“I need to call upon your allegiance to House Vae.”
“You know you have it, for what it’s worth.”
That’s what makes it more difficult to ask. “I hope it is worth the life of Sir Calvraign. I would like you to forswear your oath to Vae, and enter service as his man. Not as a mercenary – as a sworn-sword, and all that this implies. Just as you once did for my father.”
Osrith shrugged, shaking his head. “I told you I’d keep an eye on him. Isn’t that enough? I can watch out for him without oaths. I’ve only ever sworn one like that, and I intend it to be the last.”
“I’m asking you to. If you honor the oath you swore to my House, you’ll honor this request to serve another with the same steadfast loyalty.”
“To honor your House I should forsake it?” He folded his arms across his breast, the cords of his muscles taut. “This smells like politics. That doesn’t mean scat to me.”
“It’s not. Truly. I wouldn’t ever ask you such a thing for politics,” she said, wondering if even that much were true. “It is for Calvraign’s sake, and perhaps for much more than that.”
“Aeolil.” Osrith’s tone was respectful but edged with command, as if she were still the young girl hiding from imaginary hrumm under the hem of his cape. “What exactly are you talking about?”
A particularly severe cramp struck, and she doubled over, her head swimming with a strange hum. It was not from the moons-cycle; it was the tides. Her head cleared, but her body shivered with the echo. When she looked up again, Osrith was kneeling in front of her, picking up the pieces of her teacup.
Did I drop that?
“Lily?” Osrith’s voice was oddly gentle, and he eyed her with concern. “Are you well?”
Lily. Aeolil smiled. She’d almost forgotten his pet name for her. He had rarely used it, and even so, she’d never let anyone else get away with it. She didn’t even like lilies, after all. Although Osrith was more like a dear uncle or an old friend now, back then she had wanted nothing less than to marry him. She’d always tried so hard to impress him: the knight-errant, the un-mannered mercenary, the hardened soldier with the mysterious past. He was a hard man to resist for a young maid just short of a ten-year.
Strangely, she was bolstered by the memory of her childhood infatuation. He had been there for her when she needed him before, and he had been there for her family, even if not without loss. They had both come a long way, but inherently this was a man she trusted.
“I’m fine,” she said, adjusting to the shifting tide. “Well, there’s nothing to be done about it, at any rate. Your little Lily never had to worry about the red linens, did she?”
Osrith frowned, setting the broken pieces of porcelain on the nearby table. “I thought I smelled blackheart tea. Your mother used to send us out for that, you know – your father and I.”
“I remember,” she said. “I was just thinking about it before you came in. I’m sorry. It’s not polite discussion.”
“I’m not polite company,” observed Osrith.
“No, you’re not. But this is why I trust you with Calvraign, Osrith. He has never squired, not properly, and Agrylon has designs on him. Left to his own, he will be led down a path not of his choosing, and perhaps not to his benefit. You can look out for him as no one else can.”
Osrith cleared his throat and shook his head again, not masking his reservations. “I like the boy fine, but he already has a master bard watching over him, and not the type who excels only in singing, mind you.”
“He’s been knighted. He will be at the king’s command, and he shall be tethered to the court and Agrylon’s interests. I’ve no doubt about that at all. They may call Brohan the King’s Bard, but he is still beholden to a different master and may be called away at any time.
“No, Osrith. It must be you, and it must be a full-fledged oath of the sword-sworn, sanctified and bound by whatever gods you don’t curse. I know you will always have our interests at heart, but you must keep his close to mind. Agrylon guards his secret with such vigor, its purpose – Calvraign’s purpose – must be of great import. Please. Keep him safe, and teach him to survive, not simply to live.”
“You were always a wordy child,” Osrith complained. “Spent too much time with Kassakan, no doubt.”
“You will do it, then?” she pressed.
“No,” he answered. “Not of my free will. My place is by your side, and your mother’s. War is coming.”
“There is no place for you by my side, Osrith,” Aeolil said, and the words saddened her even as she spoke them, for they were true. “Bleys is here, by mother’s order. Prentis guards her and the castle. I must command you to accept Calvraign as your liege and release you from our service. If that is how it must be done, then so must it be. This I speak for House Vae.”
