Birdlike, her great-aunt tilted her head. “You’ve had the lessons—”
Imoshen snorted helplessly.
Suddenly the old woman gripped her arm, eyes intense. “Don’t live a life bounded by fear like I did. Seize the moment.”
Imoshen licked her lips reluctantly. “Tell me how to go about it.”
The old woman gave a hoot of laughter. “You ask me? By law I had to remain celibate or risk death.”
“Didn’t you ... I mean, weren’t you tempted? Did you never love someone enough to—”
“Risk death for the love of a man?” the old woman mocked.
Imoshen watched her great-aunt and wondered what memories caused the bitterness in her voice.
“Maybe I was too comfortable, too timid to risk everything for love. But you . . . you have nothing to lose and everything to gain.” The Aayel gripped Imoshen’s hand. “This is your great gamble and you will only get one throw of the dice. If the General suspects you are manipulating him he will react badly.”
Imoshen shuddered. She did not need her great-aunt to spell out what she meant. “Very well. But all I have is theoretical knowledge. I am not very experienced. Should I lie with—”
“No!”
“It was only a thought. I will never succeed in seducing him. He despises me.” Imoshen felt her face grow hot.
“He burns for you.”
“He has a strange way of showing it!” she snapped, feeling cornered. Resentment seared her. She wasn’t ready for this. Life had been simple before General Tulkhan and his Ghebite army invaded.
“What if he rejects me?” Imoshen whispered.
The Aayel said nothing.
Imoshen felt her body flood with heat. General Tulkhan cast a wall of indifference between them, yet she would be lying if she did not admit to sensing his attraction to her. As much as she hated to admit it, the same reluctant desire for him burned in her.
“Listen not to what he tells you, but to what his body says,” the old woman advised her and would say nothing more.
Everyone had pitched in to bring in the grain before the snows came. The harvesting was nearly over. The weather watchers forecast an early, bitter winter and already there were frosts in the hollows of the morning.
With most of the army out in the fields those who remained behind in the Stronghold were busy cleaning out the grain stores and performing the usual winter preparations.
Ten times a day the Stronghold servants came to General Tulkhan asking directions. His own men waited to be told their tasks. Trained from childhood in the arts of war, he suddenly faced the task of ordering the lives of a thousand people, administering to the needs of a small civilian army.
He found himself constantly referring to the Aayel and to Imoshen, who had been raised for this responsibility. Indeed, the Dhamfeer seemed able to keep a dozen strands of thought in her head, to know instinctively which tasks needed priority, much as he would have done on the battlefield. He saw her as a general in times of peace. Before he knew it, she was his right hand, running the Stronghold and half his Elite Guard.
Tulkhan watched with a growing sense of satisfaction as the wagons rolled in, heavily laden with grain. In the courtyard his men were working side by side with the people and the Stronghold Guard.
He was surprised by the pleasure this simple yet vital task provided him. In the past he had left the day-to-day tasks to underlings. He’d moved on once a nation had been conquered and his curiosity about their culture had been satisfied. His administrative involvement had gone only as far as selecting places for forts and garrisoning them. Intent on taking the next country, he’d been happy to leave the holding of the conquered lands to the administrators appointed by the king.
Now he realized that to conquer was one thing, to hold was another.
He turned toward the stairs. When the Stronghold was built six hundred years ago, access to these storerooms, which were designed to double as prisons, had been through a hole in the ceiling and a ladder. But over time the inhabitants of the Stronghold had sacrificed defensibility for practicality. He had seen evidence of similar compromises over and over during his inspection of the Stronghold.
The walls of the original circular keep were three times as thick as a man was tall with no windows or doors on the ground floor. It had been designed primarily to repel attack, with only the third and fourth floors set aside for living quarters. But as the Stronghold grew, its role became less vital and it was reduced to one tower of many. Once the T’En hold on Fair Isle was more secure the defenders had enlarged the Strongholds, joining outer walls with battlement walks to the keep, and reducing its defensibility. However, all of these battlements between the towers could still be isolated by dropping the collapsible walks which circled the towers, so that if one section of the Stronghold’s walls were breached this area could be cut off and the threat from attackers minimized.
