by sun sword
The girl sized her up as well, returning her measured stare with a tight-lipped defiance. But she didn't speak. After five minutes, it became clear that she wasn't going to.
"You're not from around here." It wasn't a question.
"No."
"Good."
At that, the young woman raised a dark brow.
"You've just committed three serious protocol errors, and you're only a civilian." She paused. "First: I'm The Kalakar. There are ten important Houses, and I rule one of them. You bow when you enter my presence, and you wait until I've acknowledged that bow before you rise. Second: I'm your elder—by a good number of years—and were I not your superior, manners would still demand that you at least lower your head. Third: You are the supplicant here. I've granted you an audience, which means I'm willing to hear you speak. If you want something from me, you ask me—you don't wait for me to ask you. Is that clear?"
"Am I?"
"Are you what?"
"A supplicant?"
It was not what Ellora expected to hear. "Aren't you?"
"It depends."
Definitely not what Ellora expected. "This," she said dryly, "should be interesting. There's food here; do you mind if I join you?" The irony in her tone, heavy enough to crush a lesser man, didn't seem to bother the younger woman in the slightest.
In fact, it didn't seem to be apparent to her. At all. I must be getting subtle in my old age.
"What exactly does it depend on?"
It was obvious that Ellora was not the only woman to be nonplussed. The girl opened her mouth to speak, but, having nothing to say, clamped her lips into an uncomfortably narrow line. Her eyes, narrowed as well, searched the older woman's—but when she didn't find what she seemed to be searching for, she relaxed. Which is to say, her knuckles, white around the sword's hilt, took on color as her grip loosened. She did not let go.
"Let's start again," Ellora said. "Why have you come to my House?"
"She brought me here."
"I see. Did she say why?"
"She said I would find service and food here."
"Perhaps she didn't make it clear that the service was to be offered to Kalakar by you. In return for which, you receive food and shelter."
"What… service?"
"Do you know what an army is?"
The girl nodded, once again oblivious to the heavy sarcasm in the older woman's voice. "Good. Service to Kalakar—to me—would take that venue. You become a Sentrus in the Kalakar House Guards. You follow my commands, you follow my rules, and you defend the interests of my House. In return, you become a part of the best army in the Empire; you become a compatriot to the men and women who define the term loyalty! There is no finer force."
The girl was silent for a long time, weighing the words that she'd been offered. Then, quietly, she looked up at the woman who ruled the House. It was, Ellora thought, as if a mask had fallen from her face and been replaced in haste; something looked out of those dark, dark eyes that seemed haunted. And hungry. And Ellora very much doubted that this stiff, defiant young girl wanted to reveal either. Yet it was in that brief glimpse, awkward and unspoken, that Ellora understood why Evayne had come.
Yet again, The Kalakar was to be surprised.
"You don't want me," the young woman said softly. It was not an accusation; it was a confession. Ellora had thought to hear neither.
"Pardon?"
"You don't want me. These House Guards—these Kalakar guards—they are yours. I think they are important to you."
The girl didn't know. Ellora looked at the not-quite-neutral expression on the young woman's face. "Yes," she said, leaving sarcasm and irony behind. "To me, they are the House.
"The woman who brought you here didn't tell you about Kalakar." There was no question; the answer was obvious.
"No."
"Then I will not. Words are easy; they prove nothing. But let me say this: I'll take you on your own merits if I'm convinced you have any. I won't ask about your past; I don't care about what you did under someone else's rule. What I care about is Kalakar, and the House Guards. Give me your word that you will live and die as a House Guard, and I will give you my word that you will have the protection that I extend to any of my people."
"And what of them?"
"Them?"
"The House Guards."
"What do you mean?"
It was the younger woman's turn to be frustrated, but the frustration didn't prevent her from speaking. "You can give me your word—and I'll trust it—but you can't give me their word. The rest of the House Guards. Are they going to want to die because you tell them that I have to be protected?"
