She accepted it with a slight nod, and then, as she turned away, an obscure and indecipherable hand gesture. As one, Reandn, Nican, and Elstan turned to look at Vaklar in question. With just the hint of a smile on his broad face, Vaklar tugged at his upraised cloak hood, and Reandn wasted no time in retreating beneath the hood of his own oiled rain cloak. Followed by a grudging Elstan, he went to help Varina — Kalena’s personal — and Pawl, one of the guards, with the ornate tent.
They hunched in the rain, pounding stakes and setting poles and not conversing so much as wordlessly grunting their way through the task. When the tent was up and the new ambassador had gone within to eat and rest, Reandn removed himself from the fire circle. He stood with the horses at the edges of the camp, his mind abuzz with chatter and leftover magic. After a few moments, he slid away to check the perimeter, circling through the sparsely wooded slopes.
Water ran down the road in small rivulets, weaving its way through pre-existing divots and old tracks. The previous vestiges of snow were long melted away under the rain, and the roads looked like they’d make slow and sloppy travel indeed. But Reandn found no sign of anyone lurking.
Not that he’d expected any. Whoever had caused their trouble was no doubt lurking on the Keland side of the pass. With any luck Damen would spot them on the way up — and be smart enough to pretend he hadn’t, until he reached the summit and could gather Kalena’s guard to help.
Perversely, Reandn hoped they were indeed from the Knife. The members of the Shining Knife weren’t killers, whatever trouble they made. Unfortunately, nor did they traffic with wizards — and that spell along the rocks could easily have killed Elstan. Reandn wondered if Nican would discuss their previous trouble with Vaklar, and then wondered if he should do it himself.
And then he froze, realizing he was no longer alone in these woods. Someone closed in on him, trying for furtive silence and not succeeding; the rain had eased into a sprinkle and no longer made enough sound to cover movement.
Reandn shifted smoothly to the side, finding himself a tree of no little size to press up behind. After a moment he eased back to another tree, snagging his boot knife and putting himself in the perfect position to come up behind whoever followed. There he waited — listening, following the footfalls and breathing of the man. A large figure passed Reandn’s position in the gloomy light, sticking to the original trail as well as could be expected.
When he slid out from behind the tree and up behind the man, he discovered his tracker dressed in Kalena’s guard colors of black and deep blue. Reandn hesitated, but only a moment. He took the man silently from behind, jamming the blade against his throat.
Vaklar. It was Vaklar, and he stifled his sound of protest so quickly it never made it all the way out of his throat. Reandn said, “Even a wrangler doesn’t like to be followed.”
“Peace, man,” Vaklar said, his voice hoarse and strained. “I mean you no harm.”
“Funny way you have of showing it.” Reandn’s kept his mouth at Vaklar’s ear, his voice sliding into the gravel of its deepest tones. “If I were after Kalena, the first thing I’d do is take care of her other escorts. Is that what you’re about, Vaklar?”
“Good goddess, no!” Vaklar shifted in his grip, and Reandn pressed the blade closer to his throat. “I’m here to talk to you, aya? Just wanted to see how long it’d take you to catch on I was here.”
“Not very damn long,” Reandn said. “I don’t like games, Vaklar. I don’t like them at all.”
“Easy, now, ladaboy. I’d nay’er done it, knowing you’d react so.”
“And I don’t like being patronized, either.” Reandn tightened his grip. “I know what I’m about. It’s why I’m here.”
“I begin to understand so.” Vaklar gave the merest of shrugs; it was all Reandn gave him room to do. “I came only for talking, wrangler. Thought I’d be able to get some real words out of you, whilst none from that court-tongued Hound back at camp. At least, you gave our meira so.”
“For all the good it did,” Reandn said. He removed the knife from Vaklar’s throat, holding it out just long enough for the man to see he’d been using the back edge of the blade.
Vaklar snorted dark amusement. “Aya, then, ladaboy. May be you do know what you’re about. And if I’d been a true danger, then what?”
Reand tipped the blade so Vaklar could see the back edge on the blade. He hefted it, switching his grip, and sent the weapon at the closest tree. It struck with the satisfying thunk of a solid throw, with perfectly judged distance putting it perpendicular to the tree trunk.
