He spared me. Maybe he disdained to kill any of us. His sword was not bloody.
I fled toward the edge of the tourney field and met the mob still rushing downhill. I was no longer part of it, having gathered up some of my scattered wits again. I tucked up my skirts as I ran, and I made my way against the current, dodging the runners and the riders, leaping over the slain, making my way west along the boundary of the field, toward safer ground, where the crowd thinned and the bodies lay less thickly strewn about.
It was nearly noon. The Heavens were empty of clouds but full of birds: gulls and ravens, kites and fish hawks and falcons, starlings and swallows. Up where the Sun climbed, the sky blazed white; elsewhere it was a lucid blue. I was alive for this moment and maybe the next, and I ran as if the Queen of the Dead followed at my right shoulder and Dread at the left. I meant to outrun them both, then go to ground like the prey I was. I wanted no more of crowds.
I headed for a ravine between the hills, for a stand of twisted scrub oak and a marshy place hidden behind it where the water came up from the ground and collected from the rains, where I’d gathered stanchmoss and cresses. I knew this ground and what could be found there, from many days spent wandering over these hills with Noggin at my heels when I was supposed to be watching tourneys.
A thud and a crack and I was facedown on the turf and I heard a horse galloping away that I had never heard coming. I’d been struck on my back, near a kidney, and the pain was so sharp I thought I’d been stabbed. I strove to breathe, and couldn’t. Couldn’t. Couldn’t. Until the pain tore open and let in some air. And then I breathed until I could crawl. I crawled under a rock outcropping that cast a small shadow, blessedly cool and dark, and I felt safer out of the Sun’s eye. I trembled with fever. Pain beat on me in waves.
At last the tide of pain went out. I felt my back and I wasn’t bleeding, and I knew I’d live. And I felt, for the first time since I’d fallen so far and so suddenly back into my body, that I was in one place, every last and least remnant of self called home. For the body knew what the shade had forgotten: I was mortal and not ready to die.
Yet I wasn’t wholly restored. Once I’d been all of a piece, now I was a fist around a handful of shards. Or less than that. If I opened my hand, I might find only a hum, a song.
It seemed a long time I was there. I raised my head. The tourney went on, and also the hunt. I heard them both and the sounds were different. And there was Sire Rodela’s bay horse, in mask and barding painted green and ivory, nosing about for faded tufts of grass among the stones. The bay tore at the grass and chewed, his bit jangling. I saw the horse plain, without a halo of shadow. It hurt to look, the Sun was so fierce.
Beyond him two cataphracts of Prey rode the boundaries of the field with their armigers trailing behind. They rested the butts of their scorpions on their thighs. The blades winked in the sunlight. The horsemen watched the crowd that covered the heights to make sure that no one strayed—and the spectators on the western hill were wise enough to keep to their place, though there was movement among them, swirls that troubled the backwater. They were noisy with whoops and catcalls. Someone threw a stone and an armiger’s mount shied. The silks and awnings and pennants of the Blood dotted the hill, bright as the first spring flowers in a wintry meadow.
No more than fifty paces to that haven in the ravine. Behind me there was havoc, ahead a seeming peace. Yet my way was barred. I feared to pass those men who guarded the field; they might be eager to join the sport of their fellows.
I backed away from them, around the rock outcropping. And on the other side I found Sire Rodela. He sat propped against the stone with his hands dangling laxly over his knees. His head was bowed and he looked nearly dead. The man lying beside him was dead beyond a doubt. His helmet was gone and he had cuts across his neck deep enough to lay bare his backbone. A cataphract, to judge by his fine armor; one of Ardor’s, by his banner. So Rodela had won that armor he had boasted of last night.
I stopped in front of Sire Rodela and he looked up at me. His helmet was of leather with an iron noseguard and iron ribs. One of his cheekguards was missing and the other dangled by a strap. The whites of his eyes were startling against the blood on his face. He blinked and lifted his hand, a vague gesture. I stood with my back to the Sun and he was in my shadow.
