Treason's Shore

by Sherwood Smith

  “Sex,” he said, “is rarely easy, or simple, unless all concerned are agreed that it will be. Would you have that with Yaska?”

  “No. And he didn’t want that, either. That is, his goal wasn’t just seduction.”

  “Do you know what he really wanted?”

  “To compete with you, in part, and also, oh, a family thing. I hardly know how to explain.”

  “To preserve the Dei beauty and mystique by uniting with you just long enough to produce a child?”

  “You knew?”

  Valdon’s smile turned wry. “Everyone talks about the Deis, you should know that.”

  “I’d always thought that a family secret. It sounded sensible when I grew up: from every second generation one child is picked to mate with a descendant of one of the other branches of the family. I knew about it, but never gave it a thought. My life was to be lived as Tanrid’s wife. When I went on my home visits, that tradition of mating between the families was rarely ever discussed.”

  “So now we know what Yaska wanted, to bypass some Marlovan cousin of yours in favor of you. And you were disappointed?”

  “I was disappointed that he really did not want me, in particular. Any Dei would do, and he was more interested in tweaking you than in having me. What a salutary lesson! Is that human nature, or just the arrogance of Joret Dei? Here’s a fellow I don’t want, but I want him to want me. Dos that make sense?”

  Valdon laughed. “Human nature.”

  “Well! Why don’t I feel better? Anyway, what I wanted to talk to you about is what happened right after I turned him down.”

  He gripped her hand, listening.

  “One day when I was small,” she said in a slow, contemplative voice, as their hands swung between them. They made another turning, passing an old tower house. Through an arched window just below the upward curve of the road a young scribe was perfectly framed, sitting at a high desk, bent over copy work. A lock of his hair lay against his cheek, tangled with the fingers supporting his head as he stippled a brilliantly colored drawing.

  He passed from view, and Joret resumed. “It was the height of summer. After a week of storm. The weather turned hot. We girls went out to the river. I waded out in the rushing water, so fast it tumbled I could barely stand. The cold water pressing against me, the warmth of the sun on my face, its light splashing over the water, all gave me intense pleasure. I liked resisting the water, in not falling backward to drown, in feeling the warmth of the sun on my eyelids without opening my eyes to the sun.”

  “I see.” He raised her hand and kissed it.

  “But I am not yet done. Then a root caught at my ankle, and nearly pulled me under. I had to fight to keep my breath, to keep from being dragged under. I won, and flung myself onto the bank, and that’s when the clean air, the bright sun, the rushing water were sweetest, because I’d won the fight. For just a moment, Yaska let me see him for real. He was far more attractive in that moment, but I still would have said no. Knowing that was winning the fight. Now I know my strength. It makes my vows with you the sweeter. Now do you see?”

  And he did. They passed quietly beneath the mossy stone archway that had been built over the road to join two of the old towers. Lights glowed in the arched windows of the chambers above them. Just beyond, a gap piled high with dismantled stone marked where another old tower had been taken down, to be rebuilt into a large, airy manse.

  Valdon said slowly, “My attractions have always been fleeting. Until I met you I could walk away from any dalliance with mild regret, and no sense of risk, making me suspect that I will only love once. That makes my vow of fidelity to you easy to keep. But I have been preparing myself for the fact that one day, yours to me might . . . not be worth keeping.” His voice was light, but she felt his intensity in the grip of his hand.

  “It won’t happen.” She gripped his hand tightly. “Because now I know what to watch for in myself, and I will not let my foot catch in the root. As for Yaska, he doesn’t even know what love is. I cherish my memories of Cama Tya-Vayir, but even were I to see him again, I know the tumbling stream now, and the undercurrent, and the sun in the sky. You and I have made our house by that stream, and that’s where I want to live.”

  He stopped, and right there in the street, between the tiled rooftops of one row of aristocratic houses and the closed doors of those on the slope above, he kissed her. A soft laugh from above, a hastily drawn curtain over a tiny window in an attic, revealed that they’d been seen, but neither cared.

