by CJ Brightley
It was a definitive battle, though I couldn’t be sure of it immediately. When the final count was taken, we had decimated the Tarvil forces and taken many prisoners. We identified the sashes of thirteen different tribes. The man who came at a gallop, whose message I didn’t hear until a day later when the fever receded again, brought a bloodied blue sash.
It was blue with gold ends woven with fine red silk threads, blood-stiff near one end. The sash of a high chief, devoid of tribal markings. Not the sash of the highest chief, his would have solid gold ends with no red, but perhaps his heir or an honored deputy.
It would not be long.
Yuudai chokes on his own blood, his throat gaping open. He stumbles to his knees. With his last strength, he brings up his blade to block a strike that would have hamstrung me. My blade meets another, then the sword is in a Tarvil chest, across a throat, into a gut. There is a blur, and then a stunning pain in my right shoulder and I am staring along the length of a javelin up at the sky. My vision fades, gray around the edges, in and out with my heartbeat. Blood in my mouth. I’ve bitten my tongue, and I swallow the warm coppery taste. From the corner of my eye, I can see Yuudai, facedown in the mud. Beyond him, Mikoto, fallen awkwardly, his sword only half-drawn.
Everything seems quiet, but I think it is only that I am fading. I see the mouth of the Tarvil move; he leans over Yuudai. Then he stares in my eyes. He grins, but it does not reach his eyes, and he pushes the javelin further into the dirt. My head lolls back; I don’t have the strength to keep it up. I hear my heart in my ears, and I cannot tell if it is irregular or if it is only my imagination.
I am not frightened.
The javelin pins me to the ground. The pain scatters lucid thought. All I know is the feel of my ribs grinding against the shaft of the javelin, the searing agony of each breath.
It is cold at night.
Morning comes. A magpie cries close by, then another, and a vulture. I smell blood and sweat. Sour, stinking. The men’s bodies around me smell. I smell. In my mouth is the taste of death.
I have not drunk water for twenty-four hours.
I am thirsty.
23
Riona
Kemen had been away over three months when a report came that chilled my heart. He’d been wounded in what the messenger said was a stupidly heroic attempt to save a wounded soldier under his command. The young man had died within the hour, and Kemen looked quick to follow him. The messenger said he’d taken an arrow in his left shoulder and another in one leg as he’d pulled the boy to cover.
I went about my work in distracted anguish. I spilled wine on the queen’s lap the afternoon I heard the news, and when she looked at me I felt as if I weren’t really in the room at all. I was cold and everything seemed very distant. I started to clean up the mess, and the king spoke to me three times before I really heard him.
The queen had kept my confidence. She hadn’t told even her beloved king that I’d driven away his dear friend and trusted advisor. So only then did he realize my part in it, when my despair and remorse must have been written all over my face. He stared at me for one long moment. I could hardly think; I was doing everything automatically. I never really knew how much he understood then and how much he realized later, but he must have seen something. He put his head in his hands and told me to leave without worrying about the wine.
I ran into Lani in the hallway. Her eyes were red, as I’m sure mine were too.
“Ria, I want to go to him.”
“What would you do?”
“Just be with him! What if he dies?” Her lip was trembling.
I couldn’t answer. The lump in my throat almost choked me, and I had no reassuring words.
We heard nothing for a month except one report that the campaign was stalled. Kepa had maintained their recent gains and fortified the new border, but they could make no headway. The blizzards were punishing and rations were short.
The king strode about nervous and twitchy with anxiety for his friend, short-tempered in his worry. He sent reinforcements of course, but reinforcements will not bring a man back to life. None could equal his brilliance either in command or on the field. His death would be a national loss.
Finally a messenger came to tell us that he had cheated death. Lani told me the news, and when I heard it I had to sit down and put my head in my hands. I felt dizzy with relief. For a month I’d imagined him wounded, dying, dead. I blinked back sudden tears at inconvenient times. To know he was still alive, healing, was like coming up for air after nearly drowning.
Lani looked at me very oddly. “Ria?”
I nodded into my hands, not yet ready to face anyone’s eyes.
“Did you,” she hesitated. “Were you not on good terms when he left?”
“Not the best.” My voice shook a little.
“What did you do?” Her tone was accusing. “Did you make him leave?” She was trembling, her hands clenched together.
“Lani, it wasn’t like that.”
But she was right. I stood up and tried to pull her close, but she drew away from me, shaking her head.
“You almost killed him!”
“I did not, Lani! He’s a man, and he makes his own decisions. I didn’t make him do anything, and it’s none of your business if we argued.” I tried to keep my voice low.
She drew in a deep breath and let it out in a rush. She bit her lip as though she wanted to say something, but finally turned away and almost ran down the hallway.
I had to sit down because I was so dizzy with emotion. The accusation hurt and my hands were shaking. Of all people in the world, I loved these two the most, Kemen, whom I had driven away, and Lani, who hated me for it.
We didn’t speak to each other for days. It was hard, avoiding each other in the hallways and sliding silently by each other in the kitchen. She was deeply upset and I didn’t want to risk any more accusations. I already felt guilty enough, and seeing her hurt made it worse. I finally gathered my courage and went to her room early one morning.