“Water,” he said.
It must be he didn’t know me.
I thought of Galan seeking Sire Rodela, and then of what Galan had said: If Chance puts him in my way, can I refuse her gift? There was no doubting my luck, but as to Chance—I couldn’t be sure.
I remembered the taste of Galan’s wrath, how I’v fed on it when I was a shadow. How it felt to be as absolute as a sword, forged for one purpose. Hard, sharp, swift, bright. I was alloyed of baser metals. I couldn’t summon Galan’s wrath. Neither could I summon my own, for I was still estranged from myself.
I must do without it.
All this I thought between two heartbeats. I said, “Give me your helmet and I’ll fetch some water.”
When he fumbled for the strap that held his helmet under his chin, I went to him and unfastened the buckle. I pulled off his helmet and the padded cap came with it. It was soaked with blood. His scalp had split where he’d been struck above his right temple—perhaps a blow from a mace—something heavy rather than sharp. I could see the injury plainly because of his bald crown. The hair was matted flat below it. The blood was darker than I expected, blackish, and it welled up from the wound and ran from his nose too, and clotted in his mustache and beard. I pressed the spot with my fingers and found it pulpy to the touch under the skin. Maybe my woman’s touch would sicken him, taint his blood, and I wouldn’t have to poison him. Maybe he’d die of the wound without my help.
Sire Rodela raised his arm and pushed me away. “Get off,” he said. He swayed and put a hand on the ground to support himself. One knee flopped sideways. He was panting.
I dumped the sodden cap on the ground and looked at the helmet. Two of its iron ribs had been driven inward. He’d been struck more than once.
I looked up and saw that the two cataphracts and armigers who guarded the boundary were trotting away, still with their eyes on the crowd. I was afraid to run, but staying was no better. I sprinted toward the ravine between the hills with Sire Rodela’s helmet in my hand and when I reached the stand of scrub oak, I ducked and pushed my way in. The oaks were not much higher than my head. Rusty leaves clung to the black twigs, clattering as I passed. Acorns rolled underfoot and briars caught my skirts.
When I looked back I saw they had not done with killing. Riders on the slope herded the crowd uphill. On the tourney field, they chased drudges down one by one. I should stay in the thicket and hide. I was safe there.
One moment I determined to kill him, and the next I dithered. A straw was stiffer than my resolve. Why should it be hard to kill a man? I knew how it felt. I’d given myself to Galan, and Galan had killed. Hadn’t I felt the elation, the lunge, the thrust? Now the horror of it came unbidden and I was weak.
I’d seen the Blood make meat of us, meat and offal. It didn’t trouble them at all.
If he was dying anyway, there was no need.
Suppose he lived. There’d be no better chance.
I pushed through tall swamp rush. The ground was soft. I stepped from one tussock to the next and the mud squelched between my toes. The seep had no open water, not even a puddle, but water oozed up everywhere. I knelt in a clearing where stanchmoss and goosecress and slue cabbage grew, and my skirts were soaked to the knees.
I set the helmet down next to me and scooped up muddy water in my hands to drink. When I’d drunk my fill, I pressed the helmet into the mire to let water lap over the rim.
Then I saw what token Sire Rodela had carried to the tourney inside his helmet: short wiry copper hair on a scrap of flesh—my own flesh—stitched to the leather with a waxed thread. He hadn’t dared to wear it on his crest, as he’d worn the trophy he took from Sire Bizco. But he
had worn it nevertheless, and it was worse to me that he kept it inside, close to his own skin.
Rage came unsummoned then, and I shook with it.
I tore the flesh free of the helmet, and picked out the bits of hair and skin left under the threads. I found it hard to touch what he’d stolen from me, but I tucked the remnant under my bodice. I’d burn it when there was time.
The water was brown, flecked with bits of chaff, and it grew ruddy when it mingled with Sire Rodela’s blood. A water strider slipped into the helmet and I flicked it away.
