The Soldier King

by Violette Malan

  The pounding on the door renewed. With a nod at Valaika, Parno crossed back to the window, drew his sword to keep it from getting in his way should he fall, sat down on the windowsill and swung his legs over. He let himself drop straight down, knees slightly bent, ankles flexed, mindful that he might have to correct for the roughness of the cobbles below. He landed cleanly, and a quick look to the right and left assured him that he’d landed unobserved as well. He sheathed his sword and looked up in time to see Zania’s face in the window. He beckoned with his hands, and held up his arms to catch her.

  She must have learned something from the tumblers who had been with her troupe, for she twisted quickly in the air and landed in his arms as if she were throwing herself backward into a feather bed. He tipped her to her feet and looked up again. Edmir had one leg over the windowsill, but he was looking back into the room, not down at Parno and Zania.

  “Come on, boy, come on,” Parno muttered under his breath. As if he’d heard him, Edmir looked down and his lips moved silently, but almost immediately he looked away again. He dropped the hand that was hidden by his body from those within below the level of his waist, and waved them away, already withdrawing his leg.

  “What’s he doing?” Zania said. “What did he say?”

  “Guards must be in the room,” Parno said. “He’s waving us off before anyone can look out the window. Come on.” He took Zania by the elbow and pushed through the hedge beside them. If it had been more than waist high it might have been of some use as cover, but as it was, Parno needed to get them past at least two rows of fruit trees before the foliage, thick as it was at this time of the season, could adequately cover them from anyone looking out the window.

  “But what did he say?”

  “He said, ‘the Mage,’ ” Parno said. “Avylos must be with them. No, don’t look.” Parno took her by the elbow and urged her forward.

  The orchard turned out to be only three rows deep, but the hedge on the far side was as tall as Parno’s shoulder. They burst out onto yet another white pebbled path and just to their left was a stone bench, shaded at this hour of the day. Parno hooked Zania’s hand through his bent elbow and led her to the bench.

  “Sit.” He suited action to word.

  “But—”

  “We’re on a stage,” he told her, and felt her immediately relax at this bit of direction. “We’re noble lovers in a garden. And that is what anyone who may be looking out a window just now will see.”

  “Parno, what’s happening to them?”

  “Nothing we can do anything about. And Valaika was quite right, nothing very serious can happen to them, not being who they are—or, at least, who Valaika is. It’s not so easy to dispose of a High Noble House, let alone the cousin of the Tarkin of Hellik. It will take time, and in this, time is on our side.”

  “Surely Edmir will tell them who he is.”

  “The moment he thinks it will do any good.”

  “And for us? What now?” She looked up at him and smiled, just as if they were merely a courting couple taking advantage of a shady nook.

  He smiled down at her and patted her hand. “We take advantage of the absence of the Mage to get to the Stone.”

  “How will we get into Avylos’ workroom without Kera?”

  “We’ll worry about that when we get there. Today’s problems today. In a few minutes we’ll get up, and we’ll start off in that direction.” Parno nodded to the right. “We’ll be strolling, just a couple taking advantage of the rain having stopped, and the sun coming out to dry the paths.

  “And if we turn away from others, seeking out the darker and more secluded parts of the queen’s gardens and grounds, well, no one seeing a courting couple sauntering about is going to find that unusual.”

  Avylos leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, fingers tapping. Lord Semlian had managed to get himself slashed across the arm. Whatever could be said of Valaika, Avylos eyed her, she could still fight. Edmir—no, Avylos corrected himself, I must not even think of him as Edmir. Not that he was very likely to slip up. The young man had fought defensively, clearly reluctant to hurt anyone, let alone kill them. Not an unexpected attitude given who he was—but don’t say it, don’t even think it—typical really, avoid the unpleasant, even when it was necessary. Kera would have done what she needed to do, however much it might have pained her. In that, as in so many things, she was stronger than her brother. All this young man had achieved with his sensibilities was a bloody nose and a relatively quick disarming. Section Leader Megz had him bent over a chair as she bound his wrists behind him. He was smart enough to stay quiet at least.

