The Warrior's Bond toe-4

by Juliet E. McKenna

  Allin made few contributions to the conversation, and none without blushing, but when the maids were clearing the table she turned to Temar with a shy smile. “Are there many differences between this meal and those—before?”

  “Not so many,” he replied with some surprise at the realisation. “But there can be only so many ways of cooking, and meat, fish or fowl remain the same.” A maid reached past him with porcelain bowls of sweetmeats while a steward set out decanters of sweet wine and cordials.

  Allin nibbled a little pastry stuffed with nuts and raisins. “You sound quite Lescari, did you know that? Do you know people from there?”

  Temar nodded. “Most of those who came to fight for Kel Ar’Ayen last year were from Lescar. Many chose to stay on and help in our rebuilding and they hope to bring friends to start a new life with us. I have doubtless picked up something of their tongue.”

  Allin drew so sharp a breath she choked on her mouthful. Temar hastily offered her glass but she pushed his hand away as she struggled to control her coughs. “Mercenaries!” she spat. “Nurse a wolf cub at your hearth and it’ll still eat your sheep. Be more careful whom you trust.”

  Temar looked a frantic question at Ryshad, mortified to have caused offence.

  “Your family has suffered in the fighting, I take it?” Ryshad asked Allin sympathetically.

  “We used to live just north of Carluse.” The girl was scarlet to the roots of her hair but managed a hoarse reply. “Sharlac mercenaries burned us out and we fled to Caladhria.”

  “Which is where I identified the girl’s talent,” piped up Casuel. “And now she is your pupil?” He looked at Velindre with ill-disguised annoyance.

  “Forgive me,” said Temar soberly to Allin. “I know nothing of modern Lescar. In my day it was a peaceful province of the Empire.” But he should have remembered it had been rent by civil war for ten generations or more. He saw his own thoughts reflected in Ryshad’s alert brown eyes. How would Temar hold his own among the Princes and courts of Toremal, so ignorant of politics within and beyond the Empire’s reduced borders? More important things had changed than the way people spoke or sauced their dinners.

  “So, Velindre, will you be travelling to Toremal with us?” Casuel persisted, his voice loud in the awkward silence. Ryshad silently passed Allin a dish of honey-soaked sops of toasted bread to give her time to recover her composure.

  Velindre inclined her head towards Ryshad. “I take it you are going to the capital for the Solstice Festival?”

  He nodded as he filled small glasses from a decanter of white brandy. “Messire D’Olbriot is keen to introduce Esquire D’Alsennin to the Houses of the Empire.”

  “I should like to meet the Demoiselle Tor Arrial before you go,” Velindre said firmly. “To learn something of Artifice and its uses. You’ll be sparing a few days to rest?”

  Ryshad looked at Temar who shrugged uncertainly. “It may be a day or so before Avila’s recovered from the voyage.”

  “We’ll most certainly wait,” Casuel frowned. “The moons aren’t fit for travel! The lesser will be past the half in a few nights and the greater is nigh on full dark.”

  “I’d rather keep days in hand to rest the horses along the way,” Ryshad disputed. “Solstice doesn’t wait for Saedrin or anyone else.”

  “How do we travel?” Temar enquired.

  “By horse,” Ryshad stated firmly.

  “Coach,” contradicted Casuel, looking obstinate.

  “I’ll risk saddle sores over coach sickness, thanks all the same,” Temar said lightly. “But Avila may think otherwise.”

  “Well I intend to drive, even if no one else does,” Casuel snapped.

  “I never cease to be thankful for the magecraft that saves me from such choices,” Velindre smiled. “I’ll see Urlan safely back to Hadrumal, Cas, and after that I imagine we’ll see you at the Festival. For the present, we’ll leave you with your wine. Come on, Allin.” Temar watched as Velindre made her exit with the poise of a noble from any age of the Empire.

  Casuel looked after her with some irritation. “I was about to say I would bespeak assistance for Urlan. It’s just—”

  Ryshad spoke over the mage with a wicked smile as he refilled Temar’s glass. “In Toremal, we swap indecorous stories once the ladies have left.”

