Soldier Saved

by D. K. Holmberg

  Dendril’s son.

  He had thought that he had moved past that, but perhaps he hadn’t. Perhaps he never would. Maybe it didn’t matter.

  He turned away, thinking that it was time for him to go to Urik again and question him, when one of the other Denraen separated from the group and came toward him. “Are you willing to work with anyone?” the man asked. He had a high-pitched voice that cracked as he spoke. How young were these recruits?

  As young as he once had been. Hopefully not as cocky.

  Endric grunted. “Anyone who’s willing to learn.”

  “I’d like to learn. I’d like to improve.”

  Endric glanced over at Bem, but the young soldier had already started away. Endric shrugged and grabbed another practice stave, tossing it to the soldier. He caught it out of the air and licked his lips, swallowing nervously.

  “Show me what you know,” Endric said.

  The man nodded. He was more advanced than Bem, but his knowledge was somewhat stilted, his movements stiff.

  Endric led him through a series of catahs, demonstrating first the movement and then the defense, the same as he had learned and the same as he had taught when they were outside the city on patrol. It seemed to him the best way to learn.

  This man caught on quickly, and Endric progressed through increasingly more complicated catahs.

  He lost himself in the patterns. There was a certain peace in flowing through the movements, the mindlessness that he fell into when he worked with his sword. It was relaxing, and the sword became a part of him, an extension of his arm, one that allowed him to strike and retreat before striking once more.

  After a while, the man was replaced by another, and Endric continued to practice. He lost track of how many of the men came to him, content simply to work with the sword, demonstrating the patterns.

  There was value in what he did.

  He hadn’t felt that way about everything in the time that he’d been back in Vasha. Watching over Urik might be beneficial for whatever his father planned, and it might be necessary given what had happened with the teralin, but it didn’t help the rest of the Denraen, not in such a direct way. Teaching these men how to become better soldiers did.

  After a while, the line of men dwindled to nothing and the last of them replaced his practice stave. Endric stood in the yard for a moment, watching patrols practicing their march and noting the way the men spoke quietly to each other, most laughing at each other, every so often glancing back at Endric.

  He recognized that look in their eyes. It was the same way men had once looked at his brother. Andril had earned that respect. Endric wasn’t entirely certain that he had—not yet.

  Now that he was back in Vasha, he would. If he were to remain, he needed to.

  Unless he didn’t stay in Vasha.

  That had never been a consideration before. While staying with the Antrilii, he had always planned to return to Vasha, but now that he was here, a part of him wished he would have remained. The merahl cub wouldn’t have nipped at him for leaving the way that he had. There were always more groeliin to kill. And he could help. He felt that while there.

  He had once felt that here.

  Would he ever again?

  With a sigh, he replaced his practice stave on the rack and headed back to his quarters.

  9

  Endric sat at the end of the hall. A few lanterns glowed along the walls, giving off a flickering light. He felt good. For the first time since returning to Vasha, his body felt invigorated, no longer stiff and sore from the travel back to the city. He’d been working with the Denraen in the practice yard, serving as something of a sword master, for the last few days. More and more men came to him, willing to face him. None gave him much of a challenge, though there was much he learned simply demonstrating the catahs for them. It required a preciseness to his movements and forced him to focus on what he demonstrated. It gave him purpose.

  “Why here?”

  Endric glanced over at Pendin. Since his return, Pendin had been quiet and had not spent much time with him. Endric assumed it was that his friend had other responsibilities. Since he’d gone away, Pendin would have been reassigned. He hadn’t even bothered to ask what rank—and position—Pendin had taken on during his absence. Hopefully they could reconnect, and if Endric were to reestablish his commission, he could take Pendin on as his steward once more.

  “You don’t have to come with me,” he said.

  Pendin rubbed his eyes. They were slightly bloodshot, and he blinked. “You’ve been gone from the city for nearly a year, Endric. Then when you return, you’re more interested in serving as sword master to the new recruits than you are in spending any time with your friends.”

  He shrugged. “You’ve been watching?”

  “Watching? I don’t need to watch. Most of the Denraen stationed in the city are aware of what you’re doing.”

  “What are they saying about it?”

  “That it’s your penance for having so much time away.”

  Endric chuckled. Perhaps it was his penance. If it was, it was one that he deserved. More and more, he’d begun to think that he needed to pay a penance. He had left the Denraen for selfish reasons. They were necessary reasons, but no less selfish. He had broken his vows—his oaths—and so a penance was deserved.

  “That’s your reaction? You laugh at it?”

  Endric glanced over at Pendin. “I didn’t know that I needed to take them seriously. Besides, it’s better than the last penance I served.”

  “You could at least attempt to be the person you were before you left.”

  “But I’m not the person I was before I left,” Endric said. He wasn’t sure that he knew how to be that person anymore. That man had still been selfish. There was much that he had done, thinking that he had needed to do it. Chasing Urik had been done for selfish reasons. Hunting the groeliin had been partially selfish, but there had been something more to it as well. It had been necessary, necessary for him to understand who he was and what he was meant to do.

