Exile's Honor v(-1

by Mercedes Lackey

  "My thought," he agreed gravely.

  "Well, it's clean; you can bring them all in." She stood up; he waved at the wagons, and the teamsters brought their charges in to drink at the stream fed by the spring, while the humans drank at the source. Tooth-achingly cold, the water tasted of minerals. The horses adored it. Fortunately, they were not so thirsty that they were in any danger of hurting themselves by drinking too much, too fast.

  He kept an eye on the crests of the hills around them; the disadvantage of stopping here (or anywhere) for a drink was that doing so made them very vulnerable. But this spring, flowing as it did out of the side of a hill, at least was not as exposed as the stream it fed, that ran along the bottom of the valley. He put a lookout on the crest of the hill, which was all anyone could reasonably do, and trusted also to his Gift and that of the FarSeer that was with them to warn of any danger approaching.

  But all that appeared was a herd of sheep and a dog—and a very brief glimpse of the shepherd, who turned his flock aside and back over the hill when he saw them.

  :At least he'll know the water's safe,: Kantor pointed out, as he rounded everyone up, anxious to be gone now that they had been spotted. :I don't think he's likely to say anything to anyone for a while. Days, probably.:

  Considering the taciturn nature of the lone shepherds here, Alberich was inclined to agree. The Sunpriests hated them, for they could not be controlled as easily as villagers. They thought their own long thoughts alone out here, for moons at a time, and could not be compelled to come for the regular temple services. You could not leave sheep to tend themselves while you hiked to the nearest village for SunDescending, Sun-Rising, Solstice and Equinox, after all, and sheep tended to run astray when they felt like doing so, not on any schedule. If there was to be wool for the wheel and the loom, and mutton and lamb for the table, the shepherds had to be left to their own ways and thoughts. The priests were not amused, but they could do nothing about it.

  On a rock beside the mouth of the spring, he left the thank-token for whoever actually owned the resource. It might even be that shepherd—but whoever laid claim to the water rights would find the proper toll for the use of his water. Alberich had packed several such needful things in Kantor's saddlebags before they'd left. In this case, it was something virtually every hillman would find useful, the more especially since the confiscation of so many weapons by the Sunpriests; a Tedrel crossbow and a quiver of quarrels for it, all wrapped in oiled canvas to keep them safe. There was nothing about any of the tokens Alberich had brought that said "Valdemar" and nothing—such as, for instance, a bit of gold—that would be difficult for a poor hillman to explain.

  These were, after all, his people still. He would have a care to what happened to them when he was gone again.

  And on they went, taking to the pounded track once again, as the sun sank on their right and the light edged into gold, and golden-orange and the shadows of the hills grew long and stretched across their path.

  That was when he sent Laika and a younger Herald out on a long scout ahead. If Laika was right, they should be getting near to the camp. And he began the usual futile attempt to probe at the near-future, like a man probing at an old wound to see if it still hurt. As usual, his Gift was silent.

  Which was, in a way, a good thing, since it wasn't warning him about anything.

  The sun was dropping nearer the horizon now, and the sky to the left had turned a deeper blue, while the sky to the right, with long banks of cloud across the path of the sun, was turning red. It would be sunset soon, and they still hadn't found that camp. He was beginning to be concerned. They would have to decide very shortly whether to go on under the full moon, able to see all right, but risking ambush, or make camp themselves—

  :Alberich!: came a Mindcall; it jerked him out of his preoccupation with scanning the hilltops for trouble, and made his heart race in sudden alarm.

  :Steady on, Chosen. That wasn't trouble—: Kantor said. And in the next moment, he knew that his Companion was right, of course. If it had been trouble, there would have been warning and alarm in that mind-voice.

  It was from the youngster who had gone out with Laika. And the next words that came were excited, not fearful. :Alberich, get up here—you have to see this to believe it!:

  The excitement communicated itself to Kantor, who tossed his head in sudden impatience to be gone, ears pricked forward, muscles tensing.

  "Laika and Kulen, something have seen!" he called to the rest. "Keep to the track—summoned I have been."

  Kantor evidently felt that was enough; he launched from a swift walk into a flat gallop, speeding over the top of the hill, down across the next valley, and over the next hill, and the next, and the next—

  And that was when Alberich saw why there had been so much excitement in Kulen's mind-voice. Because, coming slowly toward them, flowing over the hill like a dusty, moving carpet, was an army.

  An army of children.

  Not just children, he saw, after his first astonished look. There were some adult women among them. But not many, and they were burdened with infants, slung across their backs and their chests, carried in baskets, even.

  It was clearly the children themselves who were in charge here—and it made Alberich's heart leap into his throat to see how carefully they were tending to each other. There were carts pulled by donkeys and ponies full of the very smallest, led by those old enough to control a beast. There were more carts that the tallest and strongest were towing themselves. And those old and strong enough to walk by themselves were doing so, in little groups, each shepherded by one older child.

