The Soldier King

by Violette Malan

  He must have asked for the privilege, Parno thought, baring his teeth. Though it remained to be seen whether the man would still think it was a privilege in an hour’s time. The trail was wide enough for the Nisveans to ride two abreast, and Jedrick occupied the leader’s position in the center of the men. The two in front rode as scouts, three or four horse lengths ahead of their comrades, the two in back the same distance behind. One of those in the rear guard was Nilo, Parno realized, and he recognized the others as well, though he did not know their names. Friends of Jedrick’s, without doubt.

  The two in front were his. Dhulyn’s greater elevation would allow her to reach the two in the rear. As he watched, the forward scouts slowed, finally stopping entirely as they allowed the others to catch up. Parno could almost feel Dhulyn’s disapproval at this carelessness wafting down from the branch above him.

  “It’s along here,” the taller of the two forward riders said, pointing into the trees as Jedrick stopped next to him. “If we leave the road here, we’ll strike an old hunting trail that will get us to the pass in half the time.”

  “We’ll catch them if we go this way?” Jedrick said.

  “We should get ahead of them,” the tall man said. “They don’t know the country, and they certainly won’t know the hunting trails. They’ll have to stay along this road to the village of Tesnib, where the road to the pass crosses it.”

  True enough, Parno thought. That was exactly what they would have done, if they hadn’t been Mercenary Brothers, for whom the positioning of mountain passes and the maps they appeared on were part of their Schooling.

  “Jedrick.” That was Nilo. “What made sense last night doesn’t make sense this morning. You’re right about killing the Mercenaries— we couldn’t hope to capture them alive—but the prince is worth any ransom, we could slip him over the border ourselves, none the wiser, and say we got to them too late.”

  “Do you want to change my orders, Nilo? Is that what you’re saying?” The other man stayed silent. “We’re to kill them all. Those are our orders. Commander Lord Kispeko has his reasons.”

  A bit of tree bark struck Parno on the left hand. Without looking, his fingers working automatically, Parno let fly his first arrow, watched it sink into the left eye of the tall man, the one who knew the hunting trails so well. At the same moment, Nilo caught an arrow in his left eye. Parno’s second arrow caught his other target in the throat as the man spurred his horse into the trees on the far side of the track, the spray of blood showing the man was dying as he went. As fast as he and Dhulyn were, however, Jedrick and the second rear guard managed to turn their horses and take flight down the road, back the way they had come.

  Dhulyn’s second arrow took the closer man in the small of the back, just where his armor left a gap as he leaned forward, but Jedrick, his red cloak bright in the light of the rising sun, was racing farther away.

  Dhulyn beat Parno to the ground by the simple expedient of stepping off her branch and letting herself fall straight down, meeting the ground with bended knees. She ran quickly into the road, dodged the milling horses with a few quick steps, putting arrow to the string as she went. She still had a clear shot, but there was a bend in the road perhaps ten spans away, and the red cloak was quickly approaching it.

  Parno opened his mouth, and shut it again as Dhulyn brought up her bow, released her breath, and let fly. Parno held his own breath. He’d seen her hit targets at greater distances—Caids, he’d done it himself— but that was with the longbow, and a still target. If she missed—he turned to grab the bridles of the two nearest horses.

  Then he heard the cry, and saw the red cloak that was Jedrick hit the ground.

  Dhulyn dropped her bow and swung herself up on the nearest horse, the animal instantly becoming calm and ready when it felt her in the saddle.

  “Demons and perverts,” Parno called after her as he struggled onto the back of the other horse. He was a good horseman—he was, even by Mercenary standards—but not compared to Dhulyn. Precious time was wasted as he persuaded his new mount that he was going to stay on its back, and that they were both going after the other horse. By the time he caught up with Dhulyn, however, she was already off her horse.

