Guardian Last (Lords of Syon Saga Book 2)

by Jordan MacLean

  “You know me, Tridian. You know my voice. We entered the breach at Kadak’s stronghold side by side.”

  “Tero.” Gods be praised, you yet live, he wanted to shout. In spite of his position, he almost laughed with joy at seeing his old comrade. He felt the glares at his back and gathered his wits. “When Brannagh fell, I…” He swallowed the lump in his throat. “Is that Lwyn with the bow? How many others––?”

  “Enough. Enough to defeat these boys you brought.” He saw Tridian start to protest, and he raised a hand to silence him. “We have watched your preparations for war, the season.” He peered at Tridian. “But you did not know we were among the Dhanani. You had no idea.”

  “Comes-before they see us and not one of them knows we are here.I watch, comes after you say ‘Brannagh,’ and I see their surprise. His men keep no secrets with their eyes.” Lwyn laughed. “Oh, I look to enjoy cleaning their purses at a game of chance, comes-a-day.”

  “No, i’faith,” Tridian answered candidly. He saw no reason to lie. “We did not know you were here.”

  “I see.” Tero glanced at the chief, who stood scowling as Aidan translated the conversation to him. “Then have you underestimated the strength of the Kharkara tribes so badly that you bring fewer than four score of men against them? Look around you. Just the men gathered here number four hundred strong. You will have no victory or honor here. Tridian, you must yield.”

  “No, my Lord,” whispered one of the knights at the knight commander’s back, one he did not know by voice. “Do not listen to him. You must not yield. The duke charged us to destroy the Knights of Brannagh. We see now that we failed in that mission, but we have opportunity to redress our error and fulfill our present mission. Sir, for Wirthing’s––”

  “Honor? Is that what you were going to say, son? For Wirthing’s honor?” Tridian looked around at his men, then looked up at Tero. The two seasoned soldiers’ eyes met, and they understood each other. “Honor, courage…I see little of either in this new world of ours.”

  “You look only at Wirthing.” Lwyn snorted.

  “Now see here,” Tridian protested. “I really must insist…”

  “What set you against us at Brannagh, Tridian? Wirthing honor?” Tero lowered his voice. “Surely not your own.”

  Lwyn laughed. “A high price I pay to see such a rare bird as Wirthing honor, comes-a-day.”

  Tridian shut his eyes, unable to speak the words required of him. He was silent a moment too long.

  “Honestly, my Lord Tridian!” his lieutenant seethed. “Will you let these insults to the earl stand unanswered?”

  “Honor demands,” the knight commander said at last, feeling a hot flush of shame and rage rising into his face, “that we men of Wirthing fulfill our orders and destroy Brannagh.”

  “Wirthing is scum.” Tero barked, “His orders mean nothing––”

  “Had the order come from Wirthing himself, I would still be bound to fulfill it. But the order came from Trocu, Duke of Damerien. That is,” he allowed, “we were told it came from His Grace.”

  Tero stared at him, reading him to the depths of his soul. “You do not believe it.”

  Again, the silence into which the knight commander should have spoken his instant answer stretched on much longer than it should have, and he could feel the prickle of accusation rising behind him. The worst accusation of all: treason. Lord Tridian opened his mouth to give answer then closed it again, keenly aware that his men were watching him.

  Glory hounds of Brannagh…

  He looked at the dead soldier sprawled backward across his horse’s rump, then around at the other men and a slow shudder of horror spread along his spine. They had never questioned because the order to destroy Brannagh was exactly what they had wanted to hear. And those who had not wanted to hear it––himself and the other veteran knights whose years of service to the Earl––had had too much discipline to question those orders, especially with the urgency with which they were given. He wondered if, like him, the others had faced the same sleepless nights.

  “We were told so.”

  Tero crossed his arms. “By Wirthing?”

  “Aye, even he.”

  “You believe his word, comes after the sheriff’s little son’s-daughter dies by Wirthing’s knights?” came Lwyn’s voice from the cleft.