“And now you’ve just lost your only weapon.” Vaklar’s words held a touch of scorn. “You trust me that well?”
Reandn grinned at him, more teeth than mirth. “What makes you think so?”
Vaklar shook his head ruefully, but there was a twinkle lurking in his eyes. “Well enough to say we trust one another equally, then, ladaboy.”
“Dan,” Reandn said. “I won’t ever answer to ladaboy, I can promise you that.”
Vaklar raised an eyebrow. “No, then? It’s not any insult, I assure you of that.”
“Use it on Elstan, then.” The thought amused Reandn; he figured Elstan was court-conditioned enough not to correct Vaklar, especially if Kalena was in earshot. “And say what you came to say.”
“An’ you’re some wrangler, are you?”
“A good one,” Reandn said. “Who can take care of himself.”
“And to care for the meira, as well. That’s what you’re about here, is it not? And what has you so worried, to send you into the wet woods while your Hound sees to Meira Kalena?”
Reandn looked at him a moment, weighing the consequences of telling the man — Nican’s prerogative — and of not telling him. “We had some trouble on the way up.”
Vaklar grunted, his wide mouth crimping in disapproval. “Shining Knife?”
“They didn’t leave any convenient indication,” Reandn said. “I killed one of them, and they came back again anyway. So either we’re up against two groups with magic-users, or the first one is persistent.”
“Magic, then? Not the Knife. They have naught to do with magic.”
“Doesn’t make any difference, does it, as long as they’re set on causing us trouble? Be easier if we had more escort — then we could keep Kalena both safe and happy. Right now she’s neither, no matter how good your people are.”
“They’re right good,” Vaklar murmured. “Better than a wrangler, I would have said.” He sighed, his gaze going distant for a moment. Decision-making, Reandn thought, just before Vaklar spoke again. “Understand this, lada —” But Reandn raised his chin, and Vaklar corrected himself. “ — Dan. Our Kalennie’s a good enough girl. Smarter than she came across up there. She’s just... young.”
“I noticed,” Reandn said, dry words indeed. At Kalena’s age he’d been full Wolf, and entrusted with the lives of others. But there were far too many lives depending on Kalena, who seemed younger than Reandn ever remembered being.
“Naya,” Vaklar said. “Keep that voice to yourself, then, especially an’ you talk to the others. They’re younger than I, have too much energy to waste on quick offense. Kalena’s a right to a bit of a snit or two over this. Near just two months back, she’s naught but the daughter of a Resiore Highborn meir, an’ him the Highest of all them wishin’ to cleave to Keland. Come the start of the thaw, and all them on that side find they want to get a leg up on the Knife, you follow?”
“Not exactly,” Reandn said, tripping over the man’s thick Resioran speech patterns.
Vaklar made a flicking gesture, as if the whole matter was just that simple. “Knife knows that with the thaw comes interest from the Keep, new talk on Resioran obligations and the like. But they want to ally with the Geltrians, aya. They say because the magic’s not so strong there — for magic’s a branding-hot subject for some of us — but there’s else to it.”
“Like what?” Reandn asked, retrieving his knife from
the tree and turning on his heel to lean against that same tree.
“Coal taxes and tariffs, lad — Dan. The coal we haul to you all summer long — why, most of that’s obliged of us in return for Keep protection. What else we might sell your way comes under mighty fine tariff, and our valleys have been under Keep rule for so long, there’s naya chance of changing that. So happens most of the Knife troublemakers come from the miners, up in the mountains. They figure maybe we go to Geltria, and start new, get a better deal on the taxes. Geltria proper’s got it’s own coal supplies, doesn’t need ours so bad.”
“And Kalena’s people?”
“Have the right of it, to my way of thinking. If Geltria nay’ent take the cost of allegiance in coal, they’ll take it in something else and leave us no better off. Double so, because any fighting over the matter is bound to happen on Resiore soil.”
“Can’t argue with that,” Reandn said. “So for this they’ve taken a spoiled Highborn girl and set her to a task that would challenge her elders?”
