"Alina," he said at last, when it was clear that her silence was not for the gathering of words, but for the keeping of them, "what's wrong?"
She did not like to lie to him, or so he believed; she said nothing.
"Serra Alina?"
But she could not choose to say nothing forever—not without offending the rank she was trying, by example, to teach him to honor. "It is Ser Anton," she said quietly.
"You do not want him in Avantari."
"I would be happy," she replied, "if he had perished in the fighting. Happier still if he had perished before he brought his chosen students to the North." She rose then, lifting a crystal decanter, a thing she said was different from the niceties of life in the home he would return to.
"Why?"
"It is clear to me that he has been sent, as he was before, to prove a point. But it is not to prove that point to the Empire: here, he has nothing to gain. He has been sent with men of quality to take the Crown of the Challenge. To prove that it was Leonne weakness, and not Annagarian training, or its lack, that has always been at the heart of our poor performance here."
"Alina," Valedan replied softly, "that much is obvious to me."
"Then think, Valedan," she said, with a hint of her old sharpness, her scratched pride, "what it means. He has these men, the best, and they did not perform in the Lord's Test. Think: He has been training them in the tasks of the North. For how long?"
He started to speak, but having begun, he saw that she meant to continue.
She turned away from him to the open window, to the sunlight of the late afternoon, the lengthening shadows. "He is there among them, even now," she said softly. "He speaks to Mauro and to Kyro, he courts them; he talks with Ramiro's Tyran, with Fillipo— with everyone but you."
Valedan shrugged. "He serves a different man, Alina. We did not expect that he would come to us to pay his respects."
"No. But he is respected, Valedan. He has that in the Dominion, and he will always have it. He is no Court politician; he is more dangerous than that. It is not to the head that he speaks— not the rulers, not the Tyrs or the Tors. It is to the heart. He is an enemy, Valedan."
"Alina, I know this."
She turned to face him again, white as the Northern Queen. "It was his hand," she said softly. She waited for the understanding, but it did not come; her pupil, and her lord, waited patiently for the words the silence did contain.
"It was his hand," she repeated at last, "that killed the Tyr'agar, Markaso kai di'Leonne."
He rose, then. Bowed stiffly. "Serra," he said gravely.
He left.
The sun in the North was hotter than he remembered it, and he was no stranger to sun; the heat alone didn't even darken his skin. No, it was the sea that bothered him. Days, he had been in this foreign city, and the salt touched everything, turning even the innocuous gesture of licking dry lips into something unpleasant and distasteful.
He was old, to be here.
He had thought never to subject himself to this place again. But twice, twice he had done; had come with swords strapped to his back, and himself strapped in turn—loosely—to the back of the finest horse it had been his privilege to ride, before or since. He had practiced with the three men sent for just that purpose, each of them bitter at their exclusion from the true test, at the height of the Lord's Festival, and he had quietly entered himself into the Northern ledgers, making a mark that was only graceful in comparison to the crude symbols drawn by many another, all barbarian.
He had been tested, briefly; had been chosen. It had never been in question.
And he had won that year; he had been the first, the only, man to take the wreath from the North and bear it to the South. Kings' Champion. For her. For Mari.
The next year he returned, riding the same horse, bearing the same swords, and facing the same Challenge. And that, too, he had won. For Antoni.
He had thought, the day that he rose from his bow to face the crowded amphitheater a second time, that he had paid his wife and son the highest tribute that he could; he had given, to the South, the gift of his skill in their names.
That they might be at peace.
He had failed them in life. In death, he meant their names to be remembered. And gaining the twin wreaths was. he thought, the only way he might achieve such remembrance. Because they were of the Dominion, he, his wife, and his son, and in the Dominion, only the names of men counted. His son was so far from being a man that had his father been a greater clansman, he would never have been seen outside of the harem. His wife—Mari—
The wreaths, he had offered to the Tyr'agar, and the Tyr'agar had accepted them as the prize that they were. Ser Anton di'Guivera became in all things a rich man: gold was his. and his choice of horses, his choice of swords; he was given lands within the Tor Leonne's city, and leave to train those he saw fit. The sons of the clansmen of wealth and power—if the two could be easily separated—were sent to him; his name lent credibility to skills that were often meager. He took their money.
