“I know, my son.” Car’s casual use of the phrase caused Tal’s breath to catch in his throat. “But we can only rarely have what we want in this world. Do you understand me?”
Tal nodded. He didn’t speak for fear his voice would catch with the tears only eight years of training prevented him from shedding.
“I’m sorry, Tal,” Car said softly. “By the Gods, I wish you could come, but I have to go alone.” He squeezed Tal’s shoulder, and then stood. “Go to bed, Tal. Sleep, and we will arrange things in the morning.” His footsteps slowly faded away down the hall.
The next evening, Tal once more sat in the alcove where he’d met Brea’ahrn. He sat cross-legged, facing the city below. The sun slowly sank towards the horizon, but Tal had no eyes for its beauty, seeing only the single figure riding towards the gates.
His day had passed in a whirlwind, as Car prepared to leave, and Tal met his new teacher. He hadn’t had time to really form an opinion of Shej’mahi. All he knew was that the man was the Battle Lord, Master of the Battlemagi.
He would learn more of the man tomorrow he guessed, but that was for tomorrow. Right now, his eyes were only for the rider. Car’raen was leaving. For eight years, Tal had never been far from Car. They’d been teacher and student, father and son. Now Tal was alone.
The sound of a foot shuffling behind him made him realize he’d allowed his warning net to drop. It snapped back into place as he spoke. “I know you’re there,” he snapped into the darkness.
A quiet laugh came from behind him. “I’ve been here for five minutes, Tal’raen,” a voice said behind him. A fur robe swished by him as Brea’ahrn settled down facing him. She nodded out towards the city. “Watching the Hawk leave?”
Tal nodded wordlessly.
“I didn’t expect him to leave this soon,” she said quietly. “I guess I might have, after he spent all day closeted with my parents and Earl Yet’won.” Tal caught her glancing at him before she added, “He’s my father’s closest advisor. The only one of the Earls he really trusts.”
Tal said nothing, his gaze still on the city even after Car had left. He heard Brea sigh. “Tal’raen, I guess we got off to the wrong foot yesterday,” she said quietly. “Thing is, I don’t get along with most people my age here. The nobles are a bunch of arrogant lordlings, and the Mage Initiates… well…”
“They’re a bunch of arrogant magelings,” Tal finished.
“In a way, I guess,” Brea admitted with a shrug. “You’re not, not really. You don’t disregard anything not magic as worthless.” She gestured at his sword. “Plus, I think my mother is going to almost adopt you.” She smiled, her face seeming to light like the sun, and offered her hand. “We’re going to be stuck with each other anyway, so… friends?”
Tal hesitated a moment, then took her hand and shook. “Yeah, why not?” he agreed. “It looks like I’m stuck here for a while.”
She smiled at him again, and this time he returned a smile of his own. “Now, to the other reason I came here,” she told him. “My illustrious mother told me that if I saw you, I was to request – translate that as request and require – that you join us for a private supper.”
“She figured you’d be seeing me, did she?” Tal asked, unable to stop himself arching his eyebrow in question.
“Well, no…” Brea admitted with a shrug, “she didn’t address that to me, but to a couple of Kingsmen. However, unlike them, I figured I knew where you’d be. So here I am.”
“So here you are,” Tal agreed. “I guess I shall accede to your mother’s Royal Command.” He stood, unfolding his form with only a hint of stiffness. He offered his hand to help Brea to her feet. “Shall we?”
Brea walked through the cold stone corridors of the High Citadel with a smile upon her face. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was happy, but she had no objection at all to the feeling.
The halls of the High Citadel were ancient, magically carved granite polished to the shine of marble – and frozen at that shine. Despite the odd beauty of the walls, it was still clear that the Citadel had been built as a fortress against all enemies. It had been built during the rise of the Four, before they had built the shek’maji’hil, creating the Waste and the Great Swarm to buy them immortality.
Brea’s thoughts of ancient history were interrupted by a group of flashily dressed nobles. She stepped aside politely to let them pass, but they stopped.
