The Deed of Paksenarrion

by Elizabeth Moon

  From a distance, someone said, “If she had the sense to match her guts, she’d be fine—”

  “I don’t call fainting from a simple cut like that guts, Chanis.”

  “She didn’t, and you know it. We all pushed as hard as—”

  “Well, however you say it. I still think—”

  Closer, someone called her name. “Paksenarrion? Come on now, quit scaring us.” She felt a cup at her lips, and drank a swallow of cold water. Her stomach churned, but accepted it. She opened her eyes again to see the Marshal-General’s flint-gray eyes watching her. Before anyone else could speak, Paks managed to force out her own message.

  “I want to join—the Fellowship—even if you send me away.”

  Silence followed this. The Marshal-General stared at her. Finally she spoke.

  “Why now?”

  “Because I was wrong about him—Gird. And so—and so I want to join, and do better.”

  “Even if I send you away? Even if you never go beyond yeoman?”

  “Yes.” Paks felt as stubborn now on this ground as she had before on others.

  “I hope you feel the same when you’ve remade a couple of skins of blood.” The Marshal-General sat back, and grinned. “Gird’s ten fingers! Did you have to lose half the blood in your body to learn sense?”

  “I didn’t,” said Paks. She had the curious feeling that her body was floating just above the bed. She knew she understood more than the others, only it was hard to speak. “It isn’t lost—it’s not in the same place, is all.”

  “And you’re wound-witless. All right. If you still want to make your vows when you’re strong enough, I daresay Gird will accept them. But that will be some time, Paksenarrion. For now you must rest, and obey the surgeons.”

  Not until some days later did Paks hear the full story of that day. She had had no visitors at first but the surgeons, the Training Master, and the Marshal-General. Finally the surgeons agreed that she could move back to her own room. She was surprised at how shaky she felt after climbing the stairs—from one simple cut, she thought. She sat down hard on her bed, head whirling, and leaned back against the pillows. Rufen and Con woke her some time later when they discovered her door open and looked in to see why.

  “Paks?”

  She woke with a start; the last sunlight came through her window. “Oh—I forgot to shut the door.”

  “Are you all right? You look pale as cheese,” said Con. Paks gave him a long stare.

  “I’m fine. I just—dozed off.”

  “The Training Master said you were back. He said not to bother you, but your door was open—”

  “That’s all right.” Paks pushed herself up. She wondered what they were thinking about, and felt her ears going hot.

  “I’ve never been so mad in my life,” said Con, moving into the room to sit at her desk. “I’d have taken Cieri apart if I could have—”

  “Instead of which, he dumped you—how many times?” Rufen leaned against the doorframe, smiling.

  “That doesn’t matter. Listen, Paks, if they’d thrown you out, I’d have—have—”

  Paks shook her head. “Con—it’s all right.”

  “No, it’s not. It wasn’t fair—we could all see that. I couldn’t believe it, the way he hounded you—and you the best of us. Gird’s flat feet, but I’d have blown up at him days before.”

  Paks stared at him in surprise. “But I thought you’d be on their side—I thought you’d agree that it wasn’t fair for me to be here as an outsider.”

  Con shrugged. “That! What difference does that make? I’ve been a Girdsman all my life, and I never will be as good a fighter as you are. It’s not as if you were bad: you don’t quarrel even as much as I do. No one’s ever found you doing something underhand or cowardly. They ought to be glad you’re willing to come here at all. And that’s what I told him.”

  “And then what?” Paks could not imagine that scene at all.

  “And then he told me I didn’t know what I was talking about, and until I did I should kindly keep to my own business, and I told him my friends were my business. And he said I should choose my friends with care, and I said I’d learned more from you since you’d come than from him since I’d been here—” Con stopped, blushing scarlet.

  “And then,” Rufen put in with a wide grin, “then Cieri said maybe he should have long yellow hair to catch Con’s attention, and Con swung on him, and ended up flat on his back. Cieri asked the others what they thought, and apparently everyone was on your side. I wish I’d been there—I knew I’d regret being in that lower class after you got here. I don’t know if I could have done any more, but—”

  “But you shouldn’t have,” said Paks, looking at Con. “He’s—he’s the weaponsmaster, you shouldn’t argue with him.”

