Oath of Fealty

by Elizabeth Moon

  “I’m wearing mail,” she said to the Marshal. “I was traveling and haven’t yet changed.”

  “I also,” Valthan said. “It’s fine with me, if it is with you.”

  “Perhaps you should go to the training swords,” Marshal Berris said. “No sense risking a nick on a quality blade, just for the exchange.”

  Dorrin nodded and, seeing no stand, took off belt and sword together, hanging them on one of the hooks on the wall nearby. Valthan did the same. The Marshal handed them wooden training swords, which had only simple crossguards.

  “Knucklebusters,” Dorrin said, grinning. Valthan grimaced, but ended in a grin. She jumped lightly onto the platform and walked back and forth, imprinting its dimensions in her mind; Valthan did the same. Then, from opposite corners, they waited the Marshal’s signal, and when it came, began a slow spiral toward each other.

  Valthan held the training blade a little loosely, as he would have a dueling blade, where the play of fingers had more effect. Dorrin, equally skilled with duelers’ weapons, battle swords, and short swords, wondered if it was a feint. The sword he’d been wearing had a scabbard as broad as hers. She feinted; his response was so quick, she grinned as she parried, the clack of the wooden blades loud in the breathless silence. He tried a second thrust, just off where it should have been, and she made a parry that trapped his blade long enough to drive a thrust to his shoulder. A touch, no more than necessary, but he dipped his head, acknowledging. An honest dueler, then. Not all were.

  He switched hands suddenly, and with a diagonal pace attempted her unprotected side; Dorrin spun with his move, instinct taking over, and the strong inner third of her blade met the outer third of his—strong against weak—with enough force to take it from his hand and send it clattering across the platform to land in someone’s hands a length away.

  Valthan stared at her, empty-handed and wide-eyed, for a moment. She forced herself to stillness, backed a step, and bowed. “My pardon, Sir Valthan,” she said. “Enemies have made that switch before, and I forgot this was a ritual exchange. I struck harder than I should have.”

  “How did you do that?” he asked, still staring as if she’d turned into a wildcat. Or a wicked mageborn.

  “I would be glad to show you in slow practice,” she said. “It’s a very useful stroke, but only against that particular attack. If the Marshal permits?”

  Marshal Berris seemed as awestruck as Valthan. “Please,” he said. “I was taught how to face an other-handed fencer, but only quick retreat and regroup if someone switched hands.”

  “Let’s have that blade,” Dorrin said, as if the fellow holding Valthan’s wooden blade were one of her own cohort, and he handed it back, hilt-first, very politely. She checked the tip. “I’m sorry, Marshal—I cracked this blade. You’ll have to get another. I’ll be glad to pay—”

  “No, no … these are practice blades; they break; it’s their nature. Here—Sir Valthan, do you wish to be the demonstration model, or shall I?”

  “I,” Valthan said, reaching for the replacement blade. “I’ve never had someone disarm me with that move; I want to see how it was done.”

  “Very slowly, so they can see,” Dorrin said. “Do exactly what you did. Do you have a count for it? If so, call it out.”

  He complied. The feint before the switch, one and two; the change of hands, three and four, but his foot was already moving in the diagonal step.

  “If I had stood still,” Dorrin said, standing still, “he would have had an excellent draw cut here …” As he moved past her, she allowed the cut, fore and aft. “That’s how it’s supposed to work. Now, if you don’t mind, at the same speed, repeat.” He returned to his place and began the same moves.

  This time, moving at his speed, she demonstrated the footwork that moved her out of danger, and gave her opening to strike. She held up her hand and they both halted at the moment of contact, showing how the leverage was all hers by correct placement.

  “It’s a viable parry even if you don’t disarm your opponent,” she said. “But at full speed, it will usually jar them enough to cost them their blade, if your own has some weight.”

  After that, the Marshal wanted to try it, and soon Dorrin was tiring. It had been a very long day. He recognized that, and agreed to meet her at the inn the next morning to talk.

