The Silver Bracers (Lady Blade, Lord Fighter Book 1)

by Sharon Green

  "As a matter of fact, it slacked off sooner than we expected it to," Kylin answered with pure, wide-eyed innocence, gesturing with his cup to underscore that innocence. "My men were tired but I hadn't been fighting as hard as they had, so while they rested I rode home to see how your own war was going. I didn't intend doing more than stopping for a day or so before heading back, but somehow I ended up in the middle of a skirmish, and your men had just lost their commander, and the Zeranese outnumbered them, and I was in so deep so fast I couldn't simply ride away again."

  "All right, all right, enough," his father surrendered, shaking his head at the young Fighter's immediate grin. "I should have known better than to try pinning you down, especially when you knew two of your younger brothers were also in the north. If you hadn't been there we would have lost every man of that command, but you weren't supposed to spread yourself so thin, especially not by shifting back and forth between wars. What would have happened if you'd been killed?"

  "With three older brothers and four younger, all in excellent health and as skilled with a sword as their father?" Kylin asked with a laugh of' amusement and an uncaring movement of his massive shoulders. "I like to think there would have been a few tears at my final sendoff, and not only from my mother and father and brothers, but aside from that? The loss of a duke's fourth son is hardly likely to shatter the kingdom."

  "In this instance, that's not entirely true," the duke said, all traces of amusement gone from him. "You know Duke Rilfe and I are old friends, closer even than some brothers. What you don't know about is the agreement we came to, some two years ago at the King's coronation. In those days I thought I was the only one capable of seeing the undercurrents in the wind, but my old friend had noticed what I had, and had seen how he might be caught up in them to strangling. Once he spoke to me of it we formulated a plan and hoped it would never be needed, but word was recently sent me that all hope is gone. Sit down, Kylin, and I'll begin the tale from its proper starting point."

  Each man settled himself in one of the deep leather armchairs standing in front of the polite fire in the hearth, and Kylin took a swallow of his wine, glad now that the fire was there. The air outside was mild compared to what he had left in the north, but the sitting room felt as though the new-coming season hadn't yet caught up to the winter. Without the fire he would have needed his tunic, and that despite the light sheen of sweat that hadn't yet dried on him.

  "More than two years ago, well before the King's coronation, a new High Priest was anointed among those who serve Grail the All-Seeing," the duke began slowly, searching what wine remained in his cup for the proper words of description. "The previous High Priest of the god had not been a young man for the last two or three decades, so his being called Home came as a surprise to no one. What did come as a surprise, however, was the identity of the man chosen as successor to the old High Priest. The man was a good deal younger than was usual, not yet into his under-fourth decade, and not even of the Purist faction that had been the source of the last two dozen High Priests at the very least. The man had been Brother Nimram before the anointing, and afterward chose to call himself His Holiness Nimram I.

  "We who heard of it were surprised - and some few shocked - to learn that a whole man had been seated as High Priest, but there was no true law, either secular or clerical, against it, and our preferences and opinions had not been invited. A number of the older counts and barons, more than shocked, sent a delegation to the old king asking that he instruct the priests to see to it that their new High Priest be immediately neutered like his predecessors. In their opinion it was not only tradition, you see, but far safer with so powerful an organization as the far-flung Servants of Grail, but the delegation arrived to find themselves too late. King Klieant IV had, in his senility, gone hunting against the advice of his physicians, and had fallen so seriously ill from the outing that he lay closer to death than to life."

  "It sounds to me like the luck of Grail was on the side of his High Priest," Kylin said with a chuckle, sipping now at the wine that was far better than he'd expected it to be. "Even a man who has no intention of using his equipment prefers having it left intact to allow him the option of changing his mind."

