A Dubious Peace

by Olan Thorensen

  The lone intruder stood behind his friend with a large hand resting on a shoulder. Carnigan would leave the hand for a minute or two, then bring it back down, only to repeat it in another ten to fifteen minutes without speaking. What words they had were given hours ago. Now all Carnigan offered was the reminder of his presence to the man standing at the edge of the platform, facing the darkness.

  Boots thudded on the wooden planking, sending vibrations into the legs of everyone under the overhang. There were voices, some loud and some muted.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, Paramount,” said a voice to Yozef’s left.

  He turned to find a man named Verstrow. He couldn’t remember the first name of Hetman Seaborn’s adviser and cousin.

  “You asked to be notified when we heard from the men sent back along the track you followed to Grastor.”

  Yozef turned to Verstrow. A Seaborn company-size force of dragoons had left Grastor half an hour after the Kolsko party reached the city. The rider who’d been sent ahead from the final battle site had vanished, likely killed by the Kolinkans, who somehow had gotten in front of those fleeing. However, when the alert was given, as many armed dragoons as could be assembled on short notice were sent in hopes of relieving the men holding back the Kolinkans.

  “A messenger just arrived. They reached the site of the battle. They found no living Kolinkans. The rest of the men are continuing toward Nollagen, but there has been no sign of the invaders so far. They found the body of Reezo. It’s being returned, along with one surviving Seaborn dragoon. The messenger also said that except for the survivor, our men died to a man and lay among three times their number of invaders. Hetman Seaborn will see you later after he gives the news of Reezo to his family. He says to tell you he continues to pray for Maera.”

  Yozef’s expression was blank.

  “Thank you for the news,” said Carnigan, jumping into the silence. “I’m sure the Paramount wants to give condolences to your hetman.

  Verstrow nodded and went back into the darkness that Yozef now stared at again.

  Time passed. The rain, if anything, increased. A door opened. A questioning voice was heard, along with answers. Footsteps approached the two men standing alone and stopped next to Yozef. He didn’t look, but a man’s breath brushed his neck.

  “The medicants have news,” whispered Synton. “They say Senior Medicant Harlow will be out of the treatment room any moment. You want to talk to him here or inside?”

  Yozef spun and rushed to the open door, lantern light spilling into the darkness. Carnigan and Synton followed. They went down a wide hall to a treatment room where Maera had been taken. They passed other rooms, all of them filled with medicants, aides, and patients. Sounds assaulted Yozef’s ears—staff talking and yelling, patients moaning, sounds of feet on wooden floors.

  They were halfway down the hall when Medicant Harlow exited a room. He saw Yozef, turned to say something to a man and a woman who had followed him out of the room, and strode briskly forward. Yozef’s throat tightened. There was blood on the white smock. Medicant Harlow finished drying his hands on a small towel as he walked.

  The medicant grasped Yozef’s elbow and pulled him quickly into a small storage room. Carnigan and Synton followed and closed the door to the hall.

  “She’s going to be fine,” said Harlow.

  Yozef sagged. Both Carnigan and Synton grasped an arm to steady him.

  “The musket ball hit her hipbone and was deflected upward. We were afraid it had passed through internal organs, but when we operated, we found it resting not far under the skin of her lower back. She bled a lot, but that strangely seemed to ease even while we were operating.”

  Harlow shook his head. “Oddest thing I’ve ever seen. We expected her to be pale with shock from the loss of blood, but instead, it was like she had a fever.”

  Harlow stopped and looked expectantly at Yozef as if waiting for the Paramount to explain Maera’s condition. The account of Yozef’s miraculous survival from wounds at the Battle of Orosz City had circulated widely everywhere on Caedellium, especially among medicants searching for explanations. When Yozef gave no indication of responding, Harlow continued.

  “Well . . . it was a good sign that things weren’t as bad as we feared. We found a small piece of broken-off bone, but the rest of the hipbone seems all right. She should recover, although we can’t be sure if she will be completely the same as before. However, the worst case is probably that she may need a cane to walk, especially in colder weather. She’s weak and still unconscious from the ether. We haven’t given her any of the poppy extract yet. We need to wait until she wakes, and we find out how much pain she’s in. You can see her now and should be able to talk to her when she rouses from the ether.”