She felt her smile fade to a tight-lipped grimace as she recognized Shel’nart. What does he want? she wondered.
He gave her an exaggerated bow, and she quashed her irritation. Mostly. “What is it, Nart?” she asked, her lips moving into what might have been called a smile. To address someone solely by their patronym was a rather nasty insult, implying they had no real identity of their own.
She saw Shel’s smile flicker, then return. Obviously he thought he had something to return her insult with. He stood up from his bow.
“My lady Brea’ahrn,” he greeted her. “I have wonderful news.”
Brea simply glared at him, but it simply slid off the armor of whatever it was that was cheering him up. “And what makes you think I care about anything you know?” she asked pointedly.
“Well, it does involve you, milady,” Shel said, his smile smoothly changing to a grin. “My father has informed me that the negotiations between him and your father appear to be reaching a conclusion.”
Negoations? What sort of negotiations? Then Brea felt the bottom drop out of her stomach as his grin turned feral.
“They will be announcing the plans for our betrothal within the week,” Shel said simply, grinning at her.
Brea snapped. She took three steps forward and hit him across the side of the head. She’d been trained as a Jelt’nar, and only barely managed to pull the lethality of the blow. Shel still went stumbling across the room, blinking his eyes against the blow.
“You dared, you miserable little louse?” she snapped.
Shel managed to pull himself to his feet and touched the side of his face, which would most likely be sporting an impressive bruise later. “I would watch that little arrogant streak if I were you, Brea,” he told her. “If you don’t get rid of it before we are married, I’ll have to beat it out of you.” His feral grin returned. “Of course, I refuse to have my betrothed playing with magic. You might hurt someone.”
Brea took one step towards him before regaining control, breathing deeply. Shel took several steps backward, and laid his hand on his swordhilt. She felt the anger boiling under her careful control. “I think you will be surprised at how little authority even my father has over a Mage Initiate,” she told the little slime coldly. “I would rather die than marry a louse like you, but I am a Mage. Only I choose my husband, which means you should probably return to beating up tavern wenches. After all, they’re more likely to marry you, and unlike me, you can beat them.” With that, she turned and stormed away.
The Kingsman guard stopped Brea in the tapestry-decorated corridor outside the upstairs conference room’s heavy wooden door. “Your father left orders not to be disturbed,” he told her gently.
She fixed him with her coldest glare. “Let me through, Kingsman,” she commanded.
“I’m sorry, milady Brea,” he said with a shake of his head, “but I can’t.”
Brea switched her eyes from the soldier to the wooden door behind him. The door seemed to twitch, and then burst into growth. Branches of the suddenly resurrected tree wrapped themselves around the soldier, pulling him to one side as the door shattered.
She stalked past the immobilized guard and over the scattered remnants of the heavy door, each piece trying desperately to grow roots into the stone. Her father faced the shattered door, half-risen from his chair. Three other men, the two High King’s Generals and Earl Yet’won, shared the table with him.
“You dared!” she hissed at her father, ignoring the other men. “You dare try to dictate this to me?!”
Kelt’ahrn, High King of Vishni, slowly
rose to his feet. “Gentlemen,” he said quietly, “if you would give me and my daughter some privacy.” His tone was quiet, but the men acceded to his request wordlessly. As the men left, as quickly as they could, he turned back to his daughter.
“What, exactly, have I ‘dared’ to do?” he asked.
“You know damned well what you dared,” Brea snapped. “What makes you think you have the right to dictate my marriage to me?”
“Ah,” her father replied, his tone still quiet and calm. “Have a seat, Brea.” He waited a moment, but Brea simply glared at him. He sighed. “Brea, you are my daughter. Arranging your marriage is my right, indeed, it is my responsibility. You have grown too bold, too far from what a lady should be.”
“You have no right to even consider betrothing me to that slime Shel’nart,” Brea retorted.
Kelt’s face hardened. “I have the right to marry you to anyone I choose,” he told her flatly. “You will not speak ill of your intended.”
Brea faced her father squarely. “Father, I am a Mage,” she reminded him. “The only person who decides who I marry is me. You don’t have that authority, and I will not, ever, marry Shel’nart. If you need someone to whore for your political alliances, do it yourself.”
Even as she said it, Brea knew the last sentence was going too far. Kelt’arhn lunged to his feet, upsetting his chair. His face was red with anger. “I am your father and I am your High King!” he bellowed, his calm deserting him. “You will obey me in this.”
Brea locked gazes with him, her fear swept away by a cold fury. “No. I won’t,” she replied coldly. “The Council of Seven will back me, for you seek to deny one of the oldest rights of a Mage.” She felt her voice slide to the temperature of ice. “Will you truly alienate your strongest allies to try and force me into this?” Kelt began to move towards her fiercely, but stopped as she slid unconsciously into a combat stance. “I would rather die than be a whore for your alliance.”
If the door had still been intact, she would have broken it down with her bare hands.
Brea entered the practice grounds, passing through on her way to meet her Jelt’nar teacher. The salle for the unarmed combat disciplines took up a quarter of the grounds, the rest being dedicated to training with weapons.
A flash of movement drew her eye, and she glanced towards it. Glancing into one of the smaller salles, intended for one-on-one practice duels or general practice, she saw Tal. He was dressed in the exact same style of plain black tunic she’d always seen him in, running through a kata with his longsword.
The motions he went through seemed familiar and strange at the same time. For a moment she thought it was an exercise she recognized, one of the most basic exercises of the Tal’var, but then she began to notice the differences. For one thing, he was moving much faster than the novices she’d seen going through that exercise. For another, the motions were different. It was difficult to tell, because of the speed and the subtlety of the motions, but they were. She realized that she’d never seen the exercise he was performing – and that it was probably a lot more difficult than she might think.
Tal suddenly stopped. He lowered his blade and turned towards her. Brea saw him smile slightly and beckon her over. She returned the smile with a regal nod of her own, and joined him.
“What’s with the stormclouds?” he asked.
Brea looked at him in confusion. “What?”
“Brea, you look like a storm about to break on some poor bastard,” he observed with a gentle smile. “What’s wrong?”
She sighed and shook her head slightly. “It’s my father,” she said shortly. “I can’t really talk about it.” That, at least, was clear in Brea’s mind. No matter how good a friend Tal was becoming, he wasn’t family. She would keep family squabbles in the family for as long as possible.
Tal nodded. “I think I understand.” He seemed to hesitate, then reached out and gripped her shoulder gently. “If you need someone to talk to about it, though,” he told her with a small shrug, “I’m sure you can find me.”
She began to smile at him, comforted by his words.
“And just what do you think you’re doing with my betrothed?” a voice suddenly snapped from behind them. The two youths spun to face the door, where Shel’nart stalked in, an ugly look on his face.
Tal’s hand fell from Brea’s shoulder as he looked to her. “Betrothed?” he asked, his eyebrow doing that damn arching thing again.
“In his dreams, and in hell,” she snapped. She turned to Shel’nart. “Get lost, Shel. We are not betrothed, and never will be.”
“I, and both our fathers, disagree, I’m afraid,” Shel told her, smiling condescendingly, then grabbed her arm in a vice-tight grip. “Now, my dear intended, we must go. There are people who must hear the good news.”
Brea struggled to break Shel’s grip, but he’d chosen his leverage well. “Get your filthy hands off me, you misbegotten bastard son of an ape,” she snarled.
“You’re coming with me, Brea,” Shel said, his voice twisted with something, either rage or lust, Brea didn’t know – or want to know – which.
Brea began to pull away from Shel, swinging around to bring a leg to bear against his. Then Shel was suddenly no longer holding her arm, but was nearly two meters away, against the wall.
