"Sergeant! Sergeant! Someone's coming I hear a horse."
"That's the woman's horse. I'm going after her," the sergeant said as he dismounted and strode toward the bushes where Meeral crouched.
"I wouldn't. I hear that Pactyl women are trouble."
"Trouble?" The man laughed and began poking with his sword. "I'm looking for trouble."
The faint drum of hoofs on the road became louder and the man on the road again yelled, "Sergeant!"
A familiar voice said, "Identity yourself. Who are you?" MorToak had come back.
There was an immediate clash of swords. A cry. And silence. Had she lost MorToak just when he began to notice she existed? With a curse, the Drarie sergeant was back on his horse.
"Meeral!" came the shout from the rider on the road.
"MorToak! Look out," she yelled as the Drarie, sword held high, charged MorToak. Sparks flew as blade smashed against blade.
Meeral ran back to the road. The body of the slain soldier sprawled in the moonlight, black patches trailing across his chest and on to the road. A sword lay nearby. Grasping the sword, she remained, crouched and watching. She would have to defend herself if the sword of the Drarie sergeant landed where he aimed it. She tightened her grip for even the Drarie horse attacked MorToak, rearing up and striking out with his hooves. But 'Taur evaded him. Meeral recalled MorToak telling her about his training in fighting, but had he ever battled with such a seasoned horse and rider as this?
She wanted to help him, hoping to catch him in those few seconds when she could clearly see his blond head and broad shoulders. Perhaps she could enhance his strength as he thrust and parried his sword. Yet when she caught a fleeting view of MorToak's face she held back her powers. The moonlight revealed such a serene confidence as he struggled for his life that Meeral did not have the right to intervene. She justified her inaction with the thought that her interference might throw him off balance and send him crashing to the ground.
Finally she heard the scrape of horses' hooves on the road and the clash of swords. The fighting faded into a grunt, a sigh and the thud of a body as it fell on the road. Meeral's fingers touched the top of her blouse, feeling the raised curve on the pendant that hung from her neck. Who had survived, MorToak or the Drarie soldier? She crouched and waited.
The victorious rider rode toward her.
"Meeral."
Placing the sword down on the road, she stood up. She was trembling. For a moment she could not speak.
"Meeral!" he shouted. He was looking out into the woods.
When she said, "Here I am," he gave a start. Instantly he was off 'Taur and holding her in his arms.
"I shouldn't have left you," he said. "Thank Gurkon, I came back. You're trembling. You had a terrible fright."
Yes. He was right. Twice she had wondered if he had been killed. That was the worst part.
His hands pressed against her back until she felt her whole body close to his. ÒMeeral. What if you had been killed?"
Meeral rested her head against his chest, yearning, yet content.
But he had more to say. "What would Kaldoat have said?"
Meeral looked up at him. His features were a blur of gray and black shadows.
"Kaldoat?" she asked.
"You're our most valuable soldier and our most valuable weapon. We can't lose you."
He spoke with such passion -- but it wasn't the kind of passion Meeral wanted. Giving him a push, she stepped away from him.
"You're right," he said. "We'd better find out why these men are here."
I'm furious, Meeral thought, I push this man away from me and he thinks I'm showing military wisdom. That's not the kind of admiration I want. She was glad the dark hid the anger and frustration that blazed in her face.
As MorToak dragged the two men off the road, she told him what the two Draries said about landing men and cannons. They would ride back to the tavern and send the owner's son with a message to Kaldoat that the Draries had landed.
"He can pick either of these horses," MorToak said after he caught the soldiers' two horses.
"No, he can't. I'm taking that one," Meeral said pointing to the one that, in the moonlight, looked like a roan.
"What about Bonfire?"
"Bonfire? She's just an ember. I want a horse that's younger than I am."
She fastened one of the Drarie's swords to the saddle and mounted the horse. MorToak said, "That's a real war-horse. Can you handle him?"
"Of course I can," she said, but she wondered. Did she pick such a vicious horse to compensate for Bonfire? As to that old pet horse, MorToak removed her bridle, loosened her girth and gave her a resounding smack on her rear. Bonfire would find her way home at her own speed.