Tulkhan had made a point of studying the defenses of every country he traveled through and the Stronghold impressed him. Running water piped up from an underground reservoir was supplied to every floor of the new section. The reservoir was filled by a stream which had been diverted about four hundred years ago when the new section was built.
Before this their water had come from a well. This stretched down below ground level to a depth of four stories, all dressed with stone, with foot and hand holds to the water level. Tulkhan knew because he had climbed down there.
He had also instructed Imoshen to show him the main gate defenses. Access holes had been provided above the outer gates so that the Stronghold Guards could pour water if potential invaders tried to set fire to the wooden gates. Reinforced with iron bands, these outer gates opened into a long passage that ended with the inner gates. The portcullis at each end could be dropped to trap invaders in the passage and the holes in the ceiling opened so that the Stronghold guards could pour scalding water or boiling oil or shoot arrows into their attackers. If the invaders made it into the courtyard this turned sharply so that they were forced to present their unshielded right sides to attack.
Even when the new section of the Stronghold had been built all access to the buildings had been from the second floor, with stairs so steep attackers could easily be sent crashing to the cobbled courtyards below.
He had seen the more recent additions, the broadened steps with stone balustrades. He had seen where lower floors had been opened for ease of access. Tulkhan had personally walked every passage of the Stronghold, the old, the new and the additions to the new.
It was the same story all over Fair Isle—towns had outgrown their fortified walls and the inhabitants had not bothered to build new ones or maintain the old. This was what four hundred years of peace did to a people. It made them soft.
Tulkhan’s old tutor had spoken the truth when he said that all things being equal it was not the strength of the defenses, but the strength of the defenders’ hearts that decided a castle’s fate. If all of Fair Isle had had Imoshen’s passion for freedom, his task would have been nearly impossible.
Where was she now? Ordering his Elite Guard about, no doubt.
He cursed softly. Over the past few days he had experienced a strange restlessness. Even now something that was more than hunger gnawed at him. He felt irritable, tired because he couldn’t sleep at night with both moons nearly full. It was almost as bright as day, but this had never bothered him in the past.
Despite his best efforts he could not avoid Imoshen as she worked beside her people in the granaries, taking stock of what had come in, offering receipts to the farms, organizing places for the constant stream of refugees from the north. As his men returned from the harvest and the new arrivals flooded in, the plains below the Stronghold became dotted with makeshift houses. Smoke from their fires filled the sky day and night. The Stronghold had become the center of a town which rivaled the island’s capital, T’Diemn.
With a sixth sense acquired through years of living with death, Tulkhan suddenly fro
ze. He had entered a stone passage which led from the courtyard to the granaries. In the distance he could hear the people working, their voices raised in an ancient chant.
The hairs on the back of his neck lifted. There it was—a furtive step. Assassins?
Before he could back up they were upon him. Two men, one woman. From their garb, he guessed they were escaped soldiers of the Emperor’s army. The nearest lunged, his dirk passing harmlessly through the thick wadding of the General’s jerkin.
Tulkhan cursed himself for a fool. He was unarmed. Twisting the man’s hand he kneed him in the face, tearing the knife from his fingers. The woman lunged for him with a knife, screaming a name. Her suicidal leap would have had him, but at the last instant he managed to twist from under her and felt her land heavily on the dirk. It was torn from his fingers, now slick with blood, as the third uninjured attacker leapt in with a short, pointed weapon which Tulkhan knew by custom carried poison. One scratch and he would die a lingering death.
There was no time for nicety. Grunting with the effort, he thrust the woman’s body between them and saw her jolt as she took the spike in her back.
