The Swordsman's Oath

by Juliet E. McKenna

  “No one would make you do that.” Temar’s voice rose and he quelled it with an effort. “You’re being ridiculous.”

  “I don’t think so. You’re the last of your line. In any case, my family do insist on the traditional observances, whatever you might choose to do.”

  “Is this about family? Is that it?” Temar could not hide his outrage. “My Name isn’t good enough for you? You know very well D’Alsennin is an ancient house and—”

  “If I wanted to marry some well-groomed stud from an impressive bloodline, I’d have my choice ten times over in Toremal.” Guinalle interrupted Temar acidly. “I’ve had fortune hunters after my father’s coin and rank since Drianon blooded me. Why do you think I study Artifice? Why do you think I asked to join my uncle here?”

  A nasty suspicion reared its head at the back of Temar’s mind and grabbed his tongue before he could stamp it down. “You keep bringing your uncle into this? You’re not related by blood, are you, only marriage. He’s not planning to salvage the Den Fellaemion bloodline with a judicious marriage, is he? That would be very traditional.”

  Guinalle gave Temar’s face a stinging slap. “Don’t be disgusting. You just can’t accept it, can you? You’re so full of yourself that you cannot imagine a girl not falling over herself to marry you!”

  “You were quick enough to lie down with me this summer!” Temar scowled as he heard the pain in his own words, suddenly glad of the darkness hiding his face.

  “That was different, that was fun, it was delightful,” Guinalle’s anger softened with contrition, “but I would never have done it if I had thought you would make so much of it. I’m sorry.”

  Astonishment drove all other feelings out of Temar’s head. “Are you telling me it wasn’t your first time?”

  “Oh Temar, I’m the youngest daughter of a long family. My older sisters were the ones who had to make sure they could stain their wedding sheets convincingly.” A faint giggle escaped Guinalle and a glimpse of moonlight betrayed a smile on her face. “You’ve obviously had little experience of virgins.”

  “I wouldn’t have thought it of you,” spat Temar angrily. “How could you?”

  “Oh really?” Guinalle took a pace toward him. “Tell me, what right have you to judge me? Temar D’Alsennin, the Esquire every chaperone warns their girls not to let him get them behind a curtain? You accused Vahil of garter hunting, didn’t you? What was your score last winter solstice? That was what you would get the girls to wager, wasn’t it? Against your hitting a rune bone with a throwing dagger at twenty paces? According to my brothers, you had the best collection in the cohorts and a fair few girls let you pluck their petals when you claimed your prize didn’t they? Your reputation precedes you, Temar, didn’t you know that? At least I’m discreet!”

  Temar stood amid the wreckage of his hopes, furious with Guinalle, with himself, with everything. He opened his mouth but, before he could speak, Maitresse Den Rannion rounded the corner and halted abruptly at the sight of them.

  “Maitresse, I’m sorry, I was just about to—” Guinalle lifted a hand toward her mouth before realizing she still had the necklace twined around her fingers.

  “My dear, whatever is that?” The Maitresse reached for Guinalle’s hand and lifted it toward a lantern.

  “Why Temar, how splendid!” Her eyes were alight with curiosity. “Are you celebrating Drianon’s festival with something important?”

  “Temar was telling me of the discoveries his expedition made.” Guinalle tried to pass the necklace back to Temar but he stuck his hands stubbornly through his belt.

  “It’s a birth festival gift for Guinalle.” He forced a semblance of a smile. “You were an Aft-Summer baby, weren’t you, demoiselle?”

  Maitresse Den Rannion turned to him, open-mouthed. “Now isn’t that just typical! I was asking Messire Den Fellaemion if any of his household would be celebrating their year at the festival and he told me Guinalle was born in For-Winter! Here, my dear, let me take your lace, you must show off a jewel like that!” She unpinned Guinalle’s tippet before the girl could find a plausible objection and clasped the necklace around her throat. The gem shone rich and brilliant on the soft hollow of her throat. “What a handsome present to make, Temar.”

  “I think the Messire is looking for you, Maitresse.” Temar pointed through the arch of an empty window to where Messire Den Rannion was waiting by the hearth, head turning this way and that.

  “Oh, yes, I think you’re right.” The Maitresse tucked Guinalle’s lace briskly around her own neckline. “I’d better see what he wants.”

  “I’ll go and find Vahil.” Guinalle began hastily to walk away from him but Temar followed. “You do that, my lady. I’ll get Elsire away from those silly girls, shall I? The music’s started so if I dance with her all evening that should give the gossips plenty to go on, shouldn’t it? That should protect your reputation, Guinalle. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone how hollow it really is!”

  Temar strode past, outpacing her with his long legs, catching Elsire around the waist and making her an extravagant bow, keeping his back firmly turned on Guinalle as he swept Elsire into a closer embrace than was quite appropriate for that particular dance.

  The Palace of Shek Kul,

  the Aldabreshin Archipelago,

  6th of For-Summer

  I woke with an image vivid in my mind, a dream so clear I could recall every detail. A young man, black hair drawn back in a silver clasp of wrought leaves and dressed in the style of Messire’s ancestral portraits: So this was Temar D’Alsennin, last scion of a lost line and the man whose sword I now possessed. But this was more than an image, more than a dream. I shook my head at the thought of his conflicting hopes and apprehension for the future, reason yielding to an overwhelming need to make a family to replace the one he had lost in his childhood. I felt his pain at Guinalle’s intransigence, his confusion, sympathized with his blatant flirtation with Elsire, just to let Guinalle know she wasn’t the only squab in the dovecote. In many ways he reminded me of myself twelve years gone. I recognized that impulsiveness, the confidence that had led me into the toils of chewing thassin, above all the intensity of youthful emotion unblunted by more mature experience.

  I shook my head with a faint smile over Temar’s difficulties with Guinalle; at least Livak and I only had ourselves to please when we finally worked out what we wanted from each other and the future, if we ever did. I wondered fleetingly what Livak was doing at that moment.

  It had been a strange dream, mostly seen through Temar’s eyes, but at the same time I had felt separate from him. I was an outsider yet seeing direct into his ambitions and fears in that curious fashion. Above all I was most startled to realize that if I’d met him on the road I would have sworn Temar was the man who had awakened me when the bandits had attacked us on Prosain Heath. What had that been all about? That must have been a dream as well, mustn’t it? I’d recognized that belt buckle too, the one that Elietimm priest or whatever he called himself had been weaving his spells around for Kaeska. It had belonged to Temar; what could that signify? Had it been Temar’s passion erupting into my mind that had sent me insensible in Relshaz? I had no logical reason to think so but felt convinced of it nevertheless.

  I sat up on my pallet and leaned against the wall. This early in the morning the air was still cool and the sounds of birdsong in the gardens filtered through the light shutters, no insects to torment me. I savored the peace and quiet, only broken by the sounds of stealthy house slaves going about their early duties far below. Was this recollection of the long-passed festival the sort of memory that Planir the Archmage had been hoping the sword would pass to me? If so I could not for the life of me see any significance in it, other than perhaps as an object lesson in the many paradoxical ways people can find to fall out with those they love. I looked at the sword. If this was aetheric magic, it seemed no more than a curiosity, a far cry from the vicious enchantments of the Elietimm.

  I had not long c
ome to the conclusion that one of the most irritating things of the many galling facts of life as a slave was the way I hardly ever had a moment to myself to think my own thoughts. Sure enough, just as I was trying to address these mysteries, the door behind me opened and Shek Kul emerged, bare-chested, trousers loosely tied and his tunic slung carelessly over one shoulder. Despite his lack of gems and adornment, the Warlord looked no less intimidating, formidably muscled for a man of his age, self-possession in every fiber of him. He nodded to me, his smile broad with satisfaction, and he padded softly down the corridor, whistling softly under his breath. I watched him go, partly envious of his good fortune and partly resenting him and all his kind, with their unchallenged power over the likes of me.

  I looked through the partly open door to see Laio fast asleep, lying on her stomach in a soft tumble of silken quilts, face child-like in sleep with a lock of hair over her eyes, her nakedness inviting a caressing beam of sunlight that reached through the louvers to finger her smooth thigh. The morning breeze stirred the air in the room, heavy with perfume and the scents of sex.

  Stifling a churlish desire to drag my pallet noisily inside and start a thorough tidy-up, preferably with a rasping floor brush, I pulled the door to and began looking through my clothes for a clean tunic. A booted footfall at the far end of the corridor startled me and I looked up to see the Elietimm priest looking at me, an unpleasant anticipation in his eyes. The man was dressed in plain, inconspicuous clothes, a black tunic and trousers, well washed and somewhat faded, looking no threat to anyone, a supplicant for honest trade. Only those eyes gave him away as far as I was concerned, dangerous as a dog trained only to understand the lash and brutality.

  “Let me see that sword,” he commanded abruptly.

  I looked at him blankly, summoning the expression of polite incomprehension I had been perfecting on Gar.

  “I know who you are, Tormalin man.” The priest halted, hands on his hips, looking down at me with disdain. “You are nothing. All I want is the sword. Let me have that and I will let you live.”

  I stood up, the scabbard in my hand. The priest was no fool; he was staying just out of the reach of the blade. I put my hand to the hilt and saw an odd mixture of apprehension and anticipation in those light-blue eyes, cold as the winter sky.

  “I will have that blade and you as well,” he sneered, my continuing silence evidently needling him. “You will be at my mercy. Before I am done you will be weeping like a whipped child.”

  “I think that it is my place to chastise my own property.” Laio opened the door with a swift movement and stared haughtily at the Elietimm, her eyes hard. Her queenly manner was not diminished in the slightest by the fact that she was inadequately clad in a gossamer undertunic. “Your behavior is hardly respectful, for a guest of Shek Kul,” she added with unmistakable emphasis.

  The Elietimm’s face was wiped clean of expression in an instant and he bowed low to Laio before turning on his heel and stalking rapidly back down the corridor.

  “What a peculiar man.” Laio shook her head in puzzlement. “What is Kaeska thinking of, bringing him here?”

  I seized the moment. “I can tell you exactly what she is planning. I overheard them talking last night.”

  Laio’s eyes brightened. “Excellent. I knew you would learn to be a good slave eventually. Get something for us to eat and you can tell me all about it.”

  She opened the long shutters to the balcony and found a plain, loose dress among the jumble of clothes on a bench, the fact that she was doing things for herself the best evidence that she was seriously interested in what I had to say. I hurried to fetch a plentiful breakfast of unleavened bread, cheese, fruit and juice. I was still ravenous and, anyway, I had learned to make a hearty breakfast whenever I could, it being the meal least likely to spring a nasty surprise on me.

  “So, what did you hear?” Laio demanded, settling herself on a cushion and reaching for some berries. “Tell me everything.”

  I hesitated, wondering exactly where to start. I couldn’t see the whole business of the sword being of any interest to Laio; I had to tell her something directly relevant to her own ambitions and interests. “Well, to start with, I know where that man comes from. It is a group of islands far to the east and north, in the heart of the great ocean. The thing is, they are very poor lands, they have no metal, no wood, no beasts to give them fine leathers. He is lying to Kaeska about the trade he can offer her.”

  Laio shrugged, but I could see satisfaction in her eyes. “Then she will look extremely foolish when she can achieve nothing and she will lose even more status. Go on, and eat something as well. I’ve got things I want to do this morning.”

  “The promises of trade are only an excuse.” I took a hasty drink. “He is telling Kaeska that he will help her bear a child and regain her place as First Wife.”

  To my surprise, Laio laughed heartily. “Then he is as much a fool as she is. Kaeska is barren, we all know that.”

  I chose my next words with extreme care. “She might be barren with Shek Kul but what if she were to take this man as a lover and pass off his child as the Warlord’s?”

  Laio frowned at me. “Shek Kul has no difficulty getting children—women in several domains can attest to that; Mahli took particular care to make sure her first child was of his blood as well. Anyway, if it was only a matter of finding a fertile man, Kaeska would have been pregnant years ago.”

  Now it was my turn to look puzzled. “Wouldn’t Shek Kul have objected?”

  “I keep forgetting how ignorant you can be. Do see sense; the wind may sow the seeds but the farmer who tends the seedlings reaps the harvest.” Laio sighed and shook her head. “It is a wife’s duty to bear children for her husband but it is her business who begets them. After all, some wives are closely related to their husbands, some men cannot get women pregnant, others prefer to go clean-shaven. In any case, we are an island people; bringing new blood to a domain is always beneficial. It’s understood that a good wife will do that with at least one of her children. If we always bred to our own, we would all be three measures tall with six fingers by now.”

  She tossed the stripped berry stem on to the floor and took a spoon to a dark green pod of milky seeds. I drizzled honey on a piece of the leathery flatbread and rolled it around a little white cheese, cramming my mouth full while she was busy talking.

  “Kaeska is definitely barren,” Laio stated firmly through her mouthful. “She has been married to Shek Kul for nearly twenty years and in all that time has never even quickened. If she would only acknowledge the fact she could quite easily retain her status as first wife, trade for a baby from an Islander and rear it herself, for instance. There is no shame in being infertile among civilized people. The whole problem is that Kaeska won’t admit it. She stays away from the domain as much as possible and lets it be rumored that is why she doesn’t conceive; she has been making herself and Shek Kul ridiculous for years, but he has had to indulge her in order to protect his treaty with her brothers, who dote on her as well as benefiting from her rank. She also does everything she can to provoke him into doing something that would entitle her to divorce him, but he’s too clever to let her get away with that. Still, now that her brothers have been ousted from the Danak domains, Shek Kul does not need to protect her status as First Wife any longer. That alliance is as dead as yesterday’s fish. Now our husband can finally get himself some heirs.”

  Laio giggled sunnily. “He and Mahli were busy before Danak Mir’s blood was dry on the sand. I will be next and once Gar has recovered from Kaeska’s demotion, I imagine she will want a child as well. Our husband hasn’t decided yet how long he will keep from her bed, just to make sure she understands he knows about her plots with Kaeska, but I imagine Sezarre will be capable of doing his duty.”

  Nailing his owner was one of a body slave’s duties? I didn’t want to jostle that basket of crabs! “What will happen to Kaeska?”

  “She will end up as Fourth Wife, unless sh
e does something stupid enough to give Shek Kul an excuse to divorce her.” Laio leaned forward, suddenly intent. “Just what is this foreigner promising her? Do you think she might over-reach herself?”

  “I’m not sure,” I replied cautiously, swallowing my mouthful. “He is definitely promising her a child and I know he is using drugs to addle her wits on the subject.”

  “Drugs?” Laio looked thoughtful. “I could do much to discredit Kaeska if I let it be known she was indulging in filthy mainlander habits like that. Her negotiations will soon suffer as well. What about distilled liquor? Did you see any sign of that?”

  I shook my head. “Would that be worse?”

  Laio opened her mouth in exasperation then tossed her head with a sudden smile. “You mainlanders! Of course it would be. Narcotics and strong spirits dull the wits and rot the body; any domain that permits their use soon finds itself with troops on its beaches.” She frowned. “It’s not really enough to get Kaeska divorced though. Is there anything else I can use against her?”

  “She’s been using tahn berries on Irith,” I volunteered.

  “What’s that?” Laio looked mildly curious.

  “It’s a plant; physicians steep its leaves to get a tisane that dulls pain but the berries are very addictive, narcotic, deadly after a while.”

  Laio shrugged. “If Kaeska wants to poison her body slave, that’s her business. If she makes a habit of it, Shek Kul will be entitled to rebuke her for the wasted trade, but other than that he has no rights in the matter.”

  “She’s had the poor bastard’s tongue cut out!” I objected with some heat.

  Laio arched her finely plucked eyebrows. “How odd. Mutes haven’t been fashionable since before I was born. Still, we’re getting away from the point. How does this foreign man propose to get Kaeska with child?”