“I don’t understand it,” muttered Keri to Paks as they marched. “I thought we were through. Siniava’s dead. What more?”
Paks shook her head. “Maybe the Duke has a contract; he’s spent a lot on this campaign.”
“Contract! Tir’s bones, it’ll take us the rest of the season just to get back to Valdaire. Why do we need a contract?”
That was a first-year’s innocence. Paks grinned at him. “Money,” she said. “Or were you going to forget about pay?”
Seli winked at Paks, a veteran’s knowing wink, and said, “Have you ever seen the sea?”
“No—why?” Keri looked stubborn; sweat dripped off his nose.
“Well, that’s reason enough to go south. I’ve seen it—you’ll be impressed.”
“What’s it like?” asked Paks when Keri’s expression didn’t change.
“I don’t think anyone can tell you. You have to see it.”
Word soon trickled down from the captains that Alured was claiming the title of Duke of Immer. This meant nothing to Paks or the younger soldiers, but Stammel knew that the title had been extinct since the fall of the old kingdom of Aare across the sea.
“I’m surprised that the Duke of Fall and the other nobles are accepting it,” he said.
“That was the price of his help this year,” said Vossik. All the sergeants had gathered around one fire for an hour or so. “I heard talk in Fallo’s cohorts about it. If Fallo, Andressat, and Cilwan would uphold his claim—and our Duke, of course—then he’d turn on Siniava.”
“But why would they, even so?”
“It’s an odd story,” said Vossik, obviously ready to tell it.
“Go on, Voss, don’t make us beg,” growled Stammel.
“Well, it’s only what I heard, after all. I don’t know whether those Fallo troops know the truth, or if they’re telling it, but here it is. It seems that Alured used to be a pirate on the Immerhoft—”
“We knew that—”
“Yes, but that’s the beginning. He’d captured another ship, and was about to throw the prisoners over, the way pirates do—”
“Into the water?” asked Paks.
Someone laughed. Vossik turned to her. “Pirates don’t want a mess on their ships—so they throw prisoners overboard—”
“But don’t they swim or wade to shore?” asked Natzlin.
“They can’t. It’s too far, and the water is deep.”
“I can swim a long way—” said Barra. Paks grinned to herself. Barra always thought she could do more than anyone else.
“Not that far. Tir’s gut, Barra, you haven’t seen the sea yet. It could be a day’s march from shore, the ship, when they toss someone out.” Vossik took a long swallow of sib, and went on. “Anyway, one of the prisoners said he was a mage. He cried out that Alured should be a prince, and he—the mage—could help him.”
“I’d have thought Alured wouldn’t listen to prisoners’ yells,” said Stammel. “He doesn’t look the type.”
“No,” agreed Vossik. “He doesn’t. But it seems he’d had some sort of tale from his father—about being born of good blood, or whatever. So he listened, and the mage told him he was really heir to a vast kingdom, wasting his time as a pirate.”
“He believed that?” Haben snorted and reached his own mug into the sib. “I’d heard pirates were superstitious, but—”
“Well, the man offered proof. Said he’d seen scrolls in old Aare that proved it. Offered to take Alured there, and prove his right to the kingdom.”
“To Aare? That heap of sand?”
“How do you know, Devlin? You haven’t been there.”
“No, but I’ve heard. Nothing’s left but scattered ruins and sand. It’s in the songs.” He hummed a phrase of “Fair Were the Towers.”
Vossik shrugged. “Alured didn’t ask you. The mage told Alured that he’d seen proof of Alured’s ancestry.”
“It seems to me,” said Erial, “that it’s extra trouble to hunt up ancestors like that. What difference does it make? Our Duke got his steading without dragging in hundreds of fathers and fathers’ fathers.”
“Or mothers,” muttered Barra. No one followed that up.
“You know they’re different here in Aarenis,” said Stammel. “Think of Andressat.”
“That stuffed owl,” said Barra. Paks had almost begun to understand what Vik meant about Barra’s prickliness. She could not let anything alone.
“No—don’t be that way, Barra. He’s a good fighter, and a damn good count for Andressat. Most other men would have lost Andressat to Siniava years ago. He’s proud of his ancestors, true enough, but they could be proud of him.”