  The two extra guards with them returned from their search of the inner rooms, shaking their heads.

  “This is everyone, my lord Mage, Guard Commander,” the shorter one said with a nod to each captive.

  “There should be at least one other,” Avylos told them. He crossed to the window and looked out. What he could see of the grounds looked normal for this time of the morning. The watch was changing, and guards walking in pairs were coming and going from stations around the perimeter wall of Royal House. On a short stretch of lawn toward the western part of the grounds a huntswoman was training a dog. Avylos lifted his head and narrowed his eyes. Near the barracks, someone was setting up butts for archery practice. There were scattered people strolling through the grounds, fewer than normal given that the rain had stopped recently, though there were even a few couples sitting on benches.

  No sign of anyone running. Nothing out of place.

  Avylos turned back into the room. “Where have you sent him this time?” Valaika did not even raise her head. Avylos wrinkled his nose. “You have seen him,” he said to the waiting guards. “The bodyguard who follows Valaika Jarlkevo. As tall as I am but thicker about the body. His dark hair is a wig, remove it and you will see a Mercenary badge.” The guards in the room exchanged glances. “If you fear to engage with him, shoot him from a distance,” Avylos told them, careful to keep the sneer from his voice. “An arrow will kill a man no matter where he has been Schooled.

  “Guard Commander, you will see to your wound and the search. Assign Section Leader Olecz. You others will bring these traitors to Kedneara the Queen.”

  Kera turned out of the corridor which led to Avylos’ wing and started back toward the Great Hall. She ducked into the alcove just before the Great West Stairs that until this winter had held the bust of her grandfather. Her lower lip was caught tight between her teeth, and in her hands was a broken strand of Tenezian glass beads, ready to spill on the floor if she had a sudden need to explain what she was doing standing in such an out of the way place.

  Though it was cool here in the alcove, Kera felt a drop of sweat trickle its way down her back. Avylos had not been in his rooms for her to lure away with a false summons to her mother the queen. What should she do now? Find him and make sure—somehow—that he stayed away? Or trust that whatever occupied him at the moment would hold his attention long enough for Parno and Zania to steal the Stone? They could not possibly have reached Avylos’ garden yet; she still had some time to decide what to do.

  She heard the sound of footsteps coming up the staircase to her left. Kera knelt, tossed the beads on the floor, and bent down to pick them up. It did not sound like Avylos, but . . .

  “Allow me, Lady Prince.”

  Kera looked up. Metrick. Metrick the Balnian. Metrick the gossip.

  “I would not keep you from your errand, Metrick.”

  “I have no errand, Lady Prince, but to find you.”

  Kera’s hands froze for one second before she forced her fingers to continue picking up beads. “Who sent you?”

  “No one, my Prince, only, I have noticed that you are frequently in this part of the House, and when I wished to find you . . .”

  “You wished to find me?” Kera sat back on her heels, not knowing whether to feel flattered or skeptical. She was Lady Prince. Metrick of Balnia might very well feel his path to advanceme
nt lay through her. Or indeed, more than advancement. How important was his family in Balnia? Was he one of the people her mother the queen had warned her against? She realized that he had gone on speaking, and that she’d missed the first part of what he’d said.

  “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

  “You may well be shocked, Lady Prince. I’m sorry to be the one to bring you this news.”

  But he wasn’t sorry, Kera could tell. He was pleased, not at the news, but at the importance it gave him in bringing it.

  “Valaika Jarlkevoso has been arrested, along with an impostor she had in her rooms and planned to pass off as Prince Edmir, your brother.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “The Blue Mage has taken them to Kedneara the Queen.”

  Kera thought quickly. Valaika and Edmir. That meant Parno and Zania were still free. Could they have been already on their way to the Mage’s wing when the guards had come? What had brought the guards to Valaika? Not that there was time to think about that now.

