The Living Throne (The War of Memory Cycle Book 3)

by H. Anthe Davis

  Beside the garrison papers were his own personnel files, plus the list he had been making for the mages' experiments and a quick sketch of the barracks and outbuildings with all the men's bunk-assignments filled in. The city's militia had scattered when Blaze Company took over their garrison—not Sarovy's idea, for he would have preferred to keep a few under his thumb. While he had addresses for all of them, he did not have the time to surveil their homes to see if they were meeting with cultists.

  He knew he should select a folder or a city map—should keep working for as long as he stayed conscious. His men depended on him understanding the lay of the land and the mood of the populace. Instead, he reached for the padded undershirt hanging at the edge of the table, and the thread and needle beside it.

  Linciard's brows crinkled as he sat back with his mending. “Sir, there's the Latchyard laundresses for that now, aren't there?”

  “I can do my own chores, lieutenant.”

  “You're the captain, sir. You don't have to—“

  “Are you just here to mother me?”

  Linciard grimaced and dropped his gaze to his glass. “No, sir. I just... This isn't what I expected.”

  “I also darn my own socks.”

  “I didn't mean that. I meant...” Linciard exhaled heavily and pushed sandy-blond hair back from his brow. “That thing with the Field Marshal and the mages and the...destruction. I was there when we brought down the wall of Savinnor, sir, but this was just...” He made a flattening motion, palm to the table, then shook his head. “And the girl, sir, what'd he want with the girl?”

  “To bring her to the Light,” said Sarovy, though he could not keep the acid from his voice. He hadn't been able to get that farm-family, the Crays, out of his head any more than he had been able to forget the Shadowland. The red walls of magic crushing down upon the tavern and all who dwelt within...

  He could rationalize it, of course. The Shadowland was a bastion of their enemies, and it had to be destroyed. He did not understand what use the Field Marshal could have for the farm-family, though, and if this was the man's method—sending his men out to do his bidding without even an inkling of the reason—then he preferred former General Aradysson's style. Kelturin Aradysson had been secretive and duplicitous, but at least he had provided direction, if belatedly.

  “But what does that mean, sir? Shouldn't she be sent to the Palace with the others? I thought that's where people go to meet the Light, not some borderland army camp.”

  “It is no longer our business, lieutenant.”

  “Isn't it, though? We're the ones who arrested them. Don't you wanna know why?”

  “They were enemies of the Empire.”

  “Sir, they were just—“

  “I know,” Sarovy snapped. “Women and children. But not our women and children.”

  “Sir...”

  “What does a powerful man do with a young girl, do you think?”

  Linciard looked taken aback, and Sarovy knew that his tongue was getting away with him but he was too tired to rein it in. Or perhaps he was finally drunk, though he didn't feel it.

  “But he's the High Templar,” said Linciard after a pause. “And the priests, they're all—“

  “Eunuchs, yes, or so the rumor goes. But soldiers say that about most civilians, don't they? And I haven't checked his codpiece, so the mystery remains.”

  Scandalized, Linciard said, “No more whiskey for you, sir,” and reached for the bottle.

  Sarovy let him take it. This response was a large part of why he had commissioned Linciard to the lieutenancy over the other options. A peasant with no political background, a soldier whose Crimson career he had overseen personally—but most of all a gregarious and protective man. A mediator. As a Wynd, he was Sarovy's foot in the door of the largely Wyndish infantry platoons; as a former Gold Army Border Corps soldier, he had been through the same kinds of skirmishes Sarovy had seen at the Trivestes-Garnet border, and thus knew the necessity of cooperation. He wasn't the cleverest or most worldly, but that was for the good, because it let Sarovy read his expressions well.

  Right now, he saw unease there. Discomfort. Disgust.

  “Put it out of your head, lieutenant,” he said, because he hadn't wanted that. He hadn't even meant to say it, except that she weighed upon his mind, that little girl. This kind of talk was an offense to the Risen Light. “The Field Marshal is one of the Emperor's closest retainers, so we must put our faith in him. He has allowed Blaze Company to survive the reorganization of the army, and now it is our job to survive Bahlaer. We can not brood about finished tasks.”

