Alector's Choice

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “In the morning.” Mykel continued to look out into the darkness, taking in the corral fence and the sentries beyond. While Selena had risen earlier, it had vanished behind the clouds to the east, providing only a faint glow behind them. Asterta hung, a miniature circle of green, above the Murian Mountains, reminding Mykel of the ancient soarer—who had also hovered above the mountainside and told him to find a talent that allowed him to look beyond, as if he even knew where to start. And when had he had time for that? The only talents he seemed to have time to find and use were being able to shoot a rifle with lethal effect under almost any conditions and finding more effective ways to kill rebels.

  Somehow, he didn’t think that was what she had meant.

  Was there a link between her and the ancient dagger? Alone in the darkness, he slipped it out from the slot in his belt. The blade shimmered greenish in the darkness, yet in a way that shed no light, cast no shadow. Why was he still carrying it?

  Because not to would be worse. That he knew, even if he üdn’t know why. He slipped the miniature dagger back into its slot.

  Then he turned and headed for the door to the tack room.

  93

  Decdi morning was pleasantly warm, if drier than Dainyl preferred, when he left the officers’ mess after breakfast, now back to cooking normally, and walked to the stables. There he watched as Captain Rhystan mustered the bulked-up Sixteenth Company and headed them out. Four supply wagons brought up the rear as the Cadmi-ans rode out the west gate.

  Once Sixteenth Company was well down the road, and the rebuilt gates had closed, Dainyl strode across the courtyard to the headquarters building. Early as it was, the building was empty, except for the squad leader on duty, who sprang to his feet as Dainyl passed.

  “Carry on.” The Submarshal smiled and kept moving.

  Once in his study, Dainyl walked to the window and looked out into the courtyard, far emptier than on previous days. How long would it take for the two Cadmian companies to herd and prod the seltyrs into gathering their forces? What if they remained separate?

  A cold smile appeared. If they remained separate, between the pteridons and Captain Mykel and Captain Rhystan, soon there would be no sizable rebel forces left.

  Dainyl still pondered over why the marshal and the Highest had armed the seltyrs and fomented such disorder in

  Dramur. The unrest clearly reduced lifeforce, both through the actual deaths of higher life forms and through the disruption of guano deliveries to the mainland. Why would they want that, particularly at this time?

  Still having no answer, he turned to the rack set against the inside wall and picked up the map of the area north of the mine. He needed to study it before he had Falyna fly him over that terrain later in the day. It wasn’t the best of maps, but it was what he had, and he systematically committed the major terrain features to memory.

  Sometime later, there was a quiet rap on the door. Dainyl looked up.

  “Sir?” Meryst stood in the study doorway.

  “Yes?”

  The captain held up an envelope. “A messenger delivered this to the guards on gate duty a little while ago. It’s addressed to you.”

  Dainyl took the envelope. The outside bore the inscription “Colonel Dainyl.” He broke the blue wax seal, unfolded the parchment, and began to read the flowing script.

  Colonel Dainyl,

  Dramur and its people are not and will not be mere counters or tokens in a game played by a handful of alectors who appear only when they wish to take something. On behalf of those who have entrusted their futures to our leadership, we urge that you leave Dramur to its people and their traditional leaders, for we cannot and will not submit to the rule of outsiders who have neither understanding nor appreciation for our ways.

  If you do not choose to leave, and to take your Myrmidons and Cadmians with you, you and they will suffer. We will not surrender, and alectors will never rule Dramur, for you can never be a part of the land and the world upon which it rests.

  At the last words of the message, Dainyl barely managed keep from frowning, recalling what Lystrana had pointed it earlier. How had the seltyrs known that? Were they guessing? Or had they just used flowery words and come up with that phrase? There was no signature, only a seal, set in the same blue wax.

  “Sir?” asked Meryst.

  “We have been told that we will suffer, and that they will never surrender. I didn’t expect something in writing, but I understood the message without a formal declaration.” He extended the missive so that Meryst could see the seal. “Do you recognize this seal?”

