The Fireblade Array: 4-Book Bundle

by H. O. Charles

  left hand and place your left foot in the stirrup here.” He turned the left side of the horse to face her.

  “I’m supposed to get my foot all the way up there?”

  “No one’s looking, Artemi,” he reassured her.

  She did as she was told, hitching up her skirts awkwardly.

  “Now jump so that your right leg swings over the back of the horse and grab the back of the saddle with the other hand.”

  The lady looked a little apprehensive. She pushed off the ground and landed behind him with surprising grace.

  “Now hold on,” he said.

  “To what?”

  “Me.”

  Artemi slid her arms around his waist and pressed herself into his back. The sensation was oddly... pleasant.

  “Looks like snow,” the kahr announced, glancing at the sky.

  “Ah... yes. So it does,” came her muffled reply.

  Morghiad booted Tyshar into a fastpaced walk and reined the animal into the bare undergrowth. He could feel her leaning to one side to inspect the ground beneath them. They were leaving quite an obvious trail, but would re-join another track soon, so that didn’t matter too much. The two of them rode in silence for a few minutes, listening to the occasional panicked calls of the native birds or the rustling of some hidden predator. Eventually they reached an old track, and Morghiad turned the

  horse to follow it deeper into the trees.

  “Shall we go a little faster?” he asked.

  Her arms stiffened. “Is that safe?”

  Morghiad allowed himselfa small smile, not that she would have seen it anyway, and then he heeled Tyshar into a soft canter that caused Artemi’s grip to tighten considerably. The weather really was unusually cold for this time of year.

  After half an hour of riding they arrived at the clearing he sought, where lichen-covered stone blocks lay scattered about the edges. Some of them appeared to have the form of hands, arms or legs from an ancient statue, fragmented long ago. Perhaps it had depicted a relative of his. With Tyshar halted, the kahr instructed Artemi to dismount, which she did with elegance. The woman looked a little

  shaken after her ride and kept her arms tightly folded.

  Morghiad dismounted beside her and began winding the stirrup straps around the metal several times to shorten them. “Take the reins in your left hand,” he instructed, “Can you reach the opposite side of the saddle with your right?”

  She stretched toward it but the horse was clearly too tall.

  Morghiad scratched his chin and walked over to one of the fallen stones. “Take the bridle near his mouth and bring him here, left side facing me.” This would be an opportunity to see how she could deal with Tyshar’s moods.

  Artemi stepped towards the animal’s head and reached up to the ends of the reins.

  The horse eyed her suspiciously. She took hold of the soft leather gently and rubbed Tyshar’s nose. Amazingly, the horse nuzzled her face as if they were old friends. Artemi grimaced at being brushed against, unaware that she should have been bitten and hoofed to the floor by now. She pushed the soft nose away and stepped toward Morghiad, warhorse following in content submission. Perhaps Tyshar could sense she was a wielder as he could. That flaming hair woman wasn’t going to learn anything if she never had a challenge from a horse! He clenched his jaw and took the reins from her when she drew near.

  “Climb onto this stone,” he said.

  She looked at it carefully. “Don’t you feel strange when you look at things like this? Objects from a past, long-forgotten? Who will

  be around to speak of their meaning now?” She didn’t remember yet. She couldn’t.

  “All things become like this eventually, do they not?”

  She nodded and stepped onto the weathered masonry.

  “Now take the reins in this hand again and place your left foot in the stirrup. Mount as you did before.”

  She did so with grace, though it afforded the kahr a rather generous view of her sleek legs.

  “Feet in the stirrups. Keep the metal beneath the ball of your foot and drop the heel. Good. That will help you keep your balance.”

  He instructed her for several hours round the clearing, watching her with some amusement when she bounced awkwardly on

  Tyshar’s back. As with all things he taught her, she showed unusually speedy progress. After she had bounced to her sixth canter, he raised his green eyes skyward. The clouds were beginning to darken and tendrils of the afternoon’s icy winds had begun to reach into the tree tops. It was time to close the lesson. “Foot out of the near stirrup, please.”

  He climbed onto the horse, behind her this time, and took the reins from her hands. They trotted and cantered back to the main road, Morghiad offering tutelage the whole way. She felt warm against him. He was glad Artemi was a woman; it probably would have been awkward riding so close to another man. He chuckled inwardly at the image. Darkness filled the woods by the time he had reached the edge of them, and though he did not want to

  leave her alone in the cold, he had no choice.

  “Stay hidden,” he said, re-adjusting the stirrups. “Bandits tend to roam these woods. I’ll send someone for you the minute I get back to the city.” The kahr eyed the lone woman: hair tumbling over her breasts, big brown eyes looking up at him, pale skin shining in the darkness. He wheeled the horse around to face Cadra, walked forward a few paces and stopped. A sharp wind roused the dead leaves from the ground.

  He couldn’t leave her there, no matter how fast he made it back. He was going to regret this. “Get up here.”

  She stepped up to the side of the horse. “But if people see -”

  Morghiad grabbed her around the waist and hauled her up, placing her across his

  knees. “Can you pretend to have an injury?”

