The Crimson League (The Herezoth Trilogy)

by Grefer, Victoria

  “When the hunters realized their trap had caught a boy, they let him out. One man put his cloak around him because he was shivering. They asked what he was doing in the forest, and he told them about waiting and about his prayer, about the panther and the snakes and the spiders. They gave him a sip of wine to calm him and something to eat, and told him they’d come to hunt panthers because the cats were starting to venture into the town on the other side of the woods. The men had been at work for three weeks and were leaving for home in the morning, back to their town sixty miles from the orphan’s village. They said no one was allowed in the woods without the king’s permission, and it might have been months before he sent someone else into its heart. They took the boy with them, and when they reached the town the kindest one, whose wife was barren, took him in and raised him as his own.”

  Allowing an appropriate few seconds of dramatic silence to avoid spoiling the ending, Lanokas said, “It’s a sweet story. I hadn’t heard it before. I liked it.”

  “The first time I heard it, I couldn’t have been more than five. I thought it was an adventure story. I remember, I clung to my father’s arm and cried when he mentioned the python. I would cry every time he got to that part. The boy was a, a kind of friend to me. I felt so sorry for him. I’d imagine Sedder in his place, very easily, because Sedder never knew his birth parents. It didn’t help that I was terrified of snakes and still am, snakes and heights.

  “One of the reasons I liked the tale so much is that each time I heard it, I understood it a little more. I discovered it had something to teach me. It was a brand new story, but at the same time it wasn’t, and I came to trust that the boy would find the hunters and make it to the town, and the Giver would answer his prayers and grant him a family like mine. I pictured him with a dog, a mutt the size of a beagle. I loved dogs. My parents never let me have one.”

  “I like hunting dogs,” said Lanokas. “They aren’t needy.”

  “Did you read as a child?” Kora asked. “Apart from your lessons?”

  “When Neslan would give me a book. He had a knack for guessing what would interest me.” Kora’s back was to the door, but she heard it open. “There he is,” said Lanokas.

  “Neslan?”

  “Hayden. Don’t turn around.”

  “I wasn’t planning to. What’s he doing?”

  “Waiting for someone to deal the next hand.”

  “Someone’s playing?”

  “Cradle—behind you, to the left. They started up while you were talking. Some came from upstairs, two from outside.”

  “I missed that completely,” said Kora. She took a sip of ale to look natural.

  The gamblers dealt in Hayden at the end of the hand. Lanokas kept an eye on the game while he and Kora talked. He told her he had never been interested in archery, mainly because his brother was fond of it and a decent shot: not as good as Bidd or Hayden, but decent enough. He himself took more to swordplay, to be different.

  “What do you miss most about the old days?” Kora asked him.

  “My piano. My father was a lot like my brother, you see, or my brother takes after my father. I respected the man, sincerely, but I vented a lot of frustration through the piano. Pieces with fast tempos. It’s been so long I doubt I could play a thing these days. You?”

  Kora told him, “I miss the smell of home. My mother used to bake in the afternoons, just about the hour I’d get back from the schoolhouse. Her bread…. The best bread you’ll find anywhere, I’d bet more on that than Laskenay gave Hayden. You never had a loaf to compare.”

  “I believe you.”

  “No you don’t. But that’s all right. I’d step inside, and smell the dough, and just know that I was safe, that everything was as it should be. That was before. She had to spend more time weaving after Zalski. Both of us did, to have cloth enough to sell to keep up with taxes. She was faster, a real artist at the loom, so I baked. The smell wasn’t as comforting after that, but it kept my spirits up.” She paused. “How’s Hayden doing?”

  “He threw out a pair of aces.” That meant a penalty of just one; it was one of the best moves in the game. “Now he’s won a big hand. An enormous hand. My God, he must have bet everything.”

  “Someone at that table must not be happy.”

  “No indeed. The man he beat…. Kora, he’s got his hand at his waist. A dagger.”

  Kora felt powerless to act without her magic, but only for a moment. Should she trip the man with a spell? Would he suspect the cause?

  Lanokas was about to jump up when she shook her head at him, her lips taut. “Lean in,” she whispered. “Lean in and take my hands.”

  Lanokas held her hands on top the table, and Kora sprang to her feet. Her chair grated against the floor as she stepped away from the prince. “Marry you? You ask me to marry you in a dump like this? What kind of girl do you think I am?” Her mug was still a quarter full, and she sloshed its contents over Lanokas’s face. “You bring me here to propose?”

  Every eye in the inn was fixed on her. The gamblers stopped in the middle of dealing cards. Kora turned to them: in addition to Hayden, there were four men and a prostitute more or less Laskenay’s age. One of the men, a dirt-streaked field laborer, had a hold on a dagger hilt just as Lanokas said. He let it go as Kora walked up.

  “Would you propose to a woman in this place? Don’t I look like I deserve more respect?”

  “Honey, I’d propose anything you want me to wherever you want.” Kora patted his cheek before glowering at Lanokas. Whether or not the prince faked his shocked insult, the reaction made Kora’s display more believable; she noticed Hayden’s winnings with a jolt.

  “You have the means to treat a lady right. What do you say we leave the pig I came with in his sty and go somewhere with class? Somewhere we can get to know each other?”

  Hayden’s confusion was perceptible for the merest instant. Then a pleased expression, strong without exaggeration, spread across his face. With a visible confidence he gathered up his money. “Go,” growled the laborer. He jabbed his dagger in the air; one of his companions took it from him. “Go. I hope she steals it all and leaves you diseased.”

  The prostitute threw her cards on the table. “I take offense to that. As a working woman.”

  “Stay out of this, Jezzie. I wasn’t slighting you, you’re tops.”

  “Always,” Jezzie told him. Hayden was studying Kora.

  “You wouldn’t take anything that didn’t belong to you, now would you?”

  “Me? Not unless you disrespected me.” She glowered at Lanokas over her shoulder. “I don’t like it when people disrespect me.”

  “I bet you don’t,” said Hayden. He offered her his arm, steering her to the door, while Lanokas jumped into action, stumbling after, mumbling protests. Kora ignored him.

  * * *

  Kora, Lanokas, and Hayden were tromping through the field back to the barn; Kora had transported there, as close as possible without alarming those on guard. “Sorry about the ale,” she said. “It had to look realistic.” Lanokas nodded in mild indignation.

  “It was a nice touch,” said Hayden. “That guy meant trouble. Thanks for bailing me out. I was trying to figure out how to handle him, but he was….”

  “He was big,” said the prince.

  Kora shivered at the memory of the field worker. “I’m just glad that charade worked. I thought he might follow Hayden out to pummel him, or worse.”

  Laskenay and Bidd came running up. “You’re back?” said the first.

  “Did you win?” asked the other.

  “Tripled my money,” said Hayden. Lanokas clapped a hand over Bidd’s mouth before he hollered. Laskenay tilted her head toward the pair she had sent to keep an eye on the gambler. “You’re reeking. How much did you drink?”

  The prince folded his arms. “I’ll let the director of our little drama explain. She’s quite the actress, this one.”

  “I’m sorry,” Kora moaned. “I’m so sorry, you know I meant
nothing by it. I had to imagine you were Menikas just to make my arm move.”

  Lanokas cracked a smile. Bidd demanded, “What happened? You really do smell, you know.”

  “Yes,” said Lanokas, “thanks for reiterating that.”

  445

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Schism

  Kora went to the plaza the next afternoon to buy dinner. She came back with yams, carrots, and melons, the cheapest produce she could find. Hal and Bidd had gone to fish, and if they made a decent catch the League would eat better than it had in quite some time. Kora’s provisions were not light, and the prospect of setting them down pushed her to make good time on her trip back to Wheatfield; there were too many people about to risk transporting. When she walked in the barn, she found Laskenay deep in conversation with Ranler and Menikas. The prince turned to look at the newcomer, and Kora dropped her burlap sack with enough abruptness to bruise the fruit.

  “You’re getting on?” asked Menikas. Kora nodded. “Join us,” he said. “You’ve the right to know what we’ve been up to.”

  “No more than Neslan or Hal I haven’t.”

  “I’m trying to be gracious, Porteg. You’ll be having news for me. I thought we could exchange information instead of making this one-sided.”

  Kora could not move her feet. All she could think was how she hated this man, how because of him Zacry was locked up in the Palace. She said from the doorway, “Zalski knows you killed Rone.”

  “I’ll take credit for the deed, thank you.” Ranler moved aside to make room for her, and she had no choice but to join the others in the center of the barn.

  “How did you, well, do it?”

  “I clubbed him with a leg from Kansten’s chair that broke off against the window frame. A bit of poetic justice, as Neslan would say.”

  “The man deserved it,” Kora said, but her stomach churned, and she knew she would never look at Ranler as before.

  Laskenay asked, “Did Rone happen to have something useful lying about?”

  “If twelve gold pieces are useful,” Ranler told her. “Nothing in the way of intelligence.”

  “Twelve gold pieces? So that explains him. Zalski bought his loyalty.” The sorceress caught Kora’s eye, and Kora know they were thinking the same thing. Twelve pieces of gold would be more than enough to last the League three months. Gambling had risked exposure and Menikas’s anger for nothing.

  “What else has Zalski done?” asked the prince. Laskenay mentioned the new general, and he frowned. “Wicker? Playing it safe, isn’t he? Argint Wicker’s a far cry from Alten Grombach.”

  “I’d say he’s just as dangerous,” said Kora.

  “In a different way. Argint’s brain in conjunction with Zalski’s daring…. At least I’m familiar with the man. Argint was a favorite of the king. He had a distinguished career before the coup.”

  “So I gathered,” Kora said. “He wasn’t involved in it, was he?”

  “Not that we’ve discerned,” said Laskenay.

  Menikas replied, “Involved or no, I felt better with Alten in command.”

  Laskenay shook her head. “We all felt better with Alten in command. The circumstances of his death, where they’ve brought us…. Every person here’s aware of our predicaments, and Argint’s talents have nothing to do with them. Argint’s fifty times more likely than a man like Alten Grombach to take pity on a farmer who can’t keep up with taxes, or a mother stealing peaches she can’t afford to buy. That doesn’t increase our security, but it matters to this kingdom. It matters a great deal. Procuring Alten’s exchange for this man is a success on par with finding the Librette, I believe that. Its good will likely outlive us.”

  Menikas argued, “Argint will thwart us at the Tricentennial, where Alten may not have.”

  Kora slapped the floor. “You don’t know that. You don’t know that, Menikas.”

  Laskenay cut off the prince’s retort. “We’ll discuss the Tricentennial later,” she said.

  “Then I just think I’ll take some air,” said Kora.

  Menikas protested, “You gave me one piece of information.”

  “Laskenay knows the rest. She can tell you.”

  Feeling guilty for shirking her duty, but unable to bear more time with the newly returned royal, Kora left the barn. She avoided the prince’s eye the entire way.

  Bidd and Hal returned with fourteen fish. They were small, but together with Kora’s produce made an adequate meal for the nine remaining Leaguesmen. The group lit an enchanted fire behind the barn—Laskenay used the same adapted cloaking spell as the night they first arrived—and sat around it as the trout broiled. While her companions welcomed Ranler and Menikas, even Lanokas masking his displeasure with his brother, Kora stared at the logs and pictured Zacry and Bennie chatting to distract themselves, discussing their families. No one seemed to notice Kora until dinner was ready. They were all launching questions at Menikas, who refused time and again to answer, until everyone had eaten and twilight fell. The group then moved to the barn, where Laskenay dared to light two tapers; their dim glow cast shadows across the gathering. Bidd and Hayden were whispering, but stopped when Menikas raised his voice.

  “Before we start our briefing, a moment of silence is in order. Since the last time we met we lost two sisters-in-arms. Two spirited women. Two friends. And a brother to one of our number, a boy brave beyond his years who found himself among us at the wrong moment. I think neither Kansten nor Bendelof would take offense when I tell each of you to make Zacry’s welfare your personal vendetta. Let us pledge to vindicate him.”

