Conflict and Courage

by Candy Rae

  “Gsnei told me.”

  “I had no idea. What else do you know?”

  “Ask Jim,” answered a grim Hilary.

  “Don’t think I won’t,” replied Tara.

  * * * * *

  “Do you realise,” said Wilhelm Dahlstrom, Weaponsmaster of the Vada, striding into Susa Francis and Asya’s office, “that over thirty new cadets have arrived in the last week? Do the Lind know something we don’t?”

  Francis lifted his head from the duty rosters and looked at the man. “Laura told me it was busy down in the cadet barracks when we got back last night. Problems?”

  “We have managed to fit all of them in all right. Luckily, with the last crop graduating their cubicles are vacant, but, if any more arrive, we’ll have to house them in the barn like we did that first year.”

  “We need the recruits,” said Francis. “Seventh Ryzck lost five pairs in the last pirate raid, not that there have been any attacks since, which is odd when you think about it. The coastlines have never been so quiet.”

  Wilhelm nodded and at Francis’s invitation sat down. The Susa pushed over a steaming jug of kala and a clean mug.

  “I’m not saying these extra cadets are a bad thing,” Wilhelm said, “but I was wondering, could there be a reason?”

  “Reason?”

  “The Lind know and sense things we do not. Mislya only tells me that they will be needed. You’ve just returned from Afanasei. What do Jim and Larya say?”

  “It was they who advised the present measures. Things are tense in the southern continent. The Larg are restless. Their meat herds are suffering, last winter was harsh and many died.”

  “The Larg are starving?”

  “Not yet, but our operatives have reported that they are moving. That’s why we recalled every vadeln-pair on leave. I plan to string out as many as I can along the coastlines of both Argyll and Vadath. Until we get more details from our men in the south, I can do little more.”

  This was the first Wilhelm had heard of ‘men in the south’. He was on to it in a flash.

  “Who are they, these men in the south?”

  “Can’t tell you that. Best that as few as possible know their identities and where they are. Their lives depend on it.”

  “Where are they? At Fort?”

  “No, we can’t get anyone in there. God knows we’ve tried.”

  Wilhelm thought hard.

  “I won’t press you, I’ve got a good idea who one of them is and that one is hidden with Duchesne.”

  Francis started, he hadn’t realised the Weaponsmaster would be this quick on the uptake.

  “What makes you say that?” he asked.

  “I know that Duchesne has returned some of the women taken at Settlement and you said recent reports. The only way quick and reliable information can get to us is via the Lind. I must therefore assume that there are vadeln-pairs down there.”

  “You are correct,” answered Francis, leaning back in his chair.

  “Maurice and Qenya,” surmised Wilhelm, “I have not seen that duo for years, not since Louis and Ustinya arrived with the Howard children.”

  Francis said nothing, staring him out.

  “Okay, okay,” Wilhelm said at last, “keep your secrets, just try to give me fair warning of what’s coming, that’s all I ask.”

  * * * * *

  Afanasei, Elda of the pack that bore his name entered Jim and Larya’s daga.

  “I have been thinking,” he began, “and I like not my thoughts.”

  “Kolyei and Tara are on their way,” warned Jim.

  “I am worried,” said Afanasei, ignoring the warning.

  “I am worried myself. Something about all this doesn’t make sense,” admitted Jim. “Fernei cannot find any traces of the kohorts to the west of Duchesne’s lands. He feels there should be some signs by now if they are going to attack Argyll over the island chain by midsummer.”

  With Peter and Radya gone to the Vada, Tara and Kolyei had decided to pay the threatened visit on Jim and Larya at domta Afanasei without further ado.

  She, like Wilhelm Dahlstrom had put two and two together.

  Jim, Larya and Afanasei were waiting for them and invited them in out of the cold. The last vestiges of winter had brought with them the high winds and rain usual for this time of year and Tara was feeling very cold and damp.

  Settled in the warmth of the daga, courtesies over, Tara started the ball rolling.