  “Would a badly broken ankle do?” The city’s poor frequently walked about with injuries their bodies were slow to heal.

  “Perfectly.”

  Artemi untied a scarf from her narrow midriff and wound it carefully around the top of one foot. It revealed a tear in her commoner’s dress. He really ought to find a way of paying her now that she was a soldier, though it would have to be kept off the books. Giving her coin would be awkward... but he could have some new dresses made for her in private. False injury bandaged, the kahr held her by the waist with one hand and neck-reined the horse with the other. They galloped back to the city at speed, her hair whipping by his jaw with its purr of Blaze echoes.

  At the perimeter gates Morghiad was pleased to find that only the guards paid any attention to his saddle-mate, and they would understand the situation in any case. He rode into the city with her at a relaxed pace and offered, as any nobleman would, to see her back to her home. Artemi asked to be taken back to her father’s house in the poor district of Cadra, and they worked their way through the orange stand-lamp-lit streets with only a few pedestrians stopping to gawp or fumble a bow. At least, by heading towards the commoner area, he would avoid meeting any lords or ladies who would undoubtedly ask difficult questions.

  The sloping streets narrowed considerably and became more thickly stacked atop one another as they approached the

  smaller houses. Skewed buildings were piled here like a collection of sodden card boxes that had fallen from a great height. The area was lively though: many people thronged outside the doors of their abodes, chatting noisily about the day that had gone. Warm yellow light spilled from the entrances and windows of most rooms, heating the green stone pathways. The area was clean of litter but had a worn feeling about it. Many of the bronze railings were broken or missing and much of the stonework was chipped or crumbling. There hadn’t been any collapses in the last century, but it was only a matter of time before this lot gave way.

  He drew Tyshar to a halt outside one aged-looking property. It was singular from the others in the plant life that had been cultivated around it. Purple sprays of tiny flowers poked

  out of the single window, a holly bush gr
ew along the front and several unidentifiable shrubs hung from the walls, which were otherwise covered in ivy. Artemi slid from his lap and pretended to land awkwardly on one foot. The cold air rushed in to fill the space where she had sat.

  Giving her a courteous nod, the kahr turned his mount to the castle and tried not to notice as an auburn-haired man stepped out from the house. Instead, he booted Tyshar into a canter and headed toward the blackened, basalt heart of the city.

  “Are you alright? What happened? And what are you doing hanging around with the Kahr-of-bloody-Calidell, young lady?” Her father put an arm around her and helped her into the warmth of his house. Artemi was faced with a difficult choice. Either she could lie completely to the only family she had, or she could tell the truth and risk him finding out that she was this terrible thing: a wielder. And that she’d killed her mother. She looked at his worried blue eyes as he sat her in the familiar wooden chair and fussed over her. “My ankle

  is fine. It was a ruse so thatI could get back to the city in safety.” Artemi could not bring herselfto lie; it would be too much for her to bear.

  Her father straightened, suspicion filling his eyes. “You were outside the city, with him?”

  “Yes. He was teaching me to ride, father.”

  His face turned pink as anger took over his voice. “I bet he was! Has he touched you? Because if he has I’ll...” His mouth worked.

  She stood and held his shoulders, hoping to calm him down. “No. It’s not like that. He wouldn’t do that.”

  Her father shook his head. “Oh,

  Artemi. Fool girl. Don’t you realise he’s a man? That’s all they ever want. And he’s a bloody noble as well, royalty are even worse; what

  else could he want from a pretty girl like you, with no money or expectations to speak of?

  You’re not to take any more ‘riding lessons’ with him again, do you hear me?”

  She bit her lip. “I don’t have a choice.”

  “What has this man gotten you into, girl? Should’ve known he’d turn out as bad as the king,” he spat.

  Artemi tried not to clench her fists at his unwillingness to believe her. “Just - be quiet while I explain it. Morghiad doesn’t have any interest in women. I’m sure of it.”

  Her father folded his arms and raised an eyebrow, but stayed silent.

  She went on, “I’ve joined the army. I can use a sword moderately well, butI can’t ride a horse, and for obvious reasons it’s not something I can learn in public with him... and

  he can’t trust anyone outside the army to teach me... and he’d be discovered if he paid for lessons for some commoner. A woman isn’t supposed to fight. The king wouldn’t allow it but the whole army have promised to keep it a secret, for me.”

  Her father’s mouth had dropped. “Damn right a woman isn’t supposed to fight! And even if you were a lad I’d not have allowed it! Why has he got you fighting, is he really that desperate for sword hands? Blazes, Artemi! I didn’t name you that to live up to the bloody stories! And think about it, why didn’t he get one of your sworn-to-secrecy soldiers to teach you to ride, instead of personally escorting you to who-knows-where?”

  “Because he is trying to protect his honour and my own. I cannot be seen

  departing the city with a different man each day, whilst simultaneously visiting his rooms.”

  He frowned. “You visit his rooms, too? I should never have let you go to work in that castle, never.” Her father slumped into the only other chair.

