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To David,
for taking a chance more than thirty years ago …
and sticking with me the whole way
Characters
Lephi
Emperor of Cyador (Deceased)
Mairena
Empress of Cyador (Deceased)
Kiedron
Duke of Cigoerne, Son of Lephi and Mairena
Xeranya
Healer and Consort of Kiedron
Emerya
Healer, Daughter of Lephi and Mairena
Jhalet
Commander, Mirror Lancers
Chaen
Majer, Second-in-Command, Mirror Lancers
Altyrn
Majer [stipended], former Commander of Mirror Lancers
Maeroja
Consort of Altyrn
Rojana
Daughter of Maeroja and Altyrn
Lephi
Eldest Son of Kiedron and Xeryana
Lerial
Second Son of Kiedron and Xeranya
Ryalah
Daughter of Kiedron and Xeranya
Amaira
Daughter of Emerya
Atroyan
Duke of Afrit
Haesychya
Atroyan’s Consort; their children are Kyedra, Traeyen, and Natroyor
Rhamuel
Arms-Commander of Afrit, brother of Atroyan
Khesyn
Duke of Heldya
Casseon
Duke of Merowey
Tyrsalyn
Third Magus of Cyador, First Magus of Cigoerne
Saltaryn
Magus, former Tutor of Lerial
Apollyn
Magus
Veraan
Former Captain, Mirror Lancers, head of Myrapol House
Aenslem
Merchanter of Afrit, father of Haesychya
CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Characters
Map: The World
Map: Hamor
Prologue
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Chapter XVIII
Chapter XIX
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
Chapter XXII
Chapter XXIII
Chapter XXIV
Chapter XXV
Chapter XXVI
Chapter XXVII
Chapter XXVIII
Chapter XXIX
Chapter XXX
Chapter XXXI
Chapter XXXII
Chapter XXXIII
Chapter XXXIV
Chapter XXXV
Chapter XXXVI
Chapter XXXVII
Chapter XXXVIII
Chapter XXXIX
Chapter XL
Chapter XLI
Chapter XLII
Chapter XLIII
Chapter XLIV
Chapter XLV
Chapter XLVI
Chapter XLVII
Chapter XLVIII
Chapter XLIX
Chapter L
Chapter LI
Chapter LII
Chapter LIII
Chapter LIV
Chapter LV
Chapter LVI
Chapter LVII
Chapter LVIII
Chapter LIX
Epilogue
Tor Books by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
About the Author
Copyright
PROLOGUE
From the low rise where he has reined up, the Mirror Lancer undercaptain glances eastward to the Swarth River, slightly more than five hundred yards away, its waters far lower than usual in the hot afternoon, an afternoon more like late summer or early harvest. Then his eyes turn westward, taking in the open lands, whose grass is dry and brown and barely calf high. More to the north are the few scattered plots that have brought forth little enough from the drought-plagued past harvest. Less than a kay behind him, beside the small stream that flows down the middle of the swale between the rolling rises, is a scattering of cots and hastily built shelters—structures thrown together by the people of Ensenla after they had fled the town of the same name, a town less than two kays north of where he waits, a town burned to the ground early that morning and now marked only by trails of smoke rising into the silver-hazed green-blue sky. Roughly fifty yards in front of him is a single post, stained a faded green. There is another such post a quarter kay to the east, overlooking the river, and another a quarter kay to the west, and that line of posts extends a good ten kays west of the river, perhaps farther, since the undercaptain has not measured the precise distance they extend in the three eightdays since he arrived to patrol the area.
The undercaptain studies the lay of the land, and the approach to the rise, knowing that a full battalion of Afritan Guards rides toward him and Eighth Company. They are less than half a kay to the north, just out of sight on the dirt road that has linked the burned-out town to the Cigoernean hamlet of Penecca for the past twenty years.
The undercaptain continues to reach out to the skies, frowning as he does. Still … there is enough moisture there to continue to create the clouds he would prefer but does not need.
“Ser?” asks the senior squad leader.
“Five companies. They’re riding up the slope just on the other side of the border. They’ll want us to stand aside so that they can slaughter the people who fled. We can’t let them do that.”
“Strange that the duke isn’t here, ser.”
The undercaptain knows that the senior squad leader is suggesting a withdrawal might be in order. “It’s better that he isn’t.”
“Begging your pardon, ser…”
“The blood won’t be on his hands.” The undercaptain is being obscure, but he also knows that obscurity will serve him and the duke far better than clarity in the matter.