  And now that Alberich was here, Laika was not going to wait any longer; she and her Companion raced toward the oncoming horde, and after an initial reaction of alarm, several of the children recognized her, and dropped the bundles they were carrying to race toward her, cheering as they went.

  :Kantor—:

  :I've told them,: Kantor replied joyfully. :They're putting on some speed.:

  By the time Alberich and Kantor got to the front of the mob, Laika was engulfed in children, all babbling in that strange polyglot tongue she had told him about. He remembered what else she had told him as they rode on the way—that these poor children were starved for adult attention, that she used to tell them stories, and had made herself a kind of extended grandmother to a great many of them. The dry, bare bones of her narrative did not prepare him for seeing this, and he felt his eyes stinging with tears. At least he had had his mother, lonely though his childhood had been—

  He felt a tugging at his sleeve, and looked down at a little girl who had the features of one of his own hill folk. "Aunty Laika says you were of the people of the Sunlord," the child whispered in Karsite, peering up at him hopefully. "And that you are of the White Riders of the Ghost-Horses now—"

  "I am both," he told her, immediately dropping to the ground to put his eyes on a level with hers. "This is my Ghost-Horse; his name is Kantor."

  :Ghost-Horse? Where did she come up with that? I like that a great deal better than "White-Demon" or "Hellhorse,": Kantor said, lowering his nose to touch the hand she stretched out to him.

  "Have you really come to take us somewhere safe?" she asked, as he marveled that a child of Karse should ever reach toward a Companion without fear.

  "We have—but who told you of all this?" he asked, trying to make sense of the puzzle. "Who told you about Ghost-Horses and White Riders?"

  If it was Laika, he was going to have a few choice words with her. That sort of story could have gotten her killed and the other three Heralds exposed.

  "Oh, it was Kantis, of course," the child told him blandly, in a tone that put the emphasis on of course. "Kantis has told us about the White Riders forever, and he promised us that some day they would come and take us where there are always good things to eat and a soft bed to sleep in, and no one would make us walk when we're tired, and that we'd all have a mum and a da, though we'd have to share—"

  Be
fore he could ask her who Kantis was, much less where he was and how he had come up with this unlikely tale and convinced them it was going to be true, she caught sight of something past his shoulder, and with a squeal of glee, ran off.

  He looked around; what she had seen, and what had set the rest of the children running, was the first lot of Heralds and wagons topping the hill, brushed by the scarlet and gold of sunset. And in a moment, he was nothing more than a rock in a flood of children who found a little more energy in their weary bodies to run. They flowed around him like the largest flock of sheep in the world, faces transmuted by hope—and it was all he could do to hold back his tears.

  And of course, faced with this oncoming flood of children screaming, not in fear, but with delight, the Heralds and Healers and teamsters reacted just as any decent human beings would—tumbling out of the seats and off their mounts to open their arms and their hearts, to open the boxes and bags of provisions they had brought, to stuff little hands and mouths with food and drink and toss little bodies into wagons padded with blankets, even as more little bodies were helping even littler ones to climb up as well. They couldn't understand what the children were saying, but they didn't need to know to understand what was needed.

  And many of them were smiling with tears in their eyes. How could they not? After leaving that grim scene of battle aftermath behind them, how could they not want to ease their own aching hearts with the warmth of a joyful child?

  And it was all sorted out in a remarkably short period of time. Those carts that had been drawn by children were fastened to the backs of the wagons. With the children themselves sharing out the provisions in a generous way that made Alberich marvel, everyone got enough to fill his empty belly. The few camp followers who had come with the children rather than fleeing, burdened with abandoned infants, were provided with seats and clean linens for the babies, and in lieu of milk, sugar-water for them to suck to at least stop their crying and ease their hunger. The last of the teamsters, finding no need for their empty wagons, asked permission to go on under guard and see what they could get out of the abandoned camp. After a moment of thought, Alberich gave his permission—although, with unchildlike forethought, the little ones were all carrying loot in their bundles: whatever was small, valuable, and light.

  They gave it up to the Heralds without a second thought, and that pained him. Did they think they would have to pay for their rescue?

  "No," Laika said, when he asked her that. "No, this is just something that this mysterious Kantis told them to do."

  He relayed that information back to the army via Kantor, along with his recommendation that at least a portion of it be kept in trust for the children themselves. That was all he could do about it, but they seemed far more interested in eating and sleeping than in the jewelry and coins they'd lugged along, so he dismissed it from his mind.

  As if the One God had decided to ease their way further, the full moon rose before the last light of twilight faded. With the broad track to follow, there was no chance of getting lost, and not much chance that a horse would make a misstep and hurt himself; accordingly there was never even a thought but that they would turn around and head back to the Border.