Once or twice, a boy showed promise, and on those rare occasions, he accepted no barter, or trade: the chance to temper and hone the weapon was enough. It was his life, all the life he had left him, and he was too afraid of cheapening the memory of the dead to choose another life, although many were offered him.
The wreaths were displayed in the palace itself, that the clansmen might witness this proof of the superiority of the Lord over the Northern demons.
And while those wreaths were displayed, Anton di'Guivera had become a legend, to young boys and old men, and the range of power that falls between either extreme. For his wife and his son had been killed in bandit raids—along with half of his village, and all but a handful of his clan—and it had become his lifelong obsession to see banditry ended. Each season, he was given young men in their prime, and they traveled across the width and breadth of the Dominion, seeking, always, the men who had been responsible for the death of Mari and Antoni. Of so much of Guivera.
The wreaths hung, for the nobility to see; Anton fought for the serafs to see; from the heights to the depths of the Lord's and the Lady's service, his was a name and a presence that was known.
Even here. Even in this Northern Empire, with its demon Kings, its lack of tradition and respect, its law against the owning of serafs, those born to serve, and raised to make it a fine art. He was known, in this place. For it was here that he had twice earned the title Kings' Champion.
With the death of the Tyr'agar Markaso kai di'Leonne, the wreaths had returned, dented and slightly bloodied, to him.
And he had taken them, one and the other, and he had repaired to the lands that were his, in the city that he had come to hate, the Tor Leonne. In the privacy of a night sky, the moon itself so slender a crescent of light he'd carried four lit lamps into the darkness to see by, he'd returned them to their rightful owners: His wife. His son.
The dead were the worst taskmasters. No matter how you struggled, no matter what you sacrificed, what you lost, what you paid, they gave you no nod, however minimal, to show their approval. No benediction. No absolution.
Carlo was flagging.
He frowned, as the lackluster sparring caught his attention. His frown spoke volumes; it was the expression that no one of his students had ever been able to ignore, be they deaf to the words that followed. Carlo was no exception.
"It's the heat," the young man said, wiping sweat from his forehead before it reached his eyes. "And the air. It's so thick you can hardly breathe it."
Andaro's subtle shift in expression was as good as a cringe in a lesser man.
"That," Ser Anton replied, "is why we fight here. The Lord will not destroy the ocean overnight so that you can have the fight you're accustomed to. A warrior fights the fight he's confronted with; he doesn't whine for a different one. We are not Serras longing for different shades of green silk so that we may best present ourselves; we are men. Learn."
Andaro, thankfully, was silent; hi
s face had fallen into that perfectly neutral mask that he used when he wished to convey nothing whatever to a possible enemy. That Ser Anton was that enemy in the young man's eyes did not give the older man cause to worry; they were students, these two, and of them, his finest. He expected them to be wary.
Unfortunately, the fact that Andaro was wary enough for two did nothing whatever to instill such a wariness in his closest rival and friend; Carlo spoke too much, complained too frequently, drank too much, ate too much—and admired foreign women too much.
He had never been a man like Carlo, although he had served beside many; it was Andaro, silent and measured, who best re-fleeted his youth, and perhaps because of Andaro, he had been too indulgent with the friend.
When Anton folded his arms across his chest, it spoke in a fashion that words alone could not: the two fell silent and returned to their sparring with a passion that spoke of anger, annoyance, and perhaps a touch of shame. Together, they could best him. On a very, very lucky day. No doubt they considered it from time to time, like any sullen children. They were wise enough not to try; there were tricks that one did not teach champions. And Anton's early skill had been honed in a place where the sword decided not honor and glory but life and death; the imperative of survival could make a man cunning, and low. If the Lord judged, he did not judge harshly.
He did not need to.