  "Some of us found the thing as amusing as you do now," the duke said, staring soberly at his son. "Nimram's timing was a stroke of luck for his manhood, and became even more than that. The delegation turned then to the Crown Prince, but Prince Lillint was too ill over his father's impending death to listen to them or even to see them, and then the Prince was abruptly done with listening or seeing of any sort. The middle-aged but very delicate Crown Prince went out for a bit of fresh air in his carriage, his Guard alert all around him, and there was a terrible accident. Somehow a starving treecat dropped into his open carriage from the overhead branches of the forest trail, and by the time his Guard reached him the Crown Prince wasn't screaming any longer."

  "I remember hearing about that," Kylin said with more introspection, holding his cup now with both hands. "I was here in the east then, outlaw-hunting with some friends of mine who are King's Fighters from this district, and the first word brought by the crier-gallopers was that Prince Lillint was dead before his father. We all expected Prince Traffis to be confirmed as heir in his place, and then we heard that Prince Imfar had returned out of the blue from wherever he'd been, and as elder to Traffis had been named heir in his place. I heard it was a near thing: three more days and Traffis would have been confirmed Crown Prince and Imfar, elder or not, would have been out of luck."

  "Yes, luck," Duke Trame mused, this time relishing the word. "As luck would have it Imfar did return in time, and only a few days after Traffis had sent the delegation packing, their ears still ringing with Traffis's denunciation of their 'sacrilegious intentions.' The new Holy Father was not to be commented about or criticized by any group of men as 'lustfully vulgar' as the members of the delegation and the rest of the nobility they represented, and Traffis was outraged that they'd dared to approach him with such a shameful and appalling demand."

  "Evon's Steel protect us," Kylin sighed, shaking his head. "King Klieant, you've always said, gave courtesy and respect to Grail for the sake of the people of his kingdom, but it doesn't sound as though Traffis followed his father's inclination to honor Evon above all other gods. He can't be much of a Fighter if his steel hasn't been dedicated to Evon, Blesser of Blades."

  "He isn't much of a Fighter, and never was," the duke agreed, swallowing a grimace along with his wine. "He was livid when Imfar appeared, of course, but there was nothing he could do to get rid of him again. Imfar had spent the years he'd been gone making a name for himself as a Fighter, and he'd been only a couple of weeks over the border from Zeran when he heard of Lillint's death. He'd stayed away that long because he'd never been able to consider Lillint as King without getting sick to his stomach, but Lillint was the elder of them and Imfar refused to dishonor his father by disputing Lillint's claim. When he showed up the Council was delighted, and confirmed him so fast it made people's heads spin."

  "Meaning they didn't like Traffis any more than anyone else," Kylin said, this time nodding. "I've heard he's the sort who's never happy unless he's making sacrifices of one kind or another - or making other people's lives miserable. Since he wasn't likely to become king no one cared - until Lillint died. There were a lot of people sweating then, I can tell you."

  "For more reasons than you know," Duke Trame said, rising to get the wine pitcher and bring it back with him. "After Imfar was declared heir the delegation concerned about Nimram returned to the capital city, but they still didn't get the answer they were looking for. Imfar heard them out courteously, then explained his position. As a fighting man and follower of Evon, he had never gotten involved with Grail beyond knowing what his father's feelings about the religion were. His father had honored Grail for the sake of those people in the kingdom who worshiped the god, and other than that left the Servants entirely alone. Klieant IV had been acknowledged a
great king even by his enemies, and when Imfar became Klieant V, he intended trying to emulate his father in every way possible. If circumstances changed, or the delegation could find proof that the situation was harmful to the kingdom he would reconsider his decision, but until then Imfar had to refuse to do as the delegation asked."

  "That sounds like the reasonable man everyone now knows the King to be," Kylin said, watching his father closely. "Why do I get the feeling you would have been happier with an unreasonable decision?"

  "There are some things a man can't afford to be reasonable about," the duke said, gesturing vaguely with his wine cup. "Imfar is making a good king, but how are we supposed to find hard evidence to support observations, deductions and suspicions? It took a lot of months before the old king died, and by the time of the coronation Rilfe and I had noticed enough oddities to come to the same conclusions.

