by Dave Duncan
Blades typically resisted release vehemently, but Hoare was always an exception to rules. He beamed. “I want to go off and rot at a place called Sheer, whose lord has a most gorgeous daughter of seventeen with the sort of breasts that inspire poets to write epics.”
“You mean sonnets.”
“Not in this instance.”
“Is she crazy enough to want a lecherous, broken-down swordsman?”
“She is mad about me. So is her father, but I can fight him off. No, I mean he approves of me as a man, but he doesn’t want his only child tied to court, that’s all.”
With wistful thoughts of Kate, Durendal congratulated him. Times were a-changing when the Guard’s most celebrated rake settled into matrimony. He wondered how many more Blades had such ambitions.
“You won’t mind,” Hoare said, “will you, if I go and tell her now?”
As he ran out, he almost knocked over the wench bringing the bottle of sack. Durendal sent it back to the cellar and proceeded to explore Guard headquarters. The first door he opened revealed an assembly of seven bored Blades playing dice and drinking. All of them dated from after his time, except Felix, one of his old classmates, but they all leaped to their feet to embrace him and welcome him back to the world of the living.
Touched, he broke the news that he was their new commander.
“Ha!” Felix bellowed. “Now you’ll see some changes, you slipshod tadpoles! Now you’ll find your backbones stiffened.”
“Quite possibly,” Durendal said. “And you can start by carrying a message for me, brother. Kindly inform Mother Superior that the commander of the Royal Guard needs to see her at once upon a matter of extreme urgency. Don’t mention my name. I give you fifteen minutes.”
When the formidable and somewhat breathless lady was ushered into the ostentatious office, she recoiled in horror at the sight of the man behind the great desk. A wrinkling of her nose suggested that the taint of the Samarinda conjurement had not yet faded very much. She herself had brought the same penetrating odor of lavender.
“Do be seated, Mother,” Durendal said without rising. “His Majesty has just appointed me to succeed Commander Hoare. I am exceedingly concerned about the King’s safety, a matter on which I have overriding authority, of course.” He scowled at a handful of papers he had snatched at random from a drawer. “These schedules!”
She perched stiff-backed and awkward on the edge of a chair designed for lounging. “What schedules, Commander?”
He assumed a threatening glower. “About an hour ago, Mother, I took a very obvious conjurement into His Majesty’s presence. I was not challenged until I was less than twenty feet from our sovereign lord. That is clearly unacceptable.”
“But…”
“Yes?”
“Nothing. Do continue.”
“I intend to.” He slapped the unoffending documents. “I am going to double all the guards on the palace. That will apply to both Blades and White Sisters, of course.”
She gasped and clutched both hands to her monumental hat, as if it were about to fall off. “Double? You mean His Majesty wishes to contract for additional assistance from our Order?”
“No, I regret that the budget will not allow hiring more staff. Advise your charges that they will be working double shifts from now on.”
The old witch glared at him. “I do not believe this!”
Durendal was ashamed to discover that bullying could be a pleasurable occupation in certain circumstances. “If I fail to have your complete cooperation, Mother, I shall lodge a complaint with the Privy Council—just see if I don’t!”
She colored in fury. She chewed her lip for a moment. Just when he had concluded that she was going to call his bluff, she said, “I investigated your previous inquiry, Commander. There was a Sister Kate, as you said. She resigned from the White Sisters almost five years ago, which is why she had slipped my mind.”
“Indeed?”
“Indeed.”
They eyed each other appraisingly, like fencers after a first exchange. He dropped the papers on the floor and leaned back in the chair. “And where is she now?”
“Our last information is that she returned to her parents’ home.”
“Married?”
“I understand not.”
“In that case—and only in that case—I wish you would find her for me. I shall be posting the new duty rosters in…let me see—three days?”
She stood up. “Make it four!”
After so many years, what was one more day? “Four it is.” He rose and bowed across the desk to her. “I look forward to working with you, Mother, on all matters pertaining to the safety of His Majesty.”
“It will be interesting,” she said as she swept out.
5
After the King had been safely seen off to bed that night and guards posted, the Commander was treated to a private supper in the Chancellor’s opulent suite, and that august personage rewarded him by returning his sword breaker. Montpurse had aged less than anyone, for his hair had always been ash blond and he had not lost it. He even retained his Blade trimness inside vestments as sumptuous and bulky as the King’s. Despite his disclaimers, he did not seem to be finding the golden chain too onerous. His worst burden, he said, was the King’s creation of the office of private secretary and the man he had chosen to be the first incumbent.
“Then why don’t we drink to his swift but painful demise?”
“An excellent suggestion!” The Chancellor refilled the glasses. “Kromman is a hagfish. He attaches himself and sucks out the life. Tell me what he did in Samarinda.”
Cautiously Durendal asked, “How much do you know already?”
Montpurse’s eyes were still the color of skimmed milk and could still twinkle in candlelight. “More than the King suspects. He swallowed some tale of the philosophers’ stone and threw away a few lives on it. But one of his strengths is that he’s never afraid to try something new. That’s rare in aristocrats, you know? I hear you lost a good Blade. Was there anything behind the legends?”