“All bloody formal,” muttered Osrith. “I suppose I’ve no choice, then, if my word to Hestan has any value at all. Whatever words I say, and whatever pledge I take, I will have an eye on you and your mother. I will do what I can for the boy, but that’s the best I can promise. Why you’d trust me with him….” He exhaled, clenching his teeth.
“And,” Aeolil said, the words reluctant on her lips, “that brings us to the next matter.”
Osrith spread his arms again. “Out with it, then.”
“I need to know what happened that day, Osrith – how you and Kiev survived. Brohan told Agrylon that Calvraign is threatened by no less than the Pale Man. A credible foretelling, he called it. It’s why I need your help, specifically. So that this time we will be prepared.”
Color filled Osrith’s cheeks and his eyes narrowed to hard slits. “Gods-be-buggered!” he shouted, his manners burned off by the heat of his anger. “What is that supposed to mean? Have you forgotten he butchered your father and brother last time we met, and nearly me and Kiev with them? Get some sense!”
“Yes, I remember that,” Aeolil countered, biting the words off in an angry growl despite herself. She’d thought she could remain composed, but it was a raw wound for both of them, and she could not keep the edge from her own voice. “And I remember you brought Kiev home. Safe. You hate yourself for what you failed to do, but even in that you succeeded as none other I’ve heard. I wish you’d saved all of them, Osrith, with all my heart. You couldn’t – but you did save one. Perhaps you can save one more.”
“For all the good it did,” Osrith muttered, turning his back on her to stalk to the other end of the room. “Who’s to say Kiev was marked for killing at all?” he said, without turning. “Maybe it was just Andrew and Hestan he wanted.”
“I don’t believe that. Kassakan will not say much on the matter, but she says the Pale Man still intended pursuit until she arrived.”
“Yeah. All the more reason to see I can’t do what you ask. I’d already bled a cask by the time she showed. I was so close to grey, I could see the stitching in Death’s knickers.”
“Do you think I’ve not considered this?” exclaimed Aeolil. Her face was hot: from the moons-cycle, the tugging tides, and her boiling anger. “Do you think I secreted myself into Agrylon’s service for thrills alone? On a dare? There’s certainly no political advantage to sorcery in these times. It is power, Osrith. Power and knowledge.
“The Pale Man and his magic took my brother and my father, and taking them took you also. He shred my very world. Kassakan may have kept quiet, but Agrylon’s library has given me ample to study over the years, and I have availed myself of that knowledge, Osrith. He has a power over you now – that is true. He is tuned to your tides. He may walk in your dreams, torment you, use you like a lodestone. I know all this, and a good sight more.
“But, Osrith,” Aeolil felt the rage seething through her teeth in her angry whisper, “you have tasted the arcane Dark of that sword, and swallowed it, and lived. You, Osrith, may also have power over him.”
“Bull scat.”
“No! Listen to me, captal! He senses when you are near, but do you not also sense him?”
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Osrith ran a hand over the old scar. “Aye,” he agreed, in a whisper. “Like a twisting knife.”
Aeolil nodded. “He cannot surprise you. You will know when he comes. His power is our power, too.”
Osrith finally turned again to face her. “And how will I ward against his sorcery? He walks where he will through Shadow.”
“You won’t,” she replied. “Kassakan will. She has already agreed to help us.”
“Of course she has,” he said, resigned.
“This is why we need to know – I need to know – what happened. What exactly happened that day? You did not defeat him in battle, and yet you defeated him by surviving. How?”
“That’s no great mystery,” he explained. “I don’t like talking about it; doesn’t mean I can’t. I suppose I owe you as much. You were too young when it happened. Though I warn you the hearing of it won’t be pleasant.”
“I know,” said Aeolil. “I don’t relish it.”
Osrith pinched his face into a scowl, his eyes looking past Aeolil and at something distant and far away, but all too vivid in his memory.
“Dieavaul ambushed us in a little gully down south of the mainway, but east of the Daemeyr. Baited us in with a ruse of some hrumm looting a wagon, then sprung a trap on Hestan and my men when they drew near. Hestan had ordered me to stay back with the boys. I guess he was at least a little suspicious, because usually it was Hardt who drew that duty. Mostly, Hestan liked me guarding his flank in battle. I suppose that saved me their fate, them that charged.