Clenching his fist, he thumped the man in the side of the head even as the first one leapt on his back. He heard the thunder of feet in the passage as his own guard arrived. They hauled the man off his back and slit his throat in an excess of zeal before Tulkhan could question him.
The last attacker turned to flee, but a dagger thrown by one of his guards caught him between the shoulder blades.
Panting with the exertion, Tulkhan looked at the bodies.
It was as he feared. The name on the woman’s lips as she leapt, intent on his death at the cost of her own life, was “T’Reothe,” rumored to be the leader of the rebels.
Silencing the angry comments of his Elite Guard he indicated the bodies. “Bring them into the courtyard. Send for the Aayel and Imoshen.”
Imoshen knew by the smack of metal and the sharp thump of boots that this was no ordinary summoning. Kalleen ran into the room gasping something about an assassination attempt on General Tulkhan.
“What?” Imoshen’s first thought was to consult the Aayel but fear closed her throat so that she could not speak. She crossed the room and knelt beside her great-aunt’s chair, silently seeking reassurance.
The Aayel would know what to do.
The old woman clutched her hand. “Time has run out, Shenna. I thought we had longer. There is so much I did not tell you. I’d meant to—”
Imoshen’s heart sank as the Elite Guard marched through the open doors. Without deference they ordered Imoshen and the Aayel out.
Their leader would not meet her eyes. He knows, she thought. The General means to have us killed!
But she came to her feet with outward dignity, while inside she raged at the unfairness of it. Another two days and she could have spun her web.
Imoshen helped the Aayel to stand. She realized her great-aunt was playing for time. The old woman walked slowly as if weighed down by her great age.
Imoshen’s mind whirled with images, half-formed plans. Should she have warned General Tulkhan about the scrying? It had been on the tip of her tongue so many times, but she knew how he held such things in contempt. He might even have assumed she knew something of the plot, or worse still, was the instigator. In the end she had kept her own counsel.
She took a deep breath and stiffened her back. Come what may, she would not beg.
Kalleen would have accompanied them, but the Elite Guard pushed her aside.
They were led downstairs. Imoshen imagined the great hall where the General would have them summarily executed. Now she would never have her chance to seduce him, to save her people from servitude. She should have run with Reothe when she had the opportunity!
What? And left the Aayel to die alone?
As if sensing Imoshen’s thoughts, the Aayel squeezed her hand.
To Imoshen’s surprise they were led out into the courtyard, where a sea of faces turned to them, refugees from the north, loyal locals returned with their harvest, the household servants and Stronghold Guard—and the Ghebites.
General Tulkhan did not meet her eyes as he leapt onto an empty dray and signaled for quiet. He indicated the parapets where, much to her horror, she saw three round objects, heads.
“Rebels!” he roared, and there was a hushed intake of breath from the crowd.
Imoshen’s thoughts spun. No traitors’ heads had been spiked there for hundreds of years. Nausea swept over her. These Ghebites were barbarians. Truly, she and the Aayel were about to die.
A buzzing filled her head as the General shouted something about treachery and death to all those who opposed him. He paced on the dray’s boards, all eyes drawn to him.
With bravado he told how, unarmed, he had fought off three armed attackers. She realized it would become part of the mythology which surrounded him. Even the locals and her household guard were in awe of him.
Suddenly he turned to the captives and indicated they were to come forward. The men who surrounded Imoshen pushed her in the back. They would have lifted her bodily onto the dray, but she thrust their hands aside and leapt lightly up, her heart hammering.
With great deliberation she turned and helped the Aayel, steadying her as the men thrust her up. There was a concerted hush, an inarticulate moan from those loyal to the old empire.
Imoshen looked out over the sea of faces. Sections of the crowd were shifting uneasily. The camaraderie of the harvest was forgotten.
So she was to die here, slaughtered like a pig by a butcher in the courtyard of her family’s Stronghold. She never imagined herself dying except with a weapon in her hand. She cursed. If the truth be told she’d never imagined herself dying!
The General was speaking, and she tried to concentrate.