  “No, sir.”

  About that, the captain was telling the truth, and his puzzlement seemed genuine.

  “Why do they think they can defy the Myrmidons? Do ou have any idea, Captain?”

  “Sir… the seltyrs have always felt they are the true and ightful rulers of Dramur. So long as no one interfered in what happened on their lands, they paid token allegiance to the Duarches.”

  Was that the reason for the marshal’s plot? But… if that vere so, why would the seltyrs have trusted any emissary vho was an alector? Or had they just pretended to trust to obtain the weapons? Or had someone else acted as an inter-nediary? “That speaks poorly for everyone.” Dainyl’s vords were dry.

  “Yes, sir, but that is the way they have felt.”

  “Thank you, Captain.”

  Meryst nodded, then turned and left.

  After a moment, Dainyl walked across the corridor to the smaller study, where Overcaptain Dohark stood at the window.

  The overcaptain turned. “Sir?”

  “The seltyrs have declared war to the death, or some such,” Dainyl announced, holding up the missive. “They actually sent a message. Almost touching, their belief in their power and the rightness of their ways.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You sound doubtful, Overcaptain.”

  “Not doubtful, sir. A Cadmian finds out soon enough that every man feels his ways are the right ways. Otherwise, he couldn’t face the next day. Most wouldn’t declare that they’d fight to the death. Fewer would.”

  “You don’t think the seltyrs will?”

  “They will. Some of their men will.”

  “And the rest? What will they do?”

  “They’ll go home and do what they must.”

  “Even if that means following the next seltyr?”

  “If that’s the only choice, and it will be for many.”

  “I fear you’re right about that.” Dainyl nodded. “I’ll be out flying for most of the morning. It could be longer.”

  The Submarshal returned to his study, where he reclaimed his flying jacket from the study and made his way out of headquarters and into the courtyard, striding toward the square that held the duty pteridon. Falyna was waiting. “Just recon today, sir?”

  “Just recon—unless we happen to see a massed force of rebels in the open.”

  Dainyl thought that most unlikely, and, from her expression, so did Falyna.

  94

  Under the midmorning sun of a warm Duadi, Mykel blotted his forehead, then leaned forward slightly in the saddle to look at the half score of houses that lay five hundred yards ahead down a barely perceptible incline.

  Over the past few days, following the Submarshal’s orders, Mykel had slowly moved Fifteenth Company westward and northward. While they had occasionally seen the tioofprints of the rebels’ mounts, the prints had been at least a day old, and all were headed in a westerly and more northerly direction.

  Gerant cleared his throat. “Sir, roads and lanes look clear.”

  Mykel shifted his eyes from the small hamlet back to the scout reined up beside him. “There’s no one out in the hamlet?”

  “No, sir,” replied the scout. “Saw me coming, and every door and every shutter slammed shut, quick as a lightning bolt. A couple ran and shut up their stables.”

  “We’re not exactly popular,” Mykel said.

  “No, sir. Not as though
we shoot women or children.”

  “Or poison people,” Mykel added dryly. “We’ll ride through, but with rifles ready.” He doubted that they would need the rifles, since he couldn’t sense any real danger, but there was always the chance that his senses wouldn’t pick up all dangers.

  He straightened in the saddle. “Fifteenth Company! Rifles ready! Forward!”

  “First squad, forward!” repeated Gendsyr^

  Mykel studied the hamlet as they rode closer. The fields on each side of the road alternated between sunbeans and pastures where grass alternated with bare soil. The grasses that had been green throughout Dramur a few weeks earlier were showing signs of tan and gold as the days continued to warm.

  Small orchards grew behind most of the small cots, but Mykel had no idea what the fruit might be. He’d thought the people who lived in the north Westerhills had been poor, but they were well-off compared to the peasants in small hamlets in Dramur. Yet the seltyrs lived like rulers—they were cepted it. They not only accepted their poverty, but they seemed to be against anything that would make the seltyrs more accountable. From what he could see, the young men willingly joined the ranks of the rebels, even while the seltyrs were bleeding their families and parents.

