pinned her while the embers shifted loudly in the firepit, sent up a spray of sparks. You have it too, she heard.
What do you mean? she asked. If Laniel was able to hear her question, he didn’t get the chance to reply.
With a sigh, Thorn said, “Poor Amyrith. He hated the sprites at the ritual baths.”
Laniel nodded sagely. “They stole his pants every chance they could get.”
Soon the two of them were chuckling about it. Thorn raised his mug. “To Amyrith.”
Laniel stood and raised his mug high. “To the fallen,” he cried across the room. Everyone with a mug repeated the gesture, and a thunder of voices shook the rafters, “Vann er ghedielen!”
Carah took a ladylike sip, but the Elarion, and Uncle Thorn with them, drained their mugs in one breath. She would soon be nursing a crowd of inebriates, she was sure of it.
Flagons of mead made the rounds. “We’re fortunate,” Laniel said, folding himself onto the bench again. “Captain Evriah lost half her troop, and half her survivors bleed over there.” He gestured toward the dividing screens. Another screen was needed; the two cots on the end were exposed. In one, Lassarien thrashed. An orderly brought him a thimbleful of poppy wine. His sister sat on the floor next to him, gripping his hand. Elliona winced as if she felt her twin’s pain. Rhian had found her. He sat against the wall beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pressed his face against her hair and whispered comfort in her ear. Elliona wilted against him, relying on him, letting him be the strong one for a while. Carah turned away. She didn’t dare meet her uncle’s glance. His posture had gone rigid beside her, as if he waited for her to go into a rage or burst into tears. She longed to do both, but she clenched her jaw and sat silent at the table, hands tight around her mug.
Thorn refrained from offering an ‘I told you so,’ for which Carah was glad.
She’d been chasing shadows. Stupid, childish, hoping for the impossible, like a heroine in a song. They had shared one kiss, beside the lake during the flight from Bramoran, and he had held her while she wept, and that was all. Just a pearl fisher, she chanted to herself. Pearl fisher first. Avedra second. And neither was meant for her.
Laniel was saying, “The twins are Evriah’s niece and nephew. It was a mistake to assign them to the same troop, but they refuse to be separated.”
“Like Danellys and Dannevir in your troop.”
Laniel nodded grimly. “Aye. Maybe now they see the risk.”
“I won’t allow family in my troop,” interrupted a dark-haired woman as she claimed the space beside Falconeye. “Still, I lost four of my best.” As far as Elarion went, this woman was not beautiful. Her features were long, almost horse-like, and faint scars latticed her face along with the green stripes of her office. Her indigo eyes were cold, hostile, and penetrating. They skewered Thorn. “Tell me, avedra. What’s going on here? We’ve seen the naenion amassing for years, but still have no explanation. All we know is that some of our own lead them, which is beyond comprehension. Is today’s attack the brainchild of one of our own?”
“It’s possible,” Thorn admitted. He turned to Carah. “This is Teriena, Captain of the Dranithion Kathiel.”
Carah nodded a greeting at the woman. Teriena paid her no mind. “And beyond the Wood?” she persisted. “We’ve seen the naenion marching—in formation, mind you—up and down the highways, like they own them. They’re not down here fighting dwarves, I’d wager.”
“You’re right,” Thorn conceded. “They’ve turned their gaze on humans, and they do own the roads.”
Teriena’s surprise turned to a narrow-eyed glare. “What happened at Bramor?”
Bramor? wondered Carah. Why does she call it that?
Thorn ignored his niece’s curiosity. “Heard about that, did you?”
“A city’s worth of pigeons fled the place, settled here, and have been shitting all over my trees.”
Thorn explained that the Black Falcon had betrayed his own people, and that the Elarion who had defected from the Wood were using him for their own ends.
“Bramor in the hands of Elarion again,” Laniel mused. “A bold move.”