MorToak had to pound on the tavern door for at several minutes before they heard noises inside. At first it seemed as if the door would not be opened but MorToak shouted, "The Draries are coming! Open the door!"
Quickly, the owner sent his son off with a message to Kaldoat. The tavern keeper told them of a deserted beach where he thought the Draries probably landed. It was not far from the road.
MorToak said they would return to one of the places that they had looked at in the afternoon, a place where the road cut between two high hills.
"Are there any other roads to Pactyl?" MorToak asked.
"No. Only this one."
"Have you heard any other scouting parties go by here tonight?"
"When I sleep, I sleep," the man said.
"If we go too fast, we might catch up with scouting parties. If we go too slowly, the Drarie army will catch up with us."
The man scratched his baldhead and murmured, "May Ezant be with you."
They had been riding for quite a while when they made a sharp turn. Ahead of them was a group of Drarie soldiers.
"Halt!" one of the men shouted with slight accent that Meeral now recognized as the Drarie speech. "Identify yourselves."
MorToak and Meeral wheeled their horses around and raced back down the road.
"We have to get past them," MorToak said. They heard the shouts of the Draries behind them.
"This way," Meeral said. She dropped the sword on a moonlit spot on the road, the point facing toward the pursuing Draries. She guided her horse into the woods, and said to MorToak, "Dismount and draw your sword. Face to your left." In the dark she knew he was staring at her. "Quickly! Before they reach the sword. Now drop your sword on the ground."
The Draries approached the sword that lay on the road.
Meeral said, "Pick up the sword and watch the men on the road. Use it against them."
As MorToak picked up his sword, the sword on the road moved in unison with his. He slashed with his sword, and the other sword slashed, hitting the legs of a horse. The horse crumbled, throwing the rider to the ground. MorToak lunged high at the next rider who swerved and tried to parry the thrust. Horses bolted, men fell. A man pointed down the road and yelled, "Over there! They're over there!"
In the confusion, MorToak and Meeral threaded their way past them and back to the road.
"Come on" MorToak shouted, and this time no one stood in their way.
The location on the hillside was as strategically located as they had remembered it when they scouted in the daylight. Meeral stood watch while MorToak built a small fire on the side of the hill hidden from the road. He kept the fire going until the Drarie army wound its way between the hills. The moon had set and the predawn light gave Meeral a view of the road. The string of twenty cannons, with a few large, enclosed wagons began to pass on the road below. Drarie soldiers walked on each side of the wagons.
Meeral let half the cannons go past before she grabbed the fire MorToak had lit. She moved the flame around, setting fire to the second wagon with its cannon, then the tenth, then back to one at the far end of the line. She saved the large, enclosed wagons for the last. The wagons disintegrated in a shower of wood and cannon balls as the powder exploded.
The Draries searched in eve
ry direction for the source of the destroying fire. When Meeral disabled the last cannon, they mounted their horses.
"We'll make a run for it," MorToak said. "If I stop, you keep going. That's an order."
She looked around. Draries seemed to come from all directions. She could not locate MorToak. Where should she go? A Drarie soldier on a black horse was galloping toward her, his sword swinging above his head. Why had she picked such a spirited horse as the roan? She was too busy trying to control him to use enhancing to protect herself. Digging her heels into the roan and she snapped the reins. He plunged forward -- but it wouldn't be fast enough. She leaned over the horse's neck, her head turned, watching the Drarie come closer. Suddenly two arrows were sticking out of his side. The memory of telling Kaldoat to train the enhancers and archers for accuracy flashed across her mind. Then a third arrow appeared on the flank of the approaching horse. The horse stumbled, right in the path of the roan. She remembered falling and someone shouted, "Meeral!" She managed to get to her feet when she felt an arm around her waist and a voice saying, "Hang on"
She caught sight of MorToak's blond hair.
