Stormed Fortress

by Janny Wurts

  As Arithon rose, chastened, the raptor’s glance fixed next on Jeynsa. ‘Young lady, your liege lord serves more than crown office. Under his calling as Masterbard, I’ve asked him to favour my home with his music. You were invited here at his request. But no private quarrel excuses the fact that I am your hostess. I shall overlook your unkempt hair and dress, provided that you mend your execrable manners and display the civility fit for your breeding!’

  Tirade finished, she greeted Sidir with respect. Her nippish nod acknowledged Talvish. For Fionn Areth, who reddened and doffed his rough cap, she softened her battle-axe glare. ‘A grass-lander, and without pretensions, I see! My salutations, young man. You’ve upstaged the oldest blood of Rathain, to the mortified shame of great ancestry. Please sit down. If you’re chilled as you look, Cresiden here would be pleased to serve you peach brandy.’

  Pert head turned, chin lifted, Dame Dawr declared, ‘I shall sit, now.’

  Her man-servant eased her into a chair, brought a quilt, then wrapped her frail limbs into the semblance of comfort. She subsided, lips clamped, and her breathing too short. No one else, even Arithon, dared to make comment, that in fact, the brief stint of passion had drained her. Tintless skin and bright eyes, the grandame huddled up like a bird. She failed to snap at Mearn’s worried survey, or jab with snide wit, when Fionn Areth refused to risk countrified wits to the seduction of her rare liquor.

  Lest her stamina fail, there could be no delay. Arithon took up his shining lyranthe. He bowed to Dame Dawr, a rueful arch to his brows that might have been suppressed mirth. ‘By all means,’ he pronounced, ‘let us wreck the last shred of our dignity and slay the dragon of self-importance.’ Forthwith, he ignored the footstool set out. To play for the lady in his stature as Masterbard, he embraced the clown, and plonked his richly clothed rump on her carpet.

  The lyranthe spoke, instantly. A shouted chord in a major key that raked over fourteen silver-wound strings tuned to superb, ringing pitch. The musician followed his opening with a burst of merriment fit to banish ill humour. Foolery spoke in his phrasing. Once, twice, three times, his deft fingers slipped, a tripping, deliberate change that shocked shifts in key, tone, and timing. The changes tumbled over themselves like epiphanies: in triplets and couplets, drunken slurs and wild dissonance. The bard played the buffoon until his listeners ached, teeth and bones, and the assaulted mind floundered, unable to bear the assault of his catchy invention. Dawr withstood the onslaught, rammed stiff in her shawls like a jangled cat.

  Arithon tipped his head to her, then, his strait-laced demeanour beyond all reproach.

  Colour bloomed on the old woman’s cheeks. Her lips twitched. Then, her wide-opened eyes welled with tears over egg-shell-thin lids. Dame Dawr exploded, not with outrage or scolding, but with unbridled laughter.

  The lyranthe captured her mood and responded. The madcap tempo increased. The Masterbard grinned. He took hold, wringing sound through a fiery lift across three major keys. By then, no one could curb the tap of their feet. Had his performance been played for a tavern, he would have had patrons dancing on table-tops, shouting and stamping and free. Here, he played happiness, careless and glad, a soaring cry that evoked a forgotten exultation. Before the composition reached pace, his patroness was weeping. The catharsis burst every dam of held grief and lit Dawr from within like new morning.

  No listener could mistake that the tribute was hers. Helplessly swept in, no heart could resist captivation. Sealed separate, they ached: for a celebration of life that recast the hatreds of war as utterly rigid and meaningless.

  Unlike the others, Jeynsa s’Valerient had never heard Arithon play. Had never seen art and spirit unleashed with such soul-inspired abandon; nor been touched by a grace that invoked living light, sparked to a transcendent longing. Unprepared, stripped defenceless, she found no retreat, no cranny unscoured inside her. Her torrent of feelings could not be recontained, or stamped out of breathing awareness. The hard knot of mourning she held swelled and burst till she bent in a paroxysm of tears.

  Sidir caught her close. He held on through the storm as she drowned, unable to bear the release.

  The lyranthe strings spoke, striking air like flung gold, relentless and pure and impassioned. No respite was shown for the Teiren’s’Valerient’s collapse, or for Dawr’s manic flame of delight. Arithon added song to his fabric of harmony, his lyric voice clothed in Paravian.

