Protector of the Small Quartet

by Tamora Pierce

  “Boring,” announced Merric with a yawn as they left the mess hall. “I can put the time to better use.” Kel shook her head. How could anyone describe the lesson as boring? She would have been happy if it had gone on all night.

  Kel was still preoccupied by the battle of Port Legann during her dawn exercise with Lalasa. Would it have been different if relief forces from the Copper Isles had beat the queen’s army to the city? Kel let her maid grab her wrist as she tried to see it in her mind. The next thing she knew, she was flying through the air. Only a quick twist saved her from slamming into the door full-force.

  Lalasa gasped and knelt beside Kel in a panic. “My lady, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she cried. “I never meant it! My lady, I swear, I’ll never do such a thing again, only don’t dismiss me!” She covered her face with her hands and wept.

  Kel took a moment to catch her breath. When she did, she began to laugh. “Stop it, Lalasa, you goose!” she ordered. “That was wonderful! You caught me just as you should have. I won’t dismiss you—please stop crying.”

  Lalasa lowered her hands, gazing at Kel with eyes that swam in tears. “You’re laughing?” she asked, and sniffed.

  “That was very good,” Kel told her. “You did it exactly right. I’m proud of you!”

  “Proud?” Lalasa repeated in a whisper. “But— my lady—I threw you into a door. After all your kindnesses, and teaching me when I’ve hardly been grateful...”

  “What I’ve been teaching you, among other things, is how to throw me into doors.” Kel grinned as she got to her feet.

  “Some nobles would kill a servant for doing that. You know its so, my lady!”

  “I do,” Kel said grimly. “Nobles like that aren’t worthy of the title. How could I punish you for doing what I want you to do? Only think how silly I would look.” She helped her maid up. “Now you can use this to protect yourself, so the only men who end up hugging you are the ones you want to hug you.”

  Lalasa smiled crookedly. “That will be some time in coming.”

  Kel put a hand on the older girl’s shoulder. “I wish you would tell me,” she said, making her voice as gentle as she could. “What put you off men so bad?”

  Lalasa shook her head as she fished her handkerchief from her pocket. “It’s nothing, my lady. I am sorry I threw you, even if I’m allowed to.”

  “I’m glad you did. Otherwise how am I to know if you’ve got the hold and the leverage right?” Kel pointed out. “And—oh, drat.” The first bell of the day began to ring. She looked around, to find Lalasa was offering her the weighted harness. Kel looked at it and sighed. She still wasn’t used to the new weights. Most of the other pages didn’t put theirs on until after breakfast. Couldn’t she wait until then just today?

  One day leads to another, she told herself wearily. Next thing you know, the boys will get used to it first, and I won’t be able to keep up. She took the harness from Lalasa and let its weight slide over her shoulders.

  nine

  AUTUMN ADJUSTMENTS

  After two years, Kel could go through her morning classes in her sleep, and sometimes she did. Hand-to-hand combat with Hakuin Seastone and Eda Bell was first. Then came weapons training starting with staffs in the autumn. Archery class followed weapons, then tilting. None of the pages ever expected anything new. In the fourth week of Kel’s third year, however, Lord Wyldon turned creative.

  In weapons class, their teachers announced a new program. The first- and second-years were to continue staff practice. The third- and fourth-year pages were to learn how to fight in groups of different sizes. The combinations would change from day to day: three third-years against two fourth-years, four fourth-years against five third-years, or simple battle, one-on-one. They were allowed to use any of their usual weapons, not just staffs. They could even resort to Shang kicks, punches, and throws in a tight spot. The Shang warriors would record points for each combat. When the senior pages were put in groups, one page would be put in command of each side. If the members of a group looked to someone who was not the appointed leader for orders, their side would lose points.

  “One day you will be leading peasants who don’t know a sword from a rock. You will have to do your best with them,” Lord Wyldon explained on the first day they tried this new practice. “Or soldiers, or other knights, or simply your own squire. Learn to give commands, and learn to take them. Learn to know where the other members of your force are, and learn to command forces of different sizes. Now, get to it!”

  “Seniors get to do all the jolly things,” Owen complained as they walked to archery practice that first day.

