The Sworn

by Gail Z. Martin

  “We may have no control over it, but this couldn’t be worse timing for the army,” Senne said. Tris had learned to depend on Senne’s experience and clear thinking during the siege of Lochlanimar. Senne was twenty years older than Tris, and his dark hair was gray at the temples. His eyes were a cold, dark blue, and there were fine lines at the corners of his eyes from time spent squinting against the sun. Bricen had always valued Senne’s advice, and after having seen him in battle, Tris now shared his father’s admiration. “With the soldiers home, we barely have enough men to bring in the crops. The plague’s made it hard enough, but if we call back the soldiers, can we really expect the women and elders to bring in a full harvest by themselves? I don’t fancy fighting a war when the townsfolk behind the lines are hungry. It’ll make it the Crone’s own to provision the troops, and hungry people have little patience. We could have a revolt on our hands, even without civil war in Isencroft.”

  “Lady knows, the Council of Nobles has no desire to see another pretender to the throne, whether it’s from across the Northern Sea or it’s Jared’s bastard.” Lord Dravan was a generation older than Tris’s father and had been one of the nobles who remained loyal to Bricen throughout Jared’s rule. Dravan’s white hair showed his age, but his blue eyes were sharp and his angular features showed keen intelligence. “With the three new additions to the Council of Nobles, I trust Your Majesty will find the support you need if it comes to war, but I pray to the Lady such a course is not necessary.”

  Tris nodded. Political maneuvering among three of the former members of the Council of Nobles had nearly resulted in unfounded charges of treason against Kiara and a warrant of execution for Master Bard Carroway, one of Tris’s dearest and most loyal friends. When Tris had returned from battle to set the matter straight, one of the Council had been hanged for treason and two were banished permanently from court. Their replacements had been chosen both for loyalty and the ability to think rationally on matters of policy. With any luck, the new Council reduced the threat of betrayal from among the most prominent nobility.

  “We can’t count on support from the Sisterhood.” Fallon’s voice made her disdain for the ruling body of mages clear. “I’ve tried to get Sister Landis to rethink her position of neutrality, but she’s adamant that her mages will not get involved in ‘temporal’ concerns.”

  “By the Whore!” Senne roared. “Will she stand by and do nothing if we’re invaded by a dark summoner?”

  Fallon met the general’s eyes. “She’ll see to the safety of her mages. If they were attacked, she would use magic to defend them. But she won’t provide battle mages for the army or bring the Sisterhood to the aid of the crown.” She paused. “On the other hand, if war really does break out, I know of quite a few mages who might find their consciences tried by Landis’s edict. I think we could count on many of those mages to go rogue and join us, as some of us did during the battle for the throne.”

  Dravan leaned over to Tris. “Refusing to aid the king—isn’t there something on the books about that?”

  Tris managed a wan smile. “With the rest of Margolan’s problems, do you really want to skirmish with the Sisterhood?”

  Dravan sat back in his chair with a muttered curse. “Of course not. It’s the principle of the thing.”

  “Unfortunately, after the battle for the throne and the siege of Lochlanimar, the number of vayash moru who could join our forces is smaller than it used to be,” Mikhail observed. “We’ve also had more than a few vayash moru flee to Dark Haven after some of the locals tried to burn them out, blaming them for the plague. On the other hand, we’ve got more vayash moru than usual as refugees at Huntwood and Glynnmoor. They might prefer taking an active role, especially against a threat like a dark summoner. I could see who I can personally recruit, but we won’t have a very large contingent under the best of circumstances. There are never as many of us as the mortals believe, and now, there are fewer still.”

  “Your people fought bravely at Lochlanimar,” Senne said. “Our losses would have been much heavier without them.”

  “I’m afraid that the vyrkin are in much the same situation as the vayash moru,” Kolja said. “Our numbers were never very large, and Jared did his best to hunt us to extinction. He may have come closer to success than he knew. Many of my people have also fled for sanctuary in Dark Haven, but even there, I hear that mortals are hunting us for fear that we carry plague.” He spread his hands. “Ironic, isn’t it? Neither we nor the vayash moru can carry or die of plague, so they kill us for the crime of not dying.” Kolja paused. “Like the vayash moru, many vyrkin have found sanctuary at Huntwood and Glynnmoor. I will see whose pledges I can secure.”

