by Tony Daniel
“Yeah. That, too.”
Chapter Fifty-Seven:
The Request
Rainer found Ravenelle in the Chapel of the Dark Angel. Her new bloodservants stood outside the door. For a moment Alvis and Harrald Torsson moved to block his way.
Harrald Torsson was blind. Yet he still looked deadly.
“Really, guys?” Rainer said. “Can you ask her if I can come in?”
They didn’t reply, but after a moment’s pause they stepped aside. Rainer shook his head and walked through the chapel door.
Rainer was back to training, but he was sorely missing Marshal Elgar Koterbaum. He hadn’t realized how much he really liked the master at arms, despite Koterbaum’s tendency to suck up to the gentry.
And even if he did almost get me killed, Rainer thought.
To die from a cowardly sneak attack, as the reports said. It had been a bad way to go for the gallant Koterbaum.
In the mornings, Rainer had started working with the town guard. They’d put him to work teaching townie boys how to fight with weapons. He was learning a few things about fighting on the streets in return. There were boys lining up to take his classes, and even a few girls. Rainer didn’t care. It was first come, first served for him. Everyone needed to be ready when trouble came the next time.
He expected that would be soon.
Maybe learning from the townies was enough to make up for the school lessons he was missing. He had plenty of time to catch up. Raukenrose University, which he’d planned to attend next year, was a mess. Two-thirds of the faculty were dead, their brains burned out. The whole town was going to be many months recovering. Some things might never be the same.
Father Calceatus was at the altar. Ravenelle had taken communion, and the priest was leaving to clean the blood cup. He nodded curtly to Rainer as he passed him.
“Come in,” Ravenelle said.
Rainer walked the rest of the way down the aisle. He stood with Ravenelle before the altar. He looked up at the image of the Dark Angel. She was naked, of course. Her wings were unfurled, and her arms were spread wide in welcoming. Yet there was something menacing in her gaze.
“She looks kind of like you,” Rainer said.
“I doubt that,” said Ravenelle. She gestured around herself. “I wanted you to see this place, Stope. This is where the heart of the Talaia happens. Even if there isn’t a blood ceremony, I always feel peaceful in here. Does it seem even a little bit peaceful to you?”
Rainer looked again at the Dark Angel. She seemed to be smiling at him like he might make a tasty morsel.
“Yeah, I guess so,” he said.
“Oh, don’t lie to me, Stope. I can always tell. That’s how I beat you at Hang the Fool.”
“Oh yeah? How can you tell?”
“Your earlobes get red,” Ravenelle said. “Or even redder than they already are.”
Rainer self-consciously tugged on an earlobe. “Feels normal to me.” But it was a bit warmer than he had expected.
“Let’s sit down.”
“Where?”
“Up on the altar, in the cathedra chairs.”
“Isn’t that…I don’t know . . .”
“Sacrilegious? They’re just chairs, Stope. They only have to be empty during communion.”
They climbed the two slate steps to the altar. The altar platform was made of one large piece of black marble. Rainer could imagine how much it had cost to bring here. They sat down in the altar chairs. These were upholstered with red velvet and much more comfortable than they looked. Now Rainer was even closer to the Dark Angel. He felt like she was glaring down at him, but when he glanced up, she still had the same placid expression.
“So how’s your romance?” Rainer asked. She’d left a scroll rolled up on the front pew. Rainer knew this was where she usually came to read.
“That’s The Red Rose Dies. It’s been there since…well, I haven’t read one for a while,” Ravenelle said. “I feel like I’ve been living one, you know. I’m not so sure how I like to be inside the story instead of outside and able to walk away whenever I want.”
“You have to walk away,” Rainer said. “You’re going in a month. Your prison term with us barbarians is over.”
“True. Even though I haven’t heard a word from mother in weeks. The mail service man told me it’s gotten really hard to get messages across the southern border.” Ravenelle cupped her hands together. She looked like she wanted to say more, but instead she reached up and smoothed back her hair. A dozen black curls had come loose, as usual, and she managed to stuff a couple under a hair pin.
“You’re holding something back,” Rainer said.
“What makes you say that, Stope?”
“When you get nervous, you play with your hair.” Rainer smiled.
Ravenelle pulled her hands down to her lap. “I guess we know each other pretty well,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“You’re right. I have a favor to ask you.”
“Okay.”
Ravenelle nodded. “I’m very worried you’ll say ‘no’ when you hear what it is.”
“Just tell me, Ravenelle.”
Ravenelle caught herself trying to smooth her hair again, stopped herself and clasped her hands together. “Okay, what I was saying about messages not getting across the southern border? It’s really a huge worry to me. You know I’ve been waiting for years and years for the day I can go home, and now I don’t hear anything?” She bit her lower lip. “I think nobody’s coming for me, Stope.”
Rainer leaned forward. He spread his hands. “They’ll come. They always have.”
The month that Ravenelle’s mother spent at Raukenrose Castle every year always meant huge trouble for everyone. The place was full of bloodservants, and you couldn’t say anything because everything they heard would instantly get back to the queen.
