by Anthony Ryan
He lowered his head to Evadine then hauled on his reins, turning his mount, and galloped away, his men-at-arms following. Some regarded Evadine with bemused glances as they rode off, though most were more interested in casting dire looks or obscene gestures in my direction.
“I thought the new hand in the ledgers looked familiar,” Evadine commented, sliding the sword back into its scabbard as I flicked the reins to compel the horse into motion. We resumed our progress and she guided her grey alongside, gaze lingering on my downcast features in expectation as I fumbled for an answer.
“Your perception does you credit, Captain,” I said finally, not looking up.
“Also, his letters,” she went on. “I discerned a considerable improvement in both style and grammar in that last flurry his lordship sent me. Your influence, I assume?”
“He was… grateful for my advice. Then, at least.”
She paused for a second, her tone shifting into something far more serious. “What he said about Ascendant Sihlda…”
“A lie,” I stated flatly, unable to keep the hard denial from my voice. “The escape was her plan, something she had schemed for years. Her demise… was not my doing.”
“So, you did know her? That much is true?”
“I did. It was from her that I learned letters and the crafting of them, and a great deal more besides.”
“And do you think she was what some claim her to be?”
“And what is that, Captain?”
She voiced a short laugh. “Don’t play the ignorant churl with me. It’s a mask that doesn’t fit you. There are those who contend that Ascendant Sihlda would have ascended to martyrdom upon her death, had she not been condemned for so vile an act. Did you find her so devout a soul as to warrant such claims?”
“I found her to be the finest soul I ever encountered, but not without flaws, like any other.” I steeled myself and met her gaze, finding only genuine interest rather than the poorly concealed calculation of Ascendant Hilbert. “I had the honour of recording her testament shortly before her death,” I said. “Although, if you’ve heard any of Ascendant Hilbert’s sermons recently, you might find some of it familiar.”
“I am discerning in my choice of sermon. Do you still have a copy of the testament? If so, I should greatly like to read it. In its uncorrupted form, of course.”
I wondered if she might be intent on some theft of her own but discounted the thought. Having heard her speak every night on the march, I knew this woman had no need to steal another’s words. “I do, Captain, and will be happy to provide you a copy.”
“My thanks, Alwyn Scribe. But I doubt this fully settles the debt you owe me. Wouldn’t you agree?”
I certainly couldn’t argue this point. But for her intervention, I would at this juncture most likely have found myself swinging from a convenient tree branch, minus some bodily accoutrements. “I shall pay any price you require, Captain,” I said, because she expected it and because, in that moment at least, I meant it.
“Then this is what I require to settle our debt.” She paused, her expression taking on the same intent seriousness as when she had confronted Lord Eldurm, though I was grateful her tone was not so challenging. “Don’t run off tonight as you and your friend were planning to.”
I instinctively began to look away but something in her gaze held me. It also caged the pointless denial that bubbled to my lips. I could only stare in silence as she continued, “Sergeant Swain is well versed in sorting the runners from the fighters. You, he told me, are too clever not to be a runner. He tells me it’s the smart ones who run when there’s little chance of catching them, in the interval before battle is joined when captains draw in their pickets to form up companies. The less clever cowards wait until the battle’s almost joined before taking to their heels.”
I am not a coward, I wanted to say, but knew it to be an empty statement. Cowardice had always felt like a redundant concept to one born to a day-to-day struggle for mere survival. Some fights could be won; some could not. You fought when you had to or when you knew you could win. What shame was there in running from death? A deer felt none when it ran from a wolf.
“This war…” I began then stopped at the prospect of spilling unwise words. Evadine, however, was keen to hear them nonetheless.
“Speak,” she instructed. “Without fear, for I’ll not condemn a man for voicing his truth.”
“This is not my war,” I told her. “Nor my friends’ war, though a few seem to think it is. A man I’ve never set eyes on claims his blood makes him worthy of taking the throne from another man I’ve never seen, and thousands have died for it. Perhaps the Pretender’s a liar; perhaps he speaks the truth. I have no way of knowing. I do know our king and his nobles never did anything for me besides try to hang me. They are not worthy of my blood, low as it is. I’ll not die for them.”