  Translation of the words made no difference. The round vowels and cadenced consonants themselves built the mystical framework. Inspiration fused high art with rhythm, and entrained the bard’s purpose, unstoppable.

  Arithon played them the rebirth of hope. A vibrant blaze that razed away reason and dissolved earth-bound walls to the expansion of limitless spaces. He gave them a shattering brilliance of joy that devoured the fogs of despair as though pain had never existed. Peace such as the forest-born clans had not known, since the departure of the Paravians; and heights that a simple, Araethurian grass-lander had never held enough life to imagine.

  Dame Dawr sat transported. Talvish huddled with arms clamped to his breast, sorely tried for the lack that his friend Vhandon could not share the ecstasy of the moment.

  Hearing, Mearn s’Brydion saw his vital priorities reordered. Epiphany changed him, nourishing as spring rain, that there were other things he would fight to preserve for Fianzia and his unborn child.

  Then in trauma and splendour, the peak experience passed. The Masterbard let down his woven thread and drew his creation to closure. Beyond word and string, grace danced in his presence: a tender release of the brilliant focus that supported his consummate artistry. When the last note died, the left quiet cradled an immaculate calm. No one spoke, or applauded. All tears had flowed dry. The reprieve abided, in which Sidir could help Jeynsa back to her feet. With a nod of awed tribute, he acknowledged the bard, then saluted the hostess, who gestured permission to escort the unsteady girl out for privacy.

  Fionn Areth sat stunned, until Talvish gripped his shoulder and urged, his whisper not without sympathy, ‘If you won’t risk Dawr’s brandy, we’ll seek Dakar. Tonight, he’ll damned well share his prize hoard of beer chits and let you get drunk.’

  The goatherd arose, flustered. He managed not to trip over his own boots as the field-captain steered him away and propelled him over the threshold.

  Mearn remained, and the man-servant, caught at a loss. Neither one dared to disturb the grandame in her regal chair.

  A masterbard’s empathic awareness alone possessed the unerring instinct. Arithon laid down his instrument. He stood and bowed before the old woman who had asked for his talents as patroness. ‘The joy in the song was all yours,’ he said softly. ‘Mine, the privilege and pleasure to translate.’ He raised her withered hand, turned her fingers with their sparkle of fine rings, and kissed her palm with the reverence of family.

  Dawr’s grasp tightened, strengthless, except for the will that defined her indomitable spirit. ‘When you lead them out, those fathers and children and wives who are wise enough to seek refuge, I would beg not to be left behind.’

  Although Mearn and the servant could not see Arithon’s expression, as a mirror, Dawr’s seamed face transformed to a luminous smile.

  ‘You shall be with the first,’ the Masterbard promised. Then he straightened, stepped back, recovered his lyranthe, and, on noiseless feet, left the chamber.

  The trembling dowager settled back, wrapped in the loving care of her youngest grandson and the kindness of her trusted servant. Because peace in her domicile was always kept sacrosanct, Duke Bransian’s authority did not cross her threshold, unasked. That irony twisted the warp thread of fate: for as long as Mearn stayed immured in her presence, he remained oblivious to all else that transpired that night in the citadel.

  Cold, whitely shaken, Jeynsa s’Valerient failed in her third attempt to spark the wick of the tallow dip. Her tower chamber was fireless and dark, but not without human comfort. Over her shoulder, Sidir’s quiet rea
ch plucked the flint from her trembling fingers.

  ‘Let me.’ He drew his knife. A practised rap flaked the stone back to sharpness. Peerless scout, he kept shaved bark in his scrip. The flint was returned, followed by a lit spill that even the most nerve-wracked grasp could not fumble while kindling the pricket.

  Wood scraped, from behind. The quiet strength of warm hands guided Jeynsa to sit in the chair just pulled up by the hearth. Sidir did not speak, but crouched by the hob and began to sort the scant logs from kindling within the bronze bin. Soon, he had a clansman’s small blaze, which threw off only enough light and heat to take the chill off the bed-clothes he would hang to warm using the towel-rack.