  “If the warnings are true, and Alvior’s invasion includes a dark summoner of real power, then we’re at a disadvantage without more mages and without significant numbers of vayash moru and vyrkin,” Tris said. He knew they could hear the weariness in his voice, and a glance in the mirror that morning had told him that his tiredness was plain on his face. If he hadn’t been born with white-blond hair, he was quite certain that the burden of the crown would have turned his hair gray within his first year as king.

  “The vayash moru have strength and speed and they’re just plain tougher to destroy. That’s an advantage when we’re fighting magic. And as we saw at Lochlanimar, fever and pox spring up quickly in army camps. It helps to have some of your troops who are immune,” Senne said.

  “It’s not just immunity to disease,” Fallon added. “Taking mortal troops up against a dark summoner means magic will be as much the weapon of choice as your catapults and trebuchets. Vayash moru and vyrkin are more immune to mind-meddling or magicked terrors than mortal troops, and they’re better at seeing through whatever glamours a mage might cast to trick soldiers into a trap.” She shrugged. “But if we don’t have the numbers, we don’t have them. There’s not much we can do about it.”

  “What kind of a fleet can Margolan put to sea?” It was Nisim, the mage-Sentinel, who spoke, and Tris startled. Except for his report to the council of the warning signs observed by the Sentinels, Nisim had said nothing.

  “There’s been no serious threat from across the Northern Sea in generations,” Tris said. “And while there are explorers who’ve gone into larger, open waters, the seas near Margolan are icebound for months out of the year. There are fishing boats and trading vessels that move from Isencroft to Margolan to Principality—some even to Eastmark, and the privateers who keep the pirates away from the villages. The fishermen from the Bay Islands are probably our best sailors. They go far out to sea for the best catch, but I’m not even certain they really consider themselves to be Margolense. Margolan’s never had much in the way of a real navy. If we were ever to go to war with our neighbors, it would make more sense to march rather than sail!”

  Nisim nodded as if he expected Tris’s answer. “That had been my observation, but I wanted to hear confirmation.” He leaned forward. “To my thinking, and to my fellow Sentinels, the evidence is overwhelming that an invasion fleet from across the Northern Sea is coming. We don’t have time to build ships to counter that. But we might be able to rally the good shipping folk of the Bay Islands and the Borderlands to our cause if they knew that foreign troops and dark mages would be ravaging their lands and villages.”

  “Say on,” Dravan said, stroking his chin as he listened.

  Nisim looked uncomfortable being the center of attention. He was a thin man, perhaps ten years older than Tris, with long, straight, dark hair. His accent gave Tris to guess that Nisim came from the Borderlands he now protected. “Even mages have their limits when it comes to personally gathering information,” he said, with a glance toward Fallon, who nodded encouragingly. “The other Sentinels and I have been making contacts among the shipping folk for a while now. They agree to be our eyes and ears, and in exchange, we help them fill their nets with fish and keep the rough seas to a minimum.”

  “Spies,” Senne said. “You’ve built a ne
twork of spies.”

  Nisim nodded. “The shipping folk and the privateers were quick to spot evidence to confirm the dangers we observed in the currents of magic. There’s a powerful bond between those folk and the sea. If it isn’t magic, it’s near enough as to be no different. They’ve practically got brine for blood, and they can scent the winds almost as well as any weather mage.

  “My point is, no one’s got more of a stake in this than they do. If invaders land their ships on the Margolan coast, it’ll be the shipping folk’s families who are first to die. And if it comes to a Mage War, then it’ll be their fields and homes blasted into oblivion,” Nisim continued.

  “So you think they might help us?” Tris asked.

  “The privateers have already offered their aid. And the fishermen are angry enough about anyone spoiling the catch that, with or without the king’s flag, they’ll fight any foreign ships that enter their waters.”

