Joust

by Mercedes Lackey

  On a clear night, six hands of days after that first horrible storm, Vetch put Avatre to bed with a full belly, and stayed with her until her eyes had closed and she was breathing deeply. The last of the sun god’s radiance was gone from the sky; to the west, it was a lovely azure, to the east, the color of fine lapis, and overhead, stars were beginning to come out. A clear night meant that the sea witches would probably conjure a storm tomorrow, or next day at the latest; which meant that the Jousters would go out after more dragonets and there would be yet another influx of youngsters. Vetch headed for the kitchen court, feeling slightly melancholy.

  The slaves and serfs who served the latecomers, when things were slower and mistakes easier to rectify, were all new to Vetch, and they didn’t know him from any of the new serf boys. He probably would have missed his friendly serving woman more than he did, but by the time he sat down to dinner, he was usually so tired he could hardly think.

  Still, when he took his place in that out-of-the-way corner tonight, he wished she would move to doing the late serving. The slave who left him a jar of beer and a platter of bread did so without even looking at him. He sighed, reached for a loaf, and tore off a piece with his fingers, hoping that there was someone still grilling fresh meat, and he’d get a plate of that, instead of cold leftovers. And that thought made him realize just how far he’d come. Last year at this time, he’d have done nearly anything for a scrap of meat, burned hard enough to need pounding between two rocks before he could actually eat it!

  A shadow fell over his table; a tall one. He looked up.

  “Well, Vetch,” said an unsmiling Baken. The slave must have just gotten a bath; his hair was wet, and slicked neatly back, his hands were clean, his kilt fresh. Vetch noted without surprise that Baken wore a hawk-eye talisman made, not of the usual pottery, but one like Haraket sported, cast from silver and inlaid with enamel. Never had it been so obvious that Baken was not from Tia—he had a Tian’s black hair, but it was curly, and not all the water in the world could make it lie straight on his head. His eyes were a disconcerting blue, and his complexion, beneath his tan, was a fine olive color rather than Tian bronze or Altan ivory. His features were mathematically symmetrical; deep-set eyes, prominent cheekbones, small nose, generous mouth, chiseled chin with a cleft in it. Definitely not Tian, nor Altan.

  Vetch blinked at him, taken by surprise by the young man’s appearance at his table. “Well,” he replied, not knowing what else to say. Baken seemed to take that as an invitation to sit down, because he did so, sliding onto the bench opposite Vetch’s.

  “So, you’re Kashet’s boy, I’m told,” the young man said, taking a small loaf, but just holding it in his hands, rather than tearing it open to eat it. “You’re the serf. The first serf to be made a dragon boy. The one that gave serfs a good reputation as dragon boys.”

  Vetch nodded warily. What was this leading up to? Did he have something against serfs?

  “So it’s largely thanks to you that I’m here at all.” Baken regarded him steadily, the torchlight in the court illuminating only one side of his face, and once again Vetch nodded, feeling even more alarmed.

  “So why do you hate me?” Baken asked, as calmly as if he was asking why Vetch was eating bread instead of an onion.

  Vetch started. “I—I don’t hate you,” Vetch protested, feeling horribly guilty, and caught completely off-guard by the unexpected question.

  “Then in that case, just what is it that makes your eyes go so dark and angry when you see me?” Baken persisted, pressing his advantage like a hunting cat trying to flush a pigeon, and with every bit of that intensity. “I’d like to know. I don’t make enemies, and if someone has decided on his own that he wants to be my enemy, I want to know why.”

  Since Vetch had thought he was keeping his feelings securely to himself, Baken’s accusation made him tense and nervous. What else wasn’t he keeping secret? And why was Baken confronting him about this, anyway? It wasn’t as if he was trying to make himself into Baken’s rival. He didn’t want to be Haraket’s assistant—he didn’t even want to be here! “I’m not your enemy,” he said brusquely, looking away. “I don’t wish you ill. How could I? You take better care of the dragons than anybody but me!”

  Baken’s head lifted at that, like a hound on a scent, and Vetch felt another pang of alarm. Now what had he given away? “Anybody but you. Is that jealousy I hear?”