The Afritan battalion appears at the north side of the top of the rise perhaps two hundred yards from the undercaptain and the senior squad leader. The Afritans continue forward until the lead riders are within fifty yards of the border post, and the line of five companies abreast comes to a halt. All five companies re-form into a five-man front, then dress their ranks, and even their files.
An armsman carrying a white banner bordered in the dull crimson of Afrit rides forward, stopping just short of the border post.
The undercaptain motions for him to proceed, even as he separates order and chaos in the air above the rise, watching as the cloud above expands and darkens slightly.
The Afritan rides forward, reining up ten yards short of the Mirror Lancer undercaptain.
Neither speaks, but the undercaptain gestures.
&
nbsp; The lancer clears his throat, then begins. “Majer Ehraam is pursuing traitors who have rebelled against His Mightiness Duke Atroyan. He would appreciate your not impeding his duty.”
“These are the lands of Duke Kiedron. While we understand the majer’s desire to do what he perceives as his duty, our duty is not to allow the armsmen of another land to murder and ride down those who have fled to Cigoerne for refuge.”
“I am commanded to inform you, Undercaptain, that you and your men will be treated as allies of those who are traitors if you stand in the majer’s way.”
“Might I ask if Arms-Commander Rhamuel accompanies the field commander?”
The Afritan armsman does not answer.
“Surely, you must know,” prompts the undercaptain.
“The majer has the authority of His Mightiness.”
The undercaptain nods. “You may inform the majer that we will not harm him or his men so long as he does not cross the border into Cigoerne. My Mirror Lancers are posted a hundred yards south of that border.”
“The majer must insist on the right to bring traitors to justice.”
“He has the right to bring them to justice in Afrit, not in Cigoerne. That is the rule in all lands, and that is the agreement between Duke Kiedron and Duke Atroyan. We will enforce that right by force of arms if necessary.”
“The majer has declared that he will pass.”
“If the majer crosses the border with his battalion, we will enforce our right to protect ourselves.”
“Then … the majer says you will suffer the consequences.”
“So will he and all his men.” The undercaptain glances at the small but thickening cloud that has gathered partly above him and mainly over the center of the rise to the north of where Eighth Company has reined up, arms ready.
Abruptly, the Afritan armsman turns and rides back to the massed formation.
The undercaptain waits.
“Ser…?” ventures the senior squad leader.
“Have the squads hold their positions. I’ll give the order if we need to attack.”
“Yes, ser.”
While the senior squad leader relays the order, the undercaptain concentrates, extending his order-senses and beginning to create order-lines as parallel as he can make them to the dancing chaos within the small thundercloud overhead, a cloud that darkens moment by moment as raindrops begin to fall across the top of the rise.
A trumpet triplet sounds, and the Afritan battalion starts forward at a fast walk. Carefully and precisely, the undercaptain eases apart order and chaos in both the air above the advancing Afritans and in the ground below them. The Afritan riders break into a canter as they pass the faded green boundary post.
As he senses, with what he thinks of as brilliant light, the interplay between a deeper level of order and chaos, an interplay within all things, the undercaptain begins to separate small bits of order and chaos in the ground under the mounted mass of Afritan riders. Seemingly just before, but in fact, a calculated time before that point where his separations would unleash massive power, he limits the separation, and creates a quadruple ten-line order coil with the power going into a shielded circle around the Afritans.
HSSSST!!!!
Lightnings flare from ground and sky in a pattern that crisscrosses men and their mounts, galvanizes blades with such force that they are ripped from the hands of men who do not even feel their death. Thunder with the force of mighty winds slams into everything within that fiery circle, and the charred fragments of men and mounts are thrown to the ground, consumed almost totally by flame, and then covered with fine ash that is all that remains of the browned grass of harvest.
The undercaptain shudders in his saddle as a wave of silver gray flows over him, a wave unseen by any but him. His eyes blur, and tears stream down his cheeks. His head feels as though it is being pounded with a wooden mallet. He squints, enough to sharpen his blurred vision so that he can make out what lies before him on the top of the rise.
All that remains of a battalion of mounted Afritan armsmen is a circle of ash and blackened ground some two hundred yards across.
The senior squad leader gapes, then looks to the undercaptain, his mouth open, but wordless.
“The skies and storms favor Cigoerne,” says the officer. After a long silence, he adds, “Have Second Squad continue the patrol. The other squads will return to our camp. We need to tell the people of Ensenla that it is safe to reclaim what they can from their old town. They’re entitled to it. They’ve little enough left to their names.”
“Yes, ser.”
The rain is already beginning to let up as the undercaptain and the bulk of Eighth Company begin their return to the temporary camp and post in Ensenla, a post that the undercaptain knows full well will soon become a large and permanent base for protecting the northern border of the duchy.