  Temar laughed as Casuel drew an indignant breath. “Something else not changed, for all the generations I have missed.”

  “But there are many things you do need to know.” Casuel leaned forward, face eager. “I made some preliminary notes, but we need to identify particular areas of concern—”

  “Not tonight, if you please,” Temar pleaded.

  “Give the lad a chance to catch his breath,” Ryshad chided Casuel genially.

  Temar suddenly felt exhausted. He set down his half-finished glass with an unsteady hand. “I’ll gladly learn all I may from you and you’ll have my thanks, but for now I’ll bid you good night.”

  “Arimelin send you pleasant dreams,” said Ryshad.

  Temar looked sharply at him but saw nothing but good will in the man’s face. “And to you,” he stammered before hurrying from the room.

  The Shrine of Ostrin, Bremilayne,

  10th of For-Summer in the Third Year of Tadriol

  the Provident, Morning

  It’s such a commonplace to wish the goddess send someone refreshing dreams that the words were out of my mouth before I’d realised what I was saying. Temar’s startled look set nervous fingers plucking at the back of my own mind and, once I’d bid Casuel good night, I climbed the candlelit stairs of the guest house with uncommon reluctance. I’d thought nigh on a year of being alone in my own head had cured me of the horrors of having my mind invaded by another’s, but it seemed not. I even considered going back for a flask of some liquor to drown any dreams but sternly reminded myself I’d found such remedies ineffective enough in my callow youth. Uncomfortably aware of Temar’s presence in the next room, I resolutely diverted my thoughts by speculating what Livak might be up to and listened to the chimes of the shrine sounding well into the night.

  Arimelin must have been busy elsewhere. When I finally fell asleep I didn’t dream of my red-haired beloved or anything else and woke to a clear sunny morning. Washed, shaved and dressed in short order, I was downstairs early enough to startle a servant girl sweeping the hall floor.

  “We’re done in the dining salon, sir.” She sent a cloud of dust out of the open door billow in a golden haze. “You can make yourself a tisane or I can fetch you something from the kitchens?”

  I shook my head. “I’ll breakfast with everyone else.”

  The sideboard in the salon was laid with delicate ceramic cups and an array of jars with silver tags around their necks identifying the herbs and spices within. A kettle sat on a small charcoal stove set in the fireplace, puffing gentle wisps of steam up the chimney. I was finding a spoon when the door opened behind me and I turned to see Temar looking much better for a good night’s sleep.

  “Tisane?” I dangled a pierced silver ball by its chain.

  Temar gave a brief smile but his wolf-pale eyes were still wary. “We use scraps of muslin in Kel Ar’Ayen.”

  “Like most people this side of the ocean.” I clicked the little sphere open and spooned in some lemon balm. “But noble guests are accustomed to their little luxuries.”

  Temar made some noise that could have been agreement or not. He studied the crystal jars before helping himself to some red-stemmed mint. “Back in my day, this shrine was a place set aside for the contemplation and study of Artifice.” A broader smile cracked his rather solemn expression. “ ‘Back in my day’; I sound like some grandsire lamenting his lost youth.” The smile faded. “Well, it’s certainly lost, along with my grandsire and everyone else I ever knew.”

  “But you have new friends,” I said encouragingly. “And the House of D’Olbriot will welcome you as warmly as one of their own.”

  Temar was staring out of the window,
tisane forgotten. “I knew it was all gone, that they were all gone, but in Kel Ar’Ayen things aren’t so different, not to how it was when we first arrived. We’d lost all we’d worked for but we knew that, with the Elietimm destroying everything as we fled—” His voice trailed off into uncertainty.

  I took the tisane ball from his unresisting hands and added some bittertooth, my mother’s specific for low spirits. “And now you’re here?” Fetching the kettle, I poured water into both cups, hoping no one would interrupt us.