  They began walking uphill again; the palace spires were visible two switchbacks up.

  “I had a talk with my father today.” His voice lightened. “He agrees with what I did down south.”

  “The harbor guilds versus the trade?” she asked. Now that sea trade was starting up again, it seemed everyone had new ideas on how things should work from now on.

  “Right. Joret, here’s what he said. As soon as Queen Servitude dies—assuming of course she doesn’t live to be five hundred, just to spite everyone—he wants to retire to our house in Eidervaen. Maybe tour other lands, like he did as a boy. Mother never got to see Sartor; she wants to go, too. That means you and I are going to be wearing the crowns. Figuratively speaking. I hate crowns. Do your Marlovans wear crowns?”

  “Never saw one until I came here.” She chuckled again.

  “Back to the south.” He grinned. “There was one more item of business. Ever since I met you, I’ve tried a new thing. I hadn’t spoken of it before because I was not sure of the wisdom of it—the first time I mentioned it to my father he reacted in horror.”

  “Go on.”

  “It was your riding around with Gdand that caused me to think of it.

  When I go myself to see to these problems, I’ve begun leaving the carriage and livery and outriders. They proceed as before, but the carriage is empty, driven by one of the younger fellows. I put on plain clothes and take to horse with just my own driver, who is a deedy hand with a quarterstaff.”

  She laughed inside, enjoying this discovery; if their love was a house, he kept showing her more doors to open.

  “I ride around, and I see people I wouldn’t otherwise. I see things I wouldn’t have. I spent a night in an old inn. When I woke up early and wandered, I discovered a barn where people were spinning glass. Did you know that that wavery glass that you find in the countryside is spun in plates? That’s where the wave comes in. I used to love looking at the world through that glass.”

  Joret smiled. “We made both kinds. Some actually prefer that glass, when the window just opens onto stone. It can throw more splinters of light inside.”

  “I did not know. Well, anyway, speaking of your family. It seems another of your relations has just crossed the border. I wore my plain clothes and spent a little time observing your relation while deciding what to do. Unlike your decorative cousin Yaska, he exhibited no tendency to lead a crowd of fast-riding, hard-drinking courtiers in making trouble just to assuage their boredom. Before I left, he took a job.”

  Joret knew exactly whom he meant. “I take it you had him followed? Surely not arrested.”

  “Not unless he decides to raise an army.”

  Joret clasped his hands. “We both know where he’s going, and why. Will you let me handle this matter discreetly?” Joret mentally rearranged her morning, knowing that the duchess they’d just left, though equally tired and about to embark on a long journey, would not deny her if she called in private.

  “I would like nothing better,” he said with obvious relief, and kissed her. “I leave it to you.”

  The week after New Year’s, when every hand aboard Tau’s trader had been on deck through a day dark as night and a night made brighter than day by almost constant lightning, they were finally released in small groups to the waterlogged cabins to rest, as the ship sped through the spume and sea wrack of a departing monstrous storm. When they eased their fatigue-sodden limbs below they discovered that the mighty waves washing down the deck had brok
en both hatches. Water had poured in as the massive waves crashed down, then spewed out as they rode up the next wave. Most of their belongings had thus been swept out to sea—including Tau’s golden case, which he’d carefully left in his hammock, along with his gear, in case the working of the ship’s timbers let in water.

  Just as the bitter east winds were beginning to weaken toward spring, they reached the northernmost bay of Anaeran-Adrani, where the captain and some of the crew had kin whom they had not seen or communicated with for years.

  Tau thanked everyone, wished them a good journey, stepped ashore, and vanished into the harbor crowd. By day’s end he had a job.

  By the end of a week he’d earned enough money to travel. He bought a map and set out for the north.