I
Lerial looks up from the half-written report before him, thinking, Saltaryn, if you only knew how all your efforts to improve my writing with precise statements are being corroded by the requirements of being post captain. Then he concentrates on the words he has just written.
… the Afritan Guard continues to patrol the top of the ridge one kay north of Ensenla. They occasionally stray across the marked boundary. They do not stay on the south side of the boundary for long, and they refrain from crossing when a Mirror Lancer force larger or roughly equivalent to the Afritan force is present …
He shakes his head. They’re not quite taunting us, but what can you do? At the same time, he worries about what he writes, because he had earlier sensed, not that much after dawn, a number of riders leaving the Afritan Guard post to the north, and now he waits for his scouts to return and report.
Lerial glances from the dispatch he is writing, the required summary of Eighth and Eleventh Companies’ evolutions and other events occurring over the previous eightday, to the dispatch he had received two eightdays earlier.
From: Jhalet, Commander, Mirror Lancers
To: Lerial, Captain, Ensenla Post
Date: Third Twoday of Winter, 593 A.F.
Subject: Border Patrols
Please find attached a map of the border between Afrit and Cigoerne, as agreed to by Duke Kiedron and Duke Atroyan. These borders are to be respected. Duke Kiedron has affirmed that no Mirror Lancer company is to cross them, even under extreme provocation. All officers and squad leaders are to be familiar with the borders and to conduct patrols in such a fashion that no Mirror Lancer evolution can be taken as provocative or as an encroachment upon Afritan lands.
Duke Atroyan has issued a similar proclamation to the Afritan Guard. Should the Guard inadvertently trespass, all Mirror Lancer squads and/or companies should offer the Guard the opportunity to retreat before resorting to arms. That opportunity need not be offered should any Afritan force commence hostile actions on the lands of Cigoerne.
If such hostile action is commenced on the lands of Cigoerne by Afritan or other forces, whatever response may be necessary shall be determined by the officer or squad leader in command of the Mirror Lancer force so attacked. In no case, however, shall a Mirror Lancer force knowingly enter the lands of Afrit. The sole exception to this directive is that a company commander or more senior officer may commission a force to recover Mirror Lancers carried into Afritan territory.
Any attacks by Afritan forces are to be reported expeditiously to Mirror Lancer headquarters, as are any border crossings for the purpose of recovering personnel. Such reports must contain the time, the location, and the complete scope of forces, both Mirror Lancer and others, involved in the action.
Lerial returns his attention to his own report and continues to write. A third of a glass later, he signs the report and eases it aside to let the ink dry before folding and sealing it for dispatch. He considers all that has happened over the past four years—and all that has not—ever since the people of Ensenla all fled Afrit over less than an eightday and subsequently rebuilt the town, or much of it, in th
e duchy of Cigoerne … and then demanded the right to continue to till their lands and tend their flocks on their ancestral hills.
Duke Atroyan’s response had been quick … and disastrous for the Afritan Guard. Lerial shakes his head, recalling the events that followed. Thankfully, over the last four years, he has not been required to use such force. The upside of the “effect” of such a storm has been that Duke Atroyan could suggest that the deceased field commander had been unwise to attack in such weather … and lay the blame there, with no word about the fact that the duke himself had ordered the attack while his brother, the arms-commander of Afrit, had been either inspecting the ironworks at Luba or ill with a severe flux … at least that is what Lerial has gathered over the years, from listening and from veiled hints from his aunt Emerya, who has her own sources. But the downside of letting a freak storm take most of the blame for the deaths of over five hundred men is that at least some officers in the Afritan Guard are wagering that such a freak storm is unlikely to occur again … and they are tired of being restrained from pursuing the growing numbers of refugees who have fled to Cigoerne, many of whom have been skilled crafters. Nor has Duke Atroyan grown more patient as time has passed … which is why Commander Jhalet issued the order that rests on Lerial’s desk. It is also why Lerial has insisted on training one squad from each company to use horn bows similar to those used by the Verdyn Lancers—even if it took some pressure by his sire to get permission for that … and well over a year of training.
Lerial has no desire to unleash the power of unbinding linked order and chaos again … and he has been fortunate in not having to do so. But how long will you be able to refrain?
Cigoerne has grown to almost half again its size in five years, and places like Penecca, the “new” Ensenla, and Teilyn, as well as others that had been barely more that hamlets or small towns, now are far more than that, and the factors in Cigoerne have added two more river piers to handle the trade from all over Hamor, and even from Candar and Austra.
Heritage of Cyador (saga of recluce Book 18) Page 1