  “But he was wrong,” said Con stubbornly, his eyes glinting. “Paks, if you’ve got a fault it’s that you’re too willing to be ruled. I know what you’ll say—you’ll say that’s how a good soldier is. Maybe so, for a mercenary company. But we’re Girdsmen; Gird himself said that every yeoman must think for himself. I don’t care if Cieri is the weaponsmaster, or the Training Master, or the Marshal-General, if he’s wrong, he’s wrong, and if I think he’s wrong I should say so.”

  “Just because you think he is wrong doesn’t make him wrong,” argued Paks. “How do you know you’re right?”

  “I can tell unfairness when I see it,” growled Con.

  “How do you know?” Paks persisted. “Sometimes things seem unfair when they happen, but later you can tell they weren’t—so how do you know when something is truly unfair?”

  “Well, when it’s—I mean—by Gird, Paks, it’s easier to know than to say. I know Cieri was unfair to you; he kept picking at you, trying to make you mad, and then when you got mad he blamed you for it. And you were hurt, dripping blood all over, and he didn’t even offer to heal it for you.”

  Paks shrugged. “If he thought I was wrong, he wouldn’t.”

  “But it was his fault. And so it wasn’t fair. Don’t you know anything? Didn’t you ever have brothers or someone in your Company that kept trying to put things on you—surely you know what I mean.”

  Paks shrugged again. “Con, I know enough to know that looking for the final fault, who’s really to blame, just keeps trouble alive longer. I shouldn’t have lost my temper, no matter what. If he was wrong to push me that far, it was still my fault. And the Marshal-General told me when I came that they were reluctant to train someone who had given no vows of service.”

  “But now you’re joining the Fellowship, is that right?” asked Rufen.

  “Yes. The surgeon says I should be up to a bout at Midwinter Feast.”

  “How bad is your leg?”

  “Not bad. They stitched it up; it’s healing clean. It’s mostly blood loss; I should have tied it up tighter to begin with.” Then she thought of something else. “Con—did some dwarves show up at the field after I left?”

  Con looked startled. “How did you know about them?” Then he grinned broadly. “That was something, let me tell you. Two of ‘em came marching up, right into the class, in the middle of the row we were—anyway, came into the class, and interrupted us. I can’t talk like they do—all that ‘it is that’ and ‘is it that it is’—but the long and short of it was that Cieri had asked them to come and demonstrate axe fighting, and they were ready. Cieri told them he’d dismissed his student, and they grumped about being called out for nothing. So he said they could show the rest of us, and they glared around and said they wouldn’t show anyone who didn’t have the guts to learn. One of them challenged Cieri himself. Well, we saw some axe-fighting, let me tell you, and that axe you were using won’t ever be the same.”

  Paks felt a guilty twinge of satisfaction. She tried to conceal it; Con needed no encouragement. “Is Master Cieri all right?”

  “Oh, yes. He got a scratch or two, but you know he can heal that—it’s nothing to him. Anyway, now that you’re joining the Fel
lowship, you’ll be coming back to class, won’t you?”

  “I suppose. I haven’t seen Master Cieri.” Paks wondered if he would hold a grudge against her.

  “You are staying, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll be back with us. That’ll be good. And listen, Paks, you keep in mind what I said. As a yeoman, you have a right to think for yourself. You’re supposed to—”

  “I do,” said Paks. “You—”

  “You do, and then you don’t. I know what you’re thinking, about me and the juniors, and you were right, there. You stand against us—the others in the class—when you think differently. But you don’t stand against anyone over you—I’ll bet you never argued with your sergeant, or captain, or the Duke—”

  Paks found herself smiling. She could not imagine Con arguing with Stammel more than once, let alone with Arcolin. But she defended herself. “I did argue with the Duke once—well, not exactly argue—”

  “Once!” Con snorted. “And he was wrong only once in three years? That’s a record.”