  "To begin with, Nimram wasn't the old High Priest's choice as a successor. Rilfe and I had both made discreet inquiries, and our individual efforts had turned up nothing more about that than the fact that three of those who would have had strong Purist backing for High Priest had met with serious - and fatal - accidents just before the old High Priest took a turn for the worse. Because of that the Purists were divided and unsure, which let Nimram's followers walk in and take over. His people were the younger priests, the ones who went out preaching and teaching, ones who hadn't yet decided to give up their manhood in order to join the Purists and gain advancement. Until then the Purists had been the hierarchy of the religion, but the unexpected coup knocked them out of power.

  "After learning that, Rilfe and I had again done the same thing - which was investigating what the Servants of Grail had been teaching over the past years. What they taught when I was a boy and for generations before that was either helpful or innocuous. They taught the offspring of nobility their letters and sums, art and literature, history and science and, with the permission of the nobility, schooled promising peasants in simple reading and counting. They also preached their religion to the peasants, of course, and to the ladies of noble houses who could not join their husbands and fathers in paying homage to Evon. Some of the Servants were also physicians, and these usually established themselves in villages.

  "It took a lot of effort and roundabout inquiry, but I, and Rilfe on his own, discovered that the teaching and preaching had changed over recent years. The people were being told that because of the influence of Evon on their lords, they were being forced into lives of sin that would never let them go Home after their final sendoffs. New rules of conduct have been brought up and insisted on, and after years of being lectured and preached at, the people are beginning to believe in them. They've also been told, over the last five years or so, that no king who didn't bow solely to Grail could possibly have his people's best interests at heart."

  "Wait a minute," Kylin said with a frown, leaning forward in his chair. "Over the last five years? But that means they started their preaching three years before the old king reached his deathbed. Lillint was Crown Prince then, and wasn't he primarily a follower of Millis?"

  "Millis the Overindulgent and Squeamish?" Duke Trame asked with a snort of scorn. "Yes, Lillint found Millis an excellent patron god, and visited his temple on a regular basis. I've heard it said the temple priests spray perfume instead of burning incense."

  "But that doesn't make any sense," Kylin insisted, his expression showing his annoyance. "Why would the Servants preach what they did, when the only prince who followed Grail was -"

  "Traffis," the duke finished for him, nodding slowly. "A Traffis who never announced his feelings about Grail until after his brother Lillint was dead. You see now how the picture was drawn for Rilfe and myself."

  "Fatal accidents happen, and Nimram becomes High Priest," Kylin said, settling back heavily. "The king ends up very sick but not dead, just the way the old High Priest was, and then an accident takes the Crown Prince. If Imfar hadn't turned up without warning, Traffis would have been King. I'm surprised Imfar didn't meet with any accidents."

  "He almost did," the duke said grimly, drawing a sharp look from his son. "A horse going suddenly and unexpectedly wild under him, an arrow flying wrong on the Palace Guards' practice field, one or two other incidents everyone knows about, and Evon alone knows how many unmentioned. If Imfar hadn't been as good as he was, he would have been as dead as Lillint. And before you ask, no, he won't believe any of it was done on purpose. Any fighting man knows how likely accidents are, that's why we try being prepared for them, and Imfar is a fighting man. End of story, end of suspicions."

  "And once he was crowned King, he was safe," Kylin said after swallowing at his wine. "He may not have produced any legitimate issue as yet, but the number of sons he left scattered over this continent alone guarantees that Traffis can never be considered his heir. The Council has been known to recognize a bastard over a brother before this, just to make sure younger brothers of kings don't get any ideas. Isn't it too bad Nimram's plans didn't work out."

  "Nimram's first plans didn't work out," Duke Trame corrected, showing none of the pleased relief his son did. "Traffis disappeared right after the coronation, only to show up again with an army and a claim for the throne. It's too bad you never met Traffis, or you'd know how unlikely it is that he thought of the claim and the effort on his own. And that's not all that's been happening."