  Kora lowered her head, her eyes stinging, and Neslan, who sat next to her, put a hand on her back just as Kansten once had done, when Sedder died. Menikas continued after what felt like the longest minute of Kora’s life.

  “No one needs the repercussions of Zalski’s attack explained. It ruined every prospect and ongoing operation to our name. On a positive note, Ranler salvaged enough gold to last through the Tricentennial. As far as after: there will be no after, not for the League. We’ve been compromised one too many times. Our resources are bone dry, or will be, because we’re throwing everything we have at Zalski on the twenty-first of July.

  “The time has come, once and for all, to prove to Herezoth who we are. In case you hold doubt yourselves, we are resilient. We are men who refused and will always refuse to be victimized. We are swift and bold, intelligent and underestimated, all of which will work to our advantage. We will triumph, yes, or tales of our attempt will guide others to raise our banner. We are Zacry Porteg’s hope, and we will not disappoint him.”

  Neslan appeared disconcerted, but not surprised. He let out a slow, heavy breath, his fist closed in resignation. On Kora’s other side, Hayden’s hand shook as he turned to look at his cousin.

  Neslan said, “Not one of Galisan’s men can take part?”

  “Most have families to relocate, and the rest I dared not ask in the end. What if they refused me? Went their own way, with knowledge of our plan? Zalski knows who they are, thanks to Rone, and if he captures them…. As we speak tonight, the sorcerer suspects nothing. If we are to succeed, I can’t stress this enough, we must ensure his ignorance.

  “Know this, all of you, we have our chance for victory. Odds are meaningless next to what truly matters: focus, perspiration, the knowledge that our dreams survive in the breast of every child who longs for justice. If we use our time wisely, every second; if we work past exhaustion; if we do all we can to maximize our effort, the better off we’ll find ourselves. Your life, and that of the person next to you, will be saved or lost by our strategies. Remember that. Let it spur you onward. Let it give you hope and fortitude. We can prevail. We end our campaign at the moment of our choice and in the manner of our liking. That in itself is something to appreciate. We’ve all known people denied that opportunity.”

  The barn descended once more into silence. Kora had known deep pauses in her time with the League, desperate moments that enveloped her w
ith instinct and adrenaline, or the strength of her own emotions: pauses like the one mere minutes before, in honor of her brother. This one was different. She shut her eyes, and she was alone except for the faint scent of tallow wax. Her limbs felt listless, not restless, her brain stuck on the knowledge of the death that waited at the Tricentennial, her death, the death none could experience with her. The intense and utter solitude drained all energy. Even her body felt distant.

  “You’re all looking my way,” said Laskenay. Kora shook off her torpor, and saw that it was so. “You look to me as if I, as if something I could do could change things. The truth is, I have no idea what to tell you. All I can think to say would be trite or repetitive if voiced. What I feel is gratitude for your friendship, and a simple joy in knowing I’ll be with you a little longer. If it comes to death, I’m proud to think my name may be remembered with each of yours.”

  “Wait just a moment,” said Hayden. “Hold up: what if we do kill Zalski? What happens then, if both—forgive the thought—if both Menikas and Lanokas die too? If we all die? I didn’t sign up for anarchy.”

  “There wouldn’t be anarchy,” said Lanokas. “The army would take control. Under the new general.”

  Menikas said, “He’s a sensible man, with a sense of honor. If a legitimate claim to the throne existed—mine, for instance—he’d cede power.”

  Hayden scoffed. “Sure he would.”

  Menikas said, “I know the man personally. I knew him for years before this hell.”

  “What if I don’t trust your judgment? If he’s such a great guy, why isn’t he with us?”

  Kora, Neslan, and Hal all muttered support of Hayden. Menikas raised an eyebrow, but answered what he had to consider the question’s impertinence with civility.

  “You have to understand a military mind. Argint’s a decent man.”

  “So you say,” argued Neslan.

  “Argint’s a decent man,” repeated Menikas, annoyed, “and as far as we know neither planned nor executed Zalski’s coup. A true soldier’s first loyalty is to the military and always will be. Right now, that military is in Zalski’s camp, for the sake of some degree of public order.”