  “We had heard rumors, but…” he trailed off, sick at the weak sound of conciliation in his voice. Then he looked up at Tero, his voice stronger. “Do you have proof that the order did not come from the duke? If so, I will surrender my forces to you at once and put myself at your mercy. Otherwise, I offer you the opportunity to surrender yourselves.”

  Tero watched him for a moment, then turned to Bakti. “Tridian of Namor would not be this blind.” He looked away. “I do not know this man.”

  Bakti nodded and the Dhanani shifted together.

  Behind Tridian, his knights and soldiers likewise readied for battle

  “Blind how?” he protested, his former comrade’s words withering his soul like death in his veins. “I am a Knight Commander of Wirthing! My Lord gave me an order! What was I to do?”

  “Think!” Lwyn shouted. “You come upon sickly farmer as ally against Brannagh! Then strange magen! And you do not think, ‘why just feeble Wirthing, and not also formidable Tremondy and Windale, to bark at Brannagh’s gate for plague and death?’”

  The words burned in Tridian’s ears. The battle had been such a chaotic jumble. They’d arrived indeed expecting to find forces from all the noble houses arrayed against Brannagh, but they were the only ones––they and the very Brannagh farmers whom he’d been led to believe were afflicted and were also to be put down. Wirthing had made a show of cursing the other houses for having no stomach for what needed to be done and had rallied his own men to redouble their courage for the fight. And in the madness that followed, to his eternal shame, Tridian had to admit that he had not allowed himself to wonder why.

  “Comes after you fight Brannagh, and still you do not think, ‘why the earl sends us to kill Damerien ally Dhanani?’ Still you do not question. Still you do not see.”

  “You cannot mean to suggest that Wirthing would overthrow His Grace!” Tridian snapped. “Such an accusation would be unthinkable”

  “Unthinkable?” Tero cocked his head. “And yet you thought it. We have no need to suggest. You see it for yourself.”

  “Such an accusation cannot go unanswered!” He drew his sword, tears of rage streaming down his face. He had no choice. He found himself on the wrong side of this battle, and he would likely die at the hands of honorable men defending his treasonous Lord Wirthing.

  “Your men die comes-after such pride, Commander.” Lwyn lowered his bow slightly. “What brings you thinking that, hale and strong in arms, armor and allies, we fall, comes-after you and a thousand more fail to kill us as we lie sick abed at Brannagh? Come, what brings you this thinking? Your position?” He sneered down at them. “Your numbers?”

  “We defend the honor of Corin of Wirthing, an we prevail!”

  Tero glowered. “An you do not?”

  “An we do not,” Tridian said quietly, his expression hardening, “we die for our crimes.”

  “Indeed.” In that one word, he knew that Lwyn understood.

  “So be it,” murmured Tero. He looked at Bakti, who nodded.

  The battle, like so many since the war’s end, was not a lengthy, glorious pageant of bravery and sacrifice and of good against evil of the kind that fills tapestries, songs and stories. The songs, the stories, the tapestries… These can never fully capture the sights and smells and sounds of war, nor should they. They are meant to capture the good that comes of war, not the evil, and every war breeds both. No one wonders why the great houses display tapestries of their victories and not their defeats. But it is this very tendency to sing of the good and the glory and the valor of war and to hide away the darkness that breeds the desire for war in young hearts.

  Wirthing’s younger knigh
ts, those who felt they’d missed their war and leapt to embrace these battles, however small and petty, learned this lesson too late. Before the sun fell below the horizon, too many of Wirthing’s men were dead, heads and bodies crushed to jelly through their armor by the deadly xindraga or shot through with arrows.

  After the battle, the Dhanani killed the injured horses for meat and captured the rest, adding them to the Dhanani herds “to be trained properly,” as Bakti had ordered. Only three Dhanani had been killed, likewise young and impetuous boys eager to prove themselves in battle, and a handful more were injured beyond cuts and scrapes.

  Of Wirthing’s men, but a score survived, all of them badly injured and unable to continue the fight. Five had begged for death on account of the gravity of their wounds and had been accommodated with reluctance. The rest had been sedated and were placed under Aidan’s care while the tribe’s other healers tended to their own injured.