She held on until she heard Linima's voice. "Lay her down here." Hands felt her body. Someone said, "No bleeding. No bones broken." A flask pressed against her lips. She drank and lay in a hazy half-sleep.
She heard MorToak's voice, far off. He shouted, "Send a message to the fire enhancers. Tell them to come at once."
A little later she heard him say, "Build a fire."
In what seemed only a few minutes, Meeral opened her eyes. Shakily, she stood up. MorToak stood near the line of fire-enhancers. By the time she reached them to take her place in line, she was not needed.
"You're not hurt?" MorToak said as he came toward her. With a quick glance in the direction of the Draries, he said to her, "Before I finish this business, I would like to know . . . " But Kaldoat said, "Get the cavalry ready for battle. We'll finish them off."
Another battle. They had been lucky so far. Must he fight again? The Lurdoan cavalry was waiting. The enhancers had destroyed the small boats in the harbor. Meeral had destroyed Drarie cannons on the road. The archers, with the help of enhancers, had stopped the attack of the Drarie soldiers. The fire-enhancers had completed the work of the archers. And what had the King's cavalry done in the battle for Pactyl? With their armor over the chests and their swords in the hands, they sat on the horses that Kaldoat would not let Meeral use to defend Pactyl. Impatiently they waited so they could show how important they were in the defense of the city. At a signal from MorToak, they charge the Draries. They waved their swords, dug their heels into their horses, and shouted their frightening battle cry. That was all that was needed. The remaining Draries surrendered without any member of the Lurdoan cavalry getting blood on his sword.
CHAPTER 17
"I thought you'd sleep right through the ball," Lenera said.
"Ball?" Meeral asked. She was still groggy from sleep. She had bathed and slept, ate and slept, chatted with the twins and slept. Now, more than twenty-four hours after she fell from the roan horse, she was a bit stiff but she was ready to go back to work.
"The Duke and Duchess are giving a ball to celebrate the victory over the Draries," Lenera said, handing Meeral three envelopes.
Shejani had described the balls that the Duke and Duchess gave in Pactyl. Meeral was not surprised to see three invitations, separately addressed in exquisite calligraphy to Lenera, Linima and Meeral. Even with the Duke's fourteen level enhancer another calligrapher had written in the names. That meant many invitations and many guests.
"A ball means you must wear a formal dress," Meeral said, glancing at the invitation. "Can you get something in time? It's the day after tomorrow!"
"Kaldoat's helping us," Linima said, "Officers are invited. He finally found a seamstress who wasn't busy. She agreed to make a dress for me."
"What about Lenera?"
"We got an enhancer to work with the seamstress," Linima said. "Kaldoat's going to watch how she works so he'll learn more about enhancing."
"Kaldoat is going to watch the seamstress work?" Meeral asked in disbelief.
Linima smiled her broadest smile. "He might be teasing me, but he is completely sold on enhancers. He praised us for sending messages so he could move troops where he needed them."
"MorToak wanted to see you," Lenera said. Her voice became apologetic. "He wanted to ask you something but you were sleeping . . . "
"I was no condition see anyone, not even the Prince," Meeral said. His question would only be a military one.
"He praised you," Lenera said. "He wanted you to know that you he had Lulrythe send a message to King ParToak telling him you were responsible for defeating the Draries. King ParToak was quite impressed."
"I found out from Kaldoat . . .," Linima said, then hesitated as if she wasn't sure she should repeat her information. "This was the first time MorToak put his military training into practice. He told Kaldoat he killed two Draries on the road -- said he was lucky."
"It was more than luck," Meeral said.
"That's what Kaldoat thought. He used to complain that MorToak . . ."
Linima stopped and looked around guiltily. "I mean . . . Kaldoat says the Prince is really acting like a commander. He's no longer leaving everything to Kaldoat but is studying and talking it over with him."
Meeral had just finished putting up her hair when the twins suddenly said, "The dress. We forgot about the dress." Lenera ran to the wardrobe and pulled out a white lace dress.