I had expected more of her faithful invective, an appeal to my allegiance to the Covenant rather than the Crown. Instead, she sat back a little in the saddle, frowning as she considered a reply.
“Who would you die for?” she asked eventually. “Friends? Family? Ascendant Sihlda’s memory? You’ve heard my sermons and I’m sure you have your doubts as to the truth of my words, as I would expect of a clever man, so I’ll not appeal to your reason. In the end, all I can do is ask for your trust.”
She leaned forward, eyes hard and unblinking as they stared into mine. “Trust my word, Alwyn Scribe, as you trusted the word of Ascendant Sihlda. You may think my visions mummery or madness…” She trailed off, her gaze unwavering but her face tightening, mouth twisting as unwelcome memories played through her mind. Taking a breath, she went on, “Again I ask for your trust when I tell you they are not. The Pretender brings only ruin for us all. Churl, outlaw and noble alike. This I have seen, though I would give anything to have been spared the sight.”
She wasn’t lying; I could tell that much. This woman truly believed she had been cursed by visions of the Second Scourge and her every act was now directed towards preventing them from coming true. Still, her truth did not make it real. Perhaps for Brewer, Ayin and the others. But not me. Ayin may have sunk to her knees and wept for Evadine’s favour, but I would not. Even so, however illusory her visions might be, the weight of what I owed her remained real and undeniable. Also, the sight of Duke Rouphon’s banner still loomed large in my mind. If I fled, it seemed unlikely I would ever find myself this close to Lorine again.
“I won’t run,” I told Evadine, forcing my gaze from hers and grasping the reins tighter. “In payment of our debt, Captain.”
I was keen for this moment to end. This woman possessed a worrying capacity for perception. I sensed it wouldn’t be long before she discerned another reason for my change of heart beyond simple obligation. I also found her directness and lack of noble condescension unnerving, or at least, that was what I told myself. Later, I would look deeper into that moment and know my discomfort came from something simpler, but far more frightening, something I wouldn’t be prepared to acknowledge for a long time.
She sat in silent regard of my averted face and I felt the air thicken with the mutual knowledge of a conversation left unfinished. She expected more, I knew. Was it Ayin’s unreasoning, tearful gratitude? Had Evadine Courlain, Anointed Communicant of the Covenant of Martyrs, become addicted to the adulation of her followers?
“On behalf of the Covenant, I thank you for your service, Scribe,” she said before turning the grey and starting off at a canter. Watching her ride ahead, I wondered if I had in fact heard the injured tone in her voice. Beauty turns the minds of men so easily, I reminded myself as I snapped the reins and the old horse resumed her plodding. It was one of Sihlda’s many lessons, provoked by an anecdote I had shared regarding my unwise and greatly regretted infatuation with Lorine. Know this, Alwyn: no woman was ever unaware of her beauty, but many a man was unaware of being snared by it until far too late.
There was no sermon that night, which surprised me, as
did the curious jocularity prevalent in the camp. Talk and laughter abounded around the fires and songs were finally sung, mostly Covenant hymns but at least it was music of a sort. I even saw a few soldiers join arms in a dance or two. Apparently, the prospect of imminent battle raised their spirits no end.
Things were different at our fire. Ayin, of course, was cheerier than ever, dancing alone to the tune of a nearby flute, smiling face raised to the night sky and eyes closed in apparent blissful serenity. Toria, by contrast, sat hunched with her features set into a frozen scowl as she stared into the flames. He reaction to my decision to stay hadn’t been pleasant to endure, however much I’d expected it. I had suggested she make her own escape, offering to distract the pickets so she could slink away through the tall grass covering the fields south of the camp. The torrent of profanity she directed at me in response was fouler than usual, albeit impressive in its inventiveness.
“Your brains are in your shit-crammed arse you fuckwitted, treacherous whoreson!”
Yet she stayed, her mood darker and more morose than during the worst times in the Pit. But still here, as trapped by her debt to me as I was by my debt to Evadine.
“Was there any scrap of this stuff that wasn’t rusted?” Brewer muttered, scraping the tip of a dagger to a rivet on the breastplate he had been given.