Teriena silenced him with a slash of her hand. “I understand why Elarion would attack humans, and even why our brothers would feel the need to raise an army of naenion to do it. But I don’t understand why our own kind would send the naenion to attack us. What happened today was an act of war. It was no mere hunt conducted by a measly war band.”
Laniel was undeterred by her brusqueness. “And anyone who met their commander in the fray died.”
“The one with the shards of metal and glass tied in his hair?” asked Thorn.
“Aye, him. His armor had no weakness. My arrows bounced right off.”
Thorn laced his fingers atop the table. “It’s dwarven hutza.”
A tense quiet descended over the table. At last, Laniel swore softly. “How did they get their hands on hutza?”
Teriena tried to shrug it off. “So the ogres learned a few things during their war against the baerdwinion. They weren’t all wearing it, thank Ana.”
“Not yet,” Laniel bit.
“What else should we know, avedra?” Teriena asked.
Thorn glanced around the room as if he sought a rock to hide under. Carah considered the troubling facts he had gleaned from Solandyr. Laniel’s brother, you said?
Thorn nodded. “Step aside with me, nethai.”
Laniel hesitated before he rose from the bench. He must’ve guessed the news wouldn’t be good. Near the door they had a little space to themselves. Thorn leaned close and whispered the truth.
Laniel backed away, horror inscribed on his face. “Bi’ev mathiel!” he exclaimed. He argued in his own tongue, rattling off excuses about why his brother couldn’t be leading the naenion. Thorn looked at the floor, letting the tirade wash over him; there was no need to interrupt it. Soon Laniel ran out of excuses. He paced, angry, confused, then fled the stifling space of the tower to hide his grief in the dark. And to keep vigil with the dead, the casualties of Lothiar’s war.
~~~~
9
Thousands of hungry people bore down on Ilswythe. They began trickling across the river late in the afternoon. By evening, there was a steady flood trudging north along the highway, and the following morning Laral woke Kelyn, saying, “You must come see.”
From atop the north gatehouse, Kelyn gazed over the racetrack and the highland camp. A city’s worth of people filled the hil
lsides. The presence of the highlanders, armed with hatchets and foul tempers, prevented them from approaching Ilswythe’s gates. But a few of the hungriest and boldest mingled among the shaggy tents, trading small treasures for morsels of food left in the highlanders’ cookpots.
Kelyn assumed most had come from Bramoran.
“What are we supposed to do with them?” Laral asked. “We can’t feed this many.” Though the highlanders had proven themselves resourceful hunters and foragers, providing quail, elk, and potatoes for Lord Ilswythe and the people in his care, even they couldn’t provide enough meat to feed thousands of mouths for weeks on end.
My son contributed to this, Kelyn thought. Does he realize the scope of what he’s done? Hadn’t Rhoslyn taught him about the consequences of his actions, his responsibility to the people? Did I?
Beside him, Rhoslyn clutched a wool blanket under her chin. She had finally drunk the sleeping drought, but she didn’t look rested. Her eyelids were swollen from the private expression of her grief, and as she gazed at the refugees her mouth pinched tight with anger. She too was thinking of her son. “You must speak with them, Kelyn.”
“Speak with them?” exclaimed Lady Athmar. She stood on Laral’s far side; Kelyn hadn’t seen her arrive. “Send them packing, I say. At spear point, if necessary.” This from a woman who had sewn shut the eyes and mouths of Kelyn’s scouts, once upon a time.
He sighed. “If only they were soldiers…” It did no good wishing.
“There must be some of fighting age,” Laral said.
“There are children down there,” Rhoslyn insisted. “We can’t leave them to fend for themselves. If they riot and storm the gates, we won’t have to worry about ogres.” She laid a hand to Kelyn’s arm. “Go talk to them.”
He swore through his teeth, then nudged Laral. “Watch my back.”
The two of them crossed the racetrack and cut a path between the highlanders’ tents and rope corrals. Children with bare feet and unwashed faces ran along behind them, singing the war songs of their grandfathers.