“But go on about Alured, Voss,” said Stammel. “What happened?”
“Well, he already believed he came of noble blood, so he sailed back to old Aare with this fellow. Then—now remember, I got this from the Fallo troops; I don’t say it’s true—then the mage showed him proof—an old scroll, showing the marriages, and such, and proving that he was in direct descent from that Duke of Immer who was called back to Aare in the troubles.”
“But Vossik, any mage could fake something like that!” Erial looked around at the others; some of them nodded.
“I didn’t say I believed it, Erial. But Alured did. It fitted what he wanted, let’s say. If Aare had been worth anything, it would have meant the throne of Aare. It certainly meant the lands of Immer.”
“And so he left the sea, and settled into the forest to be a land pirate? How was that being a prince or duke or whatever?” Erial sounded scornful.
“Well—again—this is hearsay. Seems he came to the Immer ports first, and tried to get them to swear allegiance—”
“But he’d been a pirate!” Paks agreed with that emphasis.
“Yes, I know. He wasn’t thinking clearly, perhaps. Then he hired a lot of local toughs, dressed them in the old colors of Immer, and tried to parley with the Duke of Fall.”
“Huh. And came out with a whole skin?”
“He wasn’t stupid enough to put it in jeopardy—they talked on the borders of Fallo. The Duke reacted as you might expect, but—well—he didn’t much care what happened in the southern forest, as long as it didn’t bother him. And, his men say, he’s longsighted—won’t make an enemy unnecessarily.”
“But what about Siniava?” For Paks, this was the meat of it: whose side had Alured been on from the beginning?
“Well, at first they had one thing in common: none of the old nobility would accept their claim to titles. Siniava promised Alured the dukedom if he’d break up the Immer River shipping, and protect Siniava’s movements in the area. Alured cooperated. That’s why no one could trace Siniava after Rotengre.”
“Yes, but—” This time Paks spoke up; Vossik interrupted firmly.
“But two points: Andressat and our own Duke’s cleverness. Andressat had been polite to Alured, promised him he’d accept the claim if the Duke of Fall did. So Alured wouldn’t move on Andressat when Siniava demanded it. After all, he believed himself a duke—above the command of a count. As for our Duke—you remember the wood-wanderers we met in Kodaly?” Stammel nodded. “Alured had befriended them when he moved into that forest, so they were on his side. Our Duke had made his own pacts with them years ago in the north. So our Duke knew what Alured wanted. And he knew what Fallo wanted—connection by marriage with a northern kingdom. And he knew that Sofi Ganarrion had a marriageable child—”
“But Sofi’s not a king—” said someone out of the darkness.
“Yet. Remember what he’s always said. And with Fallo behind him—” Vossik let that trail off. Several were quick to catch on.
“Gods above! You mean—”
“Somehow our Duke and the Halveric convinced the Duke of Fall that Alured’s help in this campaign was worth that much to him. So the Duke of Fall agreed to back Alured’s claim, Alured switched sides, and we got passage through the forest and Siniava didn’t.”
Paks shivered. She had never
thought of the maneuvering that occurred off the battlefield. “But is Alured really the Duke of Immer?”
Vossik shrugged. “He has the title. He has the power. What else?”
“But if he’s not really—by blood, I mean—”
“I don’t see that it matters. He’ll be better as a duke than a pirate: he’ll have to govern, expand trade, stop robbing—”
“Will he?” Haben looked around the whole group before going on. “I wouldn’t think, myself, that a pirate-turned-brigand would make a very good duke. What’s the difference between taxes and robbery, if it comes to that?”
“He’s not stupid, Haben.” Vossik looked worried. “It will have to be better than Siniava—”
“That’s my point. Siniava claimed a title—claimed to be governing his lands—but we all saw what that meant in Cha and Sibili. He didn’t cut off trade entirely, as Alured has done on the Immer, no—but would any of us want to live under someone like him? I remember the faces in those cities, if you don’t.”
“But he fought Siniava—”
“Yes—at the end. For a good reward, too. I’m not saying he’s all bad, Vossik; I don’t know. But so far he’s gone where the gold is. How will he govern? A man who thinks he’s nobly born, and has been cheated of his birthright—what will he do when we reach the Immer ports?”