  Neal glared at the chubby second-year with all the royal disdain of a vexed lion. He was limping from a staff blow to the knee. “You are a bloody-minded savage,” he informed Owen sternly. “I hope you are kidnapped by centaurs.”

  Kel liked archery. In two years she had gone from holding and drawing the bow wrong to hitting the target’s center on every shot. She had just collected her bow and quiver when she heard the archery master call, “The following will come with me.” He walked over to the right side of the yard, where the target by the fence had been moved fifty yards beyond those the pages normally shot at. He named a group that included Kel, Neal, Quinden, Merric, Faleron, Yancen, Balduin of Disart, another fourth-year, and Quinden’s friend Dermid of Josu’s Dirk.

  “You people ought to be better,” the archery master informed them. “My lord has said it, and I agree. You’ll improve by Midwinter or I’ll know why. Once you start hitting the more distant target, I’ll let you play with these.”

  Any crossness Kel felt at being forced to work harder when she was already doing well evaporated when she saw the arrows the archery master held. Until now they had shot as if they hunted deer or game birds. These new arrows were armor-piercing broadheads and needleheads, barbed heads, even the ones that made an eerie, whistling sound as they flew. Some were made to pierce a Stormwing’s metal feathers or a Coldfang’s thick hide.

  “Each has a different weight, and will fly different. You’ll learn to adjust for each arrow,” the archery master told them. “And we’ll do a bit with fire arrows. They fly different, too. In the normal way of things you’d leave this kind of work to archers under your command, but times are hardly normal, are they? All these immortals, three dangerous neighbors on edge—and who might they be?” he demanded, gazing sharply at Quinden.

  “Carthak, Scanra, and the Copper Isles, sir,” replied the boy quietly.

  “Very good. You don’t know what those enemies may get up to, or what will be asked of you. Now, start shooting. The sooner you hit that target, the sooner you get to play with the pretties.”

  “If they’ve changed things ’round in tilting, I’m going to stick my head in a rain barrel and drown myself,” Faleron muttered to Kel as they reported to the stables.

  Kel and Peachblossom were the first rider and mount to get into line at the third-years’ quintain. Rather than wait for the others, Kel whispered for Peachblossom to charge, and leveled her lance at the target shield. She hit it just right: the quintain dummy pivoted halfway, letting girl and horse thunder by without the sandbag smacking either one. Kel smiled—she loved a good, solid strike— and was about to return to her place in the third-year line when Lord Wyldon yelled, “Stay there, Mindelan!”

  He rode toward her at a brisk trot. Kel waited, trying to guess what he wanted. She’d hit the target; Peachblossom was perfectly saddled; she held her weighted lance at the right angle—and why was he carrying a bowl and a brush?

  “You’re getting complacent, Mindelan,” he announced as he trotted by.

  “Com—what, sir?” she asked, confused.

  “Smug. Comfortable. You think you can hit the target anywhere and it’s good, so long as you don’t earn a buffet with the sandbag. At your level”—he leaned close to the target shield and painted a round black dot the size of Kel’s palm at its center—“you should hit this every time. I expect you to hit i
t every time. You may start now.”

  Why pick on me? I hit the target every time, and I’m just twelve, thought Kel as she rode back to the line. Only a couple fourth-years hit it as regularly as I do.

  The third-years moved to let her at the front. Her friends looked startled; Quinden and his friends smirked. “Who put a wasp in the Stump’s loincloth?” Neal muttered as she passed him.

  What made Kel really grumpy was that the training master was right: she was getting smug. As long as she hit within the target circle, she felt she’d done all she needed. She ought to strive to improve, not just coast. If Lord Wyldon thought she could hit a dot she couldn’t even see from this end of the tilting field, she would try.

  She brought Peachblossom up to the starting mark and whispered, “Go faster.” He picked his feet up in a trot, then a restrained gallop, not the headlong thundering pace that was his response to the command “Charge.” If she was to hit precisely, she would do better if they took a little more time to reach the quintain.

  Kel lowered her lance across Peachblossom’s shoulders and aimed for that small dot on the shield. She missed, though she did hit the shield, and wasn’t clouted by the sandbag.