The arms and armour I carted back to the company had been carefully shared out under Sergeant Swain’s instruction. Pulling back the covering I had seen him conceal a grimace of professional disdain at the pile of assorted metal. Much of it gleamed dully in the sunlight, flecked in brown and red by rust and accumulated dirt. Still, the sergeant made a show of grunting approval as he handed various accoutrements and weapons to the waiting line of soldiers. The breastplates and much of the mail went to the pikemen along with the falchions and swords. Pikes, we had been told many times by Supplicant Blade Ofihla, would inevitably be shattered or dropped after the first clash of arms, so it was important to have another weapon to reach for.
Swain had handed me a short-staved, crescent-bladed axe to go with my billhook. The half-moon blade was dark and rough from age and neglect, but an hour or so with a whetstone succeeded in putting a silvery edge to the crusted steel. The sergeant also handed me what at first appeared to be two squares of cracked leather with a row of loops into which some old iron rings had been fixed.
“Vambraces,” he said. “They go on your forearms. The straps are frayed so you’ll have to find a way to tie them on.”
Fortunately, Ayin proved as deft with an awl and twine as she was with a skillet. Only a couple of hours’ work, during which her normally animated features took on a stern frown of concentration, and she had fashioned sturdy straps and buckles to each vambrace. The fact that she hadn’t been provided with either a weapon beyond the dagger she wore at her belt, or a single scrap of armour, didn’t appear to concern her.
“The Seraphile’s grace is the only safeguard I require,” she told me when I enquired about her lack of protection. Upon expressing my concerns to Ofihla, I had been gruffly assured that Ayin would be ordered by the captain to remain with the baggage train for the duration of the battle. The Supplicant also regarded my entirely serious suggestion that the girl be chained to a cartwheel as a poor attempt at humour.
Toria’s riches amounted to a mail shirt, the only one handed out to the dagger line as far as I could tell. Also, it had been pushed into her sullen grasp by Ofihla rather than Swain. It fitted Toria’s wiry frame surprisingly well, almost as if it had been tailored for her. I also noted that the small interlinked iron rings that formed it held no sign of rust. Ofihla clearly intended for at least one of us to survive the coming day.
“But,” Brewer went on, holding his breastplate up so it caught a faint sheen from the firelight, “I reckon it’ll polish up nice enough if I can get hold of some oil.”
“It’s shit,” Toria muttered, still staring into the flames. “All of it. Shit parcelled out to a gaggle of deluded scum following a mad-woman’s banner.”
I glared a warning at her, shooting a glance in Ayin’s direction. Luckily, she remained too lost in her dance to succumb to blasphemy-induced anger.
“Fuck off, Alwyn,” Toria stated, very precisely.
I made no further attempt to ameliorate her mood, being somewhat preoccupied with my own undercurrent of dread. It hadn’t built into outright fear as yet and perhaps it wouldn’t. Much like the confrontation with Sergeant Lebas, panic did not assail me now there was no prospect of avoiding danger. But still, my lack of experience with what waited on the morrow inevitably birthed a hard discomfort in my gut that stubbornly refused to fade.
“You’ve done this before,” I said to Brewer as he continued to polish his breastplate. “Been in battle, I mean to say.”
“Twice,” he confirmed, dabbing a cloth to his tongue before working the spit into the steel.
I fumbled over how to frame my next question, disliking the notion of unveiling my uncertainties. Toria, as usual, was less circumspect.
“Are we all going to die, d’you think?” The venom had leached from her voice and she spoke with a note of grim resignation.
Brewer left off from his polishing for a second, brows furrowed in consideration. “Some, certainly. Not all. Heart and fortitude count for as much in a battle as do discipline and skill at arms. This company, thanks to our anointed captain, has heart aplenty.” He cast a sour glance at the many campfires beading the dark below the slope. “As for the rest, they seem a mixed bag to be sure. Too many churls who’d rather be elsewhere for my liking. Still, the king’s gathered a big host. That’s sure to count for something.”
“The Pretender’s lot are veterans,” I pointed out. “Killers all, so they say.”
