Homage and Honour

by Candy Rae

  “Don’t understand nautical maps too well,” the latter said. “What are those lines, depths of the sea?”

  “These lines are confusing,” agreed Trent, “but I remember everywhere I’ve sailed tae and I understand enough to tell ye what’s what. Went tae sea as a boy like my father and grandfather before me.”

  “Tell the Susa and the Weaponsmaster about that time fifty years ago when the seas last froze,” commanded Captain Wylie, “you talk about it often enough.”

  The old man’s face brightened, for years he had bored the clientele of The Lucky Lind with the story of when he was a boy, of that winter when his ship could not find a way through the ice.

  “Must have been in ninety-five or thereabouts,” he began, “I was only a lad and Granfer said ‘twas time I went tae sea. Ma had the wee ones at home and I was a bit of a handful.”

  “Not much changed there,” said his Captain.

  Trent’s eyes twinkled. His stubby finger pointed at the map, “there or thereabouts. Sea was low, frozen solid in places. The ship was top heavy with ice. Lost some men frae the rigging, slipped as they were chiselling it free lest ship overturned with the weight. Captain couldn’t get through the channels, no sea room. I remember there was a line of rocks. The old Swallow had a shallow draft; she was designed for coastal work and we still couldnae get through.”

  “You sailed that far west?” asked an amazed Rhian, “there weren’t any outposts there then.”

  “Captain wanted tae know what was there I reckon, the charts were a might incomplete in them days.”

  “And the rocks were exposed?”

  “Saw them with me own eyes. I was up the mast, lookout you see, no-one else tae spare and I had keen eyesight in them days. Razor sharp rocks. Granfer named it Trent Reef because I saw it first, after his father, him who arrived here. The name stuck.”

  Lynsey stared at the indicated area on the chart. There was the Trent Reef, labelled clear as day in the middle of the inordinate amount of incomprehensible wavy lines and what she mentally called splodgy squiggles.

  “We followed the reef south, trying tae find a passage through until, on the horizon there, we seen the Southern Continent. No way through.”

  “Did you ever go back?” asked Rhian.

  “Couple of summers later, ice had gone by then. No sign of the reef. Granfer took soundings and it was there right enough under the Swallow’s keel as we sailed through. Granfer died a few years later and me da, he didn’t hold with going so far west, no profit in it he said. Took a contract out with some of the islanders. Spent his life in the Great Eastern Sea and so did I until me bones got tae old and stiff. Ended up in Vadath here, sold me boat. I feel at home here, I like the Lind, they’re friendly sorts.”

  “They enjoy listening to your stories,” teased Captain Wylie.

  “That tae,” Trent admitted, “and I can’t get drunk and leave the tale half-told with them around.”

  “Is the reef passable on foot?” asked Lynsey.

  “You mean frae the South ma’am?”

  “By the Larg,” agreed Lynsey.

  The old man thought for a moment then nodded.

  “Aye, I think it could be, certainly at low tide and with the seas so low. If the sea’s iced up, which it likely is, then that’d help tae. Plenty of islands for them to wait out higher tides if they have tae.”

  Lynsey turned to Captain Wylie, “I need as many ships and boats as you can gather together.”

  The Captain looked at her and took a deep breath, “you mean to commandeer them?”

  Lynsey did not answer. She turned to Rhian, “how many days to run to the far western tip?”

  “Around a thirty days run perhaps more,” estimated Rhian after some rapid mental calculations.

  “How many days to sail to the reef?” she asked the Captain.

  “Bout twenty, current will be with us part of the way.”

  “From Settlement?”

  “Another three or four.”

  “Let’s do it,” decided Lynsey.

  “But what do I say to the other Captains? How do I persuade them?”

  “No persuasion will be necessary Captain Wylie,” said Lynsey, “you will order them to ‘offer’ their ships to us, call it a temporary loan. If they refuse you commandeer.”

  “Order?”