  Yozef grabbed both of the medicant’s hands, shook them slightly, and, at a loss for sufficient words of thanks, turned to the door to go to Maera. Harlow put a hand on his back to stop him.

  “I’m afraid it’s not all good news, Paramount. The wound was quite a shock to her body. Before we started the operation, she lost the child. A boy. There was nothing we could do.”

  Yozef’s entire body went rigid. Both Carnigan and Synton made motions to support him again, but it wasn’t necessary. He was a stone pillar. Seconds passed.

  Harlow waited for a further reaction. When none came, he looked at the other men. Carnigan gave a quick single head shake. More seconds.

  “I can go be with her now?” Yozef’s voice was blades of ice. Carnigan’s hand rested again on Yozef’s shoulder.

  “Yes. Follow me. While we were talking, she was being taken from the treatment room into a quieter, smaller recovery room.”

  Yozef grasped the medicant’s elbow as the man turned to lead the way.

  “There’s no reason to tell Maera it was a boy. If she asks, please say you aren’t sure.”

  The medicant nodded, understanding, and motioned Yozef to follow.

  They reentered the hall and followed Harlow to a large ward with thirty or so beds, most of which were filled with patients. On one side of the room was a series of doors, half of which were open to reveal small rooms. Each had a single bed and one or more persons standing or sitting, looking at a patient. Harlow led them to an open door with several aides just exiting as they left the patient. It was Maera. Harlow waved them inside, and the medicant left.

  Yozef stopped by the bed and stared for several seconds before reaching out to pick up her hand.

  “Thank you, God, if you exist,” he whispered. Carnigan and Synton exchanged looks. His voice sounded more like the Yozef they knew.

  “And look after Linkun, God. He deserved a life. I won’t tell Maera about him, and I’ll instruct others to say they didn’t know if it was a boy or a girl. I wish Harlow hadn’t told me. It made the baby more real, and there’s no reason for her to have that. I’ll bear it for the both of us.”

  He stopped talking. Then, when he started again, it sounded as if it were a doppelgänger speaking—someone almost identical to Yozef Kolsko but who put Synton’s nerves immediately on alert.

  “And forgive me, God, or at least try to understand what I’m going to do. I don’t know the details, but . . . ”

  His voice choked and trailed off.

  Time passed again. It was daylight, but he didn’t remember it coming. The rain and the lightning had stopped. Maera moaned. Yozef stroked her arm. Her eyelids flickered and opened. Unfocused eyes stared at the ceiling.

  She croaked, “Wha . . . !” as she tried to speak. A bowl of water and a cloth sat on a small table next to the bed. Yozef folded the cloth and dipped a corner into the water before dabbing it on Maera’s mouth. She licked her lips, and her eyes focused on her husband.

  “Thirsty,” she whispered hoarsely.

  He dipped the cloth in the water again, letting it sit for several seconds to become saturated, and held it against her lips. When she opened her mouth, he inserted the cloth’s corner and let her suck out moisture.

/>   “Where am I? What was . . . ”

  Her voice trailed off, and her eyes half-closed.

  “Sleep, Maera. I’m here with you. You need to rest.”

  She sighed, gave a nearly imperceptible nod, closed her eyes, and drifted away.

  He sat silently for five minutes, holding her right hand in his and stroking her arm with his other hand. When he stood up, he leaned down to kiss Maera, then turned to Carnigan and Synton. They didn’t see Yozef, friend and concerned husband. What faced them was Paramount Hetman Yozef Kolsko, leader of eight hundred thousand Caedelli, architect of destroying a Narthani army, fount of knowledge and innovations previously unknown, a suspected but undeclared Septarsh to whom God whispered, and something else of which they were uncertain.

  “Let’s find Hetman Seaborn. I want to find out if more is known.”