The sun was high, hot; it bore witness to this, the beginning. Bear witness, he thought, to an end. Let there be an end.
Old. He was old, now, to think such thoughts at the height of the Lord's power. He turned his anger out; Andaro and Carlo were not the only two men who served his purpose here, they were merely the best.
The woman watched.
Her hair, brass and silver, her eyes brown with hints of the gold that spoke of her demon heritage, she stood straight-backed, her head tilted to one side as if listening to the cadence of metal and metal's strike. He had been guaranteed privacy when he had accepted the offer—her offer, he was certain of it now—to accept the protection of the Kings' Swords within the palace itself. That guarantee could easily be invoked.
Ser Anton knew it because he had done it, not once, not twice, but ten times, forcing spectators to withdraw. He was not afraid that they would carry tales of his students and their exertions; very little that could be said about either Carlo, Andaro, or the rest of his men, could damage them.
But this woman—he could not deny her her observation. Because she had, upon her face, that intent concentration that spoke not of war, not of spying, not of prurient curiosity, but rather of mastery, of comprehension.
Such a vanity, in a man his age, with so much at stake. But these eyes reminded him of a young boy's eyes. What was his name? It was gone; he could see, clearly, the white, white hair that in the Dominion would have been both so rare and so highly prized.
and he could see, more clearly than that, the intensity of his desire to be what Anton created. She did not have that desire.
He very much wished to see her wield the sword that hung at her side. But he did not ask her to spar, and she did not offer.
Who are you, demon daughter?
Princess Mirialyn ACormaris. Too valued by her father to be married off to any who might come asking. When she came to stand above them, in the rounded stone of balcony that was one of many in these halls of cold, tall stone, he could not bring himself to demand her removal. It was his weakness, still. Women. Children. It had always been his weakness.
He could not afford to be weak here. And yet…
Andaro disapproved of the decision—although not obviously, and not loudly enough to endanger himself or to truly anger Ser Anton di'Guivera. He was prudent, in all things prudent.
"She is only a woman," Anton said genially.
"She is a woman in the North," Andaro replied levelly. "And you yourself have said that the women in the North are as dangerous as the men, in their fashion."
"If you think this does not apply to a Serra, you are young, Andaro." Ser Anton shrugged, losing the facade of geniality slowly. "What she observes here will have no bearing on the Challenge."
"It has bearing on Carlo already."
"True enough, but if Carlo cannot concentrate in the face of the admiration of one young woman—"
"She is the daughter of demons, as far as Carlo is concerned."
"—he will be utterly destroyed by the audience gathered in the so-called high city. It is best to face obstacles now, Andaro."
"We face enough; we must fight in the sun and the humidity, in public, like common cerdan."
It was Andaro's pride that Anton least liked; he did not remember his own youth as so prideful a thing. And yet they had so much in common, his younger self of memory and this young man, that he was not now so certain of his own worthiness. Age took it away, that certainty. Replaced it with truth, much of it bitter.
"You will face it for three days. If you cannot fight without collapsing—or turning into sluggards, like Viello—you will fail here."
Carlo and Andaro exchanged a single glance. Words passed in silence between them, some struggle. At length. Carlo began to speak, and Anton braced himself for at best mild stupidity. He counted himself lucky that he had not yet been exposed to it, and he could see, by the dour expression upon Andaro's face, that had the wiser man held sway, the words would be stuck permanently behind Carlo's lips.
"Why did the General—"
"The Tyr'agar. Carlo."
Carlo ducked his head as if he expected to be struck. Had they been elsewhere, it would have been a safe bet. "The Tyr'agar. My apologies, Ser Anton. Why did the Tyr'agar choose to send us to the city? Why could he not just bespeak the servants of the Lady?"
Andaro stepped on Carlo's foot, hard. The glance that passed between them was more heated than the exchange of sword blows toward the day's end, when their tempers had frayed completely.
Anton covered his eyes with his hands: both of them, for good measure. At times it hurt him to look upon such a sincerely stupid face. But he did not correct the boy; Andaro had done as much of that as was safe. "If such servants existed at all," he said at last, "they would not be summoned by the Tyr'agar. The Tyr'agar serves the Lord, Carlo. Not the Lady. You are here in service to the Lord, not the Lady."