  And what should she do? If Parno and Zania were free, then they would be coming to the Mage’s garden. And that’s where she should be. She would simply have to trust that her mother would not act so quickly that Valaika and Edmir would be in danger. And surely, surely, her mother would recognize her own son?

  “Metrick, go now and fetch—no,” she interrupted herself as if she was having a change of thought. “Please take these beads to my apartments and give them to Sharian, my lady page. Explain to her what has occurred.” He’d like that, he evidently liked being the bearer of news. “I will go myself to tell the Blue Mage’s cousin what delays him, as she may not trust another. Tell Sharian to go to my mother the queen’s apartments and await me there.”

  “At once, Lady Prince.”

  Kera waited until Metrick was part of the way down the Great West Stairs before turning and running back into Avylos’ wing.

  As they walked Parno steered them farther away from Valaika’s rooms, seemingly taking paths at random, so anyone watching them would not even believe they had a destination, let alone guess what it might be.

  “I think this is the first thing I’ve ever done where my goal was not to attract attention.” Zania’s voice was calm and measured, but Parno could feel her arm trembling ever so slightly in his.

  “Not true,” he said. “Remember how and why we started using the code word ‘Pasillon’? To remind us that we are not the only people on stage, and that sometimes we must efface ourselves to let others shine, or to let the story unfold of itself? What is that if not a need to deflect the audience’s eyes?”

  The farther they got from the gardens closest to Valaika’s rooms the greater the urge to walk faster. It seemed that every corner they turned led to yet another piece of statuary, yet another formally laid out bed of flowers or ornamental trees. Finally the paths began to widen, and Parno knew that they approached the edge of the garden plantings closest to the section of repaired wall.

  Parno slowed down even more; the only person within eyeshot was a kitchen boy passing with a basket of eggs hanging from one arm, and the instant the turnings of the path faced him away from them Parno pulled Zania into the nearest shrubbery. In a moment, Parno had discarded his formal overgown, and had cut Zania’s laces, allowing her to drop her own gown and step out of it. She pulled up the shoulders of the simple vest she had been wearing under the gown. At a distance, with her tousled hair and leggings, she could pass for any lower servant. Only the rope wound around her hips was out of place. A wriggle, and that too was on the ground. Parno picked up the coil of rope and slung it over his shoulder.

  A trumpet call from toward the front gate—and the guard barracks— made Zania look around and grab Parno’s arm.

  “Ignore it,” he told her. “They call the guard to assemble a search party. By the time they reach us down here, we’ll be in the Mage’s garden.” As he spoke, he took sights from the top of two battlements, and the flagstaff on a tower he knew lay to the north. The repaired part of the wall was to their left.

  “Just ahead there,” he said. “Follow me.” The distance they had to cross was short, and in a moment Parno had his hand on the surface of the wall. He frowned. The wall was smoother than he remembered, much smoother.

  “What is it?”

  “I may have cut the angle a little short after all, coming through the garden. Wait here.” He took three paces to the right, but the wall was equally smooth there. He returned to where Zania marked the spot he’d started from, took three paces to the left . . . and found nothing but smooth wall.

  “Zania, you did not move?” He hardly needed her indignant response to tell him that she hadn’t. He checked his position again against the closest guard tower, the edges of the garden, and the distant murmur of noise that would be the guard barracks. He had not made a mistake. They were in the right place.

  Parno’s skin crawled with a sudden chill.

  “The wall’s been magicked,” he said. “He must have been told. Avylos must have been told that I came over the wall.”

  Zania’s face fell. “We’ll get our court clothes back on,” she said. “We’ll have to try bluffing our way in the front doors.”

  “With everyone now looking for us? No disrespect intended to your ability to bluff anyone into anything, we would still have to find our way through the entire House, to say nothing of the magic that would keep me at least out of the Mage’s wing once we got there.”