“At the Red Drifts I saw men who’d fought a dozen battles drop their arms and flee.” Brewer shrugged and returned to his task. “Courage is like rope: sooner or later it always runs out.”
Feeling the weight of the stares Toria and I continued to direct at him, Brewer sighed and favoured us each with a steady glance of his single eye. “You two know how to brawl. That’s something in your favour. Y’see, a battle, for all the guff the nobles spout about gallantry and such, is just a very large brawl, with weapons instead of fists. When the fury of it starts and the tidy ranks turn into a great mob of fighters, that’s where the battle’s lost or won. In the brawl. So—” he offered a rare smile “—brawl away and you’ll have a fair chance of finding yourselves alive when it’s done.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
We were roused by the Supplicants just before dawn. It remains a marvel to me that I contrived to sleep through much of the night. More remarkable still is that it was an untroubled sleep. I was also able to wolf down the hearty breakfast of bread, milk and fresh fruit Sergeant Swain managed to procure from somewhere. The tight ball of dread in my guts hadn’t faded but it couldn’t negate a sudden ravenous hunger.
“Eat up!” Ofihla instructed a considerably less enthusiastic Toria, tossing her an apple from the half-emptied barrow. “Need your strength today.”
Toria, pale of face and hollowed-eyed from a sleepless night, stared back expressionlessly. Nevertheless, as the Supplicant Blade lingered with an expectant frown, she consented to take an obedient bite of the fruit, quickly spitting it out once Ofihla moved on. “That cow’s had it in for me since the first day I joined this bundle of fuckwits,” Toria muttered.
“I really don’t think that’s the case,” I told her, plucking the apple from her grasp since she seemed to have no use for it. I took a large bite, followed by several more as I offered Toria a grin. “Quite the opposite, in fact.”
I expected a profane snarl or two in response, but instead Toria’s narrow features assumed a grave sincerity. Stepping closer, she grasped my hand and met my eye, speaking with quiet but urgent solicitation: “Alwyn… I just want you to know. If I should die today…” the grip on my hand suddenly took on a painful, vice-like tightness as her
eyes flashed, bright and savage “… it’s your fucking fault!”
“Form up!” Sergeant Swain’s voice cut through the chilled morning air, soon joined by the shouts of the Supplicants.
“I’ll haunt you, y’bastard!” Toria promised in a farewell hiss before running to take her place in the troop.
“Marching order!” Ofihla called out, shoving her way through the throng. “Gather weapons and form ranks! Hurry now! You, Ayin, report to the captain. Don’t dawdle, girl! Off with you!”
Ayin paused long enough to cast a bright smile at me and Brewer before scampering off towards Evadine’s tent. I could only hope Ofihla had passed on my suggestion about chaining her up.
“Stand straight, Scourge take you!” The Supplicant moved along our line, pushing the slouches into place and cuffing the heads of laggards. Never a gentle soul, her demeanour now was even more forbidding, leaving none in any doubt as to the consequences of a slip in discipline.
“Scribe,” she told me, glowering as she put her face close to mine, “get that hook on your shoulder like I showed you.” Stepping back, she surveyed our ranks, chin jutting in grudging approval that didn’t show in her voice. “You lot’ll have a king’s eyes on you this morn,” she called out, “and I’ll not have you shame the captain with your slovenly ways.”
We waited in starchy immobility for what felt like a considerable interval, but in truth probably amounted to just a few minutes. I heard several bellies rumble, the drone of it punctuated by a wet fart or two. The notion of being sent off to war by such a malodorous chorus brought a laugh to my lips, one that spread throughout the troop. To my surprise, Ofihla let the mirth continue for a bit before snapping out a command to silence. I supposed she found some small encouragement in the sight of soldiers laughing in the face of imminent slaughter.
Finally, there came the bugle call that set us into motion, Ofihla leading the troop through the camp to join the company’s marching column. By now, the hardness in my gut had begun to loosen into a nauseous, churning ball, one that lurched when I saw that our troop was last in line. We had trained as a full company a few times on the march, and each time the troop at the rear of the column always formed the right extremity of the battle line. Being on the right of any line, I had learned during my time with Klant, was never a good place to be.