  “Sloppy,” commented Lord Wyldon as she rode past him. He’d dismounted to lean against the fence, where he could see the impact of lance on shield clearly. He was scratching Jump’s ear.

  I hope he bites you, Kel thought grimly as she rode to take her place in the third-years’ line.

  In the end, Lord Wyldon required only two fourth-years—Faleron and Yancen—and Kel to hit that dot at the target’s center. “I hate it when he thinks up new things,” Yancen told Faleron in Kel’s hearing.

  Kel agreed with him completely.

  On the last day of that week, Kel’s lance hit the black dot and shattered, the impact and crash making her wrist ache. Shaking her hand, she rode back to the barrel and selected a practice lance. Without lead weights such as she’d had in her old one, the lance was feather-light in her grip. When she next rode at the target, she forgot the new weight and raised her lance point far too high. Before she could lower it, she rode right by the quintain, scraping the target shield. The sandbag thwacked her back soundly, her first buffet in over a year. She heard pages laughing as she returned to the line.

  She missed the target on her next charge as well. Determined to hit it, she lowered her lance so hard on her third charge that it bounced off her saddle to rap Peachblossom between the ears. Startled, the big gelding reared. Kel dropped her lance and hung on, praying her mount wouldn’t fall backward. Peachblossom wheeled frantically to save himself from that very fate. At last Kel got him under control and on all four feet. She dismounted to collect her fallen lance, and trudged back to the line on foot, leading her mount. She would have dragged the weapon like her eight-year-old nephew if she hadn’t known Lord Wyldon would give her a punishment job for it.

  “What is the matter with you today?” demanded Lord Wyldon. “This head-in-the-clouds act will get you killed in the field, do you understand that? You dare not daydream with a weapon in your hand, or under you.” He pointed to Peachblossom. “That is a weapon, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  Peachblossom’s head darted out quickly, like a snake’s. The training master was quicker. The gelding’s teeth closed on empty air where Lord Wyldon’s finger had been.

  “My lord, I’d like permission to take this to the smithy,” Kel said, hefting the lance. “It’s too light.”

  Wyldon blinked at her. “What?”

  “Surely my lord knew that Page Keladry has lead weights in all of her practice weapons,” commented Neal, who stood nearby. He looked the spirit of mischief.

  Kel glared at him. Neal ignored her. He usually did.

  “Queenscove, do not try me,” Wyldon said, clear warning in his voice. His eyes were on Kel. To her he stated, “You use weighted practice weapons.”

  Kel made no reply.

  “How long have you done this?”

  How could she forget? On the day the first-years began to train with the lance, Joren had made sure that Kel got a lance three times heavier than the normal ones. “Since the first week on lance, my lord,” Kel replied evenly.

  ’’All of your weapons, not the lance alone?” he inquired. Neal had told him all, but it seemed he wanted to hear it from Kel.

  “It was too strange after a while, going from a weighted lance to a lighter staff and practice sword and ax,” she explained. “It works better if they’re weighted, too.”

  Lord Wyldon hooked his fingers in his belt, frowning. As usual, there was no reading his handsome, stern face. At last he sighed. “Tend your mount first. Do not be late for lunch,” he ordered.

  Kel thanked him and bowed, but he had already turned to Neal. “Clearly you have too much time on your hands,” he told Neal. “You may take the next five runs at the quintain, beginning now.”

  Kel heard Neal say, “Yes, your lordship, immediately, your lordship,” as she led Peachblossom away.

  “One day he won’t let his tongue get him in so much trouble,” she told the horse as she groomed him. “I hope it happens before he dies of old age.” Peachblossom whickered, and nudged Kel with his nose. He was uninterested in Neal, except as something to bite, and he preferred to bite apples and sugar lumps. He seemed to think Kel was hiding a treat.

  After leaving her new lance to be weighted, Kel returned to her rooms. The noon bell had not yet rung, and she meant to sit in her bath and soak for a while before she had to dress for lunch.

  Entering her rooms, she found that Lalasa had company. The stranger was a young woman Lalasa’s age, blond and brown-eyed with a soft, round face and strong shoulders. She curtsied gracefully to Kel, who tried to remember where she had seen this woman before.

