Winter of Ice and Iron

by Rachel Neumeier

  “Banners are like game pieces. Save that they are carried by living men onto bloody fields. Kings and dukes cast them out and gather them up again. As I have done, and shall do; yours among the rest.” He met her gaze again, his golden eyes filled with fire in the lantern light. He said, with a dangerous curl of his lip, “But I shall see to it that yours does not fall.” Then he smiled and added smoothly, “Nor mine, to be sure.”

  Kehera was silent. She was very aware of the Wolf Duke; of his physical presence and of the leashed passion he held back. Part of that was his Immanent, but she knew part of it was his own. The chain with which he bound back Eänetaìsarè . . . that was all him: a hard-held discipline she had to respect. Despite moments like this one tonight. It troubled her, though she knew, or thought she knew, where that crack in his discipline had come from, and why. Methmeir Irekaì was hardly likely to leave off his efforts to conquer all the northlands. If the duke found himself hard-pressed now, how much worse would that get?

  The duke’s fingers as he arranged the tiahel pieces were long and elegant. Indeed, he was long and elegant throughout. She stole a glance at him. He did not have the open, friendly good looks Kehera had always appreciated. His features were severe, his manner restrained, his temper biting. But she had to acknowledge that he was growing on her. Especially as now, when she glimpsed the vulnerability underlying his . . . not quite limitless strength.

  He was twenty-seven, she knew. Not so much older than she was. He seemed far older. Of course, he had held the ruling tie to the Eänetén Power for seven years. After killing his own father to take it. And then holding Eäneté safe against his own king. Little of that was easy for a Harivin to imagine.

  He liked her. He valued her good opinion. Morain Lochan had said so, and Tageiny had agreed. She was still uncertain that she could say she liked him. But she thought it was at least possible she would learn to.

  He had let her send Riheir Coärin away. And now he was sitting there patiently, the blackwood tiahel rods on his side of the table, waiting for her to pick up the six made of maple and roll the smoky agate dice.

  Kehera did not go back to her own tent until almost the hinge of the night, when she judged the Eänetén Power finally settled enough that they both might rest. She felt, when she stepped out into the cold and caught the eye of Caèr Reiöft, rather like one soldier handing an important duty over to another, and while she was sorry that Caèr—and Tageiny, whom she had all but forgotten—had had to wait so long in the weather, she also felt that she had done well.

  They reached Meilin Gap an hour after noon on the twenty-first day of the Iron Hinge Month.

  To the right of the road, the mountains marched away to north and south, towering peaks of stone and snow and tangled frozen forest as far as any eye could see. Meilin Gap should not have been readily apparent in this season. But snow and ice had plainly exploded outward from the gap, the debris spreading out like the devastation that followed an avalanche, a wide fan of destruction across the field below the mountains, where even now men and Powers strove.

  Kehera knew very little of battle, and what little she knew seemed to translate poorly to an actual field where real soldiers and lords and Immanences fought for dominance. She saw Riheir Coärin’s White Stag banner on the field below—yes, of course he’d said he had sent men, and obviously that had been a very good idea. And there was the graceful Black Swan of Viär—that was good; all this land lay within the precincts of Viär. This was a small province, much smaller than Coär, its Immanent having emerged from its rough mountains only four generations ago. The land here, subject to nearly the worst fury of the obsidian storms of midwinter, could not be settled until it possessed an Immanent Power that could provide protection. Yet the lord of Viär had done well since his great-great-grandmother had taken the tie of the young Immanent Power. Kehera didn’t know the current lord, Toren Viärin, very well. But she knew her father had always liked him and approved of the stamp his line was gradually putting on Viär’s small Immanent. She had felt Raëhemaiëth moving subtly all day; it was supporting Viär, she guessed now, though quietly.

  But a lot more of the men down on that field seemed to be following a different banner. The long snaky form of the Irekaïn Winter Dragon whipped in the wind, double-headed and monstrous, and from what she could see, it had all but won the field. She said in a low voice, “There are so many.”

  Tageiny, setting a reassuring hand on her arm, said calmly, “Not so many more than we have, really, and they’re not set up to meet a force coming against their flank.”