  “Quiet.” Bhoral pulled his mount alongside Mykel’s. “Every hamlet has been like this. You think they fear us that much?”

  “I don’t know whether they fear us, or they fear what we might do, or they fear not showing fear because of what the seltyrs and growers will do once we’ve left.”

  “You think things will be that bad?”

  “Oh, there will be new seltyrs, and some growers will become seltyrs, but these people will stay poor. For them, nothing will change.”

  “I suppose not. My folks still live in the same house in the same village outside of Hafin as my grandparents and their parents did.”

  Mykel’s parents lived in the same house where his grandparents had. Was it like that for most people? Was that why so little changed? Mykel’s lips tightened as he considered the thought.

  95

  Dainyl leaned against the study desk that was too low and small for him to sit behind for any length of time. He supposed he could have ordered a larger one built, but he’d never expected to be in Dramuria so long, and he wouldn’t have felt right about wasting the resources for something used so infrequently or for such a short time. For a moment, his eyes flicked to the window. Outside headquarters, the Tridi morning sun was beating down on the stones of the courtyard. A faint heat haze was forming, although noon was a good two glasses away. His eyes turned back to the overcaptain who stood before him. “The rebels are slowly being pressed back north of the mine and well west of Enstyla. Within another day or so, they should be in a position where we can attack.”

  “I’ll head north this afternoon, then,” said Dohark.

  “That wouldn’t be a good idea. I’ll have to be there.” Dainyl handed a folded sheet to the overcaptain. “That is my commission designating you as officer in charge of all Cadmian forces in Dramuria, under my supervision, as well as the officer in charge in my absence, injury, or death.”

  Dohark’s eyebrows lifted. “Sir?” He did not unfold the sheet he had accepted.

  “While I don’t plan on anything happening in my absence, if you join this assault on the rebels, there will be no one I can trust here in the compound—or in Dramuria. In my boots, would you wish to leave command in the hands of Captain Meryst or Captain Benjyr?” Dainyl didn’t mention that Benjyr had spent the last weeks avoiding even getting anywhere near him, although Dainyl had not pressed the issue.

  “No, sir.” Dohark’s words were grudging.

  “I know you’re a fighting officer, and a good one, but my choices are simple. I can either relieve Captain Mykel and give you Fifteenth Company, and put him in charge here, or leave you here. You have more rank and stature, and you are not perceived in quite the same… light… as Captain Mykel. Didn’t you tell me he was being called the Knife of the Ancients, or something like that?”

  “Yes, sir. That’s a blade that cuts so sharply that it wounds both the user and the victim. Supposedly, such blades actually exist. They’re very rare, though, and no one admits to ever having seen one.”

  “Does the captain know this?” The idea of Captain Mykel being termed a tool of the ancients disturbed Dainyl, but then, the captain and his emerging Talent already worried at the Submarshal.

  “He knows what that means, sir, but I don’t think he’s aware of being called that.”

  As he stood in the study, Dainyl sensed, for the third day running, the use of Talent to the north. It was clearly the Talent of an ancient—the soarer—and not the unfocused and shorter spurts of Talent that he associated with the Cad-mian captain. Unlike earlier manifestations of the soarer, the more recent appearances had lasted far longer. So much use of Talent by an ancient, or ancients, at a time when his plans were coming to fruition, troubled Dainyl. It suggested that the ancients were aware and interested, if not involved.

  “The name fits, in a way,” added Dohark.

  “That the captain is far sharper than most realize?” Dainyl kept his tone dry.

  “Yes, sir. Right now, he could be a good majer. In time, he could be a good colonel.”

  “As I recall, you were worried that he could be too ruthless.”

  Dohark flushed. “Ah… that was not quite what I said. I said he was as ruthless as necessary, and effective, but I worried that it would take a toll on him.”