  Temar sighed, lacing his long fingers round the cup’s comforting warmth. “I don’t know where I am. Bremilayne was a fishing village, a few boats pulling crabs from the rocks.” We both looked down at the sizeable fleet returning from the night’s fishing, seabirds wheeling within the massive curve of the harbour wall. “The adepts founded their sanctuary here because the place was so isolated, of no use or interest to anyone else. That has certainly changed.” He gestured at the imposing houses set around the equally impressive precincts of the shrine.

  “The port deals with all the Gidestan trade,” I explained. “Goods from the mountains come down the river to Inglis and are shipped down here.”

  “To be carried over the mountains to the west?” Temar nodded at a shallow cleft in the looming ridge. “Even the skyline has changed. When did that landslip close the old route?”

  As he pointed I saw a hollow where a great mass of stone and earth had fallen from the heights in some past age. The sprawl of broken ground wasn’t immediately obvious as trees tall enough to make ships’ masts dotted the scrub. “Not in my lifetime, or anyone since my great-grandsire’s, I should think,” I admitted.

  “Perhaps I should ask your friend Casuel,” Temar suggested, and his half-smile encouraged me.

  “I know something of what you’re feeling,” I reminded him.

  Temar sipped his drink and looked up with frank scepticism. “How so?”

  “The Aldabreshin Archipelago was as foreign a place to me as all this is to you,” I pointed out. “I found my feet there. It’ll take us a good while to cross the country, and I warn you Casuel’s determined to teach you all you need to know, and more besides, I’ll wager. In any case, Solstice Festival is only five days, and once it’s over you can take ship back to Kellarin whenever you like.”

  Temar suddenly set his cup down. “I have not asked your pardon for my part in your enslavement.”

  I was taken aback. “You were hardly to know what was happening, caught up in the enchantment as much as me. What’s done is gone and we need to be looking to the future, not turning over last autumn’s leaves.” I managed to make something of a joke of it and in any case I blamed Planir far more than I’d ever blame Temar.

  Temar studied my face and some of the tension left him.

  “And as far as we can tell, it was the Elietimm setting their claws in my mind that woke you in Relshaz and set you searching for your lost companions,” I reminded him. Temar’s fellow colonists had been sleeping like him, their enchanted minds held in seemingly innocent artefacts. Once roused, Temar’s consciousness had overwhelmed my own, starting a frantic quest for one of those trinkets that had landed me in chains. Taken for a thief, I’d been condemned to be sold into slavery to repay my so-called victim’s losses. “That Elietimm enchanter we killed in Kellarin was the one who got the Aldabreshin woman to buy me. He was after the sword that was linking me to you and the secrets of the colony.” Even my anger with the wizards didn’t blind me to the true enemy here.

  “True enough.” Temar’s face hardened. “I have no doubt the Elietimm will attack us again, whatever Master Devoir may say. We must have means to defend ourselves. I refuse to stay reliant on the Archmage for protection.”

  “So what do you need?” I prompted.

  “First and most important we must recover the artefacts to restore those still held in enchantment,” said Temar firmly. “Several of our most adept are still lost to us.”

  “How many are still asleep?” I stifled a shudder at the memory of that vast, chill cavern, dark beneath the weight of rock as unchanged through the years as those frozen bodies beneath it.

  “Some three hundred and more.” Temar sounded surer of himself. “That is why I came for Solstice. It has to be the best time to trace the missing artefacts, with all the great families gathered in the capital.”

  I nodded. “And Kellarin has gold, gems, furs, who knows what else to trade. Messire D’Olbriot has the contacts to help you earn the coin to buy in tools, goods, skilled men, everything you need to rebuild. He was saying Kellarin goods could rival the Gidestan trade inside five years.”

  “How much can I accomplish in five days?” Temar looked a little daunted.

  “I’ll be there to help,” I pointed out.

  “You are D’Olbriot’s man. You will be busy with your own duties,” he protested, but with evident hope I was going to contradict him.

  “You’ll be D’Olbriot’s guest,” I reminded him. “I’ll be your aide, at Messire’s direct order.” Which was fortunate, since I’d have been doing all I could for Temar, with or without the Sieur’s permission.

