The Unwilling Warlord

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  Sterren realized he’d spoken Ethsharitic again; he wasn’t sure whether he wanted to weep or scream. He did know he wanted a drink. He sat down heavily in the nearest chair, and resorted to a language understood everywhere; he waved a finger in the air in the general direction of the barmaid, and threw a coin on the table.

  That worked, and the barmaid smiled at him as she placed a full tankard before him. He began to feel more cheerful.

  After all, he reminded himself, he was in a port. Naturally, there would be a variety of travelers, speaking a variety of tongues. “In Semma,” he said to Alder, “all speak one language?” He knew, as he said it, that his phrasing was awkward, but it was the best he could do.

  “Sure,” Alder said, settling down at Sterren’s table. “Everyone in Semma speaks Semmat. Just about, anyway; I guess there might be some foreigners now and then who don’t.”

  Sterren struggled to follow his guard’s speech. He had been resigned to learning Semmat, but now he was becoming really eager to learn. Whatever the ignominy of being forced to use a barbarian tongue, it was nothing compared to the isolation and inconvenience of not being able to speak with those about him.

  And it looked as if he was, indeed, going to be stuck in Semma for the foreseeable future, if he didn’t get away very, very soon. Thirteen leagues inland! There was simply no way he would be able to slip away and cover that distance without being caught and dragged back—not if the Semmans had any sort of magic available, as they surely did.

  If he was going to escape, he would have to do so tonight, here in Akalla, and stow away aboard a ship bound for Ethshar.

  And how could he do that when he couldn’t find three people in Akalla who spoke the same language as each other, let alone anything that he, himself, understood? How could he learn which ship was bound whither, and when?

  Even if he once got aboard a ship, how could he earn his way home, when he couldn’t even understand orders, or argue about the rules of a friendly game?

  No, it was hopeless. He was doomed to go to Semma, a country that his grandmother had been only too glad to flee, even at the loss of her noble status.

  Being thus doomed, all he could do was make the best of it. He would have to find some way to fit in.

  He might even have to actually be a proper warlord.

  First, though, he needed to know the language.

  “Alder,” he said, “I want to learn Semmat better. Fast.”

  Alder gulped beer, then nodded. “Sure,” he said. “What do you want to know?”

  Chapter Three

  At first, the discovery that he would not be required to walk thirteen leagues came as a relief. By the end of his first hour on horseback, however, Sterren was having second thoughts, and wishing he had found an opportunity to slip away during the night. Riding had always looked so easy! All you had to do was to get up there—which was simple enough when one had two burly guards willing to hoist you into place—and then sit there.

  He hadn’t realized how hard it was to just sit there, with the saddle bobbing up and down underneath, on and on and on unendingly, as the four horses Lady Kalira had bought carried them up out of Akalla of the Diamond onto the high flat plain to the east. His backside already felt very scraped and raw.

  He was surprised to see, between bounces, that they were not following either of the main inland roads, which led north. In fact, the road they did follow faded quickly away, leaving them on featureless sun-washed grassland that seemed to extend clear to the horizon in every landward direction. To the south and southwest, at least at first, the plain was chopped off short by the cliffs and the sea below.

  The only structure in sight anywhere was the castle, gradually diminishing behind them. Sterren had no idea how his companions were finding their way once the road had vanished, but they seemed confident of the route, so he did not question it.

  For one thing, he was far too busy trying to minimize the bruising of his backside to worry about where he was going, or why. He put aside all worries about wars and warlords and life among the barbarians, concentrating solely on matters closer to hand—and closer still to his seat.

  By the time the party stopped by a tiny stream for a midday rest and refreshment, out of sight of even Akalla Karnak‘s highest tower, Sterren’s throat ached from dryness, his hands ached from clutching the reins, his feet ached from being jammed into the stirrups, his back ached from trying to keep him upright, and worst of all, his rump ached from the constant abrasive collisions with his saddle. He did not descend gracefully, but simply fell off his mount onto a tuft of prairie grass.