  Kylin nodded as he reached for the wine pitcher, knowing his father was finally getting to the nub of things. He still didn't know what part he was supposed to play in all that, but he didn't doubt for a minute that he did have a part.

  "Duke Rilfe came to the coronation out of duty, not because of any desire to celebrate," the duke of the west said, his words heavy with commiseration. "He had just lost his eldest son to a legitimate accident, but the incident had started him thinking. His second son had become his heir, but although the boy was well-liked and noble in spirit as well as by birth, he was too trusting and not as skilled as he should have been with a blade. With Rilfe's third and fourth sons gone off to see the world and no word of them having come back for years, it occurred to him to wonder what would happen if his last male heir met with a fatality. We knew nothing of the impending war then, you understand, but Rilfe's investigations into Nimram's doings had made him suspicious.

  "We talked the problem over together, and decided that what had served Nimram so well in the past would likely serve him well again. Under the proper circumstances, having his own people declared heir to one or more of the reigning dukes would, after those dukes were put out of the way, give Nimram control of a significant portion of the kingdom through his pawn or pawns. We agreed to be on the lookout for that, and also agreed on a plan of action if it turned out we were anticipating rather than worrying needlessly. Four weeks ago, I received word that Rymar, Rilfe's son and heir, had met with an 'accident.' "

  "I don't think I'm following this," Kylin said with a small headshake and a frown. "I can see that Nimram is behind Traffis's warring even though he publicly made an appeal to the 'misguided' to stop fighting and go back where they came from, but what good would it do him to have Duke Rilfe's heir killed? Unless he has one of the duke's missing sons as tightly as he has Traffis, how would he gain control of the duchy?"

  "He may or may not have one of Rilfe's sons," the duke answered with a shrug. "What Rilfe has, though, is three daughters, one of whom is of more than marriageable age. She's been living with an aunt for years now, and would have been properly married off long ago if her aunt hadn't advised Rilfe against it. The girl wasn't ready, the woman kept insisting, but now she has to be ready. The only way Rilfe can have a suitable heir is to marry the girl to the man of his choice. Before she ends up in Nimram's clutches, and married to someone of the High Priest's choosing."

  "Something the High Priest would probably have no trouble arranging," Kylin said in disgust. "Delicate little things that just aren't ready for marriage usually spend all their time praying and doing
just what their priest tells them to do. This, I take it, is why you were unhappy about my … multiple activities before first snow. I'm the one you've chosen to marry Duke Rilfe's daughter."

  "The choice wasn't mine alone," his father said with a smile, traces of pride coming through again. "Rilfe saw you fight in the masked competition last year at the king's birthday celebration, and was very impressed when I told him you were my son. That was when the decision was made as to which of my sons would marry his daughter, and I can't say I blame him. I've been given reason to be very proud of all of your brothers, but you, more than any of them, remind me of me when I was young. Are you willing to accept the choosing?"

  "After a buildup like that, how can I refuse?" the young Fighter asked with a laugh, causing his father to join him, then he shook his head. "All joking aside, I find myself very flattered, Father. I won't say I'll try to be worthy of your confidence and Duke Rilfe's, but only because I think you know I will. I hadn't been thinking in terms of settling down, but if I'm willing to give my life for the kingdom, how can I refuse to give the service of body parts? I know it doesn't matter, but what does the girl took like?"

  "That I can tell you from personal observation," the duke said, grinning as he chuckled to himself. "I met the young lady about five years ago, having come visiting myself when she paid a visit home. She was about sixteen then, taller than you would expect and pretty, with bright gray eyes. She hardly said a word during the visit, almost as though she were afraid of saying the wrong thing, so you don't have to worry about endless chatter. I can also remember how uncomfortable she seemed in her gowns, as though she was used to wearing less finery in her aunt's house, which was also a good sign. She won't be forever pestering you for additions to her wardrobe."