“... amongst you who would cling to the old rulers, who do not accept my right of conquest!” General Tulkhan raised one hand. “The old ways are dead. Know this.”
He drew his ceremonial dagger. Someone shrieked.
The crowd surged forward. Instinct told Imoshen they were on the verge of revolt. Tulkhan must have sensed it too, because for an instant his eyes met hers in silent understanding.
Whereas this morning the locals and Stronghold Guard had worked beside the Elite Guard laughing, singing as the food was stored, now the people stood circling the dray, their work tools raised as weapons.
If the General put Imoshen and the Aayel to the sword, not only their blood would stain the courtyard stones.
Tulkhan knew it. His hold was tenuous. Here, in the packed courtyard, hand-to-hand combat would be butchery. The resentment which seethed just beneath the surface would erupt into outright rebellion. It was conceivable that he could be brought down and killed in the melee. He could lose the jewel in the crown, Fair Isle, and his very life.
Yet, all his experience told him the last of the royal house must die. He turned to the two women, one on the verge of life, the other older than he believed possible.
Imoshen’s face was blanched white, her lips compressed. As the Stronghold Guard surged forward, the General caught a flicker of anticipation and realized she did not intend to let him kill her without a fight. She meant to precipitate a rebellion, and she would take him down with her. He acknowledged this with a flash of admiration.
There it was—he had to kill them both, yet the minute he raised the knife he was a dead man. The crowd would riot, the stones would run with blood. He saw no way out of this dilemma.
A withered hand pushed Imoshen aside and the Aayel met his eyes. She stepped forward, her hand extended.
Tulkhan looked from her hand to her shrewd, implacable face.
“Your code demands a death to assuage the dishonor of this attack,” the Aayel stated simply.
“Yes.”
“No!” Imoshen hissed as she realized what the Aayel intended. “I won’t let you—”
Those old eyes turned to her. “You have no control over m
y actions. This is the only path and my chance to die with honor!”
Imoshen watched her great-aunt extend her hand for the knife. The General gave it to her.
The Aayel lifted the ceremonial dagger high, her thin voice carrying in the sudden hush. “I release you from all guilt and take on the guilt of those who attacked the General.”
Imoshen wanted to scream against the injustice of it. It was only with a supreme effort of will that she remained outwardly impassive. Inside she was reeling though her feet remained rooted to the spot. Her heart thudded thunderously in her ears.
In a movement too swift to anticipate, the Aayel plunged the knife up under her own ribs, committing ritual suicide.
A terrible cry, an outpouring of raw and angry pain, rose from the crowd. The Aayel had seen the oldest of them born, she had seen their parents born and buried—she was a living historical link to their communal past.
And now she was gone.
Tulkhan stepped forward but Imoshen thrust him aside, catching the frail old body in her arms. She sensed the life leave the old woman on a whisper of a breath.
How could this be? How could someone so intense and knowledgeable pass from this world to the next with so little sign?
“She died well,” Tulkhan said softly.
Imoshen met his eyes and spat her words at him. “She saved your skin, barbarian.”
She saw him flinch but did not care. He went to take the Aayel from her.
“No. This has to be done properly to honor the dead.” Amazingly, she was dry-eyed, though inside she was weeping. Raising her voice she shouted over the rising babble of the crowd. “The Aayel must not be touched by any but one of the blood. We must honor her passing with the proper ceremony.”
Burdened with the frail husk, Imoshen knelt on the dray. “Take us out onto the plain.”
The General himself took the reins, urging the workhorses forward. The Elite Guard fell back and the people parted as the dray’s wheels thudded over the cobbles. As they passed through the inner gates into the passage they were plunged into darkness. Imoshen blinked, momentarily blinded. She could see Tulkhan’s silhouette dark against the light of the plain beyond the outer gates. It seemed fitting that he should honor the Aayel’s sacrifice by taking the reins of the dray.
Broken Vows Page 12