“Can I come in?”
She nodded.
“I thought you might want me to do your hair.”
She shrugged a little and sat down in the chair in front of her desk. I brushed her hair and started the braids, putting golden ribbons in each one before braiding them all together and twining them around her head like a crown. She sighed heavily when I was nearly finished, and I bent over to kiss the top of her head.
“I’m sorry, Lani.”
She shrugged, a quick jerk of her shoulders and a duck of her head. She didn’t meet my eyes when I looked at her face in the mirror. I kissed the top of her head again, and she turned suddenly. She flung her arms around my waist in a short, tight hug, her face pressed against my stomach, and then she hurried off to her chores.
24
Kemen
Blood in the snow.
I woke drenched in sweat and thirsty. Every muscle in my body ached, my shoulder sending hot tongues of fire across my back and through my chest. I thought it was morning, because the room seemed infused with a bright glow. I dressed and walked through the hall and across the courtyard. I think I intended to speak with Eneko, but I didn’t make it.
Eneko said later that Kudret found me facedown in the snow some distance from his door. My memory is blurred. Constant thirst, the pain in my shoulder that nearly made me scream, and the dreams.
Once, when I was lucid, Amets explained the infection had deepened, as if I hadn’t already noticed. We still hadn’t received the supplies I’d ordered, so there was no brandy or even ale for the pain. They held me down and Amets cut away the infected flesh and scraped at the bone, trying to remove the poisonous parts.
Hakan had obviously received Eneko’s report. His letter asked about my wound, about the pain and whether I felt strong enough to travel back to Stonehaven for rest. I couldn’t blame Eneko for sending it; he’d wanted guidance if I didn’t survive. But Hakan and Kveta didn’t need to worry about me while Kveta
carried the royal child.
I couldn’t imagine what Riona would feel if she heard I’d been wounded. She was kind-hearted and would worry about me as about any acquaintance. She might even feel guilty, imagining she had done something wrong when we last spoke. I wished to spare her that. She’d been right, and her frustration more than justified.
I should have been kinder. Warmer. Shown my love better. I should have been different than I was.
A man can change. I know it’s possible, and I would have tried. But the opportunity for that had passed. Without her, all that remained was to finish my last task for Hakan. It should have been simple, I could see it almost within reach, but my strength faded every day.
I half-dozed huddled by the fire as I dictated my replies to Hakan and Kveta. Kudret wrote that night because Kyosti was on guard duty. He frowned as he wrote. The sound of his pen on the parchment was pleasantly soothing, a reminder of long evenings with Hakan in his office devising the curriculum for the Common school he started. I wondered how it was doing, and I asked in the letter, although I didn’t expect to live long enough to receive his answer.
“I look forward to our next meeting.” I stopped. What did I want to say? I was trying not to shiver because the trembling made the pain rise and fogged my mind, but I was so cold. Always cold.
Blood. The snow swirled so thick I barely saw the blade, but instinct saved me. The Tarvil was dead in a moment, then my blade found another. There was a body on the ground, one of many, and I stumbled. Blood in the snow, brilliant red, ruby red against the perfect white. The figure wore a plain servant’s dress, and I fell to my knees in sudden terror. Golden hair covered her face, and with trembling fingers I pushed it away.
Riona.
“You already said that, sir.” Kudret’s voice was worried.
“Said what?”
“That you looked forward to seeing His Majesty and Her Majesty and celebrating the birth of their child.”
I couldn’t remember. “Read it to me.”
Keeping the words in my head was difficult. Everything was fuzzy and whenever I closed my eyes, I dreamed. I heard Riona’s words a thousand times. Once I argued with her, pleaded with her to understand my love, how I would have given everything for her. But she did not want or need the sacrifice I knew how to give.
Kudret reached the end of my letter to Hakan and I still didn’t know exactly what I had told him. I dictated the final paragraph with bittersweet affection. Bittersweet, because I dearly wished to see him, to laugh again, to bow before him knowing I had served well. I wished to hold the royal child.
I wished many things.
Reva Galikosta’s Song of Kardu came easily to mind, and I went through most of it during yet another blizzard that kept everyone except the poor sentries huddled inside close to the fires. But the scenes between Kardu and his lover Ilarminia choked me and I hurried past them. Their romance is only a side-story in the account of Kardu’s heroism in the great battles of the war against Ophrano in the Second Age, but the sorrow and joy of their love run through the work like golden threads in a royal tapestry. Kardu was a man of the sword and a man of love, and Ilarminia had one sweet song of lament recorded when she received word that Kardu was wounded in some battle. He lived to see her again, of course, though at the end his death is recorded, as is traditional in all accounts of Erdemen history.
I skipped their scenes together and moved on to Daramenka’s Third Royal History, which contains other accounts of the same war. But after three days, I returned to the Song of Kardu. The hero is a model of a perfect man; no doubt his perfection is exaggerated in the poem, but I drew on his example to learn where I had failed. Kardu’s love song for Ilarminia is beautiful, but for every one of Ilarminia’s perfections, I thought Riona more perfect. Ilarminia’s response to Kardu’s marriage proposal was more enlightening. She notes his kindness to her, his courage, his masculine beauty. More importantly, she sings of his love for her, how she trusts him with her future, how he is tender, and how she cannot live without him.