Carlo flushed. "We are here in service to the Tyr'agar," he replied, letting the familiar anger show. "And not as warriors, but as clumsy assassins." He spit the word out as if he could not hold it in his mouth without swallowing its taint. "Warriors? Yes. That is what we are. We—Andaro and I—should have been at this year's Festival as Champions, as the Lord's chosen. Instead, we were picked by you and brought here." He kicked at packed dirt with his foot. Grimaced; it was harder than it looked. "Here, to a land where women are treated like men, and men who are barely fit to be serafs rule by money." He spit.
Sincerely stupid. "Carlo, it is wealth that defines power, even in the Dominion. You show your ignorance, as usual, and as usual I find it uninteresting."
"But even you—"
"Uninteresting enough to forbid it. Had you desired to remain in the South, you might have remained."
"You would no longer teach me."
"If you continue this, lack of a teacher will be the last of your concerns. Quite literally. Do I make myself clear?"
Carlo bowed at once.
Ser Anton di'Guivera disliked being forced to make so open a threat, and only among the sincerely stupid was he ever called upon to do so. And yet that stupidity was also the source of much of Carlo's attraction; it was his unrepentant youth, his vitality.
"You are a servant of the Lord," Anton continued serenely. "The Tyr'agar will make us strong, and we are here to gain his favor by doing his bidding. I chose you personally because I trust you both, and if I am foolish in that regard, so be it.
"We are here to kill a concubine's son, no more; a boy whom we cannot even be certain carries the Leonne blood in his veins."
Carlo bowed.
Andaro did not.
"Something troubles you, Andaro?"
"An inaccuracy, Ser Anton."
"And that?"
"We can be certain that he indeed carries that blood."
"How?"
"Have you not received word?"
Lord scorch him. "Word?" Anton was a terrible liar; that he could lie at all was the product of years of exposure to the delicate political balance of the Tyr'agar's court. Andaro had grown up in the fluidity of that elegant way of life; he knew, of course, that Anton had been the first to receive any such word.
But he continued, smoothly. "The kai el'Sol drew the Sun Sword at the Festival's height."
"And?"
"It destroyed him utterly. Had there been no acknowledged Leonne, no Leonne of the blood, there would still be a Fredero kai el'Sol."
A kai el'Sol, Anton thought, that the Tyr could slowly kill for his disobedience and interference. Ah, Fredero; you chose well. You did not strike to wound, and you had only a single strike.
"Very well, Andaro, you have bested me with your knowledge. And I am in a generous mood, so I will forgive the insolence and presumption. Get what passes for a bath in these parts, eat what passes for food, and take what rest the heat will give you."
They did not wait to be told twice.
They left him alone.
Fredero. Ser Anton bowed his head a moment in genuine respect. Could one ever respect one's allies as well as the worthy foe? No. That was the warrior's way.
He watched his two best students leave him, and he knew that Andaro understood the truth, and that Carlo would not.
That Ser Anton di'Guivera had not been sent to kill Valedan kai di'Leonne—and in the privacy of his thoughts, he granted the unknown boy his just and full title—he had demanded it as his right, and as his price for any involvement in the affairs of the General Alesso di'Marente.
The boy had to die.
The boy's blood had to be on his sword, on his hands.
In Mari's name. In Antoni's name.
And then, then he would have peace.
It was not that Anton di'Guivera was a friend; he was not a friend, had never been. But he was legend, he was a thread in the fabric of the stories that Valedan had been weaned on. There was not a boy in the Tor that did not know of the poor man's tragic loss, to bandits, of wife and son—his only son, and only wife— not a boy who did not remember the tales of his valor as he roamed the countryside destroying the bandits who preyed upon the villages, north and south, east and west, that lay around Raverra in an ever widening circle.
Michelle West - The Sun Sword 02 - The Uncrowned King Page 26
