Imager’s Battalion

by Jr. L. E. Modesitt

  “We’ll be almost a day ahead of the northern army by Mardi afternoon,” Meinyt said.

  “Most likely.” Skarpa nodded. “The nearest bridge over the Aluse in Bovaria is at Villerive, but there’s a cable ferry at Rivecote. It joins Rivecote Sud and Nord.”

  “That’s what … sixty milles upriver?” asked Quaeryt.

  “If the maps and the millestones are accurate, and I wouldn’t wager on that.”

  Neither would Quaeryt.

  “I’d like to reach Rivecote Sud well before Deucalon nears Rivecote Nord. It will be even more important that we reach Villerive before Deucalon does. The Bovarians don’t expect an army, even a small one, to advance on the south side of the Aluse. If we hold the ferry and the bridge, then we cut off their retreat … or we can attack their rear. Either way, that will put us in a stronger position.”

  “Then we’ll be more than a day ahead of the northern forces,” said Meinyt evenly.

  “What the marshal had in mind, I am certain,” said Skarpa, “was that we should never be far enough ahead of his forces that we could not support him. I intend to be able to support him where and when it is possible. There are sections of the southern side of the river where there is no road, only a path. Preparing to be able to support him will require our getting an early start.”

  Meinyt nodded, not bothering to hide a smile.

  “Can your imagers smooth out things or remove rocks if necessary?” asked Skarpa.

  “If they’re not too large,” replied Quaeryt.

  “That could prove most helpful. We’re short of engineers.”

  Quaeryt glanced to Meinyt, then back to Skarpa.

  “Myskyl said that the northern army needed them in case the Bovarians tried to destroy more bridges, the way they did over the Myal River when we were riding to Ferravyl. So Deucalon took the engineers from Third Regiment and left us with those from the Piedryn regiment. Meinyt never got any engineers for Fifth Regiment.” Skarpa shrugged. “Myskyl did say that if your imagers could build bridges, they ought to be able to repair them.”

  “It’s not that easy,” Quaeryt said. “I’m also not certain anyone wants to risk freezing the regiments to build a bridge. He seems to have forgotten that we killed almost an entire battalion of our own troopers.”

  “He didn’t forget. He’s never forgotten anything,” Skarpa said in a matter-of-fact fashion. “Though there are times when I’m not certain he’s learned anything from what happens. It doesn’t matter. We don’t have good engineers. We’ll do the best we can.” He looked to Meinyt. “We’ll be sending our own scouts out. Do you think we’ll need a recon in force?”

  “Not on Lundi. Perhaps not on Mardi. After that, if we see more than a few tracks, I’d recommend half squads. Full squads as we near Rivecote.”

  That brought another nod from Skarpa. “Quaeryt … I’d like to keep the imagers near the front. Do you have any problem riding with me and keeping them close?”

  “No, sir. I’d recommend that for the first few days. After that, it would depend on what’s ahead.”

  Skarpa continued to ask questions and seek observations for another half glass, then abruptly said, “That’s all.” He turned to Quaeryt. “You might as well leave for Nordruil now, or whenever you’re finished with your battalion. I’d like you back tomorrow evening.”

  Quaeryt understood that all too well. Lundi morning would come all too early. “I’ll be here.”

  6

  On Samedi evening, when Quaeryt reached Nordruil, Vaelora was waiting at the front entrance for him, dressed in a flattering, and clinging, green cotton dress that somehow made her light brown eyes look almost luminously amber. Even before he dismounted, he wanted to wrap his arms around her, to lose himself in her. Instead, he permitted himself a long embrace and a tender, but passionate kiss, far more than was proper in public, he knew.

  As he lifted his lips from hers, she said, “You’re only here for tonight and tomorrow, aren’t you?”

  He nodded. “We leave before dawn on Lundi.”

  “Then we should make the most of the time. Dinner will be ready in less than a glass.” She smiled. “You need your uniform washed, and you need to bathe.” After a moment she added, blushing, “Just bathe. Be patient. The evening will be long enough.”

  Quaeryt looked at her again.

  “That is not a scholarly look.”

  “It wasn’t meant to be.” He grinned. “I take it you have already made preparations for my bath?”

  “Of course. I don’t want to waste time … either.”

  Quaeryt laughed.

  Then they walked into the hold house and up the stairs.

  Quaeryt had to admit that he felt better after bathing, but he didn’t luxuriate in the porcelain tub, because Vaelora had left him there to make certain dinner would be ready. He had his doubts that her absence was totally for that reason, but, he reminded himself, you’re far more fortunate in having her than you ever thought, and there are times when it’s best to let things be as she wishes.

  He dressed quickly, and as he was pulling on a clean shirt, not a uniform, she entered the dressing chamber.

  “They’re washing all your uniforms so they’ll have enough time to dry. Are you hungry?”

  “Yes.” In more ways than one. But dinner would come first.

  They walked down the narrow stairs together. Quaeryt did hold her hand, firmly, but not too lightly.

  She looked at him. “I’m glad you miss me.”

  “I wish I didn’t have to.”