“Quite a lot. Everman would have been after your time….”
Even to Montpurse, he told little. Just a few words seeping back to the younger Blades would give the King that blood feud he did not want.
As evening drifted toward morning the Chancellor became quite talkative, passing on valuable information about ministers and nobles and even some noteworthy commoners in Parliament, supplying Durendal with an expert’s eye view of Chivian government. But then he returned to the subject of Master Secretary Kromman.
“He is definitely after my job. I’d give it to him gladly if I thought I could escape with my life.” That was a gentle twisting of the truth, of course. It was obvious by now that Montpurse reveled in being chancellor. “And when he has stuck my head on a spike, I am sure he will go after yours.”
“I’ll drink to that as an order of battle. Er, not tonight, though. I seem to have reached my limit.”
“Oh, I’ll come first, no question. He’s efficient, Master Hagfish. He can lie to you, but you can’t lie to him. The King realized his mistake very quickly. He was going to remedy it back into the cesspool it came out of, but now you’ve changed all that.”
“Me? You’re saying that I saved Kromman’s job?”
The Chancellor sighed and refilled his glass. “I fear so. Court intrigue is very like fencing in some ways: thrust, parry, feint, riposte. Where was I? Oh, yes. You convinced the King that Kromman is a liar, right? And had actually lied to him. So now the King has a noose he can drop around Kromman’s neck any time he wants. That increases his value immensely. I’m truly surprised Ambrose would put an incorruptible like you in charge of the Guard. He likes to use people he can menace.”
“You are calling me incorruptible? What are you guilty of—clandestine nose picking?”
“Many things. Letting His Majesty believe he could fence worth a spit, for example, until a braver man than I rubbed his nose in the truth.”
Montpurse laughed. “Never forget, Leader, that the best player in the game is Ambrose himself.”
“I don’t like the game. I don’t want to be part of it.”
“You will. It grows on you.”
By the following noon, Durendal had interviewed every member of the Guard. Far too many of them were of his own generation, those who remembered the Nythia campaign. He made tactful inquiries about romances, ambitions, outside interests. He discovered that Ambrose had not visited Ironhall in more than eight months and Grand Master’s reports told of a dozen ready seniors cribbing their stalls.
When he had prepared his report, he set off to seek an audience. He caught the King after lunch, when he ought to be a good mood; but the way he bunched his eyebrows and rumbled, “Well, what is it?” was not promising. He made no move to take the scroll being offered him.
“Briefly, sire, half your Blades are rotting from old age; they contaminate the rest. I have here a list of fifty-seven who ought to be dubbed knight and released. You don’t need so many guards.” The royal mouth opened, but before the foam could start to fly, he continued: “And Ironhall is bursting at the seams. If you keep those boys waiting any longer you will ruin their edge.” That was as close as he dared come to saying that his sovereign should move his fat carcass to Starkmoor and stop torturing all the anxious youngsters.
But the King took it that way. His face flamed red and his beady yellow eyes glinted like those of a wild boar. “Nobody talks to me like that! I will shorten you by a head, you upstart pigsticking serf!”
Durendal knelt. “My life is Your Majesty’s, always, but I swore an oath to serve you and will not serve you in any way except the best I can. To withhold unwelcome truth is no true fealty.” If he was remembering a certain night when an upstart recruit had given his liege a brutal lesson in fencing, it was a reasonable wager that the King was remembering it also.
The King glared.
After about two minutes, he said, “Arrange it. And get out of here before I throttle you!”
The Commander rose, bowed, and withdrew.
6
On the third day, heading up a wide granite stairway, he saw an odiously familiar figure in black robes mincing down toward him. Kromman’s face had returned to its former pallor, but it was thinner, and the dangling hair framing it was streaked with white. They halted to appraise each other. A couple of White Sisters came by, going down. They pulled faces and went on without a word.
This was the moment Durendal had been dreading, the encounter he had wanted to put off as long as possible. It was going to take all the self-control he possessed not to draw his sword and revenge the treachery that had slain his friend. Fortunately Kromman was unarmed.
When the Sisters were out of earshot, Durendal said, “So even the vultures rejected you?”
“I fail to understand that remark, Commander.” The Secretary’s voice had not lost its unpleasant hoarseness. “I do wonder on what terms you obtained your release from the brethren.”
“Go and get a sword!”
Kromman smiled. “If you wish. We know that you are destined to betray your king and if I must die to stop you then I shall willingly lay down my life for His Majesty. Do you plan to call me out?”
“He has forbidden it.”
“How unfortunate! Of course your exalted new office pays an additional fifty crowns a year, which you will not wish to jeopardize by defying him.”
Fire and death! “Don’t push me any further, Kromman.”
“I will push all I want, Commander,” the inquisitor whispered. “I will plot and scheme, and one day I will find your blind spot and drag you down. The next round will be mine.”
“No, it will be mine, because I am already old for a Blade. One day quite soon I will be released from his service, freed of my binding and my pledge. That day you die. Enjoy life while you can, Ivyn.”