"A seamstress brought it. She'll alter it for you. She said it belonged to the daughter of the Duchess," Lenera said, adding in a voice that reminded Meeral of their conversation about giving orders to servants, "She didn't want to leave it, but I told her she should."
"That looks . . . elegant," Linima said hesitantly when Meeral put it on. "Your necklace is beautiful."
"Daughter must be as short as mother," Lenera said as she tried unsuccessfully to pull the skirt down so it would cover Meeral's ankles. "The seamstress suggested she add some more lace at the bottom. She'll need to lower the waist. I'll get a servant to call her."
"No," Meeral said as she fingered her pendant and looked down at her exposed bare flesh in the front. "White makes me look sick and lace makes me look shapeless. I have a dress that will be just right for me."
She put on the silk dress with the tiny pearl buttons down the front that her mother said was country-style. The twins admitted that this dress looked beautiful on her. They suggested the seamstress could lower the neckline in front so she'd be more in style. Meeral said she wasn't going to pretend she was something she wasn't. To herself she thought, if MorToak was acting more like the commander of an army, which he was, she should act like a girl from the country, which she was.
Meeral spent a busy day organizing women to defend Pactyl by using a wall of fire on land. She noticed Kaldoat listen to the women and even took some of their suggestions.
Meeral and the twins spent the afternoon getting ready for the ball. Their hair freshly washed and wearing their best dresses, they made their entrance into the palace reception hall. Several officers gathered around Lenera, but Kaldoat made it clear that he alone was Linima's escort. A woman dressed in expensive blue fabric cut in high fashion and wearing a few elegant pieces of fine jewelry, greeted Meeral with, "Meeral, I'm so glad to see you."
Meeral mumbled something polite and neutral. The woman continued. "The harbor was almost boiling by the time all the Drarie boats were sunk. You really should have seen it"
The Countess Nelasmar! Meeral had always seen her in the simplest clothes, willingly taking orders from Meeral and acting as an example for the other women.
Now, with charming manners, the countess introduced Meeral to guests who gathered around them. "This woman had the foresight to teach us exactly what we needed to know to defend Pactyl."
When someone asked how she did it, the countess explained, "The Draries didn't under
stand how Meeral used enhancing at all. The sailors who escaped from the burning ships told their commanders that their ships had been destroyed by a large, single weapon that took a long time to launch. So the commander planned the Drarie attack on Pactyl with cannons mounted on many small boats. They made many small targets, thinking they were safe from the one imagined weapon. They couldn't have made it easier for us. Meeral had insisted we practice over and over again on targets in the harbor. It was just like a grand practice session only this time the targets were the enemy."
"But they were destroyed so rapidly," an elderly gentleman man said. "How did you know that someone else wasn't aiming for the same boat as you were?"
"We each developed our own 'fire signatures.' We could see where others were heading."
"I had nothing to do with that," Meeral said. "The enhancers developed that technique themselves."
But Meeral's words were lost as the circle of people around her broke. In front of Meeral stood the Duchess. In sharp contrast to Meeral's modest dress, the Duchess wore a dress of red silk with a gold and diamond necklace that fell on the bare flesh above her bosom. Her dark hair was piled high on her head. Meeral thought she really looked like a Duchess.
The look of disdain the woman gave Meeral's dress was hauntingly reminiscent of Shejani's when she had first seen it. "I thought you would appreciate the chance to wear a dress of white lace, my dear," the Duchess said.
Meeral looked into her rosy face and saw anger hidden behind the pretty smile. She pictured how Shejani would behave and said in her most musical tone. "Thank you, your Grace. It was thoughtful of you to send me your daughter's dress but it was really much too elegant for me." She dropped into a perfectly controlled curtsy, the pearl buttons on the bodice reflecting the palace candles and her full skirt falling gracefully around her.
"Your Grace is most kind," she added. She dropped her gaze respectfully. She was aware that MorToak had just come up and was staring at her.
The Duchess let her eyes sweep over the men who were looking at Meeral.
"Daquad," the Duchess said to the Duke as she took the arm MorToak extended to her, "Escort Major Meeral to dinner."
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