  Parno eyed the wall again. Demons and perverts, he needed to think. Kera had said that Avylos used as little magic as he could in any given situation—he would not use both an avoidance and a locking magic, where he could simply use a lock. That had made sense, given that Avylos’ power source constantly had to be renewed. Would it follow that he would be equally parsimonious when it came to placing a magic on the wall? Parno put his hand on the stone and rubbed it back and forth. Smooth, but smooth like a polished stone floor, not like glass or the glazing on a pot. So Avylos had not changed the nature of the wall itself. He tapped his fingertips on the stone as though on the airholes of his pipes. That wasn’t exactly the right sound.

  “A surface as smooth as this one appears to be should make a cleaner sound,” he said aloud.

  “It doesn’t seem so very smooth to me,” Zania said, looking up and squinting.

  “Doesn’t it? Touch it, would you, and tell me what you feel.”

  Zania lifted her hand slowly, glancing at him sideways to see if she was doing what he wanted. She laid her palm flat on the wall.

  “Move it back and forth a little.”

  “What am I trying to find?” she asked.

  “Can you feel the individual stones, the mortar?”

  “Y-yes.”

  That hesitation told Parno everything he wanted to know. Avylos would not waste his power. He would magic the wall against those, such as Parno, who intended to climb it. Zania, in truth, would be doing no climbing, it was Parno who would bring her up once he had reached the top himself. Evidently that slight difference between them was enough to make them experience the wall differently.

  So the magic didn’t make the wall impossible to climb, it just made the wall seem impossible to climb.

  “Parno?” Zania was still standing with her hand on the wall.

  “Give me a moment,” he said. “I need to try something.” He shook out his hands. The Sable Monkey Shora. That’s what was needed here. Used for climbing trees, rock faces and yes, stone walls, the Shora trained the eye to see and recognize holds that would support weight. Dhulyn had taught him the principles, not that there had been many opportunities for him to practice.

  Climb, he told himself. You’re a Sable Monkey and you’re going to climb this wall. Nothing. He waited a handful of heartbeats longer and touched the wall again. Still nothing. Was it that he didn’t know the Shora well enough? Or was it that it would not work.

  Sun and Moon. He heard Dhulyn’s voice in his head as he’d heard
it so many times during practice. The Shora always work. Pattern is always pattern. Tradition said the Shoras came from the Caids. Was that enough for them to counteract the Mage’s magics?

  Parno settled the coil of rope over his shoulder and took a deep breath, releasing it slowly. This time he concentrated on relaxing his muscles, regularizing his breathing. He repeated seven times the three words that were his own personal Shora triggers allowing him to concentrate his focus and draw upon the Shoras that he knew. And he did know the Sable Monkey Shora, Dhulyn had taught it to him only last year, and he’d practiced it since. And he did know this wall. It was climbable. He’d already climbed it. His hands and feet knew the pattern. And pattern is always pattern. He flexed his fingers in the pattern prescribed by the Sable Monkey Shora. I am climbing, I will reach the top. I cannot fall.

  Parno put up his hands, found the first fingerholds, and pulled himself up. There were the toeholds he had used before. He did not rest or pause, but put out his hands for the next holds, and then the next. He was more than halfway to the top when his hands felt only smooth stone. For a heartbeat his belly turned to ice, and the muscles in his calves began to tremble. How long until his toes felt nothing but smooth stone? How long before he fell?

  Parno laid his cheek flat against the stone, eyes squeezed shut, and whispered his triggers, whispered them seven times seven times.

  “I am the Sable Monkey,” he said aloud. “I will not fall.” He opened his eyes, and continued climbing.

  Twenty-four

  IT WAS HARD TO GAUGE the passage of time, since the water in these baths grew no colder, and Dhulyn had sent the attendants away. She found, however, that she could not recapture the languor she’d felt before falling asleep; just as she felt herself relaxing once more, she was disturbed by the nagging feeling that she had forgotten something. Her laugh echoed sharply in the tiled room. She hadn’t just forgotten something, she’d forgotten everything.