  “Kolyei and I have come to find out what is going on,” she announced, “Vada leave is cancelled. Kolyei has asked around and the Lindars have begun to run east, so we know something is up. I did ask Winston,” she added, aggrieved, “but he wouldn’t tell me a thing.”

  Jim looked at her. Gone was the timid thirteen-year-old who had gone to war with the Lindars during the Battle of the Alliance. Now he faced a competent and well adjusted adult. One glance at her determined and resolute face told him she would not leave until she knew exactly what was going on.

  “You fear the Larg will return,” she pronounced, “and I’m not buying any vuz in pokes either. Tell me the truth.”

  “Is that a translation of ‘pigs in pokes’?” asked Jim with some amusement as he tried to think of some way to divert Tara. He should have known better.

  “I’m not leaving until you tell me,” she warned.

  Jim gave it up as a bad job.

  “We have a spy in the enemy camp.”

  “We’d guessed that. Who?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  “I think you should, in fact, if you don’t I’ll list out every vadeln-pair Kolyei and I know. Your face is sure to give you away.”

  Jim gave up. He had forgotten how tenacious Tara could be and persistency was ever Kolyei’s motto.

  “Louis Randall and Ustinya.”

  Tara was quick, but Kolyei was quicker.

  “He is with the Lord who is a friend is he not?”

  “They’ve worked it out,” said Afanasei to Jim. “Tell them the rest. I have a feeling that these two will be involved before many suns have passed over the skies.”

  : The strain to keep in touch with Ustinya wearisome : telepathed Larya to her life-partner : Kolyei help share load :

  “Pierre Duchesne has been in more or less constant contact with us for the last eight years,” said Jim. “He is a friend to Anne Howard, probably the only one she can trust and has been passing information north. Good information too. Louis and Ustinya are in hiding in Duchesne’s castle. He has warned us that he believes Lord Regent Baker is about to make another alliance with the Larg. He thinks they will attack Argyll soon.”

  “You have proof?”

  “We know their regiments are in training, in fact they are on manoeuvres south of the coast. The convicts are also gathering together a fleet of galleys and barges.”

  “Galleys and barges?” exclaimed Tara. “What would they need these for?”

  “Duchesne believes they plan to divest the area around the island chain of herds. The Larg are hungry. The ships would transport the herds to the southern continent.”

  “That doesn’t seem right,” said Tara, “when they attack over the island chain they don’t need ships. They’ve always driven the herds south over the islands.”

  “Keep going,” encouraged Jim, his unease growing. He himself had been surprised at the news of the gathering of the southern fleet. It didn’t fit. If the Larg were to attack over the island chain even with ex-convict aid, a few supporting vessels should be sufficient. Perhaps Tara’s agile mind could bring some insight into what had been troubling him since the news had come through.

  “Why are Baker and the Lords supporting the Larg in this way?” asked Tara, “altruism is not one of Baker’s attributes if what Cherry tells me is true. What’s in it for him?”

  “Duchesne is convinced. They will attack over the island chain. It appears Baker has wanted another go at us for some time.”

  “I’m not convinced,” uttered Kolyei.
He sat back on his haunches and stared at the others, “how do you know the man speaks truth about this?”

  “He’s right,” said Tara, “all you have to go on really is what Duchesne is telling us and whatever else you can pick up.”

  “He’s the only contact we have who has any chance of knowing what is going on,” persisted Jim. “He is a member of that Conclave of theirs. Any other contacts we have are much lower down on the social scale, not part of the planning processes.”

  “The Larg?” enquired Kolyei.

  “Intelligence is sparse. Fernei is having trouble getting his Lind operatives close.”

  “What if this Baker distrusts Duchesne and had been feeding him false information?” was Tara’s next suggestion.

  Jim stared at her.

  “What if Baker knows, or suspects Duchesne is a friend to us?”

  “Why would he think that?” was Afanasei’s reasonable question.