  “Indeed. In case you have forgotten, as well as being Susa of the Vada I am also Susyc, Commander of the North, of all of the armies of Lind, Vadath and Argyll in times of need. There may have been no Susyc for well over a century but the then Councils in Argyll and the Lind agreed that the Susa of the Vada should be so appointed and ‘in perpetuity’. I will call on them to honour that commitment.”

  “I don’t understand,” Captain Wylie admitted.

  “If the Larg invade any of our three countries, the Armies of Argyll and the Lindars of Lind and Vadath come under my direct command. This emergency threatens us all. If the Larg gain even a pawhold on our landmass they will not stop. If they cross over this second Chain of islands, they will keep going east across the rtathlians of the Lind, into Vadath then Argyll. Do you want the Larg rampaging at will in your home village killing everyone you love and hold dear?”

  Captain Wylie replied that he most definitely did not.

  “We have to stop them. The Argyllian infantry and cavalry won’t get there in time without ships. The ice will begin to melt soon and the route impassable. They won’t be able to cross between the individual islands when it does; the gaps between the individual rocks and islets are wider and deeper than on the Argyll-Graham Chain. They will come before the ice-melt.”

  Lynsey walked over to the wall where a scale map of the Northern Continent was affixed.

  Her eyes hunted for the spot and she pointed to it.

  “Here. We will stop them here, at Fountains Head.”

  She began to outline her plans.

  The Councillors in Argyll won’t like this,” said Rhian, “if the Ryzcks leave, it’ll leave their coastlines exposed to pirate attack especially if you also call on the Garda.”

  “That’s what their Militia is for,” snapped Lynsey.

  “The Garda?”

  “Come with us with their cavalry. We’ll need them all before this is over.”

  Lynsey turned to Bernei, “urgent message, use the Express.”

  The Express had been formed not long after the Vada had come into being, a service that ran a postal (including telepathic) service throughout Argyll and into Vadath. It had stations dotted throughout the countryside and also helped to run the supply dumps for the Ryzcks passing through and back from their patrol areas. It was usually made up of retired vadeln-pairs. Their Headquarters were situated not far from Lake Stewart, a short run away from Stewarton. It was through these supply stations that Lynsey would issue her call to arms and the Council of Argyll would soon be stirred up to a froth. Never, since Jim Cranston and his Larya had been Susyc had the muster gone forth and it is safe to say that it was probable that the Council had forgotten all about the existence of the agreement. There would be rumblings when Lynsey’s message reached them, a message under the name of Susyc Lindsay of the North and not Susa Lynsey of the Vada.

  She would have to be careful about how she worded it, make sure that her commands were clear and she left not a single loophole for them to wriggle through. Chief Councillor Keane was a wily character, so Lynsey was incredibly careful.

  ‘To the Councillors of Argyll; greetings from Susyc Lynsey and her Lind partner Bernei, Commanders of the Armies of the North, of Argyll, Lind and Vadath. I so hereby order you to make ready the Garda to combat the Larg who will soon attack our shores …’

  Within the bell the message was on its way, not that she would, could wait. Her next command – that of the muster – was sent to all the Ryzckas and every Vada station and outpost on the continent.

  Lynsey knew that before the sun set the Ryzcks would be on their way.

  Lynsey also had the a
dvantage that she wouldn’t have to wait until the Argyll Council made up their minds one way or another. The Officer Commanding the Argyll Garda was her younger brother Liam. He would not wait. She was sure the first of his men and women would be aboard ship by nightfall.

  The next step Lynsey took after a quick confab with Bernei.

  : Muster the Lindars : she told him : Warn all rtaths. Rendezvous Fountains Head : Fountains Head was the most westerly Holad station in the rtathlians of the Lind.

  “Done,” said Bernei, after some intense long-distance telepathing.

  Lynsey thanked the Lai that her predecessor had anticipated that war was coming. He had watched developments with increasing concern and, always a great planner, had taken steps. True, he had not envisaged that the attack would come so far west, he had assumed it would come either in Argyll or perhaps Vadath itself but he had prepared detailed plans, up to and including the impounding of ships to ferry the Infantry, the Cavalry and the Vada to where they were needed. Each harbour master already had orders locked away waiting for just such an eventuality.