  Eased by winter practices known throughout childhood, Jeynsa massaged her shut eyelids, left swollen from weeping. ‘I can’t stand my ground with him. Not anymore.’ For she had seen, finally: in Dame Dawr’s exalted abandonment, she confronted the worth of the joy she nearly destroyed out of grief. Her father was dead. To give in to rage was to be consumed by his loss and murder the promise that infused the present. Guilt salvaged nothing. Through the settling pause, while the blaze caught and sang, and a blanket dropped over her shoulders, Jeynsa allowed the grave calm in Sidir’s presence to soothe her dashed pride.

  He never pressed her, but perched on the settle, hands laced at the patched knees of his leathers. The indoor setting did not nourish his strength. Yet he was himself: his person and habit unchanged from his traditional origins. A stag-horn-handled-dagger with a curved blade for skinning hung at his hip. Not the same steel he had carried from Halwythwood: that heirloom piece had been lost at his branding, lately replaced by an astute gift from Talvish. The raided sword he had never put off, since he came, was cocked back against his tucked ankle. The shorn clan braid, and disfiguring scars he had suffered in her behalf had never been flaunted to diminish her. Until now, that blameless restraint never stung beyond bearing.

  Her crushing remorse at last impelled speech. ‘How can I serve Rathain as caithdein?’ she despaired. ‘I have not reached the years of my formal majority, and tonight, we both watched the s’Brydion dowager melt like run wax in Prince Arithon’s hands.’ Jeynsa wiped her stained cheeks. Her tears had spilled over, again. ‘Is there any spirit alive who can withstand the masterful force he has learned to wield in compassion?’

  Sidir answered, thoughtful. ‘Asandir thought you capable, should the sore need arise, and if our liege’s willed choice ever threatens the kingdom. He hasn’t, tonight. At least, not by my lights, or by the sure instincts passed down through my ancestry.’

  Jeynsa sighed. ‘I’m glad Mother sent you. Eriegal wouldn’t show me your kindness.’

  The tall liegeman’s glance flicked up. Steady, his blue eyes held burning reproach. ‘Eriegal has never found trust in his Grace. That’s why he was not sent to Vastmark, by Caolle. No Companion among us has not hated, for loss. But some nurse the wound like a canker.’

  ‘Not you,’ Jeynsa challenged.

  ‘Or your mother,’ Sidir broached, a tender touch on the flinching pain instilled by her sire’s late passing. He added, delicate, ‘Did you know Eafinn?’

  Jeynsa shivered, raised her knees, and wound her arms tight, with the blanket fringe tickling her moistened cheeks and the soft wool embracing her misery. ‘I knew his son better.’

  He had been well-loved, that vigorous young man with the flaxen braid and a spirit keen as a raptor. He had gone off to serve with Jieret’s doomed war band, and had left no children to further his lineage. The fight to safeguard Prince Arithon’s life had claimed too many dead in Daon Ramon Barrens. Sidir had no words, there. Self-honest, he could not absolve his own part: that the same ugly fate would have been his lot had his doomed High Earl not ordered him homeward.

  ‘Father spared you for Feithan,’ Jieret’s brown-haired daughter declared, as sharp with her own observations. ‘That she should not be left alone, after him, as Barach took charge of the lodge tent.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Sidir seldom flinched, no matter how piercing a subject assaulted his dignity. He lived for a mate now, but the path that had saved him had never been his own choice. ‘I don’t think your mother was all of the reason your father made his decision. Eafinn was dead, and Caolle, gone also, who had served on the horrific campaign waged in Vastmark. That left no one other than me, for your prince. He’s not easy to fathom. Everyone fears the potential to overpower that Arithon refuses to wield. Very few know his heart. Fewer still have been offered the gift, or been entrusted to see into his mind, as himself.’ A slow breath, then, courageous: ‘This is twice, he has shown you.’

  Jeynsa swallowed. ‘Because of his deep regard for my father, he won’t use his initiate defences.’

  Sidir smiled. ‘You see that much, most clearly. But I suggest you’ve missed his other intent. The care that he bears you is genuine, and not granted only for Jieret’s bequest. His Grace would bring you out, whole, Jeynsa. Will you let go and leave for him?’

  ‘I won’t stake him out as hooked bait to get murdered!’ she snapped through a ripe flush of shame. ‘But must the recovery of my stubborn error come at an untenable cost? Who will cry out for Alestron’s free people? Should the lives in the citadel be kept at risk for the sake of Duke Bransian’s pride? Who’s left to counter the curse that stakes out the s’Brydion as scapegoat to salve the Alliance?’