  Dainyl, distracted by the continuing sense of the ancient to the north, perhaps near the old tunnel that held what had to be the equivalent of a Table, nodded. “I apologize for overstating, Overcaptain.” He paused. “I trust you understand why I must insist you remain here.”

  “I understand, sir. It might be helpful… at the appropriate time…”

  “If it is necessary, I will inform Colonel Herolt.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “There are a few other pressing matters. Until later, Overcaptain.” Dainyl waited for several moments until Dohark had left, trying not to look hurried. Then he pulled on his flying jacket and strode out and down the corridor, nod-ding at the duty squad leader before leaving headquarters. He crossed the courtyard rapidly to the pteridon square, where Quelyt waited.

  The Myrmidon ranker had seen Dainyl coming and stood by the pteridon in his own flying jacket. “Where to this morning, Submarshal? North again, sir?”

  “Yes. We’ll swing west, head north past the mine, then do a recon of the area where the seltyrs seem to be gathering.”

  Quelyt vaulted into the first seat and began fastening himself in.

  Dainyl waited a moment and did the same in the rear seat. After a moment, he called forward, “Anytime, Quelyt.”

  The pteridon sprang into the air above the courtyard, blue wings spread wide, into the wind out of the north. In moments, they cleared the northern wall of the compound. Once they were a good hundred yards above the ground, Quelyt swung more to the northwest, until they reached the mine road and paralleled it.

  Dainyl leaned slightly to the left, studying the ground below, but he saw no one on the mine road, nor on the winding lanes farther east. He still sensed the soarer to the north. It had been half a glass since he had noted her presence—a far longer time than ever before—except over the last three days.

  They flew northward for more than half a glass before Dainyl saw plumes of dust on an older and narrower road heading north. “Up ahead, on the road. See how close you can get!”

  “Heading down, sir!” The pteridon half folded its wings for a moment, starting a shallow dive, then extended them again, so that the dive became an extended downward glide.

  By the time the pteridon had descended to a hundred yards above the road, a point where Dainyl could have determined who was riding, the rider or riders had vanished— hiding in casaran orchards, woodlots, under single large trees, whatever cover was available. Such disappeara
nces alone suggested that the riders were rebels and that their officers had scouts detailed to watch the skies for pteridons.

  While Dainyl knew that some of the orchards below held rebels, he couldn’t very well have Quelyt flame every tree under which rebels might be hiding. That was one reason he needed the Cadmians to herd the rebels into a more circumscribed area. He kept scanning the area on both sides of the road, but the riders remained concealed.

  “What now, sir?” called back Quelyt.

  “Head north, toward that mountain where we found the ancient tunnel.”

  “North it is.” The pteridon began to climb, turning slightly to the northwest.

  Dainyl looked back over his shoulder, but the rebel riders remained hidden and doubtless would stay so until they were certain the pteridon was well out of sight. He turned his eyes and Talent northward, seeking out the soarer’s peak, with its odd-angled shape.

  Another half glass passed before the pteridon neared the site, and with each vingt that the Myrmidons drew closer, Dainyl could sense the soarer more clearly.

  Below the peak, in the charred grove that the Myrmidons had flamed a season before, Dainyl could see greenery where there should have been none—not so soon after the destruction wrought by a skylance. The presence of the soarer remained strong, with a hint of something implacable behind the green Talent.

  “There’s something there, sir. Can’t tell what it is, but it’s like a fog in front of that cave,” Quelyt called back.

  For Dainyl, there was no fog—just a circle of green iridescence with the soarer hovering in the center two or three yards out from the front of the cave. “Don’t get any closer. Just sweep by, then circle back again at the same distance.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  As the pteridon flew by, Dainyl could sense a Talent-probe of some sort, but one so light, so delicate, that he might not even have noticed it had he not been fully concentrating with his Talent and all his senses. He tried to block it, but his own Talent skittered off and through the fine line of green, as if it were smoke or mist, or not present at all. Yet there was a sense of strength there.