Oath of Fealty

by Elizabeth Moon

  “I—do. I am … I am just …”

  “Mazed, still. Very well. We’ll see what some good meals do for you.”

  The others were all embarrassed; he could hear it in their voices. Suli alone was not, though still clearly timid with him because of his rank. He finally asked her why his blindness bothered her less.

  “My uncle Saben,” she said. “He was kicked in the face by a cow; he had an infection in one eye that spread to the other—it nearly killed him—but after, when he decided to live … he was still my uncle, you see. He still knew everything he had known. He could still tell when one of the animals was sickening, by the sound of its walk, or its smell, better than my father. The dogs knew his whistles; I would take him out to the hill, and tell him where the animals were, where the dogs were, and he’d work them the same as ever. And you aren’t even scarred as he was.”

  “And now that you’ve left home? What does he do now?”

  “My little brother, who has no desire to leave the farm, is learning his whistles and goes everywhere with him. You did not think I would leave before I was sure—?”

  “No. No, Suli, I know you would not. I’m sorry.”

  “It is hard, the first year, my uncle said. He thought of finding a ledge, and stepping off into the air. One night he went out into a storm, when everyone else slept. He was sure he knew how to feel his way to the cliff, even in the storm … but the gods led him round, and his dogs found him, herded him just like a sheep, nipping his heels when he faltered. I remember waking the next morning and we all went out to look for him—there were his tracks, around the cow-byre and then in … he was in the straw, with both dogs on top of him.”

  “So you will not let me find a ledge—not that there are many in Vonja—” Stammel put the thought of bridges and the Immerest’s swift current out of his mind. Suli would be disappointed in him.

  “You would not go looking for ledges,” Suli said. “Not a sergeant in the Duke’s Company.”

  In the night—the true night, not the night of blindness—the dreams and memories came. He was not always sure which was which. When the grange was quiet, and the night breeze changed the scents that blew in, he lay, sometimes dozing, sometimes truly sleeping, sometimes wakeful. Now he remembered most of the day it happened, remembered the soldiers drilling, the trips in and out of the city with Arcolin. He could almost see the faces, the places. Marshal Harak—his face would not come clear. That last ride into the city … he could almost feel the saddle between his thighs. Arcolin had called him in to speak to the Council about … about something. Someone.

  One night it burst in on him. Recognizing one of the caravan guards as Korryn, his fox-head brand camouflaged with more scars. His own testimony to the Council—the Council’s request that they go see the man in prison to be sure of his identity. And Korryn had said—something—and then hands at Stammel’s neck, choking; he had fallen—unconscious—found himself under bodies, a welter of blood and guts, with Korryn free, and everyone else motionless. Arcolin’s hand, near his sword, had been trembling with the effort he made to move.

  But he, Stammel, could move, and he had struggled out from under the bodies, stabbed Korryn, and Arcolin had struck at once … and then … and then … like a blow inside his head, he had been stunned, and the fires began.

  He woke, aware that he’d cried out and was soaked with sweat.

  “Sir?” Suli, as always, was first to his side.

  “Bad dream,” he said. “Just a bad dream.”

  The fires, he’d been told, were the demon’s invasion. But Korryn … that was not a demon, inside Korryn. He was sure of that. It was something else, something less than a demon, something … almost human.

  What humans had powers to hold men still? Arcolin had told him what the prince said of the assassination attempt. The Verrakai had such powers. Magelords. But if Korryn had been a magelord, had such powers, why go for a soldier?

  At first Stammel could totter only a few steps to the jacks, leaning on someone’s arm. Then he made it out to the grange itself. His soldiers applauded. He tried to grin; he hoped it looked normal. Day by day, days he found it impossible to count without light, he pushed himself for more, knowing from years of training that his body would respond. All the way to the front entrance, where he stood gasping for breath, feeling the sun on his face. All the way back, one hand on the wall to guide him. Around the interior, still touching the wall, until he could find his own way to the jacks, to the bathing room, to the little kitchen.