  Artemi took his big hands and squeezed them tightly. “I am being looked after. I have Kahr Morghiad’s own protection.”

  “And yet you’ll march to war and get yourselfkilled for him, and the blasted king,” he sighed. “And visiting him. You are far too young to go through nalka yet.”

  “For the last time, father, I am not sleeping with him!”

  He gritted his teeth, but seemed to accept she was speaking the truth. “Temi, there’s something I’ve never told you. I...

  didn’t want you to be disappointed in me. I always thought it would be better if you grew up the daughter of a boring old blacksmith’s hand. But it seems we’ve both fallen into the same stupid trap.” He looked pained. “I used to be in that army - used to wear the black and green and march for my country. I saw so many of my friends lose their lives for nothing, for battles over pieces of land that no one but petty kings could care for. It was utterly futile.” He took a deep breath. “I went to siege Gialdin all those years ago. But it was wrong. It was the most horrific thing I have ever witnessed. We killed innocent citizens to get to the city; men and women who’d picked up farming tools to defend themselves. And then we started destroying it. Gialdin was surely the most beautiful place ever built. I wish you could have seen it before... And I was one of those who helped turn the brilliant white walls to rubble. Temi, I wept for it. It was terrible. I deserted that day; I couldn’t stay there and be part of that. So I came home with your mother instead.” He smiled. “And then we made you.”

  Artemi was less surprised than she ought to have been. He was built like a soldier, and had often talked of faraway places that only a merchant or gypsy could have known of. Her father had nothing to worry about, of course. Morghiad would not let her near a battle until she could incinerate her enemies with a single thought. But she wanted to keep the wielding from her father a while longer. “I thought desertion carried a penalty of imprisonment.”

  “It does. I was thrown into the cells as

  soon as the rest returned, what few of them survived. But your mother had fallen pregnant and the sergeant showed some leniency. And when she died... well, they decided to punish me instead by making me a runner for the farrier.”

  She nodded slowly. “You mustn’t worry for me, father. I do not think the captain would allow such a battle to occur under his administration.”

  Her father grunted. “Unfortunately the king makes those decisions.”

  Artemi stayed silent. She had already stretched one of the oaths in telling him of her involvement with the army, but that was her secret – not just the army’s. “I will be alright. Please trust me, and trust him.”

  Her father sighed and hugged her

  tightly. “When did you grow up? Though you’re not exactly big, are you? Not my little girl any more. You’ll understand when you have kids.”

  Artemi winced.

  Her father stood back and pushed the chairs to the wall, before removing a plank from the floor. The ex-soldier pulled out a long, thin, dusty object, his expression bearing resignation. A well-polished sword emerged from the gritty wrappings. He threw it to her. “Now,” he said, taking up the fire poker. “Show me what that bastard kahr has taught

  Brave fingers of green pushed through a spray of snow, hailing the first hints of a verdant spring. A fresh, damp wind brushed at the crumpled yellow soil of the Great North Road while nine-tenths of the Cadran army poured down it. Many of the men had horses, also garbed in the black and green of Calidell. At the back of the column rolled a collection of covered wagons, their brass fixings shining brightly in the brief sun, and with them rode the

  many wives and children of the soldiers. Silar rubbed the neck of his blue dun gelding to reassure it against the wind. The animal could get quite flighty over stupid things, and yet have no problem with swords or shouting soldiers. He rode at the front of his battalion which, happily for him, was at the back of the column. Every so often he would turn to catch a glimpse of the dark gold-red hair of Artemi’s braid waving about between the wagons. Dressed plainly, she was chatting away merrily to several of the drivers who, like the men of her company, seemed to have grown rather fond of her in a short time. The soldiers treated her as a beloved sister, but that was the effect an unconditionally warm and handsome young woman would have, even if she was a wielder. Even blazed Passerid spoke well of her these

  days!

  He was somewhat annoyed that his affection for her had not dissipated, and stil
l more annoyed that he had been charged with protecting her but was prevented from being her lieutenant. Morghiad had made some odd decisions regarding her, but even he was not immune to her draw. Silar had observed the captain staring at her, unblinkingly, for a full ten minutes during one practice session. Worse, he had even seen the hint of a smile touch the man’s lips while he mooned over her. And then there had been the matter of the dresses: two new cotton things had arrived for Artemi one day. Of course, she had accused Lord Forllan of being overly generous, but the accusation was incorrect. Morghiad was the only other one with access to her measurements.

  The lieutenant relaxed the frown that was fast growing on his face. If anyone was going to take Artemi, he would rather it was the kahr. It was probably inevitable, the two of them being kanaala and wielder together. Just typical. She was the one woman he seriously cared for and bloody Morghiad would likely sweep in there and make her his own. He clenched his teeth together and steadied the horse, which was clearly sensing his emotions.

  At least his captain had been wise enough to keep her as a runner in the coming battle. She was more than good enough to fight now, and had outperformed the recruits who had joined with her, but there was no point in putting her in harm’s way before she had peaked. The woman was still very young and very inexperienced. Even the best fighters