  Every one of the Express Stationmasters would, even now, be taking their own sealed orders out of their desk drawers.

  The previous Vada Susa had also recognised the fact that Argyll might be either slow or refuse to respond and would not be prepared to send its armies to fight for Vadath. Therefore deposited in the Headquarters of ‘the Express’ were documents prepared for delivery to the Councillors of Argyll, calling on them to honour the signed obligation to place their army under the command of the Susyc. On his retiral, he had told Lynsey about the steps he had taken and she had, during her first months in command, countersigned them. Susa Peter had been careful too with the wordage but Lynsey knew that there was still going to be trouble. In her imagination she could hear the howls of indignation from the Council Chambers in Stewarton. She was about to strip the Argyll coastlines and northern mountains of the Vada patrols and she had no real proof that the Larg were about to mount an attack.

  * * * * *

  The thirty-five vadeln-pairs of the Forty-fifth Ryzck were setting out on their morning patrol when the orders reached them.

  Paul and Benya stopped still, the better to hear the mindsend that had originated from Bernei a scant bell before.

  “What’s up?” asked Terez and Danei, the Holad duo of her Ryzcka.

  “Recall to Vada and immediately,” was his surprising answer.

  “Why? ”

  “Major alert. I think the Larg are coming. Benya agrees with me.”

  “The Larg?” exclaimed Terez in a disbelieving voice, then as she realised fully what her Ryzcka was saying she added, “Vada? Not the island chain? Her thoughts went to her two young children, fostered with a farmwife near the Stronghold. Are they attacking Vadath?”

  “Benya says it is neither. She is trying to find out more. Meanwhile we must go. I’ll send some pairs off to the villages and farmsteads in the area and warn them that they will be responsible for their own protection. I’ll go myself and inform Vice-Councillor Danielson and his Wardens.”

  “They’ll not like it,” prophesied Terez.

  She was correct.

  “You cannot leave,” the corpulent Vice-Councillor of the Fourth Ward insisted. “What if the pirates attack us?”

  “They have not attacked here for years,” answered Ryzcka Paul, trying to keep his temper in check. “The Garda have been notified.”

  “They have not attacked us because you are here,” complained Vice-Councillor Danielson who seemed unable to grasp what was happening.

  One of the more prominent townspeople pushed himself forward. Paul turned to the man with a great deal of relief. He had dealt with him before, a man of middling years and sensible disposition.

  “War?” asked the man

  “Yes, war,” replied Paul. “The Susyc has called the Muster.”

  The man looked hard at Paul. His use of the word Susyc had not gone unnoticed.

  “Is there danger here? Where do the southerners attack?”

  There was silence as the crowd that had gathered strained to hear Paul’s reply.

  “Larg.” He raised his voice. “We ride west to meet the Larg in battle. They have found another passage north in the far west.”

  “They won’t reach here though?” questioned a woman’s voice, shrill with panic as Paul was quick to realise. He was just as quick to offer what reassurance he could.

  “The threat is real; we do not leave you for no reason. You are not in any immediate danger from the Larg. Keep on your guard for the pirates who might take advantage of the fact that the Ryzcks are gone. Arm yourselves.”

  “The Garda will come?”

  “Some perhaps,” answered an evasive Paul. “The Garda detachment at Port Charles, look to them but don’t rely on them. Plan for your own defence.”

  “You will return?” asked the Vice-Councillor. “You will defeat the Larg and return to us?”

  “If not this Ryzck then another,” Paul promised. He saluted smartly and remounted Benya.

  Back at the patrol camp, the dom was all bustle and astir.

  A Ryzck on duty was always ready to move at a moment’s notice. Luggage was restricted to a minimum as the Ryzcks relied on the Resupply Stations that were dotted throughout the continent. One backpack for each rider was the norm, containing bedding roll and canvas covering for the rain together with a change of uniform, washing packet and food and water for two days.