  Bit by bit, as Laika and the other three talked to the older children, a broad picture began to form of what had happened.

  One of the first Karsite orphans scooped up by the Tedrels when they first made their alliance and moved into Karse was a boy they all called Kantis. It was he who had somehow concocted the odd "cult" that Laika had noticed among the children—a cult that admitted no adult members, and whose members were sworn to secrecy with a solemn oath that, apparently, not even the boys who were later initiated into the Tedrel lodges ever broke.

  Most of the cult that Kantis had created had a very familiar ring to Alberich, for it was virtually identical to the simple forms of Vkandis' rites that he had learned as a child from his mentor Father Kentroch, even to calling the God by the name of Sunlord. But there were more interesting additions....

  Kantis had, from the beginning, it seemed, included a kind of redemption story, told whenever times were particularly hard for the children. He told them all that "some day" the Keepers (as he called the Tedrel adults) would abandon them and never return. And on that day, the White Riders and their Ghost-Horses would come for them and take them all away into a new land. This would not be the home of the Sunlord, he had assured those who, out of bitter experience, had feared that this meant they would all have to die. No, this was a very real land, where they would all make families with a shared set of parents, where they would always have enough to eat and a warm, safe place to sleep, and where they would never have to follow the drum again.

  The children stolen out of Valdemar only reinforced Kantis' stories, when they identified the White Riders as Heralds.

  Somehow, he had impressed upon them the need to keep all of this utterly secret, even more so than the redemption story.

  And somehow, he had known the very moment when the Tedrels lost their battle, for even before the remnants of the army came running back to the camp to take what they could carry and flee, he was telling the children that now was the time. He organized them, told them they should get what they wanted and whatever "shiny things" they could find in the adult camp, hide the ponies and donkeys until the last of the adults were gone, and prepare to march north, themselves, as soon as the last of the Keepers fled away.

  Which was exactly what they had done. Those camp followers who had not run off with skirts stuffed full of valuables and some protector or alone had been bewildered by the stubborn insistence of the children on their goal, but had gone along with it, seeing no other options before them. Most of them were heartbreakingly young by Alberich's standards, and not yet hardened from "camp follower" to "whore."

  They must have set out from the remains of the camp about the same time that Alberich and his group set out from Valdemar. The entire story was mind-boggling. And he wanted, very badly, to meet this boy, this so-clever, so-intelligent boy calling himself "Kantis," and speak with him.

  But though he rode up and down the line, he could not actually find the boy. One child after another asserted that yes, Kantis was certainly with them—somewhere—but no one could tell him what group Kantis was with or where he'd last been seen. He might have been a figment of their collective imagination—he might have been a ghost himself—for he had somehow utterly vanished from among them the moment that they spotted Laika and Kulen.

  19

  THE wagons loaded with the most portable of the Tedrel wealth caught up with them much sooner than Alberich had anticipated. This was in part because the portable wealth was very portable indeed, and in part because the section carrying the children was moving slowly. The poor things were exhausted, and even packed together like so many turnips in a sack, once stuffed with food and water, they fell asleep. So, since the treasure wagons were going to have to catch up with the main part of the group anyway, Alberich took their pace down to a steady walk.

  Laika came up beside him; now that night had fallen, he was able to relax his guard. Laika, sharing his memories of Karse, was similarly relaxed. Nighttime held no terrors for Alberich now, not after so many years in Valdemar. If the Sunpriests unleashed their demons—and given how quiet the night was, he rather thought that said demons were fully engaged in pursuing stray Tedrels at the moment—he didn't think they would bother to do so here. So far as the Sunpriests knew at this point, there was no one in this part of the hills but the children, and why waste their most dangerous and powerful nighttime weapon on a lot of children?

  Children who couldn't escape on their own, and would soon be facing the Fires anyway....

  He had to unclench his jaw over that thought. And he sent up a silent prayer—not the first, and he doubted if it would be the last—that one day the Sunpriests would be answering for their transgressions, and one day it would be priests like his old mentor Kentroch, and like Father Henrick and Geri, wh
o would be ruling in Karse again.

  One of the other Heralds came riding up, looking nervously over his shoulder. "Herald Alberich, shouldn't we be putting outriders all around?" he asked. "I mean—"

  "Peace; at ease be, protected we are by the priests themselves," Alberich said, and exchanged a glance with Laika. She laughed.

  "Karsites won't stir out of their doors after dark," she said, with the air of one who knows. "Their priests have a habit of sending some sort of creepy-howly thing out at night, to make sure nobody's out doing something they shouldn't."

  "Even the Sunsguard stirs not," Alberich added, with sardonic amusement. "So that now, should even a priest order them out, they will not go."

  "Caught in their own trap," Laika said. "And serve 'em right. So by the time sun's up, we'll be so close to our people that even if they catch on we're here, our folks can mount a big enough rescue to squeak us across without losing so much as a hair."