  Chapter Sixteen

  WHILE Iasca Leror’s royal city was gripped in winter, Evred and Inda at last took their much-postponed walk through the academy. They began with old reminiscences, talking over each other, breath clouding as they laughed over their ten- and twelve-year-old antics. They laughed even more as they slipped and slid on ice patches. Then Inda asked about the years he was gone. Evred began sharing memories as they approached the senior barracks, which Inda had never set foot in.

  Inda had begun to answer when they reached the door. “. . . and you remember how much effort it took me to learn something about those damned lances. I still don’t think I’d—ah. Here we are. I want to go in,” Inda said, interrupting himself.

  “It’s empty. Nothing here,” Evred protested mildly.

  “I’m curious. I didn’t get this far on Lassad’s tour last summer. He was—” Inda paused, reluctant to say being Smartlip.

  “Bragging,” Evred finished. “I know. And I recall what you said later that day. Look, Inda, you’re going to find flaws in all the masters. Try as I might, I could not staff the academy with men like Gand, though I wanted to. There aren’t a lot of men like Gand—tough, wise, experienced, and able to teach. Horsepiss Noth is tough, wise, and experienced but he said he’d be terrible as a teacher. What makes him excellent for toughening up dragoons makes him terrible for dealing with boys.”

  Inda grimaced. “Didn’t he thrash Whipstick when he had a broken arm? I didn’t think twice about that when we were scrubs, but Whipstick couldn’t have been more than ten.”

  “Yes. That was after the egg dance,” Evred said, and Inda heard the regret in his voice. Dogpiss. “My father was very careful in selecting Gand, though his choice took everyone by surprise.”

  “I get it.” Inda looked around, left hand on hip, right held close to his side. “I get it. Use the strengths, overlook the weaknesses. We did that with picking ship captains. I guess I thought things would be different at home.”

  “That we had a kingdom full of Gands for the asking?”

  Inda laughed, and smacked his left hand against the lintel before opening the winter door. “Yes. Stupid, isn’t it? If that had been true, everything would be different. Including you and me standing here right now.”

  He stepped inside, flung wide the winter shutters, and looked avidly at the battered walls, the warped floorboards, the low bed frames waiting for the old mattresses to come out of storage above the barns, where they acted as insulation for the animals all winter. There was no weight of memory to rein Inda’s thoughts.

  “Here’s my question.” He stamped numb feet on the bare wooden floor. “Gand wants me to wait on changes, but won’t the Jarls sit up and howl if I don’t change everything? At the banquets half of them were yapping at me about how I was going to make their boys stronger, better. Faster. What are they expecting?”

  Evred leaned in the big window that opened into the coveted senior courtyard. He scarcely heard the question, so intense was the memory of sitting in this window, his favorite place during summer’s still nights, golden light spilling onto the honey-colored stones below as the half-lit silhouettes of boys talked, drummed, sang, laughed. He could almost smell the dust and hay and the distant astringency of summer sage, so close was his younger self who’d sat here wondering where Inda was in the wide world and how to keep a vow of justice.

  Inda seemed to think their memories were all happy. Evred gripped the knife-scarred windowsill, his gloved fingers next to a pair of initials shaped like a tree: that boy had been a year older. Rat Cassad’s voice whispered in memory, after the losing battle against the Venn invasion just below Lindeth Harbor . . . legs tendon-cut, arms smashed at the elbows. We found him on the shore with his own sword sticking up from his ribs.

  Evred turned away. “Tradition,” he said finally, when he discovered Inda not just waiting, but still. He was so rarely still. Usually he rattled around and around whatever space he was in, pacing, rapping, thumping, but now he was motionless, that wide brown gaze as bright and painful as the summer sun. You did not look into the sun. “Tradition is important to us. Or so we say, but when I think about it, every generation has made significant changes from the one before, going back to when we first moved into castles. Now Hadand wants me to bring girls in as King’s Runners.”

  Inda said, “Why not? You put girls to work in the archive for the oath project. Nothing terrible happened.”