  Weapons and armour finished off the kit and thus relatively unencumbered, a Ryzck could make good time on a run. The Ryzck would be at Vada in nine days, long enough, but they couldn’t run any faster.

  However, new orders to make for Port Lutterell were received. Paul understood that ships were being commandeered to transport them west. Using the currents in both the Great Eastern and Middle Seas, they could be at Vada in six.

  Susa Lynsey was in no mind for the Vada to arrive on the battlefield exhausted and not able to fight.

  How, wondered Paul as his Ryzck veered south-east to make for the port, had Susa Lynsey managed to persuade the Argyllian Council to agree to this? They had never been noted for being quick of thought and action.

  What Paul did not know was that the Commander of the Garda was Susa Lynsey’s brother. Lynsey and he had always been close. He had not waited for orders.

  On receipt of his sister’s warning Liam had sent men and women of the Garda to impound all shipping, thanking the Lai that the recent cold and stormy weather had sent them scurrying for the safe harbour of Port Lutterell. A promise of generous compensation if the crews were prepared to sail with their ships (also without Council approval) had done the rest. No Captain was prepared to say no with the promise of such largesse and they ignored the sounds of anguish from the merchants. Holds were emptied and water and food loaded in preparation for their human, horse and Lind cargoes.

  He sent orders to the Garda at Settlement and the officers did the same at the smaller port there. All but the youngest and less able recruits and students were ordered to muster on the parade grounds.

  The columns marched out past the envious eyes of those being left behind. But being left behind was no sinecure, as they would have to man the depleted coastline keeps and fortify the towns and villages now that the regular Garda battalions had departed.

  General Liam Durand knew fine well that he was putting his career in jeopardy but he believed in his sister and he knew of the contents of the alliance document as well as she. It was his sworn duty to protect the Northern Continent; whether the danger be in Vadath, in his own Argyll or in the far away rtathlians, at least, that was how Liam Durand had always interpreted his oath. The Susyc had called for the muster and he would answer the call to arms with all his might. He rode roughshod over the demurs of the Brigadier in command of the cavalry, peremptorily ordering him and his troopers to embark, threatening him with relief from his command if he did not obey.

  “A chance to prove you
rself General,” he said, “you always maintained that your cavalry is the equal to the Vada in battle. Now put your money where your mouth is and get them to the ships.”

  Technically, as Susyc of the Northern Armies, Lynsey was not required to wait for Council approval if a Larg attack was imminent. In such situations command of the combined northern armies immediately devolved on her. Problem was, she could not yet prove her claim that the Larg were about to attack.

  As General Liam Durand and his officers led their men and women to the ports, picking up Garda detachments as they went, Lynsey’s brother did wonder how the Council would react to his actions; not well he thought. I have gone and done it now, blighted a distinguished, though mostly uneventful career with what the Councillors will, in all probability, call mutiny! Oh well. So be it. But my ancestors had the right of it. When the call comes we must go.

  Not only those under his personal command were heading to the transports that morning. The Light Cavalry would be there by nightfall, as would the nearest Vada Ryzcks. They were running flat out to get there knowing they could rest on the transports.

  Carpenters were working day and night preparing the ships in order to accommodate the horses and the Lind, the latter would remain with their human partners but the horses needed rough stalls built in the holds.

  He would leave with the last ship and swat off any conflicting orders that might arrive from the Council. Any commandeered vessels that remained empty of troops at Port Lutterell would sail down the coast picking up Garda, Ryzcks and any Lind in the vicinity as they went.

  Liam Durand trusted his sister. The Larg were going to attack.

  His sister was also sure, positively sure.

  Accurate and disquieting reports were coming in.

  The entire adult male population of Largdom was on the march. It was not an attacking army but an invading army. She had to stop them.

  She sent for the Captain of the Emily Stanton again.

  “I was wondering,” she began, “if there was any way we can impede their journey.”

  He stared at her. “I hope you’re not intending that I attack the Larg with my ship!”