“Watch it there, now,” Vaklar warned. “Naya say such things of her. She’s a fine young meira, that one, and if you saw her on a better day you’d know just why they’ve chose her. She’ll shine in court, outshine the Knife for sure. If she can talk the Keep out of a percentage of the taxes, just enough to show good will, things’ll turn, our side of the pass. ’Sides that, she’s just of the right age to find a match there at the Keep. That’d be two things to tie us together, aya? A young couple spending half the year this side of the pass, half the time on ours?”
Reandn made no effort to tone down his skepticism. “There’s more to diplomatic negotiations than finding a mate.”
“Spoken like a wrangler.” Vaklar grinned at Reandn’s glowering response. “Tell you this much, Dan. Kalena wants nothing more than to return home, and that’s naya going to happen until the Keep listens to reason.” His grin broadened. “She’s used to getting what she wants, Kalena is.”
That last, Reandn figured, was nothing but the absolute and unfortunate truth.
~~~~~
“She’s a brat,” Nican muttered in a fierce undertone as he tightened his horse’s girth. Kalena was already mounted on her new mare, her guards in position around her. If Kalena was as skilled at arguing for the Resiores as she was in procrastination, the Allegients might yet have a chance. “A spoiled, heavy-handed brat.”
“I wouldn’t know anything about it,” Reandn said. “I’m just the fellow who feeds the horses and keeps that adorable palomino looking adorable. Oh, and sometimes I put up tents in the rain.”
Nican’s look was as fierce as his words had been. “Damn wrangler. Get that smile off your face.”
Reandn was only partially successful. “Go ahead,” he said. “Take it out on me. The Keep put me here here because I’m used to dealing with Highborn, and when I run into one like this, I know just what to do. Hide behind the horses.”
He could afford to be in a good mood. He and Vaklar had agreed to keep their conversation between them, which meant Nican wouldn’t hear the part where Reandn held the knife to Vaklar’s throat. Not as long as Vaklar didn’t want his charge to know he’d slipped and called her Kalennie, a childhood name gone bitter when the opposition used it to mock her age and her unearned new status.
“You’re bloody damn happy all of a sudden,” Nican said, his eyes narrowing as he regarded Reandn over the back of his horse. “That magic jar something loose in your head this morning?”
“Possibly,” Reandn said, indeed all too aware of the magic that thrummed in his very veins — an unforgettable, underlying threat. “Or maybe it’s just that you’ve forbidden Elstan any more of it.”
“It’s not only for you,” Nican said. “Until the man can shield you, the Resiorans are going to know every single damn time Elstan twiddles off a spell.”
“Result’s the same. Although I imagine he’s going to try to get away with a spell or two, and before too much time passes.”
“I expect you’re right.” Nican pulled himself into the saddle with a creak of leather and the grunt of his unprepared horse. “Not much left of today for him to do it in, though. We won’t get much farther today.”
Reandn mounted next to him; he was riding the bell mare today, and her round barrel felt strange indeed after Sky’s deep-chested, slab-sided form. “Why insist on moving out, then? We’ll only have to set up that tent again.”
From the head of the forming procession, Elstan called that they were ready to move out; Nican lifted his reins. “To prove a point.”
“What?” Reandn said. “That there’s danger here, or that you’re just as stubborn as she is?”
“Both!” Nican called over his shoulder.
Reandn grinned at his retreating back, and checked behind to make sure the remounts had lined up properly. Kalena chose to have her fat gelding tied to the back of her wagon rather than under Reandn’s care.
Under the overcast sky, the day went quickly from daylight to deep dusk, and Reandn figured that Nican had just barely made his point by the time they stopped for the night. Nican and Vaklar conferred on the site, one that had seen plenty of past use. To the side of the road a gentle slope created reasonable drainage, and among the trees there was just enough room for Kalena’s pavilion tent.
Better than pitching the thing in the road, Reandn thought, if not much more discreet — especially given the garish colors of the fluttery silk details. He tied the horses and eased around the wagon, and found Nican and Elstan where they conferred on horseback at the head of the party.