  She shook her head at him; it was useless to try to explain. She tried anyway. “Con—privates don’t argue with commanders. Not unless it’s very important, and usually not then. And we don’t see everything, we can’t know when the commander is wrong.”

  “So what did you argue—not exactly—about?”

  Paks froze. She had never meant to get close to that night in Aarenis again. “I—you don’t need to know,” she said lamely.

  “Come on, Paks. I can’t imagine you arguing with anyone like that—it must have been something special. What was it? Was he going to start worshipping Liart, or something?”

  Paks closed her eyes a moment, seeing Siniava stretched on the ground, the Halverics at his side, the angry paladin confronting her Duke. She heard again the taut silence that followed the Duke’s outburst, and felt the weight of his eyes on her. “I can’t tell you,” she said hoarsely. “Don’t ask me, Con; I can’t tell you.”

  “Paks,” said Rufen quietly. “You don’t look ready for supper in the hall; we’ll bring something up for you.” His gentle understanding touched her; she opened her eyes to see them both looking worried.

  “I’m all right,” she said firmly.

  “You’re all right, but you’re not well. If you’re to make your vows at the Midwinter Feast, you don’t need to be scurrying up and down stairs again today. It’s no trouble—” he went on, waving her to silence. “If we go now, we can all eat up here in peace. Come on, Con.” And the two of them went out, closing her door softly and leaving her to her thoughts.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Marshal-General Arianya headed the table; three High Marshals, two paladins, and five Marshals (three attached to granges, and two from the college itself) completed the conference.

  “Will that new yeoman be ready to test for the Midwinter Feast, Arianya?” asked the oldest of the group, Marshal Juris of Mooredge grange.

  “I think so. She says she’s well enough now, but the surgeons don’t want her fighting for another few days.”

  “That would look good,” muttered High Marshal Connaught, Knight-Marshal of the Order of Gird. “Nothing like a candidate fainting in the ceremony.”

  “She won’t faint,” said the Marshal-General firmly. Someone chuckled softly, thinking of it, and she frowned around the table.

  “It’s not that often we bring new yeomen in here,” she reminded them. “It’s serious to her—”

  “I know that,” said Marshal Kory, the Archivist. “It just slipped out, Marshal-General.”

  “Very well. And while we’re on the subject, I would like to suggest something else.”

  “What you and Amberion were chatting about yesterday?” asked Marshal Juris. “If it’s what I think, I’m against it.”

  The Marshal-General glared at him. “You might at least give me a chance to present the idea, Juris.” He waved his hand. She glanced around the table. “You know we’re desperately short of paladins—” They nodded. “I have word from Marshal Calith down in Horngard that Fenith was killed a few months ago.”

  A stir ran around the table. Several of the Marshals glanced at the two paladins, who stared ahead and met no eyes. Fenith had been Amberion’s close friend, and Saer was his great-niece.

  “We need to select a large class of candidates, if we can: the paladins in residence here agree that they can each take on two candidates—”

  “Is that necessary?” Juris broke in, looking from face to face.

  “I think so.” The Marshal-General spread a short parchment in front of her, and ran her hand down the page. “Juris, for the past two hundred years or so, the Fellowship of Gird has had from twenty to thirty paladins recorded at a time. Those on quest vary from fifteen to twenty-five at any one time. We now have on quest only five—” She waited for the murmurs to cease, nodded, and went on. “You see? And here in Fin Panir we have only seven who can take on candidates for training. As you know, any of these may be called away at any time. If we can find fourteen candidates—two for each training paladin—it will still be well over a year before any of those are ready to go. And in the meantime, we have no one to train a backup class—”

  “I think we should feather that,” said Marshal Kory. “If we chose seven now, then they might progress faster, having more of the paladins’ time. In a half-year or so, choose more. Then we’d get a few out faster, and have more coming along.”

  The Marshal-General nodded. “That’s a good idea—Amberion, what do you think?”

  “I like that better than taking on two novices at once,” said Amberion. “But I don’t know if that will shorten the time any. Remember that each candidate has had, by tradition, all the time a single paladin-sponsor can give. We dare not test these candidates any less because times are desperate. It is in desperate times that we need most to be sure of them.”