  Vaelora shook her head. “If you don’t do what you must, then you’d come to blame me. I would not have that.” She smiled faintly. “Do not tell me you wish it were otherwise. I would not love you so much were you not striving to change things for the better. I have not told you this, but I would not change one thing you did as governor now that I have thought about it. I told Bhayar that also.”

  “Thank you.” Quaeryt squeezed her hand again. “What did he say? Or did he just look at you with those dark blue eyes?”

  “That doesn’t work with me. He tried it too often when we were young. He laughed. Then he said that I was getting to be as dangerous as you, and that he would have to watch both of us.” She shook her head, then smiled. “I told him I’d learned it all from him and Aelina. He said that he was surrounded by dangerous people, and that was the price of using those who were most able.”

  “He’s right about that. Anyone who can carry out tasks well can turn that ability against one.”

  “So a ruler has the choice between faithful incompetence or dangerous competence?”

  “All too often, don’t you think?”

  “I do.”

  “Still…” mused Quaeryt, “there is one aspect that many overlook. Often those who are most able can see that they can accomplish more by working with a ruler than against him. It is usually to their interests to do so.”

  “Unless the ruler is not trustworthy.”

  “A ruler should always keep his word … that is, if he wishes to remain a ruler.”

  “Has my brother?”

  “So far as I know. Do you know otherwise?”

  “He did not as a youth. Our father whipped him once for breaking his word.”

  That was something Quaeryt had not heard.

  “Father told him that lesser men could break their word, but not rulers. He also said that treachery and lying was a shortcut to ruin.” Vaelora smiled ironically. “He also said that there was little need to deceive men, because most men would deceive themselves.” She stopped as they reached the table on the terrace, placed so that the trees beyond the terrace shaded it from the last rays of the sun.

  Once they were seated, Vaelora looked across at him. “You are tired.”

  “I’m not that tired … but the last two days have been long.”

  “How did it go with the Pharsi officers?”

  “They will obey and follow my orders.” He laughed softly, not quite bitterly. �
��At least until I prove I’m not one of the lost ones.”

  “And what if you are?”

  “They may find that they do not want what they have wished for.”

  “Oh … dearest…” Vaelora reached across the table and took his hands in hers for a moment, then released them as the serving woman approached, setting a pale lager in a beaker before each of them.

  Quaeryt took a long swallow. He hadn’t realized just how thirsty he still was. “I do like good lager.”

  “You like most things that are good.”

  “So do you,” he said with a smile.

  “Don’t most people?” She took a sip from her beaker, then set it down and waited as the serving woman placed a small platter of sliced peaches and cherries before her, and then another before Quaeryt. “I thought fruit, and then fowl, would be good.”

  “It all sounds good.” He ate one of the cherries, careful not to bite on the pit, then another, before going on. “I’m not sure that most people like what is truly good. I think most of us want to think that what we like or what we wish to do is good. Just think about what happened in Extela. The grain and flour merchants wanted higher prices for flour, even though the price they wanted would have beggared many people. When I kept the price from going too high for just a few weeks, while restoring order, they all condemned me and complained to your brother. When I questioned High Holder Wystgahl about his motives and about the fact that he’d supplied weevil-ridden flour to the post, he got so upset that he died, and his son and everyone condemned me. No one said a word about the nature of the flour, or that his actions were a theft of so many golds that a poor man would have been beheaded for taking that much. Yet all of them believed that they represented what was good.” Quaeryt doubted he’d ever forget what he’d learned from his short time as governor of Montagne.

  “You’re very right, dearest, and we can correspond about it. We should enjoy dinner … and the little time we have left together at present.”

  Quaeryt was glad for the last two words she spoke, even as he knew she was right. He would have more than enough time without her to think over how people defined what was good and what was not. He smiled and lifted his beaker. “To your wisdom, to us, and to the evening.”

  Vaelora raised her beaker as well, extending it so that it touched his with the faintest clink. “To us.”

  They drank, eyes locked.

  7

  Quaeryt found himself once more in the saddle, looking out through the rain at the massed Bovarians as the horns began to sound. The mournful penetrating call shivered through his bones. As one the Bovarians began to advance toward the Telaryn forces on the low ridge south of the River Aluse, closing in from the north, the south, and even the west.

  Quaeryt cleared his throat, extended his shields to encompass Desyrk and Shaelyt, then concentrated on imaging the bridge he visualized, with high slight arches to a central pier, a massive structure necessary for what must come.

  Nothing happened, and the Bovarians kept advancing.

  Could he do it again? Draw power from the warm rain, from the warmth of the Bovarian troopers and their mounts? From the river itself? Could he again slaughter tens of thousands?

  Yet if he did not …

  He reached out for that warmth—and from everywhere came lances of pain, strikes like cold lightning. Overhead, the clouds darkened into masses blacker than a moonless night without even the thinnest crescent of either Erion or Artiema, and liquid ice poured down like sheets in an arc around him, slashing through his shields as if they did not exist, sucking all the warmth within him away.

  From somewhere came a mocking whisper. “Should you not suffer what you wrought?”