  “Lord Tridian. Can you hear me?”

  He fought his way out of the strange, heavy sleep toward the sound of the woman’s voice. His mouth felt dry, horribly dry, and he could barely speak, and his ribs hurt when he drew breath. “Madam,” he rasped without opening his dry eyes. “Tridian of Namor, at your service.”

  “Indeed, and such is my dearest hope. But it is I who am at your service just now,” she smiled, putting a cup of cool water to his lips.

  The cool of the water in his mouth, wetting his chapped lips and tongue, was the sweetest ecstasy of his life. He reached to grab for the cup, desperate to guzzle the water down and beg for more. And he cried out with the pain of lifting his arm.

  “Ah, I will hold the cup for you. Slowly, now. You must have a care not to drink overmuch. Your stomach is still much shrunken and likely to be peevish. It would not do for you to purge while your ribs are mending.”

  “My…ribs…”

  “Indeed, yes. Your ribs all along your left side, your arm, your collar bone and your shoulder––all broken to bits, I’m afraid. You are no longer in danger, praise the gods. Had you not fallen from your horse just as you did, you might well have punched a hole through your lungs and your heart with one piece or another. There’s a last bit of healing yet to be done, but I wanted to speak to you first.” She gave him another sip of water. “Aidan tells me that, if possible, you should be awake and upright for this portion of your healing, that the bones might be set properly to bear weight. But it might be rather uncomfortable.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” he murmured. Aidan. Why did that name seem familiar to him? Now that his tear glands were working again, he blinked his eyes open, but he was not prepared for what he saw. Sitting on the edge of his bed and ministering to him was Lady Glynnis of Brannagh dressed in a Syonese gown, but built of Dhanani battle leather, her long coppery silver hair flowing about her shoulders in the most scandalous fashion for a noblewoman. Dreaming. He was still dreaming. But…something about this dream warranted alarm.

  Brannagh.

  Dhanani.

  The sudden sharp understanding of his situation and that it was not a dream at all sent him scrambling off the bed, at which point he went unconscious at once with the pain. Lwyn and Aidan caught him as he slumped down and moved him back into the bed.

  Nara and Aidan looked the knight over carefully, examining his ribs and his shoulder. “At least he did no new harm, jumping up as he did,” the nun allowed, “praise…the gods,” she added, glancing at Aidan, “though he did himself no favor for the pain.” She waved a hand across his brow, and instantly his body relaxed. “Perhaps tomorrow, madam,” the old nun said, touching her shoulder. “Tomorrow, we can begin anew.”

  Tomorrow, Glynnis thought to herself, rising. She looked over the makeshift cots of wounded knights. Yes. Tomorrow she would begin to rebuild.

  Twenty-Five

  The Landbridge

  Renda walked her patrol as she had every night, occasionally looking to the east where Gikka and Chul had gone to scout ahead in the darkness. She chided herself for watching across the expanse of muck and mire for them. She would not see them return, even if they did return on her watch. Still she looked that way, as always, anxious for their safety and anxious to hear their news.

  Depleted in number as they were and with two wounded, the knights could not afford to rush headlong into another battle, but neither could they dally on the landbridge. Their pace was a careful balance of haste and caution. The end of the landbridge, for all that it broadened as it approached Byrandia, was yet only so wide. It was a span readily patrolled by a small force. One way or another, the Syonese knights would have to cross that way into Byrandia.

  For the last tenday, the landbridge had broadened steadily to both sides until now, they could no longer see or even hear the water, and the sea bottom coral reefs had given way to short rocky crags jutting up above the silt that looked tide worn. On a hillside far away and southward, she saw a constant light high on a cliff wall, or perhaps in a tower. Beyond that, Gikka had said she thought she could see a band of faint flickering glow, as of a city. She had wanted to take the boy and scout the city ahead, but Renda had said no, not yet. There was no telling what they would find, especially in a coastal city, and she would not send Gikka and Chul to scout until they were all closer. The city would be the knights’ first stop in Byrandia, a place to resupply and establish a foothold, and the closer they got to the city, the more likely they were to be ambushed.