  Alder and Dogal politely pretended not to notice, but Lady Kalira was less kind.

  “You haven’t ridden before, have you?” she demanded without preamble.

  Sterren took a moment to mentally translate this into Ethsharitic. “No,” he admitted. He was too thirsty, weary and battered to think of any sarcastic comment to add, let alone to translate it into Semmat. Her blithe assumption that an Ethsharitic street gambler would know how to ride seemed to call for a cutting remark, but Sterren could not rise to the occasion.

  “You should have told me back at the inn,” she said. “I could have gotten a wagon. Or we could have walked. Or at the very least we could have given you a few lessons.”

  Sterren tried to shrug, but his back was too stiff for any such gesture. “I ... It was ... It did not ... damn!” He could not think of any word for “appeared” or “looked” or “seemed.” Before any of the Semmans could volunteer a suggestion, he managed, “I saw it was not bad, but I saw wrong.”

  “It looked easy, you mean.”

  Sterren nodded. “I guess that’s what I mean.”

  “A warlord really should know how to ride,” Lady Kalira pointed out.

  “I’m no warlord,” Sterren said bitterly.

  “You are Sterren, Ninth Warlord of Semma!” Lady Kalira reminded him sternly.

  “I’m Sterren of Ethshar. I play dice in taverns,” Sterren retorted.

  Lady Kalira backed away slightly. “You know, you mustn’t tell anyone that when we get to Semma,” she said.

  “Why not?” Sterren demanded.

  “Because you’re the warlord!” Lady Kalira replied, shocked. “You hold a position of great power and respect. We can’t let it be common gossip that you made your living cheating at gambling.”

  Sterren did not follow all of this speech, but he guessed one vital word from context. “I didn’t cheat!” he shouted; the effort sent a twinge through his back and legs, and more than a twinge through his buttocks.

  “Then how did you win regularly enough to live?”

  “I was lucky,” he muttered unconvincingly. He had learned the word aboard ship.

  “Ha!” she said. “Wizard’s luck, if you ask me.”

  “Wizard?” Sterren asked. He knew the word meant one variety of magician, but wasn’t sure which. “Warlock,” he said in Ethsharitic.

  Lady Kalira did not recognize the word; instead she changed the subject.

  “You must relax,” she said, demonstrating my letting her arms fall limply, “when you ride. Move with the horse, not against it.”

  Sterren nodded, not really believing that he would ever learn the skill.

  “And we can pad the saddle—that velvet tunic in your pack will help. And you can walk sometimes.”

  Sterren nodded again, with a bit more enthusiasm.

  By mid-afternoon, thanks to additional cushioning, a slower pace, and walking when the blisters on his rump became unbearable, he had improved enough that, although he still ached in every joint and in several unjointed places as well, he was able to think about his future and to carry on some limited conversation with his companions as he rode.

  He began by pointing in each direction and asking what lay there. All they could see was sand and sun and grass, which made it obvious that he was asking what lay beyond.

  Ahead, of course, was Semma; behind was Akalla of the Diamond. To
the left, the north, Dogal told him, “Skaia.” The name meant nothing to him.

  The reply when he pointed to the right was more interesting.

  “Nothing,” Dogal told him.

  “Nothing?”

  “Well, almost. A couple of leagues of sand, and then the edge of the World. If you stand up in the stirrups and stare, you may be able to see it.”

  “See it?”

  “Yes.”

  That, Sterren thought, was a very interesting concept, seeing the edge of the World. Standing up in the stirrups, however, was a terrifying concept, so he decided to forgo the view.

  How, he wondered, could one see the edge of the World? What did it look like? What lay beyond it? The southern horizon, he noticed, did look slightly different from the others; there seemed to be a yellowish tinge to both ground and sky in that direction. He stared, but could make out nothing.

  The very idea fascinated him, all the same. To be so close to the actual edge!

  He had thought that Ethshar of the Spices was in the center of the World, but if he had come so close to the edge so quickly, then that could not be so; he knew the World was bigger than that. He had heard travelers speak of Ethshar as being in the southeast, but had, until now, put it down to a distorted worldview.