  Kehera glanced at him, then looked distractedly at the Eänetén soldiers, who were leaving the road and raising up the Wolf banners and the White Stag of Coär to show they came as Harivin allies. They looked orderly and tough and there were certainly a lot of them, but it all seemed so agonizingly slow. The duke himself had drawn off a little way, with Riheir Coärin and a handful of officers and soldiers, toward a slope that offered a good view of the struggle below. She couldn’t see anything like fear in his posture. Nor in Riheir’s. But then, she wouldn’t. It was their duty to look fearless and commanding. That was her duty, too, of course, so she tried not to sound nervous as she asked, “Won’t the Pohorins have plenty of time to get themselves set any way they want?”

  “Well, yeah,” Tageiny allowed. “Only if they try to form up to meet His Grace’s wolf soldiers properly, those Black Swan soldiers down there will take ’em in the rear. No, they’ve got to face both ways at once and that’ll mean they’ve got to pull back toward the mountains, and pretty quick, too, or risk being overwhelmed. We’ve a good chance of taking that field, I should say, and a stroke of good fortune we weren’t an hour later.”

  “Oh,” said Kehera in a small voice, wishing she’d studied tactics rather than embroidery while she’d had the chance. She wondered whether Tageiny was just trying to reassure her, or if he honestly knew.

  “Of course, the Irekaïn Power did blow up half the face of that mountain over yonder,” the big man added, not quite so confidently. “So I won’t say His Grace necessarily has it all his way just now, either.”

  This time it was Kehera’s turn to reassure him. “We have our ties, too. Remember that just yesterday, in Eäneté, His Grace’s Immanent defeated Methmeir Irekaì’s.”

  “Well, that’s so,” Tageiny began, and then leaned forward sharply. “Now, what’s this?”

  “Oh!” Kehera was surprised, though perhaps she shouldn’t have been. “That’s Toren Viärin, but I wouldn’t have thought he’d come himself. Of course he can’t actually join the battle, so perhaps it makes sense.” Toren Viärin’s heir was just a little boy, so it would be a disaster if Toren fell. A child was not likely to hold Viärinéseir, especially not with the Irekaïn Power ready, she was sure, to interfere. So she could see why Lord Toren would leave his vantage point above the field and ride to confer with Riheir Coärin and the Eänetén duke. She kneed her horse in that direction, ready to play her role as peacemaker and cornerstone of the alliance.

  Toren Viärin didn’t even glance at Riheir, and he rode right past the wolf soldiers, who fell back at the duke’s gesture. He did spare a glance and a curt nod for Kehera as she arrived, obviously recognizing her. But he swung down off his horse and strode toward the duke without a word to any of them, moving with long, angry strides and a total disregard for propriety. He was an older man, older than Kehera remembered from his occasional visits to Raëh; his bony face was grimly humorless and not at all handsome. But she knew he must be passionately devoted to his land and his people, because all the Viärin line was like that; that would have aged him too.

  Now Toren Viärin stripped off his gloves without breaking stride and flung his mud-spattered cloak to the nearest soldier, who caught it, looking startled and impressed.

  Innisth dismounted unhurriedly to face Lord Toren, saying absolutely nothing, neither of welcome for the other man nor censure for the manner of his arrival.

&nbs
p; Lord Toren said fiercely, with no preliminary greeting or acknowledgment, “Viärinéseir can’t hold that bastard king of yours. It can’t hold. Fortunate Gods! That bastard Irekaì blew through Meilin Gap like a stroll on a summer day, and where were you? Yesterday would have been more timely, or better yet the day before!”

  “I know,” said the duke. “I am here now.”

  “And for all any of us know, too late!” Despite his obvious fury, Lord Toren took two steps forward and dropped to one knee, holding out his hands to the Wolf Duke. “Force the bond, then,” he snapped. “Viärinéseir will yield, and your Power had best be strong enough to hold for both of us.” He sounded not merely determined, but fiercely impatient.

  Kehera stared in amazement—everyone was staring, except the Eänetén duke, who simply took the other man’s hands in a firm grip, met his eyes, and called up his Power.