  “He might at that,” pondered Jim, “it’s been eight years, Duchesne may have let something slip.”

  : It fits : interrupted Larya.

  “And if I’m right,” continued Tara with another jump of logic, “then Duchesne and his people and Louis and Ustinya, are in grave danger. We must warn them.”

  Jim was in a quandary. He had assumed, as had everyone else that if the attack Duchesne warned them about did come, their enemies would arrive over the island chain, the traditional route, the route Duchesne himself was convinced they would use. But what if Tara was correct in thinking that they were planning to attack a different way using the fleet that was gathering. Why, they could transport their army anywhere on the northern continent and he had ordered the majority of the Ryzcks and Lindars east to reinforce the beachhead that abutted the chain.

  “I will warn Louis and Ustinya,” announced Afanasei. He turned to Jim, “you will think on this and decide what we must do. You are, after all, our Susyc.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that,” answered Jim with a grimace.

  * * * * *

  It was night.

  Jim could not sleep. The feeling of unease was growing, fuelled by Tara’s words.

  Larya lay awake, listening in to her partner’s thoughts.

  It fits, it fits, Jim was thinking, feed Duchesne the false info, our armies strung along the coastlines of Argyll and then hit us. Where? And why is Baker doing this? Why now? Why is he helping the Larg to attack us? Is he that nervous about the Larg? In return for what?

  It came to him in that instant, he helps the Larg attack us, it also keeps them off his back and in return they will get rid of Duchesne. Tara was right. Baker knew Duchesne was a friend of the north. He would use the Larg to clear out Duchesne and any other northern sympathisers, put a guard on the southern edge of the islands and root out any Lind in the vicinity … and the main force … where would it hit? He knew that the Murdochian regiments were in Brentwood.

  Jim sat up and stared into the blackness.

  Where is the Larg army? Where is it hidden? An army it was, the kohorts were mustering, word had come from Maurice and Qenya shortly after Tara and Kolyei had gone back to their daga. The Lindars had been warned, those in the far west were already moving east to Argyll to meet the attack, but had he ordered them to the wrong place?

  * * * * *

  CHAPTER 29 - KINGDOM OF MURDOCH

  Louis and Ustinya were sleeping in the hidden room next to Duchesne’s private apartments in his castle when Larya’s telepathic ‘shout’ crossed the water.

  What he and Ustinya heard during the exhausting interchange that followed shocked them both to the core. Louis got dressed in a hurry. He must warn Pierre Duchesne.

  As it happened, Lord Pierre Duchesne was not asleep; having refused to attend the coronation pleading an outbreak of marsh fever in his demesne, he believed he might have bought some time by sending messengers to the Lord Regent bearing coronation gifts for young King Elliot and explaining his absence in more detail. Sam Baker might buy it, at least Pierre hoped so but he knew he had only put off the day of reckoning. His days in the south were numbered.

  Pierre was positive that a return missive was on its way to him ‘requesting’ his presence at Court at ‘his convenience’ which Sam Baker really meant ‘at once or else’.

  He heard the coded knock from the hidden room signifying that Louis was awake and had something important to tell him. Louis squeezed through the small gap that linked Pierre’s private lounge with the chamber, “they think your position’s been compromised,” he began without preamble.

  “Who do?”

  “Ustinya has just received an urgent message from Jim Cranston’s Larya and he thinks that the information you sent north regarding an impending attack on Argyll is a subterfuge by Lord Baker. Jim wouldn’t have called us unless he is convinced and he asks, has anything unusual been happening here lately?”

  “I have a border patrol overdue. They should have sent a runner in yesterday but nothing. I wasn’t unduly worried, much could have happened to delay him.”

  “Who’s in charge of the patrol? He is reliable?”

  “Trustworthy man, been with me from the beginning. I have been sitting here wondering if I should send some men to investigate.”

  “Not a good idea,” was the categorical reply from Louis.