  Obviously, it was his own view that had been in error.

  That was quite a realization, that he had been wrong. He wondered if he had ever been wrong about anything important.

  Dogal distracted him from that line of thought. “Might be Ophkar to the north of us now,” he remarked. “Skaia’s not that big. Bigger than Semma or Akalla, smaller than Ophkar.”

  “Semma is next, beyond Ophkar?” Sterren asked.

  Dogal nodded. “That’s right. Your accent is improving greatly, Lord Sterren; congratulations.”

  Sterren said nothing in return, but felt a touch of pride. He had tried very hard to get the accent right on the barbaric names of the surrounding kingdoms, and it was good to know he had succeeded.

  He had come to realize that Akalla, Skaia, and Ophkar were all indeed separate kingdoms, squeezed into the thirteen leagues between Semma and the coast, and he marvelled that the Small Kingdoms were that small.

  He also wondered all the more just what he was getting into. If the kingdoms were crowded together that closely, they must surely rub each other the wrong way every so often. No wonder they needed warlords.

  “What is Semma ... What ... Tell me about Semma,” he said unable to come up with the words to ask, “What is Semma like?” or “What sort of a place is Semma?”

  Dogal shrugged. “Not much to tell.”

  “There must be something you can tell me; are there many cities?”

  “No cities.”

  Sterren could not think of a word for “town.” Instead, he asked, “Are there many castles?” The word for castle was indeed karnak; he had checked on that back at the inn.

  “Just one, Semma Castle. That’s where we’re going.”

  Dogal was not exactly a torrent of information, Sterren decided; he nudged his mount over toward Alder, on his right.

  “Hello,” he said.

  Alder nodded politely. “Hail, Lord Sterren.”

  Sterren sighed; he supposed he would have to get used to that pompous greeting. “Tell me about Semma,” he said.

  Alder glanced at him curiously. “What do you want to know?”

  “What it ... what I ... how it is there.”

  “What it’s like, you mean?”

  Gratefully, Sterren latched onto the phrase he had been missing. “Yes, what it’s like.”

  “Well, Lord Sterren, it’s hard for me to say, because it’s the only place I’ve ever been, except for this trip to Et’shar to fetch you. I was born there, never lived anywhere else.”

  “Ethshar, not Et’shar,” Sterren said idly, pleased to be the one correcting for once, rather than the one corrected.

  “Et’th’shar,” Alder said, spitting messily as he struggled with the unfamiliar combination of aspirants.

  “Are there many people?”

  Alder shrugged. “I don’t know, really,” he said. “The castle is certainly crowded enough.”

  “I didn’t just mean the castle.”

  “Well, that’s where everyone lives except the peasants.”

  That startled Sterren, and caused him to wonder if he was still misunderstanding the word karnak after all. “Everyone?”

  “Just about.”

  “Peasants?” The word was new to him.

  “The common people, the farmers,” Alder explained.

  Sterren nodded—he knew about the easy marks from outside the walls. “Are there many peasants?” he asked.

  Alder shrugged again. “I guess so.”

  “Are you a peasant?”

  “I’m a soldier, Lord Sterren.” The reproof was obvious in Alder’s tone.

  “You weren’t born a soldier,” Sterren pointed out, proud he had remembered the word “born” from Alder’s earlier comments.

  Alder reluctantly admitted, “True. I was born a peasant.”

  “Nothing wrong with that,” Sterren said, seeing he had hurt the big guard’s feelings. “I was born a peasant, too.”

  This was a lie, of course; he had been born into the merchant class. He meant, however, that he had been born a commoner.

  Startled, Alder corrected him. “No, Lord Sterren, you were born a nobleman.”

  “Well, I didn’t know it,” Sterren retorted.

  Alder considered that, then smiled. “True,” he said.

  Sterren rode on in silence for a long moment, marshaling his thoughts.