  “I can see that.”

  An uncomfortable silence fell. Endric thought about telling Pendin how he had gone to see Elizabeth, but decided against it. If Pendin was already upset with him, telling his friend how he had gone to his mother might enrage him even more. They were not close, though Endric didn’t know what had happened between Pendin and his family. Whatever it was had kept them apart. It had something to do with the fact that Pendin had joined the Denraen, but it wasn’t about that entirely. There was more to it than Pendin would acknowledge.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “Sorry?”

  “I didn’t think about how my departure would impact your career. I haven’t asked about it since I returned. For that, I’m sorry.”

  Pendin grunted. “Your absence has made it difficult for me. When you were here, I was your steward, and that granted me certain freedoms.”

  “I’m aware of what that granted you.”

  “No. I don’t think that you do.”

  Endric waited, but Pendin didn’t elaborate.

  “Senda could have looked out for you.”

  Pendin shook his head and laughed bitterly. “Senda? When she was promoted to Raen, she made it clear that she would not allow any favoritism.”

  It was almost enough to make Endric smile. He could imagine Senda being quite determined to prove herself, and part of that would likely have been wanting to avoid any illusion of favoritism. The easiest way to avoid that would be by not showing any to her closest friends.

  “She would have asked you to prove your merit,” Endric said.

  “I think I’ve proven myself enough, don’t you? She saw me when we fought in Thealon. She knows what I went through and what I was willing to do on behalf of the Denraen.”

  He sensed resentment in Pendin’s voice. “Whatever happened, I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry.” Pendin shook his head, letting out a heavy sigh.

  “You don’t have
to sit with me,” Endric said.

  “I don’t, but I was hoping…”

  Endric waited for him to finish, but he didn’t. Pendin looked at him and then rubbed his bloodshot eyes again before shaking his head and leaving Endric standing in the hall by himself.

  What had happened to his friend in the time that he been away?

  It wasn’t only Tresten who had been lost. It seemed that Pendin had as well. Was that what Elizabeth had meant when she had referred to Endric’s actions? Did she know something about what had happened to Pendin?

  It seemed as if it was more than anger, but he wasn’t sure why that would be.

  He needed to find Senda and would need to ask her what she knew about Pendin and what had changed for him. And he would, but first he had other things that he needed to complete.

  He pushed open the door and stepped inside.

  The room hadn’t changed much since he had been here over a year ago. It was Urik’s old room, one that had been left untouched in the time that they had been searching for the man. Endric had been surprised to learn that Dendril had left the room alone, and that he hadn’t given it back to Urik to use.

  Dust covered much within it. There were a few books stacked on the desk and the bed was unmade. The wardrobe against the wall had not been opened in quite some time and cobwebs covered the front of it.

  It seemed a waste having a room like this untouched and unused. There were many ways that this room could have been used, and he imagined that there were many Denraen who would be pleased to have such accommodations.

  His father must have some reason for leaving it empty like this. Endric wasn’t certain what it was, and Dendril had been difficult to find over the last few days, making answers he wanted unable to be obtained by the general’s absence.

  Why had he come here?

  Maybe he’d come because he wanted answers, but maybe he’d come because he was frustrated with what had become of him. He wanted answers, wanted to know more about what he had been asked to do.

  The wardrobe was where he had discovered the teralin sword. It had been placed there after Urik’s departure and Endric still didn’t know why—or how—it had ended up there.

  He pulled open the door. Dust drifted away as he did, clogging his nostrils. He wiped his hands on his pants, clearing the dust.

  The wardrobe should have been empty, but it wasn’t.

  There was a roll of parchment propped against the far corner. Had that been there the last time he had been here?

  He couldn’t recall. It was possible that it had been, but he didn’t know.

  Endric grabbed the parchment and unrolled it. The words written on the surface were in the ancient language and he didn’t recognize them. He stuffed the paper into his pocket and closed the wardrobe, standing in place for a moment.

  As he turned to leave, he discovered Urik standing in the doorway.

  “I saw the door open and thought…”

  Endric straightened, gathering his thoughts and giving himself a moment to adjust to the suddenness of Urik’s appearance. “Does it bother you that my father hasn’t given you access to this room again?”

  Urik sniffed. “I don’t deserve to have access to this room. I am no longer Denraen. The quarters he’s given me are more than I deserve anyway.”

  The comment surprised Endric. He would have expected more agitation out of Urik, but this was a tone of regret. “We spent months searching through your room, searching for anything that would help us understand why you betrayed us.”

  “Months searching when the answers should have been clear, if only you’d been listening.”

  Endric frowned. “You don’t think anyone was listening to you?”

  “We’ve had this conversation before, Endric.”

  “We’ve had a conversation where you seemed determined to place the blame on my father and his unwillingness to do as you wanted.”

  “After what you’ve seen of the Deshmahne, do you still believe that I was wrong?”