Rainer was used to nobles putting on airs and trying to boss him around, but Ravenelle’s mother was in a class by herself. He always tried to make himself scarce for as long as he could during her visits.
“I know she’ll send someone. She always said she would. It’s just…what if she doesn’t?”
“You’ll be all right either way. The duchess loves you, even if she doesn’t quite understand you.”
“You think so?”
“You know she does.”
“But I could never be her child. You’re all such pale faced barbarians,” she said. “Look at Ulla and Anya’s silky hair and mine, it’s just . . .”
“Like wool from a black sheep?” Rainer volunteered.
“Yeah, thanks, Stope.” She frowned. He had meant it as a compliment, but he’d clearly missed the mark.
“I like your hair,” Rainer added.
In fact, he thought her hair was beautiful. He thought she was the loveliest creature he’d ever seen. But what was the use?
Get it out for once, coward, Rainer told himself. She’s leaving anyway. She’s leaving, and I don’t like it.
“Look, Ravenelle, I want to say something.”
“You?”
“Yeah, me.” He swallowed. “I think you’re…amazing. More than anyone. Always have been pretty much in love with you. So there it is.”
Ravenelle leaned back against the chair.
“You shouldn’t talk that way to a princess,” she whispered, almost to herself.
“Yeah,” Rainer said. “Right.”
“Stope…I . . .”
“Don’t say anything. I mean, forget it.”
There wasn’t anything else to say about it. So he stood there. Finally he spoke. “Ravenelle, ask me whatever it is you want.”
“Okay,” she said. She reached up to smooth her hair again.
He could feel the breath catch in his throat.
Tretz, when she does that . . .
“I want you to take me home,” she said in a quiet voice.
Home? That was leagues and leagues away. And Kalte men weren’t exactly welcome down there. At all.
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“To Montserrat?”
Ravenelle nodded. Then she sighed and put her hands back in her lap.
“Take me home, Stope,” she whispered. “Please.”
Chapter Fifty-Eight:
The Ambush
Cavalry approaching.
When the fox-man pickets came galloping in reporting a band of at least a hundred warriors on horses, Captain Max Jager at first didn’t believe them.
Earl Keiler had ordered the northern and eastern approaches garrisoned immediately. If there were reinforcements on the way from Krehennest, he wanted plenty of warning.
Jager’s Raufers had been given the job.
Then more reports came in to Jager, and he was forced to conclude there was a Sandhaven troop that had crossed the border and was riding west through Piedmont Duchy.
The Raufers’ job was to hold Dornstadt Pass. His garrison was important enough that it had nearly a hundred troops. But Jager knew he had the high ground. The road went through several sloping hills that were perfect for archers. Horsemen would not get off the road here. The woods were dense and cut through with stream gullies. It would be a hard passage for a horse.
No, they’d come through the pass. He had ridden east several times and had already picked out what he considered the perfect spot for an ambush. There were four bands of archers in his company, including one made up of bear-man longbowmen—eighty archers in all. And out here on the border an archer did double duty as a hand-to-hand fighter once the fight was going strong.
So, although Jager was understandably worried about taking on a force four times his size, he believed his chances to send them packing back to Sandhaven were good. At least he would bloody them terribly. He’d already sent riders west to alert the other forts and village garrisons along the Plank road. If they got through him, a large force of the mark would be gathering, waiting to take the enemy on.
He trusted his scouts, so he believed he was facing no more than five companies of horsemen. Whether it was the leading edge of a larger army marching west he’d worry about later.
One problem at a time, thought Jager.
It was two months since the Battle of Raukenrose Meadow—which was what the counterattack was starting to be called. Jager was still nineteen years old.
Despite his small form, the Tier he’d grown up with in his small village respected him. He’d gained the respect of the other troops in the company in the meadow outside Raukenrose by rallying his wavering company. He’d cut through the heel tendons of two frightened but dangerous buffalo men who had ignored his calls to stop and tried to bully their way past him to the rear. He’d left them wallowing on the ground, lamed for life.
That had set an example for everyone else.
You could either fight the Sandhaveners or face your insane bobcat-man captain, who was willing to saw through your legs if you decided to run.
Then, when they saw him fighting like mad alongside them, ordering water and arrows brought up, and intelligently directing them toward a weak spot in the Sandhavener line, their fear turned into respect.
After he’d seen to his wounded from the battle, he even sent a wise woman to stitch the stragglers’ tendons together. They might walk again, but their running days were over. He had, amazingly, ordered them back to duty in his company, giving them a chance to redeem themselves. He knew one of them hated him and might very well put a spear in his captain’s back if he got the chance. But Arkakeveri, the other, was happy for the chance.
It looked like he would get that chance today.
Jager watched as a dust cloud to the east announced that the cavalry troop was coming. The archers had already strung their bows. Jager, who was an expert bowman himself, checked his arrows. Most of his archers had done as he had and stuck five or six arrows in the ground in front of them so that they could shoot and then nock and let go another arrow quickly.
Then the Sandhaveners came into view, and Jager knew there would be no killing today. The front two riders carried large white flags. They seem to expect the pass would be guarded, so they stopped the horses behind them and waited.