  Jedrick must have been turning to look over his shoulder, for Dhulyn’s final arrow had caught him in the neck with enough force to knock him off his horse, but it had missed any major arteries. Blood streamed from the wound, and he would die from it if he did not meet with a skilled Knife, but that death was still some time away. Jedrick’s foot had caught in the stirrup as he came down. As Parno rode up, the man was trying keep the horse between himself and Dhulyn at the same time as he remounted.

  Dhulyn grabbed the horse’s tail, twisted it, sidestepped the stamping hooves to maneuver herself to Jedrick’s side. She caught hold of the arrow shaft that protruded from the side of his neck with her right hand, swept his feet out from under him with her left foot, and pushed the point of the arrow into the ground as he went down. The horse snorted, backed away a few feet and stopped, shaking its head and blowing foam from its mouth.

  Dhulyn squatted down on her heels next to the fallen squad leader. Parno swung himself off his own mount, but stayed back.

  “Squad Leader,” Dhulyn said. “No fear, I will not go without giving you the Final Sword. Though you are no Brother of mine, I won’t leave you to die slowly on the road.”

  “I won’t tell you anything.” Jedrick’s teeth were clenched and there was sweat on his forehead.

  “We’re to be killed, and the prince with us,” Dhulyn said. “You have nothing further to tell us. Kispeko would have told you no more than that.”

  “I had to follow my orders,” Jedrick said then.

  Dhulyn nodded, pulling her knife out of its sheath in the small of her back. “You have your orders. We have our Common Rule.” She covered Jedrick’s eyes with her left hand and cut his throat with her right.

  When it was over, Dhulyn wiped the knife off on Jedrick’s shirt and straightened to her feet.

  “Blooded snail dung,” she said. “He’s gone and bled all over my cloak.”

  Avylos the Blue Mage sighed at the muted sound of unexpected voices and put down the book he was reading by the light of the candelabra next to his chair. It was late at night, and only something very momentous would bring even Kedneara’s royal pages to make such a noise in the Mage’s wing.

  “My lord, my lord Mage,” called out a voice.

  He rose and went into the corridor, pulling the door shut behind him to keep in the warmth of the small charcoal brazier under the table. A glance at the door of his workroom showed the magics intact. When he reached the door to his wing, it was to find two white-faced pages waiting for him.

  “The Royal Guard Commander Lord Semlian sends for you, my lord Mage. A horse messenger has arrived from Probic for Kedneara the Queen.” The taller page, the queen’s page, spoke up before Avylos’ attendant could. Avylos frowned, he knew this boy, a Balnian recently come to court, and ready to put himself forward.

  “From Probic,” he said.

  “Yes, my lord Mage, changing horses all the way.”

  “I will come immediately.” There were only two or three pieces of news from Probic that would warrant a horse messenger, and Avylos was curious to know which it would be.

  This was one occasion, Avylos thought as he followed the new page through the almost deserted corridors to the stairs which would eventually take them to Kedneara’s rooms, in which it might have been handier if he slept in the consort’s apartments, rather than in his own wing. But he was more than the consort, more than Kedneara’s bedwarmer—much more—and it was vital that people keep that always in mind. Long after Kedneara was no longer queen, he would still be the Blue Mage.

  It was certainly not as consort that he was being sent for now, and sent for by Lord Semlian, not the queen. Possibly Semlian thought Avylos knew something about the news that had arrived, or possibly the guard commander suspected the
news would hit the queen hard. Avylos began to walk a little faster.

  One of the first things he had learned about the magic, even before the power finally found him, was that it did not affect women the same way as men. When it affected them at all. He’d asked his father about it, when he was still a small child, before they had all turned their faces away from him, and the old man had laughed, saying, “No power is without limit, Avi, least of all any power over women.”

  So it was ironic that the one woman it was relatively easy for him to influence and affect with his magics should be Queen Kedneara. Even the armies were almost all male now for that very reason—though he carefully made that magic temporary; troops who could never be killed or injured had a way of rebelling against their masters. But the queen’s health had begun to fail early, as had her father’s before her, and the magics that allowed Avylos to heal her—not Heal, as one of the Marked could have done, but better than anything the Royal Knives had ever achieved—also allowed him an access to her mind and spirit he did not have with other women.

