King's Shield

by Sherwood Smith

  Cherry-Stripe led the laughter, and launched into boyhood memories of stings—safe territory. Or so it seemed at first.

  “Remember that first call over? We thought Gand was going to thump us right there!”

  “The first flag run?”

  “The first overnight? The horsetails stuck us with cook drudge!”

  The cider, well laced with distilled rye, had caused their speech to slow, making it easier for Tau and Jeje, if not for Signi, to follow. For the first time in the nine years they had known Inda, they were hearing his boyhood memories—explored with the boys who had shared them.

  Inda laughed, and laughed again to rediscover laughter. At the sight of Inda’s shaking merriment, Cama and Cherry-Stripe batted reminiscence between them; by now all that was required were a few words.

  “The horse piss in the bunks?”

  “Th-the bread pills?”

  “Spying out the pigtails when they tried to—”

  “—shoeing at the Games—”

  “Oh! Oh! When Basna took bets on beetle races?”

  “How he howled when Gand measured his shoulder blades with King Willow,” Cama exclaimed, flipping up his eye patch to mop his eyes with his sleeve; Jeje quickly looked away from the purple scarring round the bad one.

  Inda whooped for breath. “Basna squawking gambling? That’s gambling? Nobody ever told me that! None of the beaks believed him.”

  “That’s Basna all over.” Cherry-Stripe thumped the table again. “Invents gambling just to get himself dusted and gated.”

  “Remember when Flash—”

  “—Fijirad and Tuft had that fight over—”

  “—tried to get Noddy to laugh?”

  As the memories slid past those first two years into the summers after Inda had gone, Fnor kept smothering yawn after yawn of boredom. But she was Jarlan now—Buck and Cherry-Stripe’s mother had moved back to live with her own mother, and while Fnor knew little (and cared less) about the minutiae of the fellows’ academy history, manners were manners. The Algara-Vayir name required that, as did the presence of outland guests—a rarity, after all these years of pirate and Venn-enforced embargo. Not that Tau and Jeje were strictly outlanders. Both said they had been born on the coast of Iasca Leror, one in the north and one in the south, but to the inