by Damien Lake
With that in mind, he paid a visit to the armory one afternoon to see what Sennet had available as a secondary sword. He and Dietrik spent an entire day sifting through the upstairs rooms. They left unsatisfied. None of the smaller swords called to him. Each would break under the stress of his strength working the way his first had. Also, he disliked the claymore types after all. Their size hardly bothered him any longer since he would only use it when a situation called for it. Yet while nicely thick in the blade, they had an increased flexibility that annoyed him.
They might be designed that way to suffer less damage. His few practice swings always landed slightly off the target. The horses these blades were designed to be used against made a large target, so striking two or three inches off the mark might not matter. But when fighting the foes Marik would, it could make all the difference in the world.
“What then?” Dietrik wanted to know. “Why not simply use a blade like your last? You could switch to this monster if you need to push yourself up.”
Marik scratched his head. “I don’t want to unless I have to. The shorter length is nice, but I’d rather have a blade that can stand up to the stress for longer than four or five hard strikes if I’m trapped and can’t switch.”
They left without finding a weapon Marik felt satisfied with.
Kerwin took his leave one afternoon. He said his farewells to his friends, dressed in one of his costly shirts and the leather vest with the dice designs tooled in. The gambler promised to return as soon as his inn opened to let everyone know the time had come for them to spend their hoarded coin. Landon followed him through the gates and the Fourth Unit’s bunk area was much quieter for their departure.
It saddened Marik. He strove to hold onto that feeling from his first night back in town. People come and go, yet Kingshome would always be his home.
Whole squads returned when their contracts closed. Summer gave way to autumn, and gradually drew closer to winter. Men who wished to apply for the band began camping outside the walls. At last the clerks showed up among the barracks with their carts and their canvas sacks, the burly Homeguard helping them empty out closets.
“Trials start tomorrow,” Dietrik mentioned that evening when Marik returned, exhausted. Today had been one of the few where he unsuccessfully avoided Tollaf. Each subsequent session with the old man became increasingly tortuous. Celerity had spoken with him through the mirror before Marik’s return.
Either Tollaf came to agree with her on matters of disrespectful apprentices or else Marik had embarrassed the old enclave member with his profound lack of ability. Whichever the case, the old man kept locking him away in a workroom to practice the few workings he knew, or subjecting him to long, boring lectures on magic that Marik never comprehended.
“Hope we’ll actually get our share of them this year,” he replied to Dietrik. “We’ve only got eight men in the unit, if you still count Sloan.”
“Or seven-and-one-half if you count Talbot.”
“That’s not fair to him.”
Dietrik shrugged. “I know he means well, but look at what’s left of the unit, mate. Edwin’s the only archer remaining—”
“He was the best even when we were full.”
“Granted, but he can’t make up for all the rest alone. You and I are fair hands with our swords, Talbot tries, Sloan might walk us into a ten-to-one battle on purpose so he can fight everyone in sight, and the others are lone wolves. I think conversation is banned by whichever religion they follow. It is difficult to remember their names!”
“If the officers know what they’re doing, they’ll give the choice picks to the squads that got skipped last year.”
With a sad head shake, Dietrik moaned, “Our survival depends on officers having the sense to piss downwind? Maybe I’ll spend the day looking for a nice gravesite.”
* * * * *
Exhaustion flooded Marik the next morning. His mind rebelled at the thought of working on his strength training exercises. The idea of any strenuous activity, such as moving, made him want to curl under his blanket and escape back into the half-death of sleep.
He was familiar with the sensation after his winters in the band, each with never enough time to accomplish all he needed to. His mind wished to rest. It had sunk into a depression and wanted nothing to do with him.
The exhaustion that usually brought this on frequently came after a long day enduring Tollaf, Marik had noticed. Silently he cursed the old man for costing him not one, but now a second day of useful training as well.
Fighting the lethargy would result in limited success, he knew. Many times in the training areas he would shake himself to awareness, realizing he had been staring into space without moving for nearly a quarter-mark. No point in going out today, truthfully.
Dietrik bounced from his cot, full of pep. “Come on, mate! Shake a leg, eh?”
“Beghh,” Marik groaned from his cocoon. “What’s got into you?”
“I’m curious, a need which I do not savor. So come with me to help satisfy it.”
Marik sat up and stared at his friend. “What are you talking about?”
“The application trials will commence today. I want to watch and see how capable our future shieldmates will be, especially seeing as how over half of the unit will be filled out by them.”
“You won’t know which ones to watch until the officers assign them, and then it will be too late.”
“I am also curious to see if that ox friend of Beld’s will make a fourth bid for membership. I can’t wait to see what magnificence he will display to awe the judges with his sheer thick-headedness.”
“Why are you so obsessed with him? Isn’t it enough that we put them all in their place years back?”
“Write it off as my own odd hobby. I was the first to send that brute rolling down the slope. I have a vested interest in making sure others continue performing well at the job I started. Besides, after all the hassle his friends put us through our first winter, do you wish to see him enter the band?”
“I don’t know about you at times, Dietrik. Beld stopped bothering us after we trounced him into the dirt. I said we wouldn’t have to worry about them anymore, and I was right.”
“It is not as if we have any other demands on our time today. You intend to avoid your master, and non-stop physical training is less effective if you don’t take a breather now and then.”
“Fine, fine. But they won’t start until noon. We have plenty of time to grab our breakfast.”
* * * * *
While he pulled on his clothing, Marik decided it would be interesting to watch the trials in their entirety this year after all. With his experience, would he be able to discern deeper traits in each fighter than he could have during his application? Also, Dietrik had a point. These men would become their shieldmates. Though he had no way of knowing which would be chosen for the Ninth Squad, watching them fight earnestly for a slot might reveal useful information about each. Seeing any flaws before relying on their skill during a contract might be vital information for his own survival.
Luiez prepared folded eggs with melted cheese and fried bread for breakfast. With fewer men in the squad than usual this year, Luiez prepared a larger quantity of food per man on fewer rations. Marik scooped an extra serving without guilt, heaping his plate from the holding pans left on the counter by the kitchen window. The bounty would only last another day, after all.
Marik and Dietrik left the barracks two candlemarks after first light. The rain held off for a wonder. That might make the trial less miserable but the mud would add a new dimension of difficulty to the fighting.
They were crossing the Marching Grounds, intent on reaching the shop that sold the best cloaks to replace Marik’s worn out garment, when Marik noticed a group of men being led toward the command building.
“What’s that all about?” he pointed at the group. He estimated it at nearly forty in number. “They have to be applicants from their look. What are they doing inside the
walls already?”
Dietrik glanced at them only briefly. “The archers, in all likelihood. Let’s hurry, shall we? I can see that more men are lined along the wall to watch than usual. The good spots will all be taken.”
“Archers?” After Dietrik pointed out the obvious, Marik could see they each carried unstrung bows across their backs.
“Of course,” Dietrik replied, responding to the surprised tone in Marik’s voice. “You hardly expect the officers to judge men listing archery skills on their application by setting them against sword fighters, do you?”
“When did they start doing that?”
Marik felt his friend studying him a long moment. He watched the men walking northwest toward the archery range, an act that enabled him to avoid meeting Dietrik eye-to-eye. “Since when? At a guess I would say since the band first formed. You never noticed the Homeguard escorting them through the gate?”
“No,” Marik admitted. “I spent the time before our trial reviewing all of Chatham’s advice while we waited. I never saw the crowd getting any smaller.”
Dietrik relented. “In a crowd that size, missing thirty or forty men can be easy. I watched them on the range the next winter while you were in the chirurgeon’s wing. There is little difference. The judges watch each man one at a time, although they spend much longer on the questions. It took them nearly three candlemarks to work their way though the entire group.”
“Only forty new archers,” Marik mused. “I don’t think I like that, especially since half will probably wash out.”
“Forty full archers,” Dietrik corrected him. “I gather those are the archers with no other skills to fall back on. Like Edwin. Chaps like Landon are good with bow and sword, so the archery is a bonus for whatever unit they place him in. If you want to enter solely on the strength of your archery, you need to prove you are good enough to warrant the extra protection your shieldmates will need to provide you.”
“Edwin is hardly crippled without his bow,” Marik countered. “I’ve seen him using his sword.”
“But only when he must. And since you have seen him, then you know he is no great shakes with it. Just good enough to be able to use it when he must.”
“Being ‘good enough’ in the Kings means you’re better than most outside!”
Dietrik shrugged, surrendering the argument. “If you want a new cloak before the next rainfall, then let’s stop standing still. See? There are already over a hundred men up there. The Ninth was not the only squad shorted this year.”
Marik could see what Dietrik meant. Men gathered along the wall top, coming to rest in places where their view of the gathering below would be unobstructed, moving only enough to keep their legs from stiffening. With that prompting him, he hastily chose a new cloak with less discrimination than he customarily would have engaged in.
They carefully climbed the planks up the inner wall. Marik always hated this. His unease with heights pulled at him every time he carefully stepped higher onto each protruding stub of wood. The constant rain from the early winter never allowed the wood to entirely dry. Slippery and damp, he gave serious consideration to abandoning the climb. Let Dietrik watch the trials alone if he cared so much.
Eventually he gained the top, but not before two other men crowded him from behind. They wanted to watch. His slow assent elicited many comments Marik would have challenged them on if he had not then been three-hundred feet above the gods themselves.
Most of the mercenary audience clustered directly above the main gate in the southern wall, spilling eastward behind the sharpened points. Dietrik walked until they reached the congregation’s edge. This placed them slightly west of the road leading up the hill, yet still close enough to afford a decent view of the battleground where the sparring would take place.
When he glanced back into the town, Marik could barely see the men on the archery range. Most were concealed by the larger buildings. The archer currently shooting stood far enough into the clear area to be made out. Resting near him were the tables familiar to Marik, holding five officers and six clerks. He watched for several moments.