  And the Eänetén Power rolled forward. Kehera almost saw Eänetaìsarè rise around the Power of Viär and snap its jaws closed like a wolf on a swan.

  Lord Toren gasped, a small, pained breath, and the Power of Viär rose in turn, but immediately yielded. Kehera perceived it through Raëhemaiëth. She saw the Immanent of Viär as a bright sweeping Power, like a cool mountain spring and feathers ruffling in the wind and sunlight on a breeze-blown lake, but harder underneath, as the stone of the mountains lies below woodlands and fields. It was strong, for a lesser Power, but it yielded and allowed Eänetaìsarè to force a bond upon it.

  Then Raëhemaiëth, that had held a bond to Viärinéseir since almost the founding of Viär, gave it up. It hurt, an odd sharp pain that Kehera didn’t really feel. She gasped and flinched, but for her it was over almost at once; Raëhemaiëth had not fought Eänetaìsarè at all. And the bond the Eänetén Power took was a strange one, not anything Kehera had ever seen or quite imagined. It was as though the bond forced upon Viärinéseir was more or less folded through Eänetaìsarè, so that the Wolf Duke himself could hold both ties at once. It was like the ruling tie a king might hold to a lesser Power, but . . . different. Kehera wished again, as she kept doing, that Tiro were here. Her brother knew about Immanences and their bonds. More than she did, at least.

  Toren Viärin still knelt on one knee, now with his head bowed against his fist. Whether he had chosen this or not, the change in the ruling tie had plainly not been easy for him. Innisth stood gripping the other man’s shoulder, one of the few sympathetic gestures she had ever seen him offer to anyone. He said, “I cannot grant you surcease. This battle must still be won.” There was no gentleness in his tone, but when he offered a hand to help the Lord Toren rise, Toren took it.

  “So long as we win, it will have been worth everything,” Lord Toren said, and added grimly, “My lord.” He was not quite swaying where he stood, but Kehera thought that was an effort of will. He started to turn back to his horse, and did sway, but the duke caught his arm and steadied him. Lord Toren gave him a curt nod, closed a hand on his horse’s bridle and stopped. “Kehera Elin,” he said to her. “I’d word of you and what you’d done, letting the Wolf into Harivir. Your father sent word to everyone.”

  Kehera hardly knew how to answer this. She said after a second, “Lord Toren, you’ve done well and generously, and if we carry the day here, you will be due all our gratitude.”

  Lord Toren snorted. “I was desperate, and Gods grant I won’t regret it!” He looked her over quickly, then nodded, though Kehera wasn’t sure what he thought, or about what, exactly. But he said, kindly enough for all his impatience, “Hope of spring in the dark of the winter, that’s what you’ve brought to Viär. Two days ago I wouldn’t have said so. But I say so now.”

  “Thank you,” said Kehera, which was all she could manage.

  Lord Toren swung up onto his horse, kneed it around, and looked over his shoulder at the Wolf Duke. “I’ll see to my people,” he said sharply. “Only you see to yours, my lord!” He reined away, back down the slope toward the battle and his waiting officers.

  “A good man,” the Eänetén duke said calmly. “In later days, I think we will be most comfortable with a hundred miles or more between us.” He glanced down toward the battle. “Let us see,” he murmured to Riheir, “if together we may drive the Winter Dragon back through Meilin Gap.” He spared Kehera a brief nod and took the rein of his tall black mare from the man who held her.

  Tageiny and Luad set up Kehera’s tent on the high slopes above the field of battle, so that she might be out of the wind and yet witness all that passed. It felt very strange to be at once so separate from the battle and yet feel so intimately connected to events below.

  The duke was distant now, but easy enough to pick out, black cloaked on his black mare, always keeping back out of the battle, on the higher slopes that gave him a view of the field below. Kehera thought she could see the fire that lay underneath all that darkness, like the fire that lay buried beneath the mountains of Eäneté.

  Raëhemaiëth was with her; she felt it. But she felt also that most of its attention was elsewhere. With her father, she knew. She felt that some other battle was taking place to the north. But here, the Immanences of Viär and Coär and Eäneté were slowly pushing Methmeir Irekaì’s soldiers and his Power back through Meilin Gap.