  “That trick,” Valthan said, on their way back to the inn. “It’s just a trick of fence?”

  “Yes,” Dorrin said. “What did you think? Magery?”

  “It was so … unexpected.”

  “I learned it in Valdaire,” Dorrin said. “My third campaign year with Phelan. I’d taken a gash from someone who did what you did, only with steel, and a man with a withered arm approached me after, and said he had a foolproof response for such attacks. I didn’t believe him, but it turned out he was a fencing master famous there, and though it cost good gold, it has been worth it since. He had lost the use of one arm to a poisoned blade, and knew more about fencing one-handed against many attacks than even the Duke’s armsmaster Siger. Practice it in your mind, and in a salle only in private; use it only at full speed, and no one will know what you did.”

  “But you taught it to an entire grange of Girdish yeomen,” Valthan said.

  “I showed it to them. Not one in a dozen will work enough to make it useful to them. And I taught it to Siger, in the Duke’s Company.”

  “You puzzle me,” Valthan said, as they neared the inn.

  “I puzzle myself,” Dorrin said, grinning. “I must get some rest. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Dorrin woke before dawn and fumbled for the candle at her bedside. A chill draft came from the window, through both the inner and outer shutters. Above her, she heard a faint creaking of floorboards; below, the steady slop-slop-slop of someone mopping a floor, probably the inn common room. Somewhere outside a horse whinnied and mules brayed, the sound growing louder as more animals joined in. In the candle’s dim glow, she could see the leather case with its contents, her pack, yesterday’s clothes hung on a stand before the fire, now a bed of warm ashes.

  Someone tapped on the door. “Light your fire?”

  A very superior inn. “Come in,” Dorrin said, and reached for her belt with its pouch of coins. A serving girl, with a canister of kindling and a lighted taper.

  “Breakfast soon,” the girl said, kneeling to place the kindling. “Can bring it here, if you’d like.”

  “I’ll come down,” Dorrin said. She swung out of bed—a clean one, she’d noticed the night before—and as the fire caught, crackling, she handed the girl a copper. “Thank you,” she said. “What’s the weather outside? Clear or snow?”

  “It’s not clear but there’s no snow,” the girl said, picking up the canister of kindling. “Cold, though.” She left, and Dorrin heard her tap on another door. Already the room felt warmer.

  Dressed in cleaner clothes from her pack, Dorrin made her way downstairs and out to the jacks. On the way back inside she stopped at the barn and spoke to the two guards Selfer had posted. Selfer himself was coming out the inn’s side door.

  “Morning, Captain. Favors of the day to you. They’ve almost got breakfast service started.” He looked wide awake, eyes bright, cheeks flushed with the cold.

  Dorrin grinned. She had been that young once, and Selfer could have been a son. “And a fair morning to you, Selfer. I’ll be meeting with the local Marshal and possibly other town officials sometime this morning; we’ll stay here another day, let the animals rest up.”

  “I’ll see the troops get some drill in, then,” Selfer said. “Any other orders?”

  “Ears and eyes open. No one to wander off alone, but if you let Tam and Amisi go shopping for something, they might hear …” Tam and Amisi, Dorrin knew, found information the way pigs found acorns.

  “Oh, I think we need several things. One of the mules’ halters is worn; I noticed that yesterday. I’ll ask the landlord if there’s a leatherworker in tow
n. And two horses need a loose shoe reset … have to take them to the smithy. Can’t say I like the look of a girth or so …”

  Dorrin chuckled. “You’re learning, Selfer, indeed you are. Take care of it, then. Don’t forget to eat your own meals.”

  She went on into the inn, where the smell of frying ham permeated the common room. A few locals huddled at one table over mugs of steaming sib. By their clothes, they were workmen of some sort, young and probably still unmarried. Through the door to the kitchen, she saw a file of her cohort, moving slowly past two serving women who piled ham on half loaves of bread and handed each a bowl of porridge, and then out the kitchen door toward the barn.