  “I know, but... What happens in the Palace, sir? You've been there, right?”

  He had, a long time ago. He shook his head and took up the needle and thread again. “That memory was excised from me. It is not our concern.”

  “That doesn't bother you, sir?”

  “No.”

  “Do you ever wonder...”

  Linciard trailed off, looking at nothing, his expression tight. After a moment's silence, Sarovy prompted, “Wonder?”

  The lieutenant shook his head. “No, nothing. Sorry. I just...it's been a long couple days.”

  “Perhaps you'd best put the bottle down as well.”

  “I haven't even— Yessir.”

  “How were patrols today?”

  The lieutenant shrugged. “The usual. Bricks and vegetables. The men have been performing all right with the rioters; I think clearing out the Shadow Cult caves at the coast was good experience for, y'know, not killing everyone we come across, though the Jernizen have been antsy. The abom— Er, the specialists did just fine, Rallant and the ladies in particular. They're really helpful for calming folk down.”

  “No doubt,” said Sarovy, threading the needle with cool precision. “When I came back from my meeting, Specialist Ilia was in my bed.”

  Linciard stared. “What? I mean, I know she's been watching you...”

  “Yes. And Sergeant Rallant, is he still following you?”

  “Um, no sir,” said Linciard, fiddling with the collar of his uniform coat. “Did you, um... Did she...?”

  “I threw her out. The other specialists, did they misbehave under your command?”

  “Not that I know of, sir.”

  “Good, but do not rely on them. I can not be certain where their loyalties lie, especially with the removal of General Aradysson.” He finished tying off the length of thread, then unfolded the undershirt to finger it for the tear he knew was there. “Houndmaster-Lieutenant Vrallek keeps them in line, not me, and he only tolerates those who show strength. As my second-in-command, you must be vigilant for his inevitable test.”

  “Test, sir, like that stare-down you had with him?”

  “If not an outright attack.” Sarovy glanced up from the first stitch to see Linciard blanch, and added, “He considered me little threat at the beginning. You, though, are closer to his size. Between us, it was a test of wills; between you, perhaps it will be arms. Be wary.”

  Linciard nodded slowly, then slugged back the whiskey left in his cup and coughed. “Thanks, sir,” he said in a strained voice. “I'll watch my back. What're you fixing?”

  “Just a cut.” Sarovy poked a finger through the slit in the garment. “The old Cray woman, you remember she came at me with a blade?”

  “And then you snapped her wrist. Yeah. You should've let one of us go first, sir. You could've gotten—“ Linciard broke off, frowning. “Isn't that the undershirt?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought you said she didn't get you.”

  “She did not.”

  “But sir... That was under your chainmail.”

  Sarovy considered him for a moment, then looked down at the slice in the garment. It was barely half an inch long and ragged, but it occurred to him that even half an inch in that spot meant that a certain length of the blade had—

  Had—

  The thought faded like an echo into fog, and he jerked his head up, feeling dizzy
. The alcohol and the long day kicking in at last. “Is there something else, lieutenant?” he said, not sure where they'd left off.

  Linciard eyed him. “Uh, the shirt?”

  “What about it?”

  “...Sir, are you all right?”

  Irritation rose in his chest. He hated being treated like a fragile bird, and Wynds had a habit of doing just that. He almost preferred Vrallek's challenges. “Fine. If you have no more business with me, you should sleep while you can. This city is restless. Incidents can happen at any time.”

  Linciard stared at him, an uneasy mix of emotions on his long face, then nodded slowly. “As you say, sir.”

  “Dismissed.”

  Once the lieutenant had pulled the door shut, Sarovy rose to drop the bar on it, then returned to his seat and the garment and thread. Spreading a garrison map out to memorize, he let his fingers work blindly, and tied off the last stitch with neat automatic motions while musing over entrances and exits and points of ambush. When he tossed the tunic into the pile of his uniform gear—all draped over another chair, as he'd yet to figure out where to put them—the last thought of it fled him.