  Endric held Urik’s gaze for a long moment before looking away. “I don’t know what to think. It’s possible that the Deshmahne would have attacked anyway.” Endric wasn’t convinced of that, though there seemed no point in arguing with Urik over that. Whether or not the Deshmahne planned an attack no longer mattered. The Deshmahne had only attacked because of Urik’s influence. “How did you coax them into attacking?”

  That had never been clear. He knew that Urik had a hand in the attack, but not what it was, not entirely.

  “It was easier than you would think. They have a deep desire for all things teralin.”

  Endric grunted. “I think we’ve seen that, don’t you?”

  Urik shook his head. “It’s more than the negatively charged teralin swords. They used teralin in their ceremonies. They use it for other purposes.”

  “What other purposes?”

  Urik shrugged. “I never was privy to that. It was something that I wanted to understand, but I never managed to find the answers in spite of my studies.”

  “Studies. That’s what you would have them called?”

  “Would you call it something different? I studied the teralin and I searched for its importance.”

  “You knew that the Magi didn’t need to use it to reach the gods.”

  Urik held his gaze for a moment. There seemed to be something he wanted to tell Endric, but he refrained. Instead, he said, “Yes. I knew it was not entirely necessary to reach the gods.”

  “Novan claims the metal is of some historical significance.”

  A smile tugged at the corner of Urik’s lips. “Some?”

  “More than some?”

  “Teralin has been known through the years as a metal of power. There was a time when wars were fought over it. Men died to gain access to it.”

  “Because it could be used the way you intended to use it?”

  Urik clasped his hands behind his back. “There was a time when teralin was better known. Even today, we know so little about it. What is known is gleaned from the past from those who had more expertise with it than what we possess today. The Magi know very little about teralin, though they would claim understanding they do not possess.”

  “How do you know that the Magi know little?”

  “Think of the decorations throughout the city, Endric. Before the attack, most of the teralin sculptures were neutral. Had they known—and had they recognized the danger—they would not have left it in a neutral state.”

  Endric remembered Tresten making his way through the city, changing the polarity of the metal. Why had he waited until then to do that?

  Maybe it was only what Urik claimed. Maybe there was no reason to charge it until it was necessary.

  Or maybe there was another reason.

  The negatively charged teralin influenced the bearer of it, which led Endric to wonder whether the positively charged teralin would have a similar effect. He’d been carrying a teralin forged sword for months, and though he wasn’t sure if he had changed, he no longer knew whether that was true.

  “How did you learn about charging teralin?” Endric asked.

  “The knowledge is there if you know where to look.”

  “And you knew where to look?”

  “The guild has access to such knowledge, even if they have never acted on it. None have ever wanted to act on it.”

  “Maybe they didn’t act on it for a reason. Maybe they recognized that they shouldn’t be, and that the knowledge of teralin, and the way that it can be used, was far too dangerous.”

  “Knowledge is only dangerous when you’re ignorant of it.”

  Endric wasn’t certain that he believed that. The knowledge that Urik possessed was dangerous. He had used it in ways that had harmed too many others. That was more than simply danger that stemmed from ignorance. It was danger that came from understanding.

  “Has the guild attempted to punish you for your role in all of this?”

  Urik sniffed. “The guild
would love to have an opportunity to seek whatever revenge they think they deserve, but they aren’t willing to risk your father.”

  Endric wasn’t sure what to make of that. He had the sense that Novan and Dendril worked together, and they would have agreed upon whatever penance that Urik needed to pay. If Urik was here, it was because both had agreed on it.

  Why, then?

  There seem to be too many questions, and they all surrounded Urik and the reason that he remained unpunished and in the city. It bothered him, though he knew it should not. He should trust that his father knew what he needed to do, and trust that he understood what the Denraen needed to do, but he’d seen his father make mistakes, which made all that difficult for him to do.

  “Why did you come here?” Urik asked.

  Endric sighed. A hint of honesty would be the only thing that would convince Urik. “I’m troubled by Tresten’s accident.”

  Urik sniffed. “You’re still on that? He was old, Endric. That is all.”

  Endric smiled to himself. Tresten might have been an old Mage, but he was more than that, and if Urik didn’t know, then he wasn’t the one to reveal it.

  “Why come to my quarters?” Urik asked.

  “I thought you were accepting of the fact that this was no longer your rooms.”

  The corner of Urik’s eyes narrowed. “They were my rooms for the duration of my time here. No one else has claimed them. What else would they be?”

  Endric glanced around, noting the empty wardrobe, the bed that now had a layer of dust, and the stack of untouched books on the desk. He started out of the room, forcing Urik ahead of him. He closed the door behind him, locking it. “They are an example of a mistake made by the Denraen. It is one we will not make again.”

  As Endric made his way past, he felt Urik watching him and made a point of ignoring the other man. Had he pushed him too hard? Would he ever be able to find what his father wanted of Urik?

  When he rounded the corner, he hesitated, waiting to see if Urik would follow, but he didn’t. Endric wished he hadn’t felt relieved and was embarrassed that he did. Why was it that Urik still unsettled him? Why didn’t he unsettle Dendril?