  Dorrin caught the landlord’s eye and he jerked his head at a table to one side, closer to the fireplace than the windows. She took the small table, and in a few moments he appeared with a wooden platter of ham and eggs and a pottery bowl of hot porridge. He went back and fetched a pitcher of cream and small pot of honey as well as a small loaf of hot bread.

  She was halfway through breakfast when Sir Valthan came down the stairs, yawning. He blinked when he saw her. “You’re up early.”

  “Not really,” Dorrin said. “Just habit.”

  “I hate mornings,” he said. “May I?” She nodded, and he pulled out a chair and sat down. “My da believed in early rising and used to yank the covers off and slap my feet with a wet towel.” He rubbed his eyes. “I can stay up all night easier than I can get up before daylight—broad daylight.”

  “Breakfast will help,” Dorrin said. She pushed the remainder of her bread across the table, and stood. “I’m full—get started. I’ll tell them to bring you the rest.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Dorrin went into the kitchen; the last of her cohort had a tray of mugs and a big pot of sib. She told the kitchen staff about Valthan and followed her cohort out. They had the barn’s big doors open and enough light came in to let them eat, sprawled on the earthen floor. They started to rise, but she waved them back down.

  “I’ll let you know what I find out later today,” she said. “Selfer’s looking for a good drill field; the grange here—which isn’t Harway Grange, but Thornhedge—may let us use their drill field, or a Field of Falk may have some space. Some of you will be given errands in town; the rest stay close, don’t wander about.”

  “Think there’d be trouble, Captain?” one of the younger soldiers asked.

  “No more than we ever have in towns, but some of you have just made it into the Company. Listen to your sergeants: If you get drunk, gamble, or swive, you can be punished by locals and I can’t interfere.”

  “I thought—”

  Kefer shook his head. “Don’t argue, Selis.” He grinned at Dorrin. “He’ll learn soon enough, Captain. Selfer said you had assignments.”

  “I won’t know until after I talk to the Marshal whether we’re marching tomorrow. Selfer’s probably already set it up, but be sure the farrier checks all the shoes, not just the ones we know are loose.”

  Back inside with Valthan, Dorrin told him what she expected. “They would have had word their attack on Phelan failed—quicker here than in Vérella. I am sure the Duke and his brother had plans for that contingency, known to those at Verrakai House. They would have followed those plans and awaited word from the Duke.”

  “And no word would have come—”

  “We cannot know that,” Dorrin said. “Haron could have assigned messengers not known to be his agents—ordinary merchants, they might seem, innocent travelers—who’d carry word from Vérella of his success or failure there.”

  “And you’re sure failure would not lead them to capitulate?”

  “Cooperate with an Order of Attainder? No. For one thing, at least some of them must be guilty, and thus would face certain execution. They’ve all practiced magery and as you reminded me, the practice of magery was outlawed. They will not want to give that up any more than a man with two legs will volunteer to hobble on one.”

  “So we may expect violent resistance?”

  Dorrin frowned. “I do not know how violent … but some combination of magery—which may be quiet and cunning rather than open violence—and force. Some of the servants, at least, will be Liartians by belief, not out of fear alone. We should be provisioned so that we need eat no food prepared there until I’m sure of the kitchen staff for instance.”

  “I still wonder—how can we know you will be able to hold off their magery? What if Liart strengthens theirs against you? Or—or invades you?”

  “Do you, as a Girdsman, think Liart is stronger than Gird and the High Lord?”

  “No, but …” His voice trailed away; he looked around the common room. “With all due respect … who in this kingdom knows what your powers really are, or whence they come?”

  Dorrin wished Paks would walk in the door—the sudden appearance of a paladin of Gird being likelier than that of the Knight-Commander, and undoubtedly more to Valthan’s taste—but when the door opened, it was for someone who looked like a mason, down to the mortar splashes on his clogs. “What proof would convince you?” she asked.

  “I—I don’t suppose you could show—something—somehow?”