  At least, he thought, he would be living in the castle, which would presumably be at least an imitation of real civilization. He had feared that he might find himself in some muddy little village somewhere. A castle was not a city, but it was, he hoped, better than nothing.

  In the remainder of the afternoon, and around the campfire that night, Sterren pieced together a rough idea of what Semma was like from a constant questioning of his two guards. This also served to improve his Semmat considerably, adding to his vocabulary and giving him practice in pronunciation and sentence construction.

  Semma was a quiet little kingdom, almost all of it occupied by peasants on small family farms, scraping a living out of the sandy soil by growing oranges, lemons, dates, figs, olives, and corn, or by raising sheep or goats or cattle. At one time some peasants had grown spices for export, but Semma had lost its spice trade long ago, when Ophkar had temporarily cut off all the routes to the sea and the markets had found other, more reliable sources. The soldiers knew of no mines, or towns, or any sort of manufacture or trade.

  In the center of the kingdom stood Semma Castle, with a large village clustered around it—the closest thing to a town or city that the kingdom could boast. The castle itself was home to something over a hundred nobles—Sterren had balked initially at believing that, but both Dogal and Alder had insisted it was the truth. Sterren could imagine a hundred people willingly jammed into a single building readily enough, since he had seen the crowded tenements of his native city, but he could not imagine a hundred people living like that who called themselves nobles.

  Back home in Ethshar, Azrad VII surely had a hundred or more people living in his palace, but only a few could call themselves nobles; most were servants and courtiers and bureaucrats.

  Alder had noticed his disbelief, and had explained, “Well, that’s counting the kids, and besides, a lot of them are lesser nobility, and it’s a big castle. You’ll see.”

  Sterren considered that, and Lady Kalira took this opportunity to present him with a salve for his developing saddlesores.

  “It’s always a good idea to bring a healing salve when travelling,” she said, “though this wasn’t exactly the use I had in mind.”

  Sterren accepted it gratefully, and crawled away from the campfire somewhat in pursuit of privacy. Lady Kalira discreetly turned away, and the Ethsharite
slid down his breeches and applied the ointment liberally.

  That done, he rejoined the others. He had just begun to inquire about the army he was supposed to command when Lady Kalira announced it was time to shut up and sleep.

  Sterren obliged, leaving military matters for the morning.

  Chapter Four

  They spotted the castle’s central tower by mid-morning of the third day, scarcely an hour after they had buried the ashes of their breakfast fire and set out again. Sterren had to admit that it looked like a big castle, as Alder had said.

  At that point they had just begun to pass farms, rather than open plain—compact yellow houses surrounded by small stands of fruit trees, patches of tall corn, and miscellaneous livestock grazing the native grass down to stubble. The various inhabitants of these establishments, intent on their own concerns of herding or cultivation or hauling water, invariably ignored the travelers.

  The plain was no longer quite so smooth and flat as it had been for most of the journey; the ground they traversed had acquired something of a roll, though it was still far from hilly.

  Sterren had never gotten around to asking much about the army, but he had learned that Semma was roughly triangular, bounded on the southeast by the desert that stretched to the edge of the World, on the north by the relatively large and powerful kingdom of Ksinallion, and on the west by Ophkar. Semma had fought several wars against each of her neighbors over the last two or three centuries—particularly Ksinallion—but under the Seventh and Eighth Warlords had stayed at peace for an amazingly long time. Alder and Dogal did not remember any of the wars themselves, but Alder’s maternal grandfather had fought against Ksinallion in the Sixth Ksinallionese War, about fifty years ago. Sterren was still patiently listening to tales of ancestral bravery when the castle came into view.

  Not long after that a cloud of dust appeared ahead of them, and grew until a dozen horsemen emerged from it. Sterren was worried, but the three Semmans seemed very pleased by this welcoming committee.

  The horsemen were all large dark-skinned men dressed much like Alder and Dogal, riding horses in red and gold trappings, and Lady Kalira announced that this was an honor guard, sent to escort the newfound warlord to the castle.