"I don't know your name, young lady," was the terse reply, "but I do see your ignorance, and I forgive it. Barely. You may insult me as you see fit—but the men and women of the House Guards are above your reproach. Wear their colors, wear their name, and you are a House Guard. You will not have brothers or sisters who mean more, or to whom you mean more. They will raise their swords in your defense, and they will lower their shields only when they've fallen. Do you understand?"
"No."
To be brought up short so many times in such a brief conversation was refreshing. At least that's what she told herself as she unclenched her teeth and tried to smile. "No?"
"I know that you mean what you say. And I know how to fight." She swallowed, and for the first time since The Kalakar stepped onto the terrace, she lifted a shaking hand from the comfort and security of a sword hilt. "Tell me how to wear these colors. Tell me what I must do."
"You can start," The Kalakar said, rising, "by telling me your name."
"Kiriel," the girl said. Then, hesitantly, "Kiriel di'Ashaf."
The Kalakar frowned. "That's the Southern variant," she said stiffly. "In Averalaan, we style it A'Ashaf." Pausing, she looked down at the set lines of the younger woman's jaw. "Do you speak Annagarese?"
"Some." Kiriel lowered her head. "It's from the Valley."
"Averda." The Kalakar knew, from the tone of the young woman's voice, that she would not speak about the teacher of that language.
"Well?" The Kalakar rose as the two men entered her study. Papers were scattered from one end of the room to the other, although most were concentrated on the surface of a desk that was—beneath everything—something of a personal heirloom. The maids and the servants did not clean this room—at the command of The Kalakar, no one touched it—and the scent of dust was strong enough to carry over the smell of burning oil. The study had one window, and at that, a small one; The Kalakar disliked working where passersby could watch her.
The younger of the two men, Gavren AKalakar, gave a crisp salute. Had he a different personality, he would have been the regiment's heartbreaker; he had a face which could be used as a model for the statues of the gods. Had, in fact, been used, at least five times. Battle—the action he had seen—had been fierce and intense, but somehow, perhaps through the grace of a protective god, that face had always emerged intact.
The Kalakar nodded at the younger man. He did everything so crisply and cleanly he had never once been up on drunk and disorderly charges—and rumor had it that more than once it was Gavren who had had to fend off the unwanted attentions of starry-eyed villagers rather than the other way around, much to the amusement—and envy—of his cohorts. She believed it and privately wondered if any of those starry-eyed maids had ever gotten what they wanted. "Speak."
"She almost broke Stavro's arm. She did break Corin's ribs." As Primus Gavren AKalakar noted the darkening set of The Kalakar's face, he raised a hand. "I do not believe that she injured either Sentrus intentionally."
"She broke Corin's ribs by accident?"
The Primus nodded quietly.
"Corin's no Michale."
"No; he knew she was trouble the moment she set foot in the pit. We all did. She's not a pretty face—well, she is that—but she's too damned cold for it. Doesn't play to her size either."
"You didn't like her."
Primus Gavren exhaled. It always came down to this, no matter how professional he wanted to be. The Kalakar was, he thought ruefully, a lot like his mother, Lady lead her to peace. You couldn't lie to her—in fact, you usually didn't get enough time to try.
She laughed before he could answer. "I love it when you think, Gavren—you do it so slowly." Genuine amusement took any sting out of the words as the man who was generally acknowledged to be the regiment's own Karatis reddened.
"There's nothing about her to dislike—" he began, but The Kalakar waved him to silence and turned quietly to the older man who stood to his left. "Well?"
Vernon AKalakar—the Verrus known to the Kalakar House Guards as the Iron Fist—frowned. As this was his usual expression, neither Gavren nor Ellora was particularly concerned. He was an older man; the only man on the Council who had more military experience than Ellora herself. It showed; his face was lined with a network of sun-bleached scars, and he was missing the tip of his right ear, but he stood with the quiet confidence of a Verrus. "I don't know why you accepted her, Commander, but you must have had your reasons. It's clear that she knows how to fight. Clearer still that she knows how to kill. What's not clear to me—and I was there—is that she knows how not to kill." He raised a finger to his chin; he often did while in thought.