  Yulan Seaborn had been eight miles southeast of Grastor, on his way to meet Yozef at the South Point peak semaphore station for the inaugural message connecting Seaborn Province to the rest of Caedellium. A rider from Grastor caught the hetman’s party, which returned to the city at a gallop.

  The rain might have been gone, but gusts of wind pulled on their clothing as they walked from the medicants’ building to what passed for Grastor’s town hall. Several hundred men and a few women, many of them fully armed, milled about on the street by the front entrance. Talking died down, and a path opened as people recognized the Paramount. Most lanterns hanging from buildings and held by people were still lit. With their minds focused elsewhere, they had not noticed the coming of daylight. Yozef, Carnigan, and Synton passed hundreds of faces: angry, hard, shocked, a few crying.

  Men opened the door as they climbed the steps. Inside was a contrast by having less light and no wind. But the people were the same as outside. Hetman Seaborn’s oldest son, Santee, who pushed through the crowd, people not yet aware the Paramount had entered.

  “Paramount, we heard you were coming. How is your wife?”

  “She’ll recover, say the medicants. The wound wasn’t as bad as it first looked.”

  “I thank God for that.”

  There was something in the heir’s voice. Yozef looked harder at the thirty-year-old man’s face and saw grief lines that made him look ten years older.

  “I’ve heard it’s confirmed your brother is dead.”

  Santee straightened his shoulders. “He and his men held the Kolinkans back long enough for you to escape. According to the messenger who arrived, there was one survivor. He was one of the last to fall and was so badly wounded, the Kolinkans thought he was dead. Before he passed out, he saw Reezo and the last three other men fall to a wave of Kolinkans. They had run out of ammunition and were fighting to the end with bayonets and using their rifles as clubs. They will live forever in the history of our clan.”

  His last words were replete with pride and sorrow.

  “I owe your family and the families of the other men a debt I can never repay,” said Yozef.

  Santee shook his head. “There is no debt,” he said with a tone and an expression suggesting it was an insult for Yozef to think this. “Reezo and his men did their duty. They would have lived without honor if they had done otherwise. I’d advise you not to say the same thing to Father.”

  “I respect that,” said Yozef, “but you should understand that my feeling of owing a debt is also strong, though as you suggest, I won’t mention it to the hetman.”

  Santee nodded. “Very well. Let me take you to Father.”

  He turned and shouted, “Make way for the Paramount!” The throng parted, creating a path that led to a cluster of men surrounding a table at the far end of the large room. Hetman Seaborn, Vestrow, and Zalzar were among the men leaning over a map of Seaborn Province. The grim-faced men waited for Yozef.

  “Paramount, how is your wife?” asked Yulan Seaborn in his naturally gruff voice.

  “The medicants say she’ll recover. I’m sorry about Reezo.”

  The hetman only nodded before turning to business.

  “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but it’s confirmed they were Kolinkans. When word first came of the attack, I automatically thought of the Narthani. When it became evident they were Iraquiniks, the Kolinkans were my first guess. As a youth, I spent some time in the Aro and Gympo kahsaks. I never met a Kolinkan, but I heard often enough how they’re considered the most treacherous of the kahsaks.”

  Yozef noted that there must be stories here worth listening to, but now wasn’t the time.

  “And they’re really gone?”

  “We think so. We got semaphore messages to the station at South Point. The telescope you brought was installed and ready for our ceremony for the first messages across the Seaborn Strait. They turned the telescope toward Nollagen and saw what looked like ships loading men for several hours. Then the ships set full sail and are reportedly heading east-northeast—the direction of Kolinka.

  “As fast as militia units can form, I’m sending them all way to the Nollagen area to search for any Kolinkans left behind. We probably won’t know any more for hours, maybe into tomorrow.”

  Yozef nodded. “Please keep me informed, Hetman. I’ll be with Maera.”

  Harlow was waiting with other medicants when Yozef reached Maera’s room.

  “She roused almost as soon as you left, Paramount. She was lucid but in enough pain that we gave her poppy extract. I think she’ll sleep now until sometime tomorrow. That’s best. Time for her body to recover. In fact, her recovery is already astounding. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve said she had been wounded several days ago, instead of yesterday.”