“I don’t know if it was fire or lightning he hit them with, but it charred most of the company straight off, and his own hrumm, too. That’s when Lynx died. I can’t tell you how many nooses that boy’d slipped out of. Chivalry from a distance, he called it. And he died charging headlong into the fray like some damned heroic Knight of the Lance…” Osrith’s voice trailed off.
Aeolil remembered Lynx. He was the youngest of Osrith’s mercenaries, a sharp-witted man just past his second ten-year, a footpad with a deadly bow and a reputation for narrow escapes with a laugh.
“Kraye knew some spell-craft,” continued Osrith. “Not enough to matter against a war mage like Dieavaul, but just enough to see a glimmer of what we were up against. He signaled retreat, like the smart soldier he was, but Dieavaul stepped through Shadow, and they were blade to blade in a heartbeat. Kraye didn’t have time for any of his magic tricks, and Dieavaul took his head right off in less than a wink. I’d never seen anyone move that fast – like he was still a shadow.”
Kraye had been handsome and self-confident. Dark-skinned, with piercing eyes edged in gleaming gold. His armor had been of ancient style, and his speech was accented with the formal tones of the Gold Coast. Her mother called him the gentleman mercenary. She remembered he and Osrith quarreling often and loudly, but lightly.
“He always claimed to be the last of some ancient and proud line,” Osrith mused. “Said he could trace it back to the old families of Dachadaie itself. And that was it for him, gone in a bloody tick along with his proud lineage, whatever it was.”
Osrith shrugged, but Aeolil saw it as a gesture of defeat rather than indifference. “Hardt had it worse. There were only a few of the guard left, and they rallied, for what that was worth. I was trying to send off the boys, but Andrew didn’t want to leave your father.”
“He wouldn’t,” whispered Aeolil in a fond melancholy.
“By the time I’d started them on their way back to the castle, Dieavaul had unleashed another of his spells. I don’t know what it was called. They all have a name, you know – the Greater Spells. If I had to guess, I’d mark it as either the Black Wind or the Flaying Death. Staples of the old legions. I don’t know. Not had occasion to survive many such spells in person. Magic like that – there’s no wonder some don’t weep much for your fallen empire.
“Whatever it was, it ate them up like a storm of razors, man and horse alike, all them that were left. All except Hardt and Hestan, and Hardt was done for. Just a pile of shredded bloody bits left of him, still trying to push your father back, but he was dead on his feet. He was just too stubborn to realize it as fast as the others.”
Osrith took a deep breath and looked around the room with an impatient scowl. “Do you have anything stronger than tea in here?”
“There’s some brandy in the decanter there on the sideboard.” Aeolil pointed. “And goblets. Pour me one, too.”
Osrith shuffled over and popped open the decanter, giving the contents a sniff. With a grunt of approval, he poured out two goblets, full to the brim.
“I’d known Hardt the longest. He’d bought me outta the gaol when I was about a ten-year, to serve in Ferus Whyr’s Company. We’d been together since. He was a big, stupid, greedy oaf – and a mean bastard, besides – but he died a braver death than most. Funny, that.”
“He always scared me,” Aeolil admitted, and accepted the brimming glass of brandy. “Of all your men, he was the one that seemed the most like a killer.”
Osrith snorted and quaffed a considerable measure of his drink. “Ah, Lily – we were all killers. Lynx was charming. Kraye was well-mannered. Blood was still on their hands, and on mine. A lot of blood. Hardt, well,” he paused to wipe his mouth on his sleeve. “I suppose he was different. We were all good at it, numb to it a bit, but he liked it. He was still the closest I had to family.
“No matter. He was gone. I’d seen this pale, lanky faeling kill a dozen men along with my lieutenants in less time than I could wet myself. Only Hestan was left, and his time seemed short. I spurred on Blackdog to charge. I hoped maybe I could last a bit longer, give Hestan or the boys some time.”
Osrith stopped talking and just stared, chewing his lip. Aeolil could sense with an impending dread what would come next. She steeled herself for it. This is how my father died.