  Faint sounds of the guest house rising for the day came from the rooms above us. I savoured the sharp tang of lemon from my cooling cup.

  “You were not so keen to return to your patron’s service the last time we spoke,” Temar said cautiously. “You were talking of striking out on your own with that girl of yours. Are you no longer together?”

  “Livak?” I hesitated. “Well, yes and no. That is, a future together’s easier wished for than found.”

  “She seemed very independent.”

  I wondered what prompted Temar’s interest in my love life. I hoped he wasn’t expecting advice on salvaging something from the disasters of his own romance with Guinalle. “Independent to the point of criminal at times, which is certainly not a road I can take, any more than she’ll settle to life in a grace house sewing her seams while I attend Messire.”

  “So what are you to do?” Perhaps Temar was just looking for some distraction.

  “If I can render Messire some signal service…” I faltered. “I’ve made the step to chosen man. The top of the ladder is proven man. As such I’d warrant a commission to manage an estate for D’Olbriot, or to act as his agent in some city like Relshaz. I’d be looking out for D’Olbriot interests, but no longer at the Sieur’s beck and call. Livak and I think we could live with that.” As with so many plans, it sounded less likely spoken aloud than it seemed in the privacy of my own head.

  “Oh.” Temar looked blank. Of course, the oath-bound traditions of service that I was committed to meant nothing to him. That had all grown up after the Chaos, the bloody anarchy that had brought the Old Empire low, when ties of loyalty had gone for nothing as the Princes of the great Houses turned on the feckless Emperor who’d brought ruin on them all. The ordered fealty of tenants to their Liege-Lords that Temar had known was as foreign to me as this new Bremilayne was to him.

  “So what is this signal service to be?” Temar challenged.

  I grinned. “Helping you set Kellarin fair for a glorious and profitable future, to the mutual benefit of the Houses of D’Olbriot and D’Alsennin?”

  Temar grinned but with a humourless curl to his lip. “If those Elietimm scum permit it.”

  “Messire has people searching for enchantments to be used against the Elietimm, in defence of Kellarin and Tormalin.”

  Temar looked hopefully at me. “How so?”

  “Livak’s travelling in the Sieur’s name, hunting aetheric knowledge among the ancient races of wood and mountain,” I explained. Casuel might have scorned Livak’s theory about her song book, but the Sieur had thought it worth wagering a little coin.

  “Saedrin make it so,” murmured Temar, and I nodded fervent agreement. After the best part of a year without their black ships on the horizon, I was certain the summer would see renewed Elietimm attack. One small consolation for Livak’s absence was k
nowing she’d be as far from any fighting as possible. Her finding something powerful would also be a signal service to weigh in our favour when the time came to ask Messire for my freedom.

  Urgent steps sounded on the gravel outside and rapid hammering at the door brought a hall lackey running up from the cellars.

  Temar and I looked at each other startled and Glannar burst in, face like thunder. “The warehouse’s been robbed!”

  “Sit down.” I urged him to a chair, not liking the florid colour beneath his beard.

  “No,” Glannar waved me away breathlessly, “I need the Esquire D’Alsennin.” He looked uncertainly at Temar.

  “At once.” Temar moved to the door.

  “Don’t you want to know what happened?” Glannar looked from Temar to me and back again.

  “We will see for ourselves.” Temar was already out of the room and I hurried Glannar to the gate of the shrine.

  “A little slower, I think,” I said quietly as we reached the road. “Or we’ll have every eye in town turned to our business.” Temar on my near side gave me a sharp look while Glannar on the off hand scowled ferociously, but they both slackened their pace a little.

  The town was still quiet, some women scrubbing front steps with a few men about nameless tasks in the morning cool. Slate and cobbles shone blue and silver in the sun, mimicking the sparkling sea below. There was bustle on the quayside, all hands busy unloading the fisher fleet, scavenging birds raucous above the shouts of the labouring men and women.