  “Why does Jim think this? I don’t think Sam Baker was lying. The Larg will attack the north this midsummer. I saw the maps, troop dispositions. Baker’s regiments are to assist.”

  “The Lind sent an operative over the island chain last week; an experienced spy, one of the party that helped Gerry Russell escape. He found few traces of the Larg. He was most surprised to find that he was virtually unhindered in his wanderings. If the Larg are intending an attack over the island chain, there would be many more gathering. Alesei found no traces of the main kohorts. He met up with one of our spies who was returning from his mission in the deep south and he seemed to think that the kohorts have been ordered up the riverside east of Murdoch, not west. Another has reported that the regiments are no longer in the original manoeuvres area but north of it.”

  “But that would mean …?”

  “That they are intending to attack the north somewhere else other than over the Island chain. What do you know about the fleet they are assembling?”

  “Fleet? What fleet?”

  Louis was destined not to answer. The door reverberated with a staccato rapping.

  “Michael Wallace,” announced Pierre with relief, “that you Michael?”

  “Yes my Lord, I need to speak to you.”

  “Are you alone?”

  “At this time of night? Of course I am. Even the guards doze when they think nobody is watching.”

  Pierre undid the bolt and opened the door enough to allow Michael to slip in. Michael was the only other person apart from Pierre who knew of Louis and Ustinya’s presence at the castle.

  As Michael had expected, Louis was seated in one of the two comfy chairs set next to the roaring fire. Nights were cold and lighting rudimentary at best. Three sconces of candles were the only other light.

  “Evening Louis,” he said, “where’s that giant beast of yours?”

  “She can’t squeeze through the gap into your room,” grinned Louis. “She’s listening in though.”

  Michael hooked one of the stools over to the fire with a booted foot and grunted as he sat down. “Not as young as I was.”

  “The patrol?” asked Pierre with concern.

  “Nothing yet my Lord.”

  “Any sign of the Larg?” asked Louis.

  Michael thought for a moment before he replied in the negative.

  “I wonder,” Louis began, “what they are up to? Where are the kohorts?”

  “Some Larg were sighted last week,” said Pierre.

  “Too few, too few,” answered Michael, “and Pete’s patrol hasn’t turned up yet. It’s not like him.”

  “They could have had an accident,” Pierre temporised.
r />   “Pete would’ve sent a runner,” Michael, “but if he’s not back in another day I’m sending men out to look.”

  “No,” said Pierre. “I’m not going to send any more men out.”

  Michael looked up. This was not like him. Pierre Duchesne was famed throughout the Kingdom for looking after and caring for those who served him.

  “If you say so.”

  It was obvious to Louis that Michael Wallace didn’t understand but then, he didn’t know yet about Larya’s warning.

  “I’m going to report it,” decided Louis. “I’m supposed to let Jim know if anything out of the ordinary happens.” He got to his feet, “and I’d best get back to Ustinya, she gets lonely stuck in that tiny room by herself with nothing to do.”

  “Coming?” he asked Pierre, “It might be best if you were beside us when she contacts Larya. Jim might have some questions. Michael can guard here.”

  Michael’s answer was to draw his sword and lay it over his knees, his eyes glued to the door.

  “Go on with you,” he said, “find out what the northerners think about it all.”

  Two hours later a dazed and stunned Pierre walked back into the room. Michael regarded his set face with alarm.

  “We have to get out,” Pierre announced to a stunned Michael, “all of us and as soon as we can.”

  * * * * *

  CHAPTER 30 - VADATH

  Tara was worried about Peter and Radya.

  Her thoughts also wandered to her other friends. What were they doing? How was the recall affecting them? In the excitement of returning home and finding Peter she had not asked.

  She knew that Tina and Daltei were with the Tenth Ryzck but didn’t know where it had been posted?

  It was presently north of the rtathlians at its duty station in the mountains led by none other than the ex-convict Richard and Dahlya and was preparing to move out.

  Orders had arrived.