"Corin is still alive," The Kalakar pointed out dryly.
"In a test situation, where there is no serious threat." Vernon AKalakar was not known for his sense of humor. With, Ellora thought wryly, damned good reason. "She's trouble."
"And that means?"
"If you must keep her with the House Guards, you keep her with the Black Ospreys."
Gavren's dark brows disappeared into the line of his hair. "You want to put a girl who's not yet adult with them?" Pause. "Uh, sir." Fist, with no conviction, struck unarmored chest.
The Kalakar looked to her adviser. "The Ospreys?"
Vernon Loris AKalakar nodded quite grimly.
"I was afraid you'd say that."
"You knew I'd say it."
"Well, yes." She sighed. "But you know what Duarte's going to say. Luckily, I'm the Commander—and you're the Verrus. You tell him."
"Yes, sir." Respect was in each of the two words, but Ellora had no illusions; she would regret this sooner or later. Later, as usual, was preferable.
Primus Duarte Samison AKalakar was a man in his prime—which is to say, just shy of forty and not pleased with the prospect of crossing that decade. It wasn't age; his training in the Order—surrounded by men and women who had not reached the peak of their powers until their sixth decade—took the sting out of encroaching mortality. But as he rolled up and out of the dusty basin, hands sprouting a thin, thin ribbon of blue flame, his back creaked ominously.
Hiding in the basin beneath the cover of thatched mat and a thin veil of dust-held hiding had been part of the plan. The Ospreys, replete in their light armor with weapons drawn and readied a hundred yards away were also a part of Duarte's plan—although he wasn't part of theirs.
The voice of the Verrus—a whip's crack of a shout— froze the Ospreys in place, and the delicate balance of the training run was shattered. Which meant, of course, that an hour eating dirt and dust with the rest of the worms, an hour sweating and baking under the cloudless sun, with a back that was getting—admit it—too old for this sort of severe test, had just been thrown away. Cursing under his breath, he stood; if it was over, it was over. There wasn't any reason to leave his cheek buried in the dust.
He narrowed his eyes and swore as he glanced at the Ospreys. Those sons of bitches were carrying armed crossbows—something The Kalakar strictly prohibited in practice. Vernon was going to have their balls. No, not just balls. Fiara was right in there among them, which only proved that women had just as little common sense as men—at least in the Ospreys.
"Good show," muttered Alexis, wiping her chin and scanning the horizon with narrowed blue eyes. "Get up, Auralis. It's done. Vernon's blown it."
At another time, Duarte would have remembered that he loved to see Alexis angered—it made her vibrant, lovely, and absolutely deadly—but at this moment, he was annoyed enough himself to miss the opportunity.
Cursing, he seared the grass off the edge of the dust bowl, announcing his presence to the rest of the Ospreys. They'd gotten better at this sort of game; half an hour, and they'd have been discovered. Of course, in fifteen minutes, Auralis, Alexis, and he would have singed their left eyebrows off, but still. Things happened in a training run.
"Duarte, the unit hasn't recovered from the last bill The Kalakar tendered for damage done to her scenery." Auralis, unperturbed as always, rose as if dust couldn't cling to him, folding his arms lazily across his chest. His hair, long for a soldier's, hung at his back in a single copper plait. "Well, what have we here?" He whistled softly, ignoring Alexis' glare, which wasn't easy.
Verrus Vernon, uniformed for the warmer weather, walked with a young woman by his side—a stranger to the House Guards. It was privately said that Auralis knew every woman on the grounds, some more intimately than others. Whether it was truth or no, it was clear that he hadn't seen this dark-haired, slender girl before. Smiling broadly—with a pause for a wink at Alexis—he jumped out of the basin, stamping out the last of Duarte's flames as an afterthought.
"Vernon!"
The Verrus—a man who liked to stand on formality if ever there was one—stiffened. But as Auralis had, just this past month, been busted from Decarus to Sentrus, he hadn't much to lose.
"Primus Duarte!"