  ‘I don’t have that answer,’ Sidir allowed, stern no longer, but only sorrowful. ‘You’ve brought your prince here. That can’t be changed. Reaction will happen, now that he’s involved. Since the innate compassion you witnessed tonight will never allow him to turn a blind eye, whatever comes, we all reap the price of your bargain.’ Before pain could bite deeper, he added, not bitter, ‘Arithon’s playing touched more than Dame Dawr. I think he unveiled his own boundless hope to remind us we strive in the present. There are no victims, now. While we survive, for as long as we love, our future is yet to be written.’

  Jeynsa stared at her hands, chapped rough from hard labour. She had no place to turn, except to capitulate, if only to silence her conscience. Sidir held his peace, prepared to make the space to recoup her demolished dignity. While the quiet extended, and the crawling flame-light traced barracks-style wood furnishings, noise intruded. Beyond the shut door, the matched tramp of hobnailed boots ascended the outside stairwell.

  Sidir arose. ‘That isn’t the bearer of friendly news.’ His alert, scout’s senses picked up the jingle that bespoke heavy weapons and chainmail. Cat fast on his feet, he assumed a guarded stance, just before the latched panel slammed open.

  One of the duke’s burly sergeants, and more armoured men, packed into the stone-walled landing.

  ‘We’ve come for Jeynsa,’ the officer declared without courtesy.

  Sidir weighed the man’s presence. Never hurried, his talent for insight digested details: from the fellow’s stiff neck, and wind-burned, blunt features shaded beneath his strapped helm, to the bristling hang of his weapons. Last, his glance swept the surly-faced colleagues who crowded the head of the stair. ‘Let her change her attire for audience,’ he said, reasonable. ‘I will stay at hand and accompany her.’

  ‘Duke’s orders!’ the leading officer snapped. ‘She comes now. Alone.’

  Deadly calm, Sidir warned Jeynsa to silence. ‘Is this an arrest?’

  ‘Move aside, forest man! My lord’s will is my duty. Don’t try me with insolent arguments!’

  Yet Sidir stood his ground. ‘You address the one chosen as Teiren’s’Valerient,’ he reminded. ‘A girl not yet in her majority, and subject to her sovereign liege, who is also a guest of s’Brydion. By right, your appeal should be made to Prince Arithon. Since you’ve spurned my escort, Jeynsa goes nowhere without his Grace’s informed consent.’

  ‘Not when she stands on the citadel’s turf,’ the sergeant insisted, combative. ‘Stand down!’

  ‘Sidir!’ Jeynsa cried. ‘If Bransian’s on the muscle, you’ll be killed, and for nothing. His soldiers w
on’t gainsay a direct command!’

  But the Companion returned a sharp shake of his head. ‘I do know where my feal priorities lie.’ Cold as spring ice, Sidir challenged the officer, and the nettled men who had cordoned the doorway. ‘Now we have a problem,’ he declared, no less earnest, and unsheathed his weapons in one fluid movement.

  The cramped, street-side tavern where Dakar had been cornered to cash in his hoarded winnings, was packed to bursting. Unemployed citizens hungry for warmth rubbed shoulders with whores and plump, aproned washing-women, and the rust-stained gambesons of off-duty garrison men. Though the evening was young, the crowd already vented rambunctious steam. Raucous noise shook the rafters. Dice games and arm-wrestling had stopped, for the nonce, in favour of running the odds on the contest incited by Talvish.

  The fat prophet and the back-country grass-lander faced off to see which one could best hold his drink.

  The pair stood, toe to toe inside a ring of cleared space, while Talvish, blond and insolent, used glib talk and the occasional mailed fist to safeguard the packet of ration chits. The task was not tame, since the booty had lightened the pockets of unwary sentries throughout weeks of wrangling card games. Some of the laughter around him was forced; not all of the badgering he fielded was friendly. Shouts belted out between jokes carried menace: the fact the wad was two fingers thick suggested the chance Dakar’s partners might have been fleeced.

  ‘He’s a slinking Fellowship spellbinder!’ a sore loser carped from the side-lines. ‘Could have used craft to shuffle the deck! Might’ve dealt any hand in his favour.’

  Talvish quipped back, ‘Ever met Asandir? No?’ His smile turned evil. ‘Then, believe me, you wouldn’t care to be in Dakar’s boots if he’d maligned his initiate knowledge for cheating.’