I set the helmet down against a tuft of sedge. There were stones everywhere and it wasn’t hard to find what I sought: a smooth stone, nearly flat but for a dip in the center like the hollow of a palm, and a round rough stone that fit my hand. Mortar and pestle. I had carried the scraps of my headcloth with me. Now I spread them on the ground. The priest of Rift had sliced the headcloth into three pieces with one cut. One scrap still had a twist knotted into it, and through the linen I felt the shriveled berries of the dwale. I emptied the dwale into the hollow of the stone: eight berries. I wasn’t sure it would be enough.
I spat on the berries and ground them, I spat again and ground hard, and Sire Rodela’s face was under the pestle. The black flesh of the berries smeared between the stones. And I prayed, for I was sure Ardor would hear me now. Didn’t we share this enemy? Sire Rodela had defiled Ardor’s offspring as he’d defiled me. Ardor Smith, make me a weapon in your hand.
And what god would I offend by this act? Gods and men, and many of them, no doubt. Ardor Wildfire, hide me from their sight. I would I had a poisoned kiss, he’d die and no one the wiser. I picked out the seeds and scraped the paste into the helmet with a twig and rinsed the mortar and pestle with water, careful to save every drop.
I crept back to the edge of the thicket. I saw men in the distance, riding, running, fighting, but there was such quiet at our end of the field that kites and ravens were already settling on the dead. One of the armigers on patrol rode at the birds and sent them flapping. I waited for the warriors to pass me, and when I judged them far enough away, I hastened to Sire Rodela, hitching up my wet kirtle to keep it from clinging to my legs.
Sire Rodela heard me coming and turned his head. The movement made him wince and groan. I put the helmet in his hands but he couldn’t grasp it, so I held it for him. My hands were steady. He emptied it in four gulps, and water ran down his chin and made a runnel in the blood. There were flecks of black berry in his beard. I wiped them off with my hand and cleaned my hand on a tuft of grass. I thought he might complain that the water was foul, but he only looked at me as I squatted before him. His face was in full sun and he squinted, dazed. One pupil was small as a pinprick, the other huge. His skin was mottled white and purple, where it wasn’t covered in blood. His jaw hung slack and breath came quick and shallow.
I picked up the bloody padded cap and set it on Rodela’s head, and tied the laces under his chin. I put his helmet on over the cap, which took some effort, for it fit snugly. He never raised a hand to stop me, though he leaned sideways and I had to prop him up.
So I was startled when he lifted his hand to take a lock of my hair between his fingers. “So bright,” he said. “Brighter than what I had of you.”
I jerked away and stood up. He knew who I was, after all.
He looked up at me; he couldn’t hold his head steady and it tilted on his neck. “I knew you were fond,” he said, and one side of his mouth smiled.
I took a step backward and tripped over the dead cataphract, and sat down abruptly. Rodela’s head flopped forward and he moaned.
Though it was foolish of me, I bowed my head and stayed there, sitting on the ground. It was strangely silent, but for the roaring in my ears.
Die now! I thought. But I knew he wouldn’t die quickly: neither the wound nor the dwale would kill quickly.
There was a mace by my hand, the dead cataphract’s mace, and I thought how I should take it up and finish Rodela. I’d taken a coward’s way, a woman’s way.
But I couldn’t pick up the weapon. I shuddered to think of swinging at his head. I knew the sound it would make as it struck.
I’d called him a viper. Who had the stronger venom?
I’d killed him and I was glad. I should be glad.
If only he would die soon.
I heard the footsteps, but kept my head bowed, my eyes closed. Just then it was too much trouble to save myself. I felt the coolness of a shadow between the Sun and me. I knew him before I looked up, before he spoke.
“Well met. I’ve been seeking everywhere for one and the other of you, and here you are together.”
Galan had taken off his helmet and hung it from a hook on his baldric. The crown of his head was sunlit but his face was dark. I thought of how he’d left me that morning, how his jealousy had spoiled our parting. Now he’d found me with his former armiger, and I feared he might suspect me of what I had done.