  Whatever the news was, it had not weakened her. Avylos could hear Kedneara shouting as he turned into the corridor of her rooms. The guards standing at her door looked up in relief when they saw him approaching, and threw open the doors to the anteroom. He nodded them aside and went in, putting his hand to the latch of Kedneara’s sitting room door, and hesitated as the thick oak shook under it. Kedneara was throwing things. He must stop her, or she would strain her heart.

  “But, my Queen.” That was Counselor Csezik’s voice. “We can send a complaint to the Mercenary House in Lesonika, and you can confidently expect—”

  “What, send a nice well-mannered clerk to ask them to explain themselves?” There was enough sarcasm in Kedneara’s tone to sour milk. “Complain that they’ve kidnapped my son? Are you mad? I want them banished. I want every Mercenary Brother out of my realm by midday tomorrow or I will send you all to the Black Dungeons! I want them GONE. Tegrian is closed to the Brotherhood. Do you hear me? CLOSED.”

  Everyone in the room found something to look at that wasn’t the queen. No one wanted to be the one to explain that midday tomorrow would not be enough time to clear the country of Mercenaries.

  Kedneara stalked back and forth over the cold stone tiles like a caged cat. She had thrown on a light robe of fine red wool embroidered with golden dragons, but was barefoot, her waist-length hair— still as dark as Edmir’s—flying loose. The robe’s trailing sleeves swung as Kedneara paced, and she kicked the train out from under her feet as she turned and saw him.

  “Avylos!” She seized him by the front of his tunic. “Find him. Find Edmir!”

  “Though I am not a Finder, my Queen, I might—”

  “Are you not a Mage? Do something! Where have they taken him?”

  Her breath was coming in short gasps, and there were two red spots high on her cheeks. If she did not restrain herself, she might easily have an attack. Almost as if she heard his thought, Kedneara took a deep breath, and then another, though she retained her grip on his tunic.

  “Perhaps they only bring him to me? That’s possible, isn’t it? They are Mercenary Brothers, after all, they are to be trusted, aren’t they? Of course they are. Perhaps all is well and Tzanek is an old woman who should be relieved of his post.”

  Here was the opening Avylos was hoping for.

  “Let me sit a moment, my Queen, let me see what I can learn. I was about to say that I am not a Finder, but where your children are concerned I have taken certain other steps, and I may be able to tell you—”

  “A chair for the Blue Mage, quickly, quickly, and whatever else he needs.”

  It was almost pathetically easy to convince them that he was performing a great feat of magic, as he took out his silver dagger, called for new, unlit candles and a bowl of the darkest wine. However, he had faked magics before, long ago, before his power found him, and he’d learned then that a good show would convince its audience of anything. It soured his stomach a little to fall back on those tricks now, when he had real power at his fingertips—but he had no intention of using up real power for this.

  After a suitable passage of time, and very visible effort, he set his dagger down, blew out the candles, and took the queen by the hands. “Sit down, my Queen. I must insist.”

  Kedneara was so white her eyebrows stood out like stains on her face.

  “I fear to give you this news, my Queen. You must be strong, for all of us, for Tegrian. For your remaining child.”

  The screams, Avylos thought with carefully concealed satisfaction, must be audible down in the Great Hall.

  Hours later Avylos shut the door of Kedneara’s bedchamber, letting the latch down slowly until it caught without making a sound. The outer room was now blessedly empty, and Avylos leaned against the doorframe, rubbing his face with his hands. He took a deep breath, tugged his robe straight, smoothed back his hair, and strode across the room to the outer door. The two guards stationed in the anteroom leaped to attention as he came out.

  “My lord Mage,” they said simultaneously as he emerged.