  Out of sight, out of mind.

  *****

  Linciard fumbled with his key in the near-dark, his mind on other things. If only he hadn't broached the subject of the girl...

  I almost did worse. I almost said it.

  'Do you ever wonder if we're wrong?'

  Oh, how he'd wanted to. He was almost certain that the captain felt it too: that precipice they had stood at for a moment, peering over into darkness. That uncertain edge between their lives as Imperial servants and treason.

  He had enough trouble right now without courting more. Done was done, and no point in brooding, as the captain had said. Yet the captain wasn't taking that advice either—which was a problem with a mentalist in their midst.

  Just let it go. Pretend it never happened, like everything on the border. Like all the—

  “And how is our esteemed captain?”

  Linciard twitched, almost breaking his key in the lock. He shot a hard look into the shadows, recognizing Sergeant Rallant's voice, then glanced around quickly. The upstairs hall was empty and no light showed beyond the inner balcony, the assembly chamber empty below. Moonlight slanted through half-open shutters in the east hallway, their only company.

  “Hard to say,” Linciard murmured, not trusting the solitude. Not trusting himself in this mood. Rallant was a danger in more ways than one.

  “Have you told him about us?”

  “No. I don't think... I told you not to—“

  “I'm making a social call. That's not banned, is it? After all, you're not my direct superior, so this isn't fraternization.”

  “Don't know about that,” Linciard muttered, but twisted the key until he felt the latch clunk. Pushing the door open, he stepped into the dark room, half-prepared to seal himself in and leave it at that.

  But Rallant was already in the doorway, smiling in a way that Linciard could feel more than see, the moonlight limning his fine hair and the frame of his face. “Going to invite me in?” he said silkily.

  “You've already been—“

  “Yes, but it's only polite.”

  He hesitated, the dice tumbling in his head, but it seemed agreeing would be wiser. “Well, come in then,” he sighed, and felt around by the door for the lantern and striker. He should have brought it with him, but the day had been a blur of running and riding and shouting to the point that he'd barely remembered he had a room, let alone that there was a lamp in it.

  The side of his hand hit it and then it was tumbling from the shelf, and he cursed and fumbled it in the dark, the glass casing trying to slide free, the oil sloshing. Then came an exhale by his ear, and cool hands plucked the lamp away. “Stay still before you break something,” said Rallant, low and close.

  Linciard crossed his arms, wishing he could step away without running into invisible furniture. He heard the sound of glass being removed, then the rasp of the striker. Light bloomed slowly from the lamp, gilding Rallant's sculpted features and making mirrors of his eyes, and not for the first time Linciard found himself captured by them.

  “Good, wonderful,” he said, trying to be gruff. “Now get out of the doorway before someone sees you.”

  “Such concern,” said Rallant, sidling in. “I'd almost think you're ashamed of me.”

  For a moment, Linciard just stared out the empty doorway, wondering what he was doing. He felt the presence of the man behind him as something more than physical: a pervasive, alluring sort of instinctual awareness, though he knew Rallant was not using his specialist talents. Those came with a scent, and right now all he could catch was dust and sweat and—

  Stop it. Think with your brain, not your dick.

  The problem was, he had lost track of the difference. He thought it had been his brain telling him to get friendly with the Shield-Sergeant, to wring out some confidential information about the specialists, but now—with a full week of assignations rolling through his memory—he was no longer sure.

  Had he initiated it on his own, or had there been something in that bite?

  Just thinking about it made his lip sting and his skin prickle with heat. Curse the man.

  “You certainly don't show much shame,” said Rallant with a possessive slyness that would have made Linciard punch someone he wasn't already sleeping with. Fingers tugged at his collar and he made an abortive motion to shrug them off, and Rallant laughed. “Tsk. Really, it's not like you complained.”