“I think not,” another voice said coldly. Brea had forgotten about Tal, and so, apparently, had Shel. Now he stepped forward to stand next to Brea, facing the man his magic had just thrown across the room. Brea felt something different in his aura, a… focus, was the right word, she guessed.
“The lady asked you to unhand her,” Tal told the noble, his voice almost conversational. “She shouldn’t have needed to even ask once.”
“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?” Shel snarled.
“Protecting a friend,” Tal retorted. Brea saw his hand settle on his sword hilt. “I’d suggest you stay away from the lady, ape.” He followed up Brea’s earlier insult without even pausing.
Shel pulled himself to his feet. “I demand satisfaction!” he snarled, his voice ringing harshly in Brea’s ears. “I demand that you meet me with steel, no magic, no tricks. Just you and me with steel in our hands.”
Tal simply shrugged. Turning to face Brea, he knelt. “My Lady Initiate Brea’ahrn,” he said formally, “I request your permission to fight this man in your name and for you honor.”
Brea hesitated. She knew Shel’nart was a very good swordsman. However, she’d seen Tal performing his exercises, and knew that he, too, was very good. Her eyes met Tal’s. He offered. I never asked, but he offered to do what I cannot do myself. She nodded regally.
“My lord and friend, Initiate Tal’raen,” she replied, quietly formal herself, “I accept you as my Champion in this. You fight for my honor.”
Tal smiled at her, then returned to his feet, facing Shel’nart. “I accept your challenge,” he said flatly, “and will meet you for Princess Brea’ahrn.”
His face turned slightly pale by a clearly unexpected turn of events, Shel’nart nodded anyway. Challenge could not be withdrawn once made. “So be it.” The words fell into the quiet of the small salle like millstones.
“You two can’t do this!” the Armsmaster exclaimed. “You’re too young.”
“Challenge has been issued and accepted, old man,” Shel’nart responded. “We will meet. You can’t stop us.”
The old warrior’s eyes glanced from Shel to Tal, and then to Brea. He locked eyes with her for a moment, and she returned his gaze calmly. How she managed to do it with the turmoil inside her she didn’t know, but she did it.
He shook his head. “You damn fools,” he told them harshly. “You’re right, I can’t stop you. But I can limit you. This duel ends at first blood, no more. Understood?”
Tal nodded, and then Shel followed more angrily.
The Armsmaster shook his head again, but led them to a small secondary practice field. A few gestures cleared it of the handful of Kingsmen training the
re. Another directed Shel’nart to the other end.
Brea stood there, somehow controlling her turmoil as she watched the two men, her friend and her enemy, face each other across the packed dirt of the training field.
They both began warm-up exercises. She recognized Shel’s exercise as the one most commonly used by Vishnean knights. Tal’s was the same as it had been when she’d seen him earlier.
She glanced over to the Armsmaster, to find him staring at Tal with a suddenly white face. A moment later, he walked quietly forward to Tal’s side.
Brea followed closely enough that she heard what he said. “Don’t hurt him too badly, milord,” the Armsmaster asked, his voice nearly begging. “He may be a fool, but he has potential.”
Tal’s response sounded distant and cold, as if he was distracted somehow. “You said first blood,” he said simply. “First blood it will be.”
The Armsmaster nodded. He looked unsatisfied with that answer, but withdrew anyway.
Brea faced him as he returned. “Why are you worried about Shel?” she demanded. “He’s a Tal’var of the Seventh Circle.” Most soldiers and knights would not achieve Seventh until they were full adults, likely not till their twentieth year at the earliest. For most, Seventh was as high as they would reach, but Shel had it now, at sixteen, and looked to continue studying the sword.
The old warrior looked at Brea sadly. “He should learn to pick his challenges more carefully,” he said quietly.
“Why?” Brea hissed.
“You saw that exercise Tal was doing?” he asked. Once Brea nodded in response to his question, he continued: “That exercise is only taught to swordsmen of the Ninth Circle and above.”
The Ninth? She stared at the Armsmaster in shock. There were only twelve Circles. To hold Ninth at fifteen… was unheard of.
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