“Hestan’s horse had spooked and thrown him. All that blood, or the magic, or the bonesword – I don’t know what did it, but it bolted for home. He was there on the ground, his leg broken or close enough, and Dieavaul laid him open – split him chest to groin, and he was done just like that.
“That was hard enough to see, but when I heard Andrew shouting, heard him closing behind me, charging at full gallop, I knew a different kind of fear. Dread, I suppose you’d call it.”
“Oh, Andrew.” Aeolil strangled a sob in her throat. Damn you, you stupid brave boy! Damn you! Why didn’t you run?
“He was proud,” said Osrith, as if answering her thoughts. “And naïve. And he loved his father. I tried to beat that garbage out of all of you, but Andrew… No. He charged, and then Kiev came after him.”
Osrith finished his drink and slammed the goblet on the sideboard. “I tried to put myself between them, but he opened a bag of hell in our face. Shadowfire. I was close enough to see his eyes. He wasn’t paying me much mind. He was following the path of the black flames, looking past me and straight at your brother, admiring his work. He smiled when the screaming started, but it didn’t last long. I knew Andrew was gone then, too.
“He turned to me next, and Blackdog finally balked, so I hit the turf and rolled. Came up in perfect position. Struck him a killing blow right through the chest. Funny thing was, the sword didn’t strike true, somehow. He was there, but not there, just kind of in between, and I didn’t have any magic, no tricks, no way my mortal blade could touch him. And he knew it. I was left there wagging steel in the breeze.”
“Did he suffer?” asked Aeolil, her thoughts frozen on Andrew’s fate. For some reason, she needed him to tell her what she already knew.
“Aye,” answered Osrith. “Shadowfire burns you fast, but not fast enough. He suffered. If the stories are true, he still suffers. You’d know more about that than I, I’d guess.”
Yes, she thought. “But Kiev escaped, then?”
“I suppose the sight of Andrew burning black was a bit much even for blind courage. While I was up in Dieavaul’s face, he got some sense and turned about. Not th
at I’d any time to wonder at the fortune.”
“Go on,” she prompted. “How did you escape?” The worst is over, she thought. There’s no one left to die, now.
“He came at me high and fast, but I knew he was just drawing me off balance and out of position for a heart thrust. I also knew he was too fast, and untouchable besides. I couldn’t kill him. I couldn’t go toe-to-toe parrying and riposting. So,” he exhaled, as if still wondering at his own actions. “I let him slip inside my guard, a smug smile on his face as he brought his sword in for the kill. I dropped my blade, and I grabbed the crossbar of his hilt in mid-strike, and I ran myself through on that damn bloody sword. Coldest thing I ever felt. It burned me with cold all the way through and out the other side.
“That surprised the bastard, sure enough. I figured if I was going to get stuck with the thing, better get stuck on my terms. I jabbed it through where it wouldn’t kill me right off, and I held it there, and him with it. Turns out, that sword lives on both sides of the Veil, and so long as I held it, I was on both sides, too. I may have been a stuck pig, but he couldn’t hide from me anymore – I was right there with him.
“So I grabbed his turkey neck in my other hand, and I gave it my all. Tried to choke the life right outta him. Had him worried, too, for a bit. He was tangled up with me, off balance, no leverage, and he couldn’t use his magic – couldn’t utter a word. I could feel his throat crushing under my fingers.”
Osrith’s eyes were glassy, distant in the realm of his recollection, his right hand clutched tight in a fist, knuckles white. Aeolil watched him there, studying him. She had always admired him and thought him both brave and capable. But now, she was in nothing short of awe. Tears rolled down her cheeks, tears of mourning and pride, and maybe vindication. If there had ever been a doubt that festered in her, it dissolved now. He’d done all he could for them, even if he didn’t seem to believe it. All he could, and a little more.
“That’s when Kassakan rode in on a rainbow, and Dieavaul managed to twist and push me off. I’d lost a lot of blood, and my strength was waning. I couldn’t put up much more fight. I managed to fall away from him and the door he opened up in Shadow. I didn’t want to follow him, wherever he was going, for damn sure.
In Siege of Daylight Page 60