  “You gave me a blasted hickey,” Linciard hissed. “Had to wear my collar up all day and I swear I saw people looking.”

  “I promise to put the next one somewhere safer.”

  Linciard swallowed and shut the door with a weird sense of finality. “Not what I was asking for,” he said even as he hauled the bar into place.

  “I wonder about these Illanites,” said Rallant, nodding toward the bar as Linciard turned. He had set the lamp on the desk and stood casually, comfortably, as if he had been here a thousand times. “Do they rise up against their militia so often that they must be barred out?”

  The question slid right past him. It was much less important than the fact that Rallant wore just an undershirt and loose trousers over his infantryman's physique, his collar unlaced to show a long V of muscled chest and the glint of his teardrop pendant. Aside from the view, it meant he had come through the packed garrison and up the stairs like that. The lieutenants and captain were the only personnel on the second floor; the rest of the space was conference rooms and storage. Sergeants like Rallant bunked downstairs with their platoons.

  Which meant Rallant's men knew he was out 'visiting', and they probably knew with who, so—

  Rallant sighed. “Erolan, stop over-thinking it. We're not breaking any rules. You are not my lieutenant, we're both off-duty, and I'm fairly sure we've done everything by mutual consent.”

  Have we? “It's not that, it's...”

  “Not the Jernizen again.”

  Linciard jumped on that opening, not daring to say I think you're playing me for a fool. “Look, Rallant, I know you don't see it as a problem. But your platoon is all Heartlanders, and Heartlanders don't care, so—“

  Callused hands caught his face, setting his cheeks aflame even as he was forced to meet Rallant's pale gaze. They were of a height, Rallant only a shade taller, and from this close the senvraka could have been carved from warm ivory, every plane of his face perfect from razor jaw to eloquent brows. Only the furrow between them marred the image, but it just made him want to kiss it away.

  “I told you, call me Sav,” he said, his tone gone serious. “Savaad if you insist. I will not call you Linciard, you will not call me Rallant, and we will stop talking about work. Yes?”

  It took great effort to keep his hands at his sides, to maintain his resistance. The slug of whiskey burned in his veins but so did a different sort of heat, kinder and far more devastating. “
But if someone tells them—“

  “Then you will beat their stupid asses. You are their lieutenant and you will not tolerate disrespect from a pack of foreigners. Former enemies! And that's if they even say anything.”

  “They will. They're great lancers but they have bad piking attitudes.“

  “So stop trying. You can't tailor yourself to their approval because you're never going to get it. Just live your life and let them rot in their jealousy.”

  “Jealousy, eh?”

  With a smirk, Rallant ran his hands down to Linciard's collar and popped open the first button. “Obviously. Who wouldn't want to have me?”

  Linciard couldn't muster any actual words for that, but managed to pull away with a garble that he hoped sounded sentient. He took over the unbuttoning though, which changed Rallant's annoyance to amusement, and tried not to stare as the senvraka turned away.

  “I swear, if not for you, I might have had to throttle Lieutenant Gellart just to take over his room,” Rallant said as he sauntered past the folded screen into the living-area. “Bed and privacy? Bliss.”

  More like torture, Linciard thought, watching the way his lover moved under those light garments. Linciard hadn't exactly slept his way through the ranks, but he'd been around, and he'd thought he could control himself. Yet whenever Rallant was close, he felt like an adolescent again, fixated on the idea of skin against skin even when he didn't want to be in the mood. He couldn't kick his boots off without the motion jarring through his groin and reminding him of his vulnerability.

  Rallant wasn't a tryst or a trophy or even fellow soldier. He was a specialist—a blessed one, a creature of the Emperor—and beyond that fair façade was another face. Behind those mirroring eyes was the judgment of the Light, while Linciard pondered treason.

  I should kick him out like the captain kicked out Ilia, he thought, but it was too late for that. And he didn't want to, anyway. The captain led a sterile life, remote as an eagle on a cliff, and what did that solitude gain him? A night alone with a bottle, unable to chase away the treacherous thoughts and dark memories.