  “Getting a little close, here,” Tageiny commented, keeping a wary eye on the shifting battle. “They keep coming this way and pretty soon we’ll be in bowshot.”

  “Surely they won’t come all the way up here,” Kehera protested.

  “Well, maybe not quite,” the big man allowed. “No, that little knot of wolf soldiers is probably going to get—yeah, there, that’s better. But if I tell you to get back, listen; there may not be time to dally.”

  “Of course, Tag,” Kehera said in mock surprise. “You know perfectly well I always do exactly what you say.”

  Luad laughed outright.

  Kehera was glad that to them the battle below seemed to make sense. To her, nothing about it made any sense at all. But Tageiny said, “It’s going well. Look, do you see? That Swan officer is taking his company around their flank and he’s going to get all the way around it, too, if the Irekaïn soldiers don’t move their tails. Right, there they go. See that, boy?”

  Luad, peering interestedly down the slope, said, “Yeah, Tag. We’ve got them cut off around to the north. Right? They can’t get away into Harivir, no matter which way they break. Only way they can go is back through the gap.” He added after a moment, “Not that it looks to me like they’re trying too hard to get away.”

  “But they should be,” Tageiny said. “Fortunate Gods, what are they thinking? It’s like they don’t think they can die. Yet their Power can’t possibly take up their dead, not here. I mean not even the local Immanent’s taking up its own dead from that field. Look, you can see the dead are staying where they fall.”

  Once he had pointed this out, Kehera saw it was true. It did seem odd. And a little disturbing.

  The Wolf Duke had now taken a place on a slope quite near the field of battle. As Kehera watched, he brought his mare around and spoke to the men who surrounded him, and riders went out from his position to carry his commands through the battle.

  “Fortunate Gods!” muttered Tageiny, “Does he think he’s invisible? We’re not the only ones as have a good view of him up there, and he’s not even carrying a shield.”

  Kehera started to ask what he was worried about, and then saw for herself as a sudden flight of long black arrows rose out of the Pohorin army. She caught her breath.

  Below her, the duke reined his mare about again, but not to flee the descending arrows, which he did not appear to notice. As they arced down out of the air, they scattered, their smooth paths broken, and not one even struck the hill that he occupied.

  “What the fuck?” Luad exclaimed, and then quickly apologized, as Tageiny glared at him, “Sorry, sorry, m’lady.”

  “Eänetaìsarè looks after him,” Kehera said, relieved, trying to sound like she had expected that.
/>   “Now they’re trying to retreat,” Tageiny said, with great satisfaction. “Figured out they can’t break his Immanent, I guess.”

  “Yeah,” said Luad, pointing. “But what about them there? They don’t look like they’ve given up.”

  He was indicating a small group of archers, a group that stood high up on the slope of the mountain, just below the gap, and sent flight after flight of black arrows raining down on the hill where the duke overlooked the battle. He never even lifted his head to track their course, and they always skidded aside on the air and fell harmlessly to the ground, but Kehera leaned forward anxiously. “He has a tie,” she said. “One of those men. Look. That one who doesn’t have a bow. He carries a tie. Can you see it?”

  Tageiny jerked his head No. But he said disgustedly, “Yeah, of course he does.”

  “Eänetaìsarè is blocking him. But he’s strong. He’s—where he stands, that is Irekay, I think. He’s anchoring his Power into this land that should belong to Viär and Harivir.” She looked anxiously back up at the hilltop where the duke sat his black mare and surveyed the battle.

  And so she was watching when the winter dragon came floating down from the eastern mountains, riding the winds down from the teeth of the high peaks. It looked like nothing real, like nothing that had ever been real. Its long body divided into five coiling necks and five slender heads; its breath was killing frost and its many-tongued voice held all the bitter violence of winter storms.

  They came down from the heights during the hinge of winter, these dragons, and men penned up their cattle and kept their children indoors. In the woodlands natural creatures sheltered in dens and beneath thick stands of firs, and the world waited for the dark days to pass. But dragons did not come ten days early, and they did not come into the precincts of Immanent Powers. And yet this one was here.