  “No!” Vetch snapped. Then honesty drove the truth out of him. “Well—not jealousy. Envy.”

  Baken’s eyes lit, and he nodded; at that moment, he looked like one of the falcons he had once taken care of, with prey in sight. And Vetch already knew what prey felt like; it was a familiar sensation, a helplessness that—oh, yes—he was certainly feeling now. “Ah . . . envy. Let me see—what have you learned or seen or heard that could possibly make you envious of me? I’m not your rival for Kashet. Jouster Ari would never accept another boy even if Kashet might. You’re far too young to consider yourself as a potential assistant to Haraket, but Haraket offered me a great deal else besides that position. . . .”

  Vetch winced a little at the mention of Haraket’s promises, and the falcon stooped on the prey that had just been flushed before its eager eyes.

  “Ah. I see. In that case—would it be that promise of freedom that Lord Haraket made me?”

  Freedom. Vetch felt his gut twist up inside him, and he set the bread aside, uneaten. Why was Baken tormenting him like this? It wasn’t fair! “Yes,” he replied, biting off the word, making it a challenge. Leave me alone! he thought angrily. Why twist the knife in the wound? What have I done to you to deserve this?

  The falcon looked at the prey in its claws—and then, unexpectedly opened its grip. Baken sighed, relaxed, and shook his head. “I’m sorry, Vetch,” he said, sounding genuinely apologetic. “I can’t help what I am, nor what you are. When a slave is offered freedom, well—”

  “I’m more of a slave than you are, or ever could be,” Vetch grated. “A serf is less than a slave, for all that the masters pretend otherwise. I don’t hate you, but don’t expect me to love you for it either.”

  Baken closed his eyes for a moment, and there seemed to be a pocket of unexpected stillness holding both of them. “I know that. I also know why our masters will offer freedom to a slave, but not a serf, though I doubt it would be of any interest to you. Still.” He pondered a moment, then continued. “I’ll try and explain it to you, as my last, and most worthy master explained it to me. Slaves are either born that way, from those Tians who are born into slavery, or are Tians sold into slavery to pay debts, or they are brought as slaves from countries Tia has never conquered. Take me, for instance, I come from a very distant land indeed, so far that there is no chance my people could ever be the enemies of the Tians, so it is safe enough to free me. I have always been treated well, and have no one to revenge myself on. I’ve nowhere to go, freed—no reason to go to Tia’s enemies, and every reason to stay here and continue to serve at the same place, but for a wage. Whereas you—” He shrugged. “Serf, you are an enemy. Freed, you are still an enemy, but there is no control over you or your actions anymore. I am sorry. If I could change things, I would.”

  Vetch’s gut twisted a little harder. “It’s not fair,” he whispered.

  “No,” Baken agreed. “It’s not. It’s even less fair, because I am certain that Lord Haraket would offer you freedom if it was in his power, for how you took over the dragon Coresan and tamed her without frightening or hurting her. You are the one who has the reputation for making dragons love him.”

  The knot in Vetch’s gut eased. “You know about that?” he asked. He hadn’t thought Baken cared, actually. The young man had been very much involved with his own doings.

  Baken smiled, and his set of large, even, and very white teeth gleamed in the torchlight; they were startling, not the least because Vetch had never seen Baken smile before. “Lord Haraket is very much impressed with your dedication and abilities; he told me all ab
out it when he told me why he changed his mind about having serfs and slaves as dragon boys.”

  “Oh.” Now Vetch felt guilty all over again, and felt he had to defend himself. “Well, I don’t hate you, Baken. But you can’t blame me for—”

  “Of course I can’t, and I don’t,” Baken replied, interrupting him. “I just didn’t want the most skilled dragon boy in the compound to be my enemy, that’s all. Here. In my country, when men agree to be comrades, they shake hands.” He thrust out his hand.