  “I know. I know. It’s considered an honor for families who will never inherit to have a boy invited into the King’s Runners.” He thought of that blood-stained, rent banner hanging over the throne, and said, “Who deserves the honor more than Hadand Tlen, the child who managed to bring what was left of the Andahi children through those terrible weeks?”

  “I think it’s a great idea,” Inda stated. “Cama talked about her. Calls her Captain Han. You know how skimpy he is with the praise. I see this idea as a change for the better.”

  Evred’s smile was pensive. “So you would think, Elgar the Pirate. As for the academy, the Jarls will all talk as if they expect their sons to come home ready for battle, but they’ll be realistic. You could offer the older boys your Fox drills—”

  Inda looked up quickly.

  Evred snorted a soft laugh. “I know everyone’s been calling your double-knife style Fox drills. I believe I’ll survive the reminder of old family feuds. Especially since the boys apparently think the name is related to the academy Fox banner.”

  “Which also used to belong to Montredavan-An,” Inda began, but stopped when Evred paused by a bed frame, drawing a slow breath.

  “Noddy’s?” Inda asked, the Montredavan-Ans forgotten.

  In the distance the watch change bell clanged. Evred said quickly, “He hated the sun in mornings. This was the darkest corner. If I could reach down through time—” He extended his fingers, but there was no tousled dark head burrowed under blankets, just an empty frame and cold air. “Let’s go.”

  I’ll never come here again, Evred thought, and closed the shutters.

  Chapter Seventeen

  ON the first day of spring, all along the road Adrani villages and towns aired their houses and put seedling pots on windowsills, in the manner of the east end of the continent.

  Tau had crossed the broad expanse of Anaeran-Adrani, finding its beauties and unwarlike life very much to his taste. By the time he left the trade center Shiovhan, he was aware that he was being followed, but he shrugged it off: he’d deal with trouble if it came. He hired himself out to share the driving on a northern-bound wagon train, having warned the team leader he would turn off at Elsaraen, wherever that was.

  One morning they plodded past a cracked plinth with time- and weather-worn carved letters impossible to make out. If he’d been alone, he would have ridden right past. “There’s your sign, you. It’s old, old’r’n the moon,” the leader added.

  The wagon train was slow and steady, so Tau flicked his forehead in salute, hitched his modest carryall over his shoulder, and jumped down without the oxen breaking rhythm. He trudged up the old road that seemed to wind directly into the mountains. The road was edged with white stone, arguing against poverty or some kind of isolated prison. It also argued against a p
leasure house, as only a fool would build them out in the middle of nowhere and expect any business. But if his mother had for some crazy reason taken up her trade here instead of going back to Parayid, Jeje would have said so, for she approved of honest work.

  He did not begin to guess at the truth until the road opened to a spectacular view of an old Sartoran eight-sided building with complicated arches and sun windows in weather-smoothed stone, enclosed by a “new” castle only a few hundred years old.

  Tau stopped at a turn on the road and studied the old castle. The old sign, the well-tended terraced gardens visible in the valley below, the fine road, all gave evidence not just of wealth but of stability. One would think those good signs, so why wouldn’t Jeje?

  Tau’s gaze finished taking in the vineyards on the north-facing hills and returned to the castle. A peculiar flutter behind Tau’s ribs—not quite laughter—offered the most likely solution, one Jeje would hate.

  With a pained smile, Tau descended the last way, and walked into the castle’s forecourt. Servants came running out, stopping to bow.

  Bows, and no word spoken yet.

  Tau shook his head, following the one who indicated the way. The servant did not explain anything, by which Tau understood his mother would perform that office herself. She expected him to be surprised and pleased. The second servant relieved him of his carryall as if it were full of precious stones, and he was led up the stairs to a charmingly furnished parlor painted in a delicate blue, furnished with lyre-back chairs and low tables with half-circle legs. The walls and furnishings were edged with patterns of knotwork and stylized flower shapes.

  His mother rustled toward him, arms extended gracefully. Saris was more beautiful than ever, dressed in pale blue, white, and gold.