"I'm coming, I'm coming." Duarte, still trailing a cloud of dust from the edge of the grass-green cape he wore crossed the hollow and came to stand in front of the Verrus. He had carefully schooled his expression and now only looked annoyed, rather than murderous. Still, he managed to make the fist to chest salute look almost respectful.
It was more than the Verrus expected.
"I see," Vernon said, looking over the heads of the Ospreys who remained standing, like a poorly formed shield wall, a hundred yards away, "that you were in training. I apologize for the interruption, but—"
"Kalakar's orders." It was always The Kalakar's orders. "What have we done wrong this time?"
"I don't know—but I'm certain that Verrus Korama would be most interested in the details should you care to divulge them. Today that is not my concern."
"What is?"
The Verrus looked very much like the fist for which he was named. "I don't," he said, in a steely cold voice, "see crossbows on the field?"
"No, sir."
"Good." Verrus Vernon looked down—he was unbowed by age, and had always been a tall man—upon the young girl at his side. "This," he said to her. "is Primus Duarte."
Duarte looked at the girl, meeting her gaze as if it were a blade's edge. The hair on the back of his neck rose, and he took a step back. It had been at least ten years since someone had, in a confrontational setting, forced him back a step by their sheer presence—and this youngling, weapon bonded, for the Mother's sake, had just done it without opening her mouth.
He didn't know why, and Duarte was not a man who liked ignorance, especially not his own. The girl was Alexis' height—maybe less; she was slender, although the dark mesh of her armor and underclothing might hide muscle bulk. Her face was very pale, her eyes as dark as her hair. Her chin was neither pointed nor squared, her cheeks high, her forehead perfectly smooth with youth. But her sword was long; had he been the arms master to equip her, he would have suggested something lighter.
Alexis was at his side in a minute, and he caught the glint of steel—unsheathed—in her hand. "Not now," he told her softly, his words as sharp as her blade.
Looking across at Vernon, he caught—of all things— an almost sympathetic grimace. He didn't need sympathy from the Verrus. "Who is she, and why is she important enough to interrupt our exercise?"
"She is Kiriel di'Ashaf, and she is, by The Kalakar's command, a member of the unit under your c
ommand."
"What?"
"She is, by The Kalakar's command, a member of the seventeenth."
"That's not the way the seventeenth works," Alexis said, her voice cool and clean as she glared at the young woman. "If The Kalakar—"
"Alexis. Not now."
She subsided grimly. A thought came and went as Duarte glanced briefly at her: although older, she was not so unlike the stranger, except that her anger, and her unsheathed blade, made her somehow seem the less dangerous of the two.
"Verrus, this is unusual. The nature of the seventeenth is subtle and doesn't adapt easily to any external influences that are not hostile." He kept his tone as neutral as possible, which was tricky. "But if The Kalakar so commands, you know that I—that we—have never been disloyal."
"Disobedient, maybe," Auralis said, stepping forward.
"Disobedient, certainly." It was Duarte who spoke, but Auralis didn't choose to hear him. He was in mid-bow— mid-Southern-bow—and as the sun caught the sweat along his back and chest, he looked like a bronzed statue, an ideal depiction of a man, not a real one. He offered a hand, and after a moment, the young girl accepted it; nor did she seem surprised when he turned her hand over and carefully lowered his forehead to her inner wrist.
"Kiriel di'Ashaf? There are very few from the South who petition The Kalakar; you are the first in many a year."
She did not answer him, which brought a smile to Alexis' lips—the first one since the Verrus had interrupted their session—but instead gazed out beyond his broad shoulders.
Duarte knew that she was staring at the Ospreys. Counting them, measuring them by the easy way they stood, weapons half-readied, in the distance. He thought, however, that it should have taken longer for her to gain their full measure—for he had no doubt that in her brief glance, she had.
Turning lightly on one foot, she bowed to the Verrus; the movement was stiff and unnatural.
"We don't bow here," Auralis told her almost gently. "We salute. You are no longer considered a civilian; you are a Sentrus, and when you greet—or take your leave— of a Verrus, you strike the center of your chest with your left fist."