This was a very narrow interpretation of what he had promised—a slippery, forked-tongued, inquisitor-type of hedging—but it was all he had, and he meant what he was saying. Kromman could see that he did, and a shadow of doubt showed in his face. Durendal strode on up the staircase.
He appointed Snake as his deputy, for he seemed the brightest of the youngsters and had shown resolution in drawing on Hoare when that was his duty. The King approved the promotion without comment.
On the third day, Commander Durendal walked in on the squirrel-like bureaucrats of the Ministry of Royal Forests and explained that he was taking over their offices but they could—if they wished—occupy the Guard’s old space, which was four times the size, much more luxurious, and hidden away where no one would ever bother them again.
He put two desks in the front room and set his own name on one of them. Now anyone could find the Guard without delay, and usually get the commander in person. He sent the King a note.
On the fourth day, Snake arrived at the Guard office to find his commander in conference with six fawning tailors. Blade Fairtrue, who had been unfortunate enough to be the first man to catch Durendal’s eye when he needed a victim, was being employed as a mobile tailor’s dummy. His stolid, boyish face was screwed up in misery as he pranced around to order, waving his sword.
“Cockroach!” said the Commander. “Swan. Rainbow. No, that neckline is going to throttle you. Take it off. Snake! Tell me what you think of these britches.”
Alarmed, Snake pulled his superior aside and hissed in his ear. “The King himself designed our livery!”
“That explains it, then. Get your pants off and try on these.”
Snake glanced out at the hallway where about two hundred people were parading back and forth. “Yes, sir. If you promise not to recommend me as your successor in your famous last words.”
“I won’t if you behave yourself.” Durendal, too, eyed that open door, realizing that more than just modesty recommended a move to more private premises. If the King had designed the livery, then he must not be allowed to hear what was going on until the entire Guard had been outfitted and the old uniforms were safely burned. Spring it on him at a big banquet, maybe—one for the Diplomatic Corps or something. Then he would have to pretend that it was his own surprise. That was Kate standing in the doorway.
Words lodged in his throat. He just stared, and she just stared—no longer as young but every bit as desirable. Smaller even than he remembered, a little plumper. And her companion…No mistaking those rebellious dark eyes, the brows already thicker than most, the widow’s peak. Numbers whirled through his head.
Finally he said, “He’s tall for his age.” Then, to the consternation of the observers and for the first time since he had been only about five himself, Commander Durendal burst into tears.
7
His years as leader flew away like swallows, perhaps because twenty-four hours were never enough for all the living he needed to do in a day. There was Kate, above all, and a mutual love that never produced a single cross word. There was winning the trust of the hitherto fatherless Andy, who had named himself by mispronouncing the name they shared and was quite the most stubborn child ever spawned by a swordsman. He was also reckless to the point of insanity, a fault that his mother would not admit must spring from her bloodlines. Soon, too, there was Natrina, the loveliest baby Chivial had ever seen.
The Treaty of Fettle brought the Isilondian war to an end, at a price. Parliament screamed that it was a national humiliation, which it was, but Lord Chancellor Montpurse retorted that a Parliament that does not vote enough funds to wage a war properly cannot expect to approve of the results. The lopsided Baelish struggle continued, with raiders ravaging the coasts almost at will: burning, looting, raping, slaving without mercy. Chivial had no way to retaliate, for Baelmark itself was impregnable, a poor and sparsely populated archipelago ringed with reefs. Parliament reluctantly granted funds to build half a dozen fast ships. The Baels caught four of them in
port being outfitted and burned them. There was little cheering now when Ambrose appeared before his people.
Durendal kept the Guard youthful, undermanned, and strung tight as a lute. He escorted the King on his progresses and royal visitations—except to Starkmoor. There he sent Snake. The first time a binding was scheduled, he arranged for Montpurse to mention in passing to the King that the founder’s name might possibly receive a louder ovation than the King’s. Ambrose took the hint and did not insist on the Commander accompanying him.
He won the King’s Cup twice more and then retired from competitive fencing, but he pointed out that only members of the Royal Guard had ever won it and vowed fearful vengeance if that tradition were to be broken. It never was while he was in charge.
Amid the pomp and panoply, when orders glittered and trumpets sang, he was closer to the King than any man. He stood with drawn sword beside the throne when the King addressed Parliament, when the King received ambassadors, when the King judged major disputes between great landowners. He developed a deep respect for the wily fat man’s ability to steer his realm the way he wanted it to go. One of his duties as chief Blade was to stand guard inside the door at meetings of the Privy Council, so he was soon aware of all major state secrets. He was amazed at the way the ministers submitted to the King’s browbeating, even Montpurse sometimes. Could they not see that Ambrose would respect only those who chose their ground correctly and were then prepared to defend it to the death?
On the shadowed side of the road sat the hated Kromman, lurking in his webs, ever plotting against Montpurse, always ready to exploit a mistake but seemingly making none of his own. The battle was unequal, for a chancellor must act while the secretary was a mere shadow of the King himself and rarely offered a target. Nevertheless there were some victories, as when Grand Inquisitor dropped dead and Ambrose accepted Montpurse’s candidate as her successor instead of Kromman’s.