  “You don’t need to convince me that Borderlanders are good fighters,” Tris said. “After all, Jonmarc Vahanian hails from those parts.”

  “Could their flotilla hope to engage a navy?” Senne’s skepticism was clear in his voice.

  Nisim shrugged. “Do you have an alternative?”

  “I don’t like putting civilians in harm’s way.”

  Nisim met Senne’s eyes. “And isn’t that exactly what happens when farmers become soldiers?”

  With a growl, Senne sat back in his chair and crossed his arms. “I still don’t like it.”

  “I don’t think we have a choice.” Tris knew he sounded more certain than he felt. “The truth is, we can barely field an army. Many of the people who fled Margolan because of Jared haven’t come back yet. They might never return. Then there’s the toll the plague’s taken, and the food shortages last winter. We lost a lot of men at Lochlanimar, even if we did win the siege.” He turned to Soterius and Senne. “How many troops do you really think we can muster and still have people left to harvest the crops?”

  Soterius shrugged. “I’ve been working on the counts for a week, and no matter how I run the numbers, I don’t like them. We took four thousand men to Lochlanimar, and lost more than a third to battle and disease. If we call up every able-bodied man from fifteen to fifty—and every woman inclined to wield a sword—we might muster up six thousand.” He spread his hands. “It’s the best estimate I can come up with.”

  “We might persuade fifty or so vayash moru and vyrkin to fight, but some of the vyrkin will need to stay with the pups, and some of the older vayash moru feel much like the Sisterhood, that the affairs of the living are no longer their concern,” Mikhail added.

  “I think I could bring in about twenty mages, but they won’t all be true battle mages,” Fallon said. “That’s everything from hedge witches to healers, and no guarantee we won’t be overly supplied with one type of magic versus another.”

  “So we could have ten land mages and only a few water mages?” Tris asked. “It would be good to have all four elements represented. Lady knows, we needed all the magic we could get at Lochlanimar.”

  “I think you’ll find water magic, large and small, among the fishing folk,” said Nisim. “And my fellow Sentinels will do all we can.”

  “Bricen’s army was twenty thousand at its peak strength,” Senne said. “How far we’ve fallen in so little time!”

  “I’d guess that at least ten thousand of those soldiers lie in the shallow graves Jared’s men dug for them,” Soterius said bitterly. A thought crossed his face, and he turned to Tris. “Is there any chance—”

  “If it comes to that, yes. I can call on the armies of the dead. But not without great cost, and only as a last resort. You saw what toll that kind of magic took at Lochlanimar. I’d rather not depend on it, if we have any other options.”

  Soterius met his eyes. “As you’ve heard, our options are sparse.”

  A knock at the doors to the council chamber startled them. Harrtuck, Captain of the Guard, leaned into the room. “Beggin’ your pardon, but there’re visitors here for you. I think you’ll want to see them right away.”

  Tris rose and walked toward the door. “Who—”

  The door opened farther. Framed in the doorway stood Jair Rothlandorn, and beside him a Sworn shaman.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Please forgive our intrusion.” Jair’s formal language was for the benefit of the council, but his grin was directed at his cousin. Tris Drayke stepped forward and embraced Jair, then drew back, still holding him by the shoulders.

  “Lady True! You’re the last one I thought to see walk through those doors. You’re supposed to be on the Ride, aren’t you?”

  Despite the urgency of the situation, Jair felt a rush of pleasure just being back with his cousin. It hadn’t been quite a year since the last time Jair had seen Tris. Then, at Tris’s wedding, it had struck Jair how the battle for the throne had changed his cousin, forced him into a maturity beyond his years. Now, after a year that would have tried even a seasoned monarch, Jair could see the tiredness in Tris’s features. “Technically, I’m still on the Ride. I’m here with the Sworn, not on behalf of Dhasson.”

  Tris looked from Jair to Talwyn. “And this must be—”

  Jair grinned more broadly. “May I present Cheira Talwyn, daughter of the Sworn chief, shaman of her people—and my wife.”

  Tris bowed. “Honored, m’lady. Jair’s written me about you, and I see that his praise was not undeserved.”