  The medicant shook his head, patted a woman on the back, and called to the other medicants to accompany him out and leave the Paramount with his wife.

  Yozef pulled up a chair and sat next to the bed to hold one of Maera’s hands. He didn’t notice the sun coming through the room’s single window and moving across the floor.

  Carnigan and Synton left them alone but found chairs of their own to sit outside the door. Finally, Synton came to stand at the foot of the bed.

  “Yozef. Can we get you something to drink? Water? Ale? What about food?”

  Yozef looked up briefly, his face blank, then gave a single side-to-side shake and returned to watching Maera. Another hour passed until Carnigan tried.

  “Yozef.”

  He didn’t respond. Carnigan put a hand on Yozef’s right shoulder and gave enough of a shake not to be ignored.

  “The medicants say she’s going to recover. She’s not in danger. I don’t know what you’re thinking, what you’re planning, but whatever it is, it’s better if you take care of yourself. You know that. You’re the one who tells people to think logically. Well . . . I guess you tell it to people who you believe will pay attention.

  “Now, I’m going to go find some warm food and some ale. You don’t have to move from here, but you will have to eat and drink, even if we have to hold you down. After that, you can sleep here. We’ll fix something on the floor for you or have another bed brought in. I, Synton, and Gowlin will be right outside.”

  Yozef turned his face upward toward Carnigan, managing an expression for the first time in hours.

  “How’s Gowlin? He was wounded.”

  “The wound was not as minor as we thought, but the medicants treated him, and he insisted he’s good to stand guard with the rest of us.”

  “You didn’t mention Toowin. Where’s he?”

  “It turns out he was wounded, too, but didn’t say anything. In that regard, he’s like his uncle, Wyfor. Hack off an arm, and he’ll tell you it’s a minor inconvenience. He’s three rooms from here. Harlow didn’t brook any argument from Toowin about leaving his bed at least until tomorrow. The old guy might be half Toowin’s size, but he’s as tough in his own way.”

  Yozef stirred, released Maera’s hand, and stood, slightly unsteady. “I need to see to Gowlin and Toowin.”

  “All right, but then right back here and sit with Maera
. I won’t be gone long. But when I come back with food and drink for all of us, you’re going to consume your share, whether you want to or not.”

  Yozef gave a wan smile and nodded.

  The rest of the day and night passed slowly or quickly, depending on who was asked. Somewhere during that time, Yozef fell asleep in the chair. Maera never roused from a deep sleep and regular breathing. The other three men took turns catching moments of sleep, always with at least two awake and nearby. Medicants and aides made regular checks on Maera’s condition.

  The sun was two hours above the horizon when Yozef woke with a start and groaned, his neck and back protesting the hours in an unusual position. He had lost Maera’s hand sometime during the night but quickly reacquired it. It was warm, as was her face when he put a hand to it. Warm but not flushed.

  Harlow, by chance or some intuition, appeared moments later and checked Maera’s dressing.

  “Everything looks fine, Paramount.”

  “But she’s slept so long. Does that mean anything?”

  “I think it means she’s resting quietly. We didn’t give her that much poppy extract, just enough to dull the pain and let her fall asleep. Her breathing and breath are good. We’ll change the bandage, but I think we’ll find little, if any, minor bleeding.”

  Harlow looked Yozef up and down. “Paramount, why don’t you clean up, get something to eat, and we’ll fetch you when she wakes? You’ll probably want to meet with Hetman Seaborn. He’s in the administration building next door.”

  Yozef glanced down at himself. It hadn’t seemed important, but now he saw himself the same way the medicant did. Dried blood and grime coated much of his clothing. Synton’s attempt to clean Yozef’s hands and arms hours ago had only removed most of the blood. Yozef cringed when he thought of his hands touching Maera.

  The rest of his own clothes were sitting in the abandoned wagon west of Nollagen, but Synton had grabbed the first brother medicant he found after Yozef woke up. A set of clean clothing was a size too large but was waiting when he dried after taking a quick ambient-temperature bath—he hadn’t waited for the water to be heated.