Kardu knew how to love a woman, and he received love in return. He deserved it.
We had no action for some time, though the scouts reported frequent sightings of individual Tarvil riders. Then a small skirmish and another lull. It was nearly a month after that last battle that a messenger came. The Tarvil pled for peace.
Their camp was even more barren than I’d expected. Lanky, ragged horses, a few drab tents, a small fire, and one hundred pairs of eyes on me. For my own pride and for the honor of Erdem, I tried to conceal the pain that still tormented me. It had been almost three months since I’d been wounded. My leg was nearly healed, and the limp would fade soon. But my shoulder might not give me the time.
Otso, their chief, met me at the entrance to his tent. Flanked by some ten or twelve warriors, he bowed to me. His form was bad, but I appreciated the gesture. Tarvil courtesy is different. I attempted to return the honor by bowing and then clasping my hands as his warriors did for their own gesture of respect.
He smiled, a tight cautious smile, and I noted the deep lines of care around his eyes. I did not trust him, and he did not trust me, but now face to face, I could see the desperation that drove their push southward. The Erdemen soldiers with me were tall and healthy, magnificent in comparison despite our short rations. I towered over the chief, whose head didn’t even reach my shoulder.
They did not have many formalities. Their purpose, like ours, was a peace treaty as soon as possible. But they did take pains to honor me, bringing a hot spiced drink of horse milk along with some other food. The milk was more than a little soured; the smell made my stomach turn. Otso took a drink first, to show it wasn’t poisoned, and I choked some down.
That night and for the next three days I was violently ill; in truth, it nearly killed me. To be fair, even at the time I knew it wasn’t poisoned; it was only a testament to their deprivations. Otso drank it with evident enjoyment. It was quite a delicacy, one that I did not fully appreciate then.
The treaty was quite simple, merely a cessation of active attacks by either side while we entered further negotiations. What did the Tarvil need? What did they want? What could they offer? My only fear was that the illness would kill me before I spoke with Hakan, and when I could stomach a bit of water and a few bites of bread on the third day after our parley, I knew I would live at least that long.
Kyosti acted as scribe and drew up the agreement. Otso couldn’t read well if his frown of concentration was any indication. I had the terms well enough in mind since I had given Kyosti the words earlier.
“This, at the end. We do not want a treaty in the name of your king. It should be in your name.”
“In my name?” My shoulder was paining me so I could barely concentrate.
“I do not know the king. How can I trust a man I have not met? Your reputation is one of honor. We will sign a treaty in your name.” He smiled and turned the parchment toward Kyosti.
“I’m honored by your trust, but I have no authority except that which is given to me by the king Hakan Ithel. I serve at his pleasure. The treaty will be in his name, or there will be no treaty at all.” If I hadn’t been in such pain, I would have bowed to soften my words, to show that I recognized the honor they accorded me, but it was all I could do to speak with a steady voice.
He was silent and finally stood, obviously flustered. “Excuse me.” He bowed hastily and retreated to speak with a few of his men.
Kyosti spoke into my ear. “Sir, it may be impossible. Their power is not concentrated in their chief. They have principalities, tribes, roughly united under a chief but still independent. He may not understand or be able to enforce his will even if he agrees.”
I shrugged. “They need the peace more than we do. I will not pretend an authority I do not have.” My tone was sharper than I’d intended.
“Sorry, sir.” He sat back and ducked his head. The pain made me edgy and short, and I put my hand on his shoulder a moment in sil
ent apology. He glanced up and I could see the worry in his eyes. They all worried. I wanted the treaty, and I would get it. But after that, I didn’t care if the wound killed me. Every man dies. It is only a matter of timing.
The chief sat down again with a nervous smile. “Your authority comes from the king?”
I nodded.
“But you are a friend of the king, yes?”
I nodded again.
“Then you have influence with him?”
“Perhaps. But he is king, and I serve at his pleasure.” My heartbeat was loud in my ears, the fever rising again.
“You serve by choice?”
“I do.”
“Then I will sign the treaty in your king’s name.”
We signed the parchment and in a few moments more we were ready to depart. Kyosti had to steady me when I stood, swaying and nauseated by pain, and even the Tarvil chief looked worried. If I died, I don’t know who would have negotiated the final peace. If there was one at all.
25
Riona
I was serving dinner when the courier arrived with the latest packet of letters from Kemen. The king opened his immediately, skimmed it quickly, then read it again more slowly with a slight frown. The queen read her letter with a smile, and read one section aloud, mostly for my benefit.
“I am recovered, and regret that I have caused you any worry. It will not prevent me from reaching an agreement with the Tarvil soon. It gives me joy to imagine you and Hakan so happy together, and I look forward to our next meeting so that I may share in your joyous expectation of a child.”
His words made me smile too, but the king still frowned.
Kveta nodded me out, and I left, but I pressed my ear to the crack by the door. I confess to eavesdropping; I don’t do it often, but I was desperate to hear what the king’s letter contained.