* * *
They found out at Immerdzan, where the Immer widened abruptly into a bay, longer than it was wide. The port required no formal assault. It had never been fortified on the land side, beyond a simple wall hardly more than man-high with the simplest of gates. The army marched in without meeting any resistance. The crowded, dirty streets stank of things Paks had never smelled before. She got her first look at the bay, here roiled and murky from the Immer’s muddy flow. The shore was cluttered with piers and wharves, with half-rotted pilings, the skeletons of boats, boats sinking, boats floating, new boats, spars, shreds of sail, nets hung from every available pole, and festooned on the houses. She saw small naked children, skinny as goats, diving and swimming around the boats. Most of them wore their hair in a single short braid, tied with bright bits of cloth.
Beyond the near-shore clutter, the bay lay wide and nearly empty under the hot afternoon sun, its surface streaked with blues and greens she had never seen before. A few boats glided before the wind, their great triangular sails curved like wings. Paks stared at them, fascinated. One changed direction as she watched, the dark line of its hull shortening and lengthening again. Far in the distance she could see the high ground beyond the bay, and southward the water turned a different green, then deep blue, as the Immer’s water merged with the open sea.
Around the Duke’s troops, a noisy crowd had gathered—squabbling, it seemed to Paks, in a language high-pitched and irritable. Children dashed back and forth, some still sleek and wet from the water, others grimy. Barefoot men in short trousers, their hair in a longer single braid, clustered around the boats; women in bright short skirts and striped stockings hung out of windows and crowded the doorways. One of Alured’s captains called in the local language, and a sudden silence fell. Paks heard the water behind her, sucking and mumbling at the pilings, slurping. She shivered, wondering if the sea had a spirit. Did it hunger?
Alured’s captain began reading from a scroll in his hand. Paks looked for Arcolin and watched his face; surely he knew what was going on. He had no expression she could read. When Alured’s captain finished reading, he spoke to the Duke, saluted, and mounted to ride away. The crowd was silent. When he rounded the corner, a low murmur passed through them. One man shouted, hoarsely. Paks looked for him, and saw two younger men shoving a graybearded one back. Another man near them called in accented Common:
“Who of you speaks to us?”
“I do.” The Duke’s voice was calm as ever.
“You—you are pirates?”
“No. What do you mean?”
“That—that man—he says is now our duke—he is a pirate. You are his men—you are pirates.”
“No.” The Duke shook his head. Paks saw Arcolin give the others a hand signal, saw the signal passed from captains to sergeants. Not that they needed any warning; they were all alert anyway. “We are his allies, not his men. He fought with us upriver—against Siniava.”
“That filth!” The man spat. “Who are you, then, if you fight against Siniava but befriend pirates?”
“Duke Phelan, of Tsaia.”
“Tsaia? That’s over the Dwarfmounts, all the way north! What do you here?” Confusion and anger both in that voice; his eyes raked the troops.
“I have a mercenary company, that fights in Aarenis. Siniava—” The Duke’s voice thinned, but he did not go on. “We fought Siniava,” he said finally. “He is dead. Alured of the forest has been granted the Duchy of Immer, and as he aided us, so I am now aiding him.”
“He is no duke!” yelled the man. “I don’t know you—I heard something maybe, but I don’t know you. But that Alured—he is nothing but pirate, and pirate he will always be. Siniava was bad, Barrandowea knows that—but Alured! He killed my uncle, years back, out there in the bay, him and his filthy ship!”
“No matter,” said the Duke. “He is the Duke of Immer now, and I am here to keep order until his own officers take over.”
The man spat again, and turned away. The Duke said nothing more to the crowd, but set the cohorts on guard along the waterfront, and had patrols in the streets leading to and from their area. All stayed quiet enough, that first day. Paks felt herself lucky to be stationed on the seawall. She could look down at the boats, swaying on the waves, and catch a breath of the light wind that blew off the water. Strange birds, gray and white with black-capped heads, and large red bills, hovered over the water, diving and lifting again.
It was the next day that the executions began. Paks heard the yells from the other side of the city, but before they could get excited, the captains explained what was going on.