Elstan greeted his presence with an annoyed look, but Nican seemed considerably cheered by their little traveling exercise. “Dan,” he said, “how goes it with the horses?”
“About the same as the last time we spoke,” Reandn said, amused. “I was thinking of saddling Sky and moving out ahead, checking the road. Might run into Damen.”
“Tsk,” Nican said. “Escaping, sounds more like it. Timely, however. I was premature in shutting down Elstan’s magic; I’d forgotten the Keep expects to hear from him at this point in our trip. A little distance might be a good thing right now.”
Reandn closed his eyes and schooled himself to patience. Patience. “Give me time to saddle Sky,” he said. “And keep the Resiorans off my back if they decide to corral me for their set-up chores.”
“Done,” Nican said. “And I hope you find Damen. Be a lot easier if I had him around to take over when I’ve had enough of —” he broke off and raised his head a fraction, raising his voice as well. “Well, then, Vaklar, is the site to your liking?”
“As good as any, aya, though I’ll like it better when Kiryl and Rufo finish scouting around.” Vaklar, too, was mounted, approaching them at a leisurely walk. “I’m for moving on some, checking out the road ahead. Thought you might want part of that.”
Nican gave a rueful shake of his head. “Until we meet up with Damen, I’m not leaving the meira. But Dan is a little restless, I think.”
“Oh, aya, that I know.” Vaklar’s gaze met Reandn’s, full of wry amusement. “Come with, then, Dan?”
“You couldn’t stop me,” Reandn said. Nican frowned at him, but Vaklar just chuckled. “Come back to the horses and see if we’ve got one to take your saddle. Yours has done enough for the day.”
Vaklar gave his horse a pat; it was a sturdy, well-muscled creature, but Vaklar was no small man, and it looked played out. “Truth enough, an’ it be a kind offer.”
“Come with, then.” Reandn headed for the horses, ignoring Nican’s appalled expression at his mimicry of the Resioran speech pattern.
Vaklar, he thought, had grinned outright, and he made no attempt to lower his voice as he reassured Nican. “Not to worry, ladaboy. Don’t you come to find life gets boring without at least one of him around?”
Nican’s muttered reply was impossible to decipher, loud enough for Reandn to know he’d made one. Deliberate, no doubt.
The remounts were happily rus
tling through small piles of hay; Reandn looked to the Resioran wagon and one of the guards there raised a hand; Reandn nodded thanks. Kalena might be a handful to deal with, but it seemed her escort deserved more credit. The hay wasn’t much, but every little bit counted when you were trying to keep weight on.
Reandn pulled Sky out of the string and offered him a spare handful of grain, just enough for the horse to think he’d actually been fed. He was tightening the girth when Vaklar finished untacking his own horse and eyed the remounts, his saddle propped on his hip.
“Suggestions, then, Dan?”
Reandn eyed the topline of Vaklar’s horse, and said, “Probably the mare I just unsaddled. They’re built alike, and she hasn’t done much today — hells, none of them have. Her bridle’s over on top of the packs. I don’t think she’ll take to the one your horse works in.”
“He’s a stubborn one at times,” Vaklar agreed, scooping up the bridle in question. Reandn waited as the man set his saddle on the mare’s back and checked it for fit; satisfied, he fumbled beneath the mare’s belly for the free end of the girth, grunting as he said, “Stubborn, but he carries me through. Worth the trouble.”
Reandn looked at his own horse. Sky stood rooted to the spot, his head bobbing up and down, already drooling around the bit. “I know the feeling,” he said dryly. He turned Sky’s head to face up-trail and double-checked the girth as Vaklar tested his own. “Give me a minute here.”
Sky stood rock still until Reandn’s weight hit the saddle, and then flung his head in the air as he bounded forward, heading out at his fastest rack. “You’re going uphill,” Reandn told him, his right toe still searching for the stirrup, making no effort to stop the horse except through the profound failure to care about the antics. “And you’ve already come down this road. It’s boring.”
Sky snorted hard several times and seemed to come to the same conclusion. He soon lowered his head into the bit and came down into a walk, and Reandn turned him back toward the camp.
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