  “What list do we have?” asked High Marshal Connaught.

  “A short one.” The Marshal-General rubbed her nose. “I sent word to all the granges last spring, when Fenith wrote that Aarenis would be at war by summer. We talked of this last year, remember? But we’ve lost eight paladins in the past year—”

  “Eight!”

  She nodded gravely. “Yes. We all know that great evil has been moving in Aarenis and the Westmounts. Nearer home, we have seen outbreaks again in eastern Tsaia. Some reports indicate serious trouble in Lyonya. Marshal Cedfer, of Brewersbridge, reported that a priest of Achrya had been laired between his grange and the gnome kingdom nearby. Apparently he had preyed on nearby farms and caravans using spellbound robbers.”

  “They’d say they were spellbound,” muttered Juris.

  “That may be, of course. I have only his report to go by. But Brewersbridge has been a healthy community for years—since Long Stones, at least. If Achrya can have a priest there, where else may we not expect trouble?”

  “What happened to the paladins, Amberion?” asked Marshal Kory.

  “We are still finishing the reports for the archives, Marshal,” said Amberion slowly. “Chenin Hoka—he was from Horngard originally; he hadn’t been north of the mountains for years—was killed by Liart’s command, in Sibili, during the assault on that city—”

  “I thought that’s where Fenith was.”

  “He was there, yes. Chenin was taken some time earlier, while helping a grange near Pliuni defend itself; a witness thought he was dead. But Siniava’s troops got him to Sibili, to the temple—and he was killed, finally, after long torments.” Amberion said nothing more, and silence filled the room. Then he sighed, and began again. “I knew him, when I was a candidate; that was the last time he was north. He knocked me flat, I remember, and I lay there wondering why I’d ever wanted to be a paladin. Anyway. Doggal of Vérella was lost at sea; he was sailing east along the Immerhoft coast. He’d told a Girdsman at Sul that he had a call to come north. The ship was seen going onto reefs near Whiteskull, and his body was recove
red some days later. We have no reason to doubt the identification. Garin Garrisson was killed in battle at Sibili; Fenith saw that. The two of them were holding light against a darkness cast by Liart’s ranking priest. A crossbow bolt got him in the eye. Arianya Perrisdotter held a daskdraudigs away from a caravan in one of the mountain passes in the Dwarfwatch, but it fell on her in the end. Tekki Hakinier was apparently killed by a band of forest sprites—whatever they call them in Dzordanya. The only word we have is from a witness that says he was ‘stuffed with pine needles like a pin-pig,’ which I suppose is what they call a hedgehog.”

  “No.” Marshal Kory shook his head. “No, a pin-pig is bigger and lives in trees. They call it that because its flesh is sweet like pork. It sounds like those mikki-kekki—they come in waves, hundreds at a time. But what was he doing up there?”

  Amberion shrugged. “I didn’t know he was there until we got the word he’d been killed. The witness said something about a varkingla of the long houses of Stokki, whatever that means.”

  Kory nodded. “It means Stokki’s clan thought they had to move somewhere, the whole bunch. That’s not common. Tekki was Dzordanyan, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “I would guess that they asked his protection, to move the clan through the forest, and the mikki-kekki didn’t cooperate. They usually don’t.”

  “Have you ever seen one?” asked the Marshal-General.

  “Oh yes. When I was a rash boy, my three cousins and I sailed across the Honnorgat to visit Dzordanya. That was the plan, at least. My uncle had told us we couldn’t sail across the river like that; of course we thought he was just trying to spoil our fun.”

  “Why can’t you?” asked Saer, speaking for the first time.

  “You’re from the mountains, aren’t you, Saer? Yes. Well, any time you sail across the river, you’ve got its current to consider, just like rowing. But at the mouth of the Honnorgat, it’s that and the tide and the sea current, all together. The short of it is that we ended up a long way up the coast. We couldn’t even see Prealith any more. The way the current set, we couldn’t sail back without going far out to sea. We may have been rash, but we had more sense that that, to sail a skin boat out of all sight of land. We thought we’d walk back along the shore, carrying the boat, until we got to the Honnorgat.”