  “Lady, this is my friend Tian—Tianine Plowman,” Lalasa said nervously. “She is maid to your sister Adalia.”

  Kel nodded, relieved. “I thought I recognized you,” she admitted. “Is my sister all right?” She couldn’t think of any other reason that Adie’s maid would come here, unless she was visiting Lalasa.

  “She is well, and atwitter over the ball to be held in four days’ time at Nond House,” said Tian. “She sent me to ask, would you allow Lalasa to serve her? She will pay Lalasa for her time, and of course you would get half. My lady wishes Lalasa to sew for her.”

  “Is that what you would like?” Kel asked Lalasa.

  The maid nodded eagerly. “I do love to sew, my lady. And you won’t need more work on your hems or seams for at least a week.” Her eyes danced at the small joke.

  “I don’t grow that fast, thank you,” Kel said.

  Lalasa nudged Tian. The blond woman smiled at her and told Kel, “If it pleases your ladyship, Lady Oranie also wishes to give work to Lalasa, with the same arrangements for pay. To be honest, m’lady, I think others will ask Lalasa to sew for them when they see her work.”

  “And I’d be sure to do my own work first,” added Lalasa. “I wouldn’t shirk at all, I promise.”

  “I don’t mind,” Kel told her and her friend. “You know I’d like to see you get out and about more.”

  Tian curtsied to her again and told Lalasa, “This afternoon, then?” Lalasa nodded. “Thank you, my lady,” Tian said, and left the room.

  Lalasa closed the door behind her and twirled giddily. Suddenly she halted. “You’ll see, my lady,” she told Kel gravely. “I’ll earn you a bit of money, and put some away for myself. Maybe a shop of my own, though that’s looking a bit high, perhaps.”

  “You really like sewing, don’t you?” asked Kel, who hated it.

  Lalasa nodded. “I’m better than a lot of the maids that serve the young court ladies, Tian says. And it’s peaceful. Just you, and the cloth, and getting everything just right.”

  Kel thought of those moments on Peachblossom’s back when she lowered her lance at the quintain, and knew in the feel of the horse, and the weapon, and her arm, that she had it perfectly. �
�I see what you mean,” she murmured. More firmly she said, “But look here—you have to keep what you earn. I don’t want it.”

  Lalasa stared at her. “But most nobles take half at least. Some take almost everything!”

  Kel began to strip off her tunic and shirt. “I’m not most nobles, remember? Is my bath ready?”

  “Yes, of course,” Lalasa replied, taking Kel’s practice clothes. “But, my lady, I wouldn’t feel right, with you paying me a wage, and giving me this chance.” Lalasa’s joy had fallen away, leaving her anxious again.

  Kel hated to see that. “All right,” she said, against her will. “But I’m putting it away for a dowry or a shop or whatever you like. You remember that.”

  “You say so now,” Lalasa replied, her tone very older-sisterly. “Just wait till you need to buy armor and suchlike.”

  Kel met the older girl’s eyes. “Do you really believe that of me?”

  Lalasa opened her mouth to reply, then closed it again. She looked away from Kel’s gaze. “No, miss. Not really. And I thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.” Shaking her head, Kel walked into the dressing room and climbed into the waiting bath. “I’m glad you have a friend.”

  “Isn’t Tian nice?” Lalasa took Kel’s afternoon clothes from the wardrobe. “So clever, and friendly. She really thinks other ladies will ask me to sew for them, and pay well for it.”

  “She’s a lady’s maid, so she ought to know.” Kel put her head back with a grateful sigh. “If I doze off, wake me when the noon bell rings.”

  That night, Kel went out after supper to retrieve her lance and take it to Peachblossom’s stable, where she placed it with her gear. She was trotting up the sloping, torch-lined road to the palace when someone called, “Hullo—is that Keladry of Mindelan?”

  Kel looked around and saw a big man in the stable that housed the horses of the King’s Own. She knew that broad, red-cheeked face with its cap of black curls and bright dark eyes. “My lord, good evening,” she said, bowing to Raoul of Goldenlake and Malorie’s Peak, Knight Commander of the King’s Own. “It’s a pleasure to see you.”