Jager also waited a moment, worried this might be some kind of trick. But they had their swords and sabers sheathed and their shields slung around the backs of their horses, or on pack horses. This was not a group ready to fight.
“All right, curse it all to cold hell, I’m going down to see what those crab eaters want,” Jager told his bear-man second in command, Knudsson. “I want Spindler’s band to go with me. The rest are to stay put and be ready.”
Jager made his way out of cover and down the hill to the road. Ten buffalo men armed with wicked-looking spears went with him.
He strode up to one of the men bearing a white flag, looked up at the man on his horse, who stared down at Jager, an expression of amazement on his face.
“What’s the matter? You never seen a Tier before?” Jager said to him. “Who’s in charge?”
“I am,” said the man. He had evidently decided he had better speak to this rather terrifying-looking half-cat, half-man. He gave the reins to the man beside him and got down from his horse.
The man cautiously approached Jager. The buffalo men, who were led by a bear-man sergeant, lowered their spears in the ready position. Jager signaled for them to stand down.
“Now tell me what you want and be quick about it,” Jager said.
The man’s expression saddened, and he shook his head. He seemed to Jager to be a man in mourning, but Jager knew he was not the best at reading the expressions of men.
“We want refuge,” the man said. “I’ve got five hundred in my band, and another five hundred are following us.”
“Refuge?” Jager said. “From what?”
“Romans and their blood cake,” the man said. “Piedmont and Vall l’Obac have taken Krehennest. The Romans have control of the whole of the Chesapeake.”
“You mean to tell me that Sandhaven has fallen to the Empire?”
“With barely a whimper. King Siggi was one of those dirty blood eaters,” the man said. “They took us completely by surprise, and the home guard didn’t stand a chance.”
“That who you are?”
“No. They were killed to a man,” the other said. “We’re two battalions of Nestie cavalry. We had to fight our way out of the city.” The man sighed. “Sir, we have nowhere else to go. We have come begging for you to take us in.”
“You people just invaded our land and killed our heir.”
“I am aware of that,” the man said. “At least of Trigvi’s army coming to get the blood price.”
“So why in the name of the dragon would we let you through this pass?”
“I and all my men are prepared to swear allegiance to Duke Otto and the Mark of Shenandoah if you will take us in. The Romans moved fast. They’d been building up in Ore and planning this for a long time, looks like. We’re cut off to the north, and they’re behind us. They are going to be here at the border soon. Don’t know if they’ll stop.”
“We’ll stop them,” Jager said. “Don’t you worry about that.”
The other said nothing, but acknowledged Jager’s defiance with a bow of his head.
“Now, as for you,” Jager continued. “I’m going to have my men collect your swords and weapons. You can keep your shields.”
“But without our weapons, we won’t be any good to you.”
“I may or may not give them back to you. I’ll send for orders on that. But I’ll have your swords or you’ll not get through the pass alive.”
The man nodded agreement. “All right,” he said. “We will do it. I wish to thank you—”
“Don’t thank me yet. I may get orders to hang the lot of you, but until then . . .”
Jager took a good look at the horse troop gathered up behind the man in two columns. The horses were sweat-stained, and their riders looked hollow eyed and completely spent. Many were wounded and bloodstained.
“Until I get orders, we’ll let y
ou camp outside the fort and we’ll get you some grub. We’re stocked with plenty of provisions, and we can share without too much trouble.”
“I thank you, sir…cat.”
“I ain’t ‘sir’ anybody. And I’m bobcat. There ain’t no cat people,” Jager replied. “And if what you say about the Romans is true, we’ll be ready for them. No matter how many of them there are, only a certain number of men can go through this pass at one time.”
“I promise you on my family’s honor that I’m speaking the truth,” the man replied. “I’m Lord Ekhard von Gurster of Tar.”
“I don’t know your family, so that don’t mean a thing to me,” Jager said. “All I know is that you are rotten Sandhaven scum fit for the vultures. But I’m taking your warning serious, and if it turns out to be right, then you’ll have my respect for that at least. Until then, drop your weapons and I’ll have my troops collect them.”
The other bowed and turned back to his men to give them the order. Jager called up the hill for Knudsson to send down a detail to collect the swords.
Blood and bones, Jager thought. Sandhaveners come begging. He never would have thought to see it. What was more disturbing was what had brought them.
Jager had paid attention to his lessons from the village schoolmaster. That was another reason he’d been elected captain. He was the only one of the volunteers who could read. Those lessons told him that the empire had been kept to the lower Chesapeake and the southern mountains for three hundred years. Before that, through war after war, the Kalte had been pushed north, but the Romans had been stopped in Sandhaven and Shenandoah.
Now, if what von Gurster said checked out, Shenandoah would be two-thirds surrounded by Roman slave-driving colonials. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what land the Romans would try to eat next.
He’d thought when the border was secure again, he would be able to go back to Bear Valley and take up where he’d left off three months ago when the call had come to assemble at Bear Hall. He’d been apprenticing with his uncle to learn the tanner trade.
Looks like it’s going to be a while before I scrape hides and lime the vats in Uncle Gus’s shop again, Jager thought. A long while.