  He wanted to protest that he hadn’t been the one who had begun the war, but the chill froze his tongue in his mouth. Brilliant lines of white ice-lightning flared through his skull, and the tears caused by that pain froze instantly on his cheeks. White fog billowed below him … and icy whiteness froze him into stillness. He struggled to escape, to move somehow, but he could not, chill as he was. He tried to blink, but failed, as if they were frozen open watching thousands freeze around him, even as ice built around him. Somewhere, he could hear rain, icy droplets … falling, coating him with yet more ice.

  He shuddered, trying to escape the endless ice and chill.

  Suddenly there was light all around him, light so bright he could hardly see, but he was cold, so cold he was shivering, even with all the sunlight.

  Before he could say anything, Vaelora’s arms were around him. “It’s all right, dearest. It’s all right.”

  Her words did not register with him, not for several moments, because they were in Bovarian. “What…?” he murmured, half mumbling because his lips were so cold they felt numb.

  “It’s all right. I’m here. I’m right here.”

  She’ll freeze, too. “… chill you … the way…”

  “I’m warm enough. Just hold on to me. Talk to me. Tell me what happened.” With her arms wrapped around him, slowly the cold deep within him began to melt away.

  Later, when they finally moved apart, at least enough for Vaelora to look at him, worry in her eyes, she asked, “What was it? The ice storm? You were so cold.” She swallowed. “The walls…”

  “What is it?” Quaeryt could see the concern on her face.

  “You started shivering in your sleep, and then there was frost. It was all over the walls.”

  He glanced around the bedchamber.

  “It’s all melted now.” She laughed uneasily. “It is full summer. But can’t you feel how cool everything is?”

  Quaeryt managed not to shudder again. Did you image in your sleep? Enough to cause frost to form?

  “Were you dreaming? About the ice storm you caused?”

  He nodded. “It was worse than that. I was fighting the battle again, and I didn’t want to image and kill thousands again, but they kept coming … and coming.” He shuddered in spite of himself.

  “What you’ve been doing with the regiment isn’t the only reason you’re tired, is it?”

  “No…” he admitted warily.

  “Tell me about it. All about it.” Her words, gently as they were spoken, were not a request.

  “This wasn’t the first time. I dream about getting caught in the rain, being frozen in place, along with the … thousands of others … the Bovarians … some of ours … I try to escape … but I can’t.” He finally shook his head. “I struggle with the ice until I wake up.”

  “Does where you sleep feel cold to you when you finally wake up?”

  “How could I tell? I always wake up cold and shivering, no matter how hot it was the night before.” After a moment he added, “I never saw frost … but I never looked for it, either.”

  Vaelora offered a smile.

  Quaeryt suspected she’d forced the expression, but he smiled back.

  “You do make the bedchamber more comfortable in summer,” she said quickly. “It was rather warm … until…”

  He looked at her, pale in the morning light. “How long have you been awake?”

  “A glass, I’d guess. You were so tired, and I didn’t want to wake you, then…”

  “You’re hungry, enough to feel faint, aren’t you?”

  “That seems to be happening more, now that…”

  Quaeryt sat up in the wide bed. “We need to get you something to eat.”

  “You’re not doing much better than I am.”

  Quaeryt laughed. “Then we need breakfast.” As he put his feet on the floor a moment of light-headedness swept over him, suggesting he had indeed been imaging as he dreamed. How had that happened? He managed not to frown, not wanting to worry Vaelora any more than he already had.

  They washed and dressed quickly. Even so, by the time they reached the terrace, the hold house servers had moved the table closer to the study so that it still rested in the morning shadows. Tea and lager were waiting for them, and two platters appeared almost immediately, wi
th biscuits, omelets, and strips of fried ham.

  Neither said much until they had each eaten several mouthfuls. Then Quaeryt looked to his wife and said, “We were hungry.”

  “We were.” Her words and smile warmed him through, if in a different way. “All three of us.”

  “Are you feeling better?”

  “Much. You?”

  He nodded, since he’d taken another mouthful of the omelet. Then he had a swallow of the lager … and more omelet, and bread with berry preserves.

  “I’ve been thinking,” Vaelora said carefully. “Do you remember the story the old Pharsi woman told us in Extela, after you rescued her from the mob?”

  Quaeryt glanced toward the serving woman who stood on the terrace beside the study door.

  “They don’t speak Bovarian well, remember,” murmured Vaelora, “only the common terms spoken slowly.”

  Quaeryt nodded, then replied, “You noticed the old woman. I just followed your suggestion. You really rescued her.”

  “All right. After we rescued her.”

  “I remember. The story was about four Pharsi, three men and a woman. The woman and her distant cousin who was courting her were lost ones. The brothers were seeking easy fortune.”

  “Do you remember the refrain of the young woman?”

  “‘Do not argue over what is not and may never be,’ or something like that.”

  “Dearest … what sort of story was it?”

  “It was a parable. The two brothers kept finding things and wanting more and arguing over what they’d found until they lost everything because of their quarrels.” Quaeryt grinned. “The only one with any sense was the woman.”

  “Not quite. The cousin who was a lost one and, according to the old woman, looked like you, also had some sense.” She smiled sweetly. “He had enough sense to listen to her.”