  The demons had retreated, but that was days and days ago. They might still be running in terror through the Byrandian countryside, but she thought it more likely, assuming the creatures here were like those on Syon, that their initial panic had eased not long after they entered familiar territory. Soon after that, they would regroup for a new assault, or, more likely, given their advantage in knowing exactly where the knights had to pass, they would set an ambush. Assuming they still intended to stop the knights, such an attack would be imperative.

  Every day that passed along this singular route and every night that they spent camped along the way, their danger grew. Sitting still, even for the few hours they stopped each night to eat and sleep, the few remaining knights and their small retinue were far too vulnerable to attack. Once the knights were off the landbridge and into Byrandia proper, the strange fellowship of demons and mages would find them much more difficult to track, unless, of course, the entire land was overrun, as was her fear.

  As they approached Byrandia, the knights were at more and more of a disadvantage in that their enemy was retreating into familiar territory or at least territory they had seen before, while for the knights, the terrain was completely unknown. With no supply chain from Syon, they would be at the mercy of what they could find along the way in Byrandia. She supposed it was a small blessing, then, that they had only a handful of men and women with them.

  So much remained unknown. The mages had not originated on Syon and were somehow allied to demons in Byrandia, but somewhere ahead was the one who had sent them, someone had chosen to attack Syon, though her father had no idea who. What the duke knew of it and how it bound up with the prophecy that seemed to loom over them…. She looked back toward the hasty lean-to where the duke slept. What he knew, she would learn when he needed her to know. She was a soldier, and she trusted his leadership. She could accept that. She only hoped he knew where he was leading them and why.

  Even so, every night while she was on patrol, she ran the prophecy fragments through her mind, searching for some hidden bit of information she had missed. Doing so was futile, of course. Even if the description of a place were laid quite bare, as was rarely the case in prophecy, it would likely be lost on her since she had no knowledge of Byrandia at all. That, and she had only the B’radikite fragments of the prophecy anyway, and she suspected her father and the duke had little more. Still, lacking anything else to keep her awake on her patrol, her mind would not stop worrying at the pieces.

  She drew a breath of cold air into her lungs and felt a thrill of excitemen
t along her spine. Before long, they would set foot on a continent that no one of Syon had visited in millennia. She laughed at herself for putting such importance on it. After all, was she not standing right now on ground that no one had set foot upon in millennia? But Byrandia was different. It was the birthplace of their civilization, the old homeland so many had fled whether because they were mages or because they sought a frontier away from the judgments of a decaying society.

  She had heard stories and legends, most likely myths colored by the embellishments of the bards across generations, but never had she considered the possibility of seeing Byrandia for herself, so occupied had she been with Syon’s own problems. Great gleaming cities built of gemstones, sparkling glass towers rising into the clouds. Impossible, fantastical stories for children, to be sure. But then she thought of the demons and felt her spirits sink. Whatever cities they find might be no more than decaying ruins, overrun with death and brutality.

  Either way, here she stood, on the precipice of another unexpected adventure.

  Another adventure bought with Pegrine’s blood.

  She stopped and looked back over the camp and over the men and women who had followed herself and her father this far. Shanth, easily the youngest of the knights, only a few years older than Jath and Chul, lay sprawled to the sky atop a saddle blanket, as always, with no covering but his own clothing, his cloak laid by where he’d kicked it off himself in his sleep, even while his breath fogged the night air. Just looking at him made her draw her mantle up closer against the cold.

  He’d become a knight on the eve of their entry into Kadak’s stronghold, and up to that point, he could have counted the number of demons he’d seen on one hand. Somehow still, even after the battle at the Lacework, he slept with a depth that only a child could know. The sleep of the innocent.

  Not far from him, Kerrick and Amara were also getting a few hours of sleep. She wished she could have allowed them a fire, but the night was warm enough that she could not risk it. So, after having completed their watch, they had huddled together against the cold beneath their heavy woolen cloaks and talked in low voices, eventually dropping off to sleep. Occasionally, Amara would mutter in her sleep, and Kerrick’s arm would tighten around her to calm her.