  As Stammel became more able to navigate in the grange on his own—as long as he kept one hand on a wall—he was aware of discussions carried on just beyond what his people thought he could hear … but now, concentrating on hearing, he could hear all too clearly sometimes.

  Arñe, doing her job as corporal, made sure they kept the grange clean and fetched whatever anyone needed—“We must not be a burden on the grange,” she said, perhaps more often than necessary. In truth, they weren’t busy enough, and soldiers needed to be kept busy. They polished everything that could be polished, to the point where Stammel heard the yeoman-marshal complain that he had nothing to do. Arñe arranged what drill she could but lacked space, since this city grange had no barton, and the street outside was busy dawn to dusk, noisy with the sound of smiths at work. Stammel could distinguish the solid whang-whang of the ironsmiths from the lighter tink-tink-tink of whitesmiths.

  Some hands of days after he’d wakened, Stammel laid a hand on Bald Seli’s shoulder and came into the grange on a drill night for the first time. The big room was full of strangers, all talking, it seemed; it smelled of sweaty people and stale breath. Seli eased him onto a stool near the entrance.

  “Go on,” Stammel said, when his people came to greet him. “All of you—go drill with them.”

  Marshal Harak opened the drill with a prayer, then set his yeoman to doing basic exercises. He didn’t introduce the Phelani; by that Stammel knew they had been there long enough to become familiar to the locals. By the grunts and groans, Stammel could guess which exercises Harak assigned, though the names were different; his muscles twitched a little as he imagined doing those stretches and bends. After a few minutes, Harak told them to fetch hauks. Someone dropped one; it rattled on the floor. Someone else laughed; Harak growled at them in the same tone Stammel himself used.

  Then came the tap-tap of the simple beginning exercises, with Arñe—Harak must have asked her—counting the time. In his mind he could see it; his body remembered every move. Someone—there, across the room, fourth row, near the front—was off-beat, constantly late. Arñe said nothing; she must be waiting for Harak to comment.

  As she speeded the count, the slow one continued to lag, off the beat. Stammel opened his mouth and shut it again. It was not his place to correct another man’s unit. He hoped it wasn’t one of his people. Finally Harak said, “Gan, you’re behind. Pick it up.”

  “Sorry,” a man said. Right location, Stammel thought, pleased with the accuracy of his hearing. “My arm’s sore, Marshal.”

  “You think an enemy will slow down because it’s sore?” Harak asked.

  “No, but … I’ll do better.”

  But once more the tap of this man’s hauk was slower than the others, and slowing down. Stammel itched to correct him and before he quite realized it, he stood. The count stopped.

  “Are you all right, Stammel? Do you need something?”

  “I need a hauk,” he said. “It’s time I started training again.” As he expected, there were mutters of But he’s blind here and there in the room.

  But from the Marshal, only silence. Then, “Of course, Sergeant. They’re on the wall to your right. Five strides across the entrance, ten to the corner, turn left and about ten strides—”

  That was a challenge—he might have sent someone to be a guide—but also recognition. Stammel put his hand on the wall and set off into the dark; the wall disappeared—the entrance. Five strides … and the wall reappeare
d, solid stone he was glad to bump his fingers on. Ten—he felt the wall ahead before he reached it, a looming presence he did not know how he perceived. But it made turning the corner easier. In three strides he was abreast of some of the yeomen; he could feel the heat of them, and smell them, and hear their breathing. Another five strides, and two … and under his hand was a rack, mostly empty, but—as he felt his way along it—the well-worn handle of a hauk. He hefted it, then found another. They felt heavy, but he told himself that would be good, after his long illness. He heard a soft sigh that seemed to come from everyone in the room.

  “Best come forward,” the Marshal said. Stammel stretched out one arm, so the hauk brushed the wall, and went toward the Marshal’s voice until the Marshal said, “Far enough. You’re even with the front rank, two strides from the platform. Gan—move over and make room. Keder, help the sergeant line up.”

  “That’s me,” a voice said, from behind and to his left. “Take three steps sideways left, that’ll put you about right, and I can help if you need.”

  But Stammel had been opening and closing ranks since he was a recruit; his body knew how to move sideways and his three steps, Keder told him softly, put him exactly right.

  “You may resume,” the Marshal said, and Arñe’s voice, much closer now, started a slower count than it had. He lifted the hauks and beat time with the others. Beside him, Gan lagged a little, then caught up. Stammel supposed the Marshal’s eye was on him. Perhaps he considered having a blind man at the head of the line was a good example. As Arñe picked up the speed, Stammel concentrated on correct form, on precise timing. Up, across, forward, back, together in front, together behind … he began to wish he too had done the stretches and bends. A muscle in his back twinged; he ignored it. It was a healthy twinge.

  On six, they should be tapping hauks with the person beside them—but Gan was never there when he was. He himself was on count, he was sure.

  “Gan—you missed your tap!” the Marshal said.

  “I don’t want to hurt him,” Gan said.

  “Don’t worry,” Stammel said. “I’m not easily hurt.” There was a moment of silence, and then the Marshal again.

  “Gan, if you don’t keep time, I’ll bring you up here and drill you myself.”

  That got a muffled chuckle from the others; apparently it was a familiar threat. The next time Arñe called six, Stammel’s hauk tapped another on his left. His tap was strong, the other’s weak, and the hapless Gan dropped his hauk. “Keep going,” the Marshal said. “Gan—recover on three …”

  Stammel’s arms ached; the palms of his hands stung. He ignored that, too. Nothing was as bad as the fire, and it had been years of training, he was sure, that gave him the endurance to survive. He would not quit until he fell over.

  The Marshal had other ideas. When the group moved into line-against-line, and Stammel turned about to face the man behind, the Marshal stopped him. “Sergeant, your captain put your health in my care. You have done enough for a first drill. Rest now.”

  In truth, he was trembling, but he hated it, quitting in front of the yeomen. He took it as an order, instead of his own will. “Yes, Marshal,” he said, and without a reminder found his way back to the rack to put his hauks away, and—left hand on the wall this time—made it back down the grange, across the terrifying space where he had no wall to guide him, and found the stool he’d been sitting on by barking his shin on it.

  He had at least started. He would come back somehow, some way, however long it took. Though what he could do as a blind man—a blind soldier—he could not imagine.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Vérella

  Camwyn, the prince’s younger brother, mounted his horse, first in the procession, and led his friends to the training ground. Today, it would be mounted drill without weapons—not nearly as exciting as knocking the heads off straw-stuffed figures—but at least his brother the prince let him out of the palace. Eight Royal Guards rode with them, in case of attack, and the Royal Guard senior riding instructor, carrying a bundle of flagged sticks to mark points on the field.

  Camwyn had missed all the excitement when Verrakai attacked his brother; it was all over by the time the palace guards came to warn him … and arrest Egan Verrakai, Duke Verrakai’s grandson, until that moment one of his own friends. Now Egan was imprisoned, under Order of Attainder, and Mikeli would not relent.

  The training field opened out before them as they came through the gates. Camwyn felt like spurring his mount into a gallop, but he had promised Mikeli he’d obey.

  “Line up there,” the instructor said. “Straight line, and I want every horse square to it. Guard, place your mounts there—there—and down there.” He rode on, leaning over to place the first stake.

  No one argued with him. Boys who argued spent the rest of that lesson on the ground with a shovel and rake, putting horse manure into a sack and dragging tools and sack around the field while their friends rode. Even princes. Camwyn’s horse lined up neatly, but pawed at the ground. On his left, Beclan’s horse shifted its rump from side to side; on his right, Aris’s danced in place. By the time the instructor rode back up the field, the turf under the line of horses was scuffed and torn. He stopped in front of them.

  “Gentlemen! I told you a square halt. Yet your horses are writhing about like worms in a bucket.”

  “He won’t hold still!” Beclan Destvaorn said.

  “Neither would I if you were sitting on my back like that,” the instructor said. “Your toes are out; you’re playing a tune on his ribs with your heels; you’ve cramped his neck with that death grip on the reins, and you’re sitting on the small of your back, not your seat.”

  Camwyn, attending to his own posture, suddenly realized that his right heel was snugger than the left; he relaxed that leg a little and his horse quit pawing. “And you,” the instructor said, pointing his remaining flagged stick at Camwyn. “Your seat bones weren’t evenly weighted and you were digging him in the ribs—good that you fixed it, but you shouldn’t have done it in the first place. That’s the same mistake you made on your first pony.”

  Camwyn felt his neck getting hot, but the instructor had already moved on to the next of them, Aris Marrakai. Aris, Camwyn thought, put on airs about his father’s horses, admittedly some of the best in the kingdom. Camwyn relaxed, prepared to enjoy the next bit.

  “You’re letting your horse dance without warming up properly—surely you, son of the foremost horse breeder in the realm, know better.”

  “Yes, sir,” Aris said. “I don’t know why he’s doing it.”

  “Do you not, indeed? Then I will tell you. You—” The horse leapt straight up, twisted in the air, and came down in a series of enormous bucks. Camwyn’s horse threw its head up and skittered sideways away from Aris’s mount; all the horses reacted. Aris rode the first few bucks with a skill Camwyn envied—Aris was the best rider in their group—but soon lost his rhythm. The instructor had ridden his own mount close, and tried to grab the horse’s rein, but it squealed and lunged, teeth snapping.

  “Dismount! Now!” the instructor said. Aris flew into the air, launched as much by the horse as by his own will, and the instructor plucked him neatly by the back of his tunic as the horse ran squealing down the field, bucking and kicking. “All dismount!” the instructor said. Camwyn and the others did so. Aris, pale-faced, stood staring at his horse, now standing lathered and trembling at the far end of the field, snapping at its own sides. The Royal Guards closed in cautiously. As they watched, the horse lunged toward one of them, but fell to its knees, and then, jerking, to its side. Aris took a step in that direction, but the instructor stopped him.

  “Did you saddle your own mounts today?” the instructor asked.

  “No,” Camwyn said. “They were in their stalls, saddled, when we got to the stable. And we were on time!” He glanced at Aris, who stared down the field, eyes glittering with unshed tears. “Aris—I’m sorry—”

  “Unsaddle them now. No—fir
st spread out. Camwyn, to that corner. Two horse-lengths between you. Then unsaddle them. Check the saddlecloths, but do not touch anything you find.”

  “Should I—? Please, sir, let me—”

  The instructor’s voice softened. “I’m sorry, young Marrakai; it’s too late. And I’d not risk you—let the Guard remove the tack.”

  Camwyn’s own mount, another Marrakai-bred bay, had quieted. He unfastened the girth, pulled the saddle off, and set it on the ground; the horse stood quietly, as it should. He looked at the sleek bay back … with a lump on it. Lump? He reached out to feel it, and just stopped himself. “Sir?” he called.

  The instructor rode over, took one look at Camwyn’s horse, and hissed through his teeth. “Don’t move,” he said. Camyn stood still. “It may not have bitten yet,” the instructor said. “Drop the reins, come hold my horse.” The instructor was already dismounted. Camwyn took the reins as the instructor spoke quietly to his horse, drawing a dagger from his belt.

  “What are you going to do—” Camwyn began, but the dagger was already moving, the lump flying away from the horse’s back.

  “May be too late already,” the instructor said as Camwyn’s horse shuddered and jerked its head; sweat broke out on its neck. The instructor stroked across its back with his gloved hand. The horse flinched, pinned its ears, and cow-kicked. Before Camwyn had time to ask another question, the instructor had cut its throat, dancing away from the flailing hooves as the horse fell, a torrent of blood pouring out.

  “Sir!” Camwyn said.

  “Poison,” the instructor said. “Yours and Marrakai’s; now we’ll see the others.”

  None of the other horses showed any lumps, nor did the saddles or saddlecloths. The instructor checked carefully; the boys tried not to look at the dead horses, or at Camwyn or Aris. Camwyn, still leading the instructor’s horse, walked over to Aris.