Edwin might find it exciting from a professional viewpoint. To Marik there was little interest in watching bowmen fire arrows one at a time across the field. At least at the tournament the prospect of advancing or being disqualified leant adrenaline to the moment. Here he felt nothing as he watched this current man miss nearly every shot at the hay bales across the range, except to hope that the judges never placed him in Ninth Squad.
The blended crowd murmur drifted from below. Marik commented, “That’s one less mystery in the world.”
“Sorry?” Dietrik lifted his gaze from the men waiting for whatever process the band would put them through to determine their value as fighters.
Marik elaborated. “Given how many men needed to pair off and fight for the judges, it never made sense to me why they waited until noon to begin.” He gestured at the archery range. “Now I know why.”
Dietrik shrugged before returning to sifting through the crowd with his eyes, as if he could read each man’s skills plain upon their milling bodies.
Noon drew closer. Marik listened to the idle conversation from the long-time band members around them. Some commented on particular individuals below flashy enough to catch their eye while others speculated on the current events around the kingdom that might call for them to fight. Overall the talk centered on the number of applicants and whether, after culling, there would qualify enough to bring the band back to full strength.
Darker skin tones, loose flowing pants and that peculiar hanging tunic populated the crowd in larger numbers than Marik had ever noticed. So many filled its ranks that he marked them in his mind where he would normally remain unaware of the foreign clothing style. Tullainians who no longer wished to live homeless on Galemar’s roads sought to earn places as Crimson Kings. This made the crowd nearly twice the size as usual; refugees flocked to Kingshome’s walls in addition to the normal bevy of Galemaran hopefuls.
This did little to comfort Marik, who assumed most of these desolate foreigners probably had never held a sword much less used one. He expected a number of disqualifications far beyond normal this year.
Ten minutes before the noon bell the judges left the shooting range. Marik watched the clerks lift the light, portable tables while the Homeguard led the archers away. Curious, Marik followed them from the etheric to see what happened next. The Homeguard led them across the town to the stable gate, bringing them out through the horse’s entrance. Roughly two-thirds were motioned to the woods encircling the vale’s upper ridge. They set to making fresh camps while the other third, under the guards’ watchful eyes, trudged downhill. Upon attaining the Southern Road, they departed in various directions.
The Homeguard reentered Kingshome, stopping by the training sally to pick up the ironwood practice weapons the trials would need. They rejoined the clerks below the gathering on the wall. After one last double check to ensure they carried all they needed, the gates opened and the panel exited.
Their arrival quieted the murmuring crowd. Once the tables and chairs were set and everyone in place, Janus stepped forward to address the gathering. His gnarled hands lifted the speaking horn to his mouth.
His words were little different from the first time Marik had heard them years ago. The only information of interest came when the head clerk revealed the numbers for this year.
“The band has over five-hundred openings! Don’t get your hopes up because there’s nearly eight-hundred of you! If you don’t have what it takes to catch our notice, we’ll cut every last one of you and go through the next season with tighter belts!”
“Five-hundred slots,” Marik whispered in horrified awe. “That’s almost as bad as last year!”
“Not quite, mate,” Dietrik replied from his shoulder. “We replaced nearly half our losses last time, but after a season’s fighting, the number of losses must have crawled back upward even with the fewer number of full squad
s out on contract. We’re better off, and with this mess of people we might come near to our normal round-out this winter!”
“I’ll reserve judgement until I see them fight.”
Janus finished laying out the rules. Marik nearly missed his added announcement that the sparring trial would be split across two days this year, as might the secondary trial depending on how many qualified to advance. He picked the first pair to come out and demonstrate their skills.
A Tullainian stepped to the tables along with a scruffy, mean-looking man who could pass as a bandit in any corner of the world. After their interview with the judges, the bandit took up a mock axe while the Tullainian chose a long pole arm.
Marik expected either the longer pole to knock the axeman senseless on the first blow, or the axe to send the pole flying away quickly from the inexperienced hands of the refugee. Instead, he witnessed an impressive battle between well-trained men using their chosen weapons.
The Tullainian used his mock spear well, thrusting accurately, stepping lightly to maintain the distance his weapon needed to remain effective, swinging it in broad sweeps when least expected to keep the bandit wary. In response, the axeman displayed moves Marik had never witnessed before, slashing, leaping to and fro with deceptive dexterity and proving that it really was possible to use an axe defensively.
They traded blows for five minutes, moving across the ground as the battle’s opportunities demanded. A gesture from the center judge made Janus call a stop to the bout before a victor could be decided. Several of the men around Marik shouted uncomplimentary remarks about that. The judges had seen enough. If they allowed every fight to continue to its completion, they would reach nightfall before so much as a quarter of the men were processed.
Both men were interviewed, then both walked to the road’s western side, the first men to qualify for the next trial.
This boded well. Marik chided himself for making assumptions based solely on race and outward appearance. He paid closer attention to the next pair Janus called, determined to assess their potential using his professional expertise rather than his suppositions regarding their motives for attempting entrance.