  Vetch shook it, gladly—and gladder still that Baken hadn’t said “friends.” Of all of the people in the entire compound, Baken was the last one he dared to have as a friend, for he was the one most likely to uncover the secret of Avatre’s existence. “I don’t mind that you’re getting all the attention, that Haraket’s depending on you, and that—well—you’ve taken over the new boys,” he said, earnestly. “Honest, I don’t. The freeborn boys probably do hate you, though.”

  Once again, that gleaming, toothy grin. “Let them. The boys I’ve picked are all like you and me—well, maybe without our gods-bestowed gift for understanding animals, but they’re just as hardworking and they like their charges. They aren’t freeborn boys with plenty of choices ahead of them, and plenty of arrogance to match their choices. They already know that there are many, many worse places to serve, and they’re learning that this is one of the best, and they do not want to lose their places. Pretty soon, our kind will outnumber theirs, and I know we’ll outlast them. So let them stew in their own juices until they can’t even stand themselves. Just so long as you and I have gotten things straight between us. There shouldn’t be any animosity between men of our kind.”

  Men! That was sheerest flattery, and Vetch knew it. Still, it was sweet to hear, even if it was flattery. “You need to meet Ari,” Vetch said at last. “He’s—different. You’ll admire him, you know, he’s not like any other Jouster in the compound, maybe not like any other, ever.”

  “So Lord Haraket says.” Baken nodded. “He seems very different, and everything I’ve heard is good. He might change my mind about—”

  He stopped abruptly, but now it was Vetch’s turn to pounce alertly on an incautious phrase. If Baken had forced him into an uncomfortable place, well, turnabout was fair play. “About Jousters, you mean? Just why don’t you like the Jousters?”

  He whispered that; he didn’t want to get Baken in any trouble, just because he wanted to know one of Baken’s secrets. Baken frowned, fiercely, but he couldn’t conceal his own unease.

  Ha! Got you!

  “What makes you think that I don’t—” Baken began aggressively, but stopped, and gave a self-conscious laugh. “You’re pretty observant as well as clever, Vetch.”

  “Maybe. But I want to know,” Vetch replied, not allowing himself to be deflected. “Ari is—I don’t want anyone around him who doesn’t like Jousters and might do or say something that would give him trouble. Unless you’ve got an awfully good reason for it.”

  And it had better be an astonishingly good reason.

  “You have a point.” Baken studied him for a moment. “And all right; I think I can trust you, so I’ll tell you—though it isn’t merely that I don’t like Jousters, it goes further than that. It isn’t because of what they do, it’s because of what they are.” He paused a moment, and signaled to a server, who plunked down a platter of still-sizzling meat and another of onions between them, with an undisguised look of hero worship for Baken, who answered it with a wink. “You eat, though, while I talk. You look starved enough as it is.”

  “All right,” Vetch agreed—since now that his gut had unknotted, it was growling. He plucked a hot piece of meat from the platter and dropped it quickly on the bread, adding an onion slice; he waited only a few moments for it to cool before biting off a mouthful.

  “It isn’t that they’re the masters either. It’s more complicated than that.” Baken took an empty beer jar from the table and brooded down at it. “As I said, I’ve always been treated well; I don’t think anyone ever realized how I feel. As I’m sure you’ve noticed, no one ever pays any attention to the feelings of serfs and slaves.”

  Vetch waited, patient as a cat at a mouse-hole with only one entrance.

  “What do you call a man who calls up his servants, has hunting birds brought out to him, takes one on his fist, unhoods and casts it, and basks in the admiration of his peers when it takes a fat duck?” Baken asked, after a time.

  “Um—” Vetch replied, and shook his head. “Um—a noble? A rich man?” he hazarded.

  “Ah. Good answer. But not the one that makes me angry.” Baken’s lip curled. “You see, what he calls himself is ‘falconer.’ He has not caught the birds nor taken them at great hazard from the nest, scaling the cliffs to find them and bring them down. He has not tended them, he does not feed them, he has not trained them.” The bitterness in Baken’s voice made Vetch blink in surprise. “If the bird flies away, his wrath is only for the loss of a valuable possession, not because he is losing something he has invested a part of his life and self in. If it is recovered, he is pleased only because his possession is returned to him, not because he has gotten back something that is near as dear as a child. But the man who has done all those things, is all those things, is not called a ‘falconer.’ He is called slave, servant, and he has not even the right to challenge the master when the master says ‘I will have this bird,’ and he knows that the bird is not fit to fly that day.”