  “Guards.” A cool nod to them, another to the pages who stood up from their couches as he passed, and he was at the door to the queen’s apartments and through it into the wide corridor beyond.

  How fast did horse messengers travel, he wondered as he took the shortest route back to his own rooms. And two Mercenary Brothers? How quickly did they travel, considering they had an injured prince with them? The official proclamation of Edmir’s death would be made by the queen from her throne tomorrow, but there were one or two people who needed to know now, tonight. Could he afford the power?

  It was late, and even taking into account the news which must be even now spreading through the Royal House on the lips of every servant, page, guard, and noble, Avylos passed only three servants who quickly stepped out of his path as he returned to his own wing. His workroom, when he reached it, was deserted, though the wards he had placed on the door showed what he expected. Two people had attempted to open the door in his absence and been thwarted. He made a mental note of their identities, and the people most likely to have sent them. Princess Kera had also attempted to enter, and had been successful.

  He smiled, entered the room and swung the door shut behind him. Without conscious decision, his feet took him directly to the casket that held the Stone and he had one hand on the lid and the other hunting in his pocket for the key before he caught himself and stopped. He breathed in slowly, lifting both hands and taking a step back. As an added precaution, he clasped his hands behind his back as he considered.

  If he used the Stone again now, who did he have to draw upon to refill it? There was the Champion Archer, his talent and art still hot within a body almost too old to the pull the bow. The second assistant cook who made those marvelous peach pastries—a pity to use her at all, really. Even though the recipe had been passed on, that particular cook would never again create something so good. There was power and talent left yet in both of those. And, finally, this morning, Lord Semlian had come to him about that ambitious new commander in the Royal Guard. The commander who hadn’t yet learned that in order to advance in the Tegrian Guard one must be either talented, or ambitious. Not both together.

  Avylos thought a moment longer. Yes, that should be enough.

  The key was in his hand, the casket was open, and the Stone glowing in response to his touch before the thought was even complete. The Stone had seven symbols etched into its otherwise smooth surface. Four were evenly spaced—like compass points—the width of his smallest finger from one end of the cylinder. A circle with a dot in the middle, a simple straight line, a rectangle, and a long triangle like a spearhead. A finger width farther in was a plain circle, all by itself. Around the other end were only two symbols, though these were larger. One he knew, having drawn it in the air many times, the three-line symbol for “light.” The other, using only two lines, he did not know; though he’d tried drawing it, no
thing had ever happened.

  “You have more power than you are giving me,” he told the Stone, stroking the warm, smooth crystal. “And when I have found your secret, then I shall need neither queen nor realm.”

  “Gehde. Gehde. Monos. Aharneh,” he said.

  The Stone glowed brighter. He took hold of it by either end, and twisted.

  The world disappeared in a blaze of blue light.

  When the light had faded, and the world returned, the Stone still glowed faintly but perceptibly. Avylos let out a long sigh. He would leave it set, and ready for the morrow, but in the meantime, the Stone would go back into its box, he would shut the lid, turn the key, and put it away once more.

  Temptation behind him, Avylos took one of the two books of poetry from the shelf behind his worktable and opened it to its central, blank pages. Like the philosophical work he’d used earlier in the day, these pages had been made from half a sheet of parchment, itself the treated skin of a pure white animal, in this case an albino calf. Avylos threw open the tall window shutters and let in the moonlight. The moon was not quite full, but there was more than enough light at this hour to illuminate the surface of the book.

  He sat down at the table, placed his hands palm down to each side of the open volume and spoke.

  “At my command,” he said, and waited. For a long moment nothing happened, and he frowned until he remembered the hour. “At my command,” he repeated. This time the answer came.

  “I am here, my lord Mage,” appeared in script on the page before him.

  “I have grave news to tell you, City Lord Tzanek,” Avylos said. “Prince Edmir has fallen.”

  “But, my lord—” the writing broke off, almost as it would if a pen point had broken, before starting again. “Surely you are mistaken? How is this possible?”