“By chance,” I said. “I was running and nearly stumbled on him. And I could go no farther …”
He leaned toward me. “It cuts me to see you afraid of me, for I know I deserve it.”
“I never …”
“I know.” He touched my cheek. “Are you hurt? What is this blood?”
I heard weariness in his voice, no suspicion. It was like a fever, his jealousy. It waxed hot and then it broke. But it would come back.
“Not mine,” I said. I struggled to my feet, hampered by my wet skirts, and he reached out a hand to me and didn’t let go.
I’d doubted my welcome; I’d doubted that he lived, after I’d been riven from him so suddenly. Now there was certainty of both, and I could do nothing but weep. My stony heart held a seed after all, and joy put forth a slender root and a green shoot that cracked the stone. I hid my face against his shoulder and pressed myself against the whole length of him, clad in all that cloth and leather and metal, and wished that, like his shadow, I could lie against his skin.
Oh, but it was better to be in the body and alive, both of us alive and shaking. I said his name. It was the only word that came to me.
He made me look at him. Sweat and blood had dried on his face, and he wore the smudge of Consort Vulpeja’s ash on his brow. He looked sallow as wax, and when we kissed I felt the bones of his skull, his teeth, and thought how thin was the veil of flesh that covers us.
He said, “The way you sat there so still—I feared …”
“I’m unharmed and you’re alive, praise the gods for it—I can’t think how else we lived so long this morning!” I kissed him again, laughing and crying at once. “But we’re not safe yet. We should get to shelter.”
Galan said, “Didn’t you hear the king’s horn? The tourney is over. The king put an end to it when the mudfolk overran the field. And it was noon anyway, near enough; no one can say he favored us. Gods—when I saw the green in their caps and knew our men were among those who ran—and you might be with them … But it’s finished now, the killing is over. They’re all dead or run off. All dead.”
Galan let me go and fell to his knees. He was trembling violently.
I knelt beside him and didn’t flinch when he put his hand on my shoulder and his fingers dug into my burns. He stared at Rodela, who had slumped over on his side. It was plain he was alive, by his rattling wheezing breath. “What of him?” he asked.
“Dying,” I said. “His skull is broken.”
“The carnifex might cure him.”
“No, it’s mortal, I’m sure of it.”
He eased his grip on my shoulder and looked at me. His straight brows were knotted; his eyes could not quite hold steady on mine. “I meant to kill him.”
“No need. Better that you didn’t.” I looked down. I wished he had, then I wouldn’t have done it.
“I meant to.” He put his hands upon his thighs and leaned forward and made a sound as if he were in pain, and I thought he must be feeling his wounds at last. But he said, “What was one more among so many?”
and he clasped his arms over his belly and bent until his forehead almost touched his kneecops.
That is what I’d told myself.
I heard him gasp as if he stifled sobs, but when he straightened up, his eyes were dry. “Truly, I don’t know how many,” he said. “Shouldn’t I know? I can’t remember them all. I must wait for the tallies.” He began to rock back and forth, still shivering. “They think this will be an end, but it will never end. I killed the Ardor’s son. That’s one I know for certain. He was good but I bested him.” He laughed. “A thing to crow about̬killing a beardless boy.”
I put my hand on his arm to stop his rocking. “Who won, Galan? Did anyone win?”
He looked at me in disbelief. “Why, can’t you see?” he asked. “The honor is ours.”
CHAPTER 16
Tallies
here was not much wood left in those hills, but what little there was went under the ax: the scrub oak in the hollows, too scrawny to suit the shipwrights, the old thorn hedgerows between pastures, the twisted trees that here and there clung to the cliffs. All of it̬and even timber herded down-river from the mountains and bought for silver in the marketplace—burned that night to feed the pyres of the Blood.
The feast was over; the living had poured a little wine from every cup for the fallen, friend and enemy alike, with praises for their valor. Those who hadn’t earned praise were flattered instead, for the dead must be sent on their journey garlanded about with fine words. They wouldn’t be spoken of by name again, not for a long year.
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