  Although he was in Tris’s palace in Margolan and not his father’s war room in Dhasson, Jair knew quite well what he and Talwyn had interrupted. Although most of the time, he much preferred the riding garb of the Sworn to the fancy dress of court, now that he had come to court on business, he felt uncomfortable not being dressed for the part. Harrtuck had permitted him his stelian and had not made any move to relieve him of the knives in his baldric. Jair saw the appraising looks of Tris’s war council, and he could only imagine how he and Talwyn must look to them. Enter the barbarians.

  Tris’s smile had faded as he began to realize what Jair’s appearance meant. “Your Ride doesn’t bring you anywhere close to Shekerishet.”

  They were speaking Common, which Jair knew both the council and Talwyn could follow. “We weren’t far from Ghorbal.”

  “That’s a week’s ride.”

  Jair managed a lopsided grin. “Four days if you ride hard and change horses. Who needs sleep?”

  “Then this isn’t a social call.”

  Jair’s grin disappeared. “No, it’s not. We’ve come with a warning, and a request.”

  “Say on.”

  Jair looked from Tris to the waiting council. “The Durim have been desecrating the barrows from Margolan into Dhasson. They’re trying to raise the Dread—and the spirits that the Dread guard.”

  “Why?” Fallon’s voice was sharp with alarm. Nisim sat up straight, and his eyes darted from Jair to Talwyn.

  “The Durim are preparing for war. They’ve been making sacrifices—animal and human, and a few weeks ago, the ones we fought were preparing for a soul harvest.”

  Tris blanched. “They were Hollowing?”

  Jair glanced sharply at his cousin. “You know of this?”

  “It was done by blood mages. And the Obsidian King.”

  “We brought the Durim we captured before the Consort Spirits,” Talwyn continued. “The Durim want to usher in a War of Unmaking. From the currents of magic, they believe the war is coming, and they want to feed from the destruction.”

  “That’s bad enough,” Jair interrupted. “But when Talwyn walked among the spirits of the Dread, they said that they’ve felt the power of a dark mage, a spirit mage,” he said, meeting Tris’s eyes.

  “Is that why you came here, to warn us?” Fallon had left her seat and now stood next to Tris. Nisim looked conflicted, as if he wanted to join them but was unsure his rank permitted it. He made do by straining to bend as close as he could to catch every word.

  “In part,”
Jair replied. “But the night before we left, Talwyn walked the spirit paths again. This time, the Dread came to her.”

  “The Dread have asked that I bring Martris Drayke to them,” Talwyn said. “They wish to determine on whose side, if any, they will fight when war comes.”

  “For the benefit of the rest of us poor folks without magic, could someone please explain what’s going on?” Dravan’s tart voice cut through the tension in the room.

  Chagrined, Tris and Jair turned toward the others. Jair wondered if the rest of the council saw the family resemblance between them as clearly as he did. Bricen’s sister was Jair’s mother, and though Tris was as fair as Jair was dark, the similarities in features were stronger than the differences. “Sorry,” Tris said, and gestured for Jair and Talwyn to join them at the table. “Bear with us; this may take a bit of explaining.”

  Tris and Jair took turns describing the full meaning of Jair’s news to the council. Fallon and Nisim jumped in from time to time to clarify an unfamiliar phrase or a bit of magical lore. Talwyn did her best to explain the mystic connection between the Sworn and the spirits that they guarded. When they were finished, the expressions of the council made it clear that as ominous as the indicators had been before Jair’s arrival, the likelihood of war was now almost certain.

  “Cheira Talwyn,” Senne said, and he seemed to be struggling to find just the right phrasing. “I have certainly learned to respect the validity of information gained through magical means, although I don’t have a magic bone in my body. But… with all due respect… can there be any room for error? If what you say is true—”

  Talwyn might be a stranger to court, Jair thought, but council meetings in the palace differed more in form than in substance from the tribal council over which Talwyn presided with her father. If she felt uncomfortable among the uniforms and brocades of the men around her, she did not show it. She was, Jair noted with pride, in every sense a warrior and the spirit-speaker for her people.