  There was a story behind that—perhaps many. Vetch didn’t want to know them. There was already enough pain in his own short life; he didn’t want to add the burden of Baken’s to his own. Already he had three people besides himself in his prayers—his father, Ari, and Avatre. If he added any more, the gods might begin to wonder what was wrong with him, that he assailed their ears with so many pleas.

  “Now—at least there is a separate name for the man who takes a dragon who is cared for by someone else, trained by someone else—who mounts into the saddle and flies it off, caring nothing except that it do what it is trained to do and bring him glory,” Baken continued, his jaw rigid. “And at least he is named for what he does, and not the good beast that he treats as he would a mere chariot.”

  Vetch started, hearing his own thoughts echoed so exactly.

  “He takes a creature that would, on its own, serve him in—say—hunting, and he turns it into a weapon, a horrible weapon, and exposes it to the spears and arrows of enemies with his only thought being where he would get another if this one fell.” Baken’s gaze smoldered. “And which of these Jousters truly knows his dragon, or has studied its ways and made it his friend, or has even cared for his own beast for so much as a day?”

  “Ari has,” Vetch said, stoutly, raising his chin. “Ari raised Kashet, trained him all by himself, and comes to be with him nearly every night. And he would tend Kashet himself, now, if he had the time. And he doesn’t trust Kashet’s care to just anyone either!”

  Baken’s rigid expression softened, and he patted Vetch on the head like a small child. Vetch bristled a little, but kept his resentment on a tight leash. To Baken, doubtless, he was a small child. That was the hazard of being so little. “So I have been told, and see no reason to disbelieve it. So your Ari is a single paragon among the Jousters, as the Commander of Dragons is a paragon among the nobles, given that he has taken, cared for, and trained his own birds, dogs, and horses.” Now there was plain admiration in Baken’s voice, and Vetch guessed that of all of Baken’s masters or the men those masters consorted with, the Commander of Dragons had been the only one who had earned Baken’s highest regard. “Such men are worth serving, and serving well. Our Haraket is another such. But such men are few, and often given names they do not deserve, when they take the praise that is rightly given to men that they think beneath their notice.”

  Oh, there are many stories there, Vetch thought, somberly, and now wanted to hear them even less. Stories—and heartbreak. And I have troubles of my own.
“Thank you for explaining,” he said, carefully. “I—I won’t tell anyone.”

  Baken nodded, accepting his word. “Now, that isn’t the only reason why I wanted to see you,” he continued, his tone now so light, his expression so casual, that Vetch could hardly believe what he’d looked like mere moments before. “I have need of your help, you see. I’m training one of the dragonets myself.”

  Vetch blinked. “You are?” That was unheard of! Trainers were trainers, and dragon boys—whether or not they were Haraket’s assistants—were merely dragon boys, not to be entrusted with the training!

  “Haraket wishes to see if my methods—things that I have learned from training both horses and falcons—produce a better beast than the methods used now,” Baken explained, with an ironic lift of his eyebrow. “As I said, another remarkable man, our Overseer. He does not answer a question of ‘why’ with the answer ‘because we have done it thus-and-so for ten hundred years’.”

  Vetch stifled a laugh with his food.

  “I need you, young Vetch, because you are four things. You are brave, you are agile, you know and like dragons, and you are small,” he continued. And smiled. “And if you will agree to take time to help me, you will see why I need someone who is all these things.”

  Vetch could ill spare the time—but—

  But he was going to have to begin training Avatre himself in another moon. And if he could learn how to do so by helping Baken. . . .

  “What’s more, Haraket says that there is absolutely no need for you to keep on with the leather work and the weapons’ inspection. You know very well how to do both, and there are more than enough new boys who need to learn to make up for you not being there.” Baken cocked his head to the side. “Will that give you time enough?”