“The Duke of Fall and the Duke of Immer are executing Siniava’s agents.” Arcolin’s face was closed. “We are to keep order here, in case of rioting—but we don’t expect any.” In fact, nothing happened in their quarter. The men and women went about their work without looking at the soldiers, and the children scampered in and out of the water freely. But the noise from across the city did not quiet down, and in the evening Cracolnya’s cohort was pulled out to join the Halverics in calming the disturbance. They returned in the morning, tired and grim; Paks did not hear the details until much later. But the Duke’s Company marched out of Immerdzan the following day, and the bodies hung on the wall were eloquent enough.
In Ka-Immer, rumor had arrived before they did. The gates were closed. With no trained troops for defense, and only the same low walls, the assault lasted only a few hours. This time the entire population was herded into the market square next to the seawall. While the Halverics and Phelani guarded them, Alured’s men searched the streets, house by house, bringing more and more to stand with the others. When they were done, Alured himself rode to the edge of the square. He pointed at a man among the others. His soldiers seized him, and dragged him out of the mob. Then two more, and another. Someone yelled, from across the square, and a squad of Alured’s men shoved into the crowd, flailing them aside, to seize him as well. The first man had thrown himself down before Alured, sobbing. Alured shook his head, pointed. All of them were dragged to a rough framework of spars which Alured’s troops had lashed together.
A ripple of sound ran through the crowd; the people crammed back against each other, the rear ranks backing almost into Paks’s squad. She and the others linked shields, holding firm. She could hardly see over the crowd. Then the first of the men lifted into sight, stretched on ropes slung over the framework. Paks stiffened; her belly clenched. Another. Another. Soon they hung in a row, one by the feet and the others by their arms. Alured’s men pelted them with mud, stones, fish from the market. One of them hung limp, another screamed thinly. Paks looked away, gulping back
nausea. When her eyes slid sideways, they met Keri’s, equally miserable. She did not see the end, when Alured himself ran a spear into each man. She felt, through the movement of the crowd, that an end had come, and looked up to see the bodies being lowered.
But it was not the end. Alured spoke, in that strange language, gesturing fiercely. The crowd was still, unmoving; Paks could smell the fear and hatred of those nearest her. He finished with a question: Paks recognized the tone of voice, the outflung arm, the pause, waiting for an answer. It came as a dead fish, flung from somewhere in the crowd, that came near to its mark. His face darkened. Paks could not hear what he said, but his own soldiers fanned out again, coming at the crowd.
Before they reached it, the crowd erupted into sound and action. Jammed as they were against a thin line of Phelani and Halverics holding the three landward sides of the market, they somehow managed to turn and move at once. Paks’s squad was forced back, by that immense pressure. They could hear nothing but the screams and bellows of the crowd; they had been ordered to guard, not attack. But they were being overwhelmed. Most of the people had no weapons; their weapon was simply numbers. Like Paks, they were reluctant to strike unarmed men and women—but equally, they did not want to be overrun.
Behind, in the streets that led to the market, Paks could hear other troops coming, and shouted commands that were but pebbles of noise against the stone wall around them. She tried to stay in contact with the others, tried to fend off the crowd with the flat of her sword, but the pressure was against them all. A man grabbed at her weapon, screaming at her; she raised it, and he hit her, hard, under the arm. Almost in reflex, Paks thrust, running the sword into his body. He fell under a storm of feet that kept coming at her. She fended them off as best she could, pressing close to the rest of the squad as they tried to keep together and keep on their feet.
A gap opened between them and the next squad; the crowd poured through, still bellowing. Paks was slammed back into the building behind her; she could feel something—a window ledge, she supposed—sticking into her back. Faces heaved in front of her, all screaming; hands waved, grabbed at her weapon. She fought them off, panting. She had no time to look for Stammel or Arcolin; she could hear nothing but the crowd. They had broken through the ring in many places, now, and streamed away from the market, lurching and falling in their panic. A child stumbled into her and fell, grabbing at her tunic as he went down, screaming shrilly. Paks had no hand to spare for him, and he disappeared under the hurrying feet.
The Deed of Paksenarrion Page 49