  “Violate the Code to satisfy you?”

  He flushed. “I didn’t mean—”

  “I know,” Dorrin said. “But it’s what you’re asking. The only reason the prince granted me permission to use magery is to ward off that of my relatives.” Then she had a thought. “What if we talk to Marshal Berris, and if he agrees, I will show you a little in the grange, where you can witness whether or not Gird approves? Will that do?”

  He nodded. “Yes, indeed.”

  “Then, we’ll do that. My plan is this: Since you will have to transport those under attainder to Vérella, I will bind their magery for your protection. Unless a priest of Liart intervenes, they should be unable to break those bindings themselves. Therefore I recommend you lodge them in a Girdish grange each night, and have the Marshal help watch over them.”

  He nodded, clearly happy with that idea. “With so many granges between here and Vérella that should be easy enough, and I can use a courier to warn the Marshals.”

  Dorrin went on. “Even without magery, and without weapons of their own, they will do everything they can to injure you and your troops and escape. Do not assume that because they are women of high family with fine manners they will be docile; you must be as wary as if they were a band of brigands. Travel with all speed.”

  “I understand. Will you send the Phelani cohort with us for extra guards?”

  Dorrin shook her head. “My cohort must stay with me, to keep order in Verrakai lands until I am certain all members of the family have been found and turned over to the Crown. I have been gone so long, I do not even know how many there are.”

  “What order of march do you recommend when we go into Verrakai?”

  “Half your troop in front, and half behind, mine; I will ride with you in front. We need the royal colors visible; I have had no chance to change mine from Phelan’s.”

  “You could at least change saddlecloths to blue,” Valthan said.

  “My troops are but lent, from Phelan—or whoever comes after him. They have their own colors.”

  “They’re mercenaries; they’ll serve who pays.”

  Dorrin stared at him until he looked down. “Mercenaries, sir, have loyalties as well as greed. My troops have fought years with me, and are loyal to me, but through me to Phelan, to whom I was loyal.” To whom she had hoped to stay loyal, to become a vassal in Lyonya, but now that was impossible. “Nonetheless, a change of saddlecloths might be a good idea. Excuse me.” She pushed back her chair and went outside.

  “Captain, what orders?” As always, one of her cohort stood sentry by the door.

  Dorrin took a deep breath and tried to relax the tension in her shoulders. “Where’s Selfer?” she asked.

  “In the stable, Captain, checking the farrier’s work. I can go—”

  �
�No, I’ll go,” she said. Calm. She must stay calm. She must not react to such slight insults as Valthan’s assumptions about mercenaries; her relatives would try that, too, hoping for a chink in her mental armor.

  In the stables, the familiar smells of dung and hay and animals took the last knot out of her shoulders. In the aisle, one of the men held a horse’s lead, while Selfer picked up one hoof after another. Dorrin paused to watch, and when he was done, he looked around and saw her.

  “Captain—I was just checking—”

  “All done, then?”

  “Yes; everything’s shod, all the straps mended, ready to pack up—do we march?”

  “I want your opinion on something, you and the sergeants. Find Kefer and Vossik and meet me in the harness room.”

  “Yes, Captain.” He jogged away; Dorrin walked to the end of the stables and turned in to the small room lined with pegs for harness, now mostly empty but ready for the traders and their wagons come summer.

  The three entered a few moments later. “You know what I’m going to Verrakai for,” Dorrin said. “I’m thinking about the effect of taking you there—I need you, and you’ve all agreed to come, but under normal conditions a new duke would be wearing House colors and carrying the family banner. Instead—” She gestured. “We’re all in Phelan’s colors, and all our insignia are his.”

  “You want us all to change uniforms?” Vossik asked.

  “No. But I’m thinking it might be a good idea to indicate that though you’re Phelani, you’re temporarily operating as legitimate troops of the Verrakai Duke: me. We could replace the saddlecloths with blue ones, get a blue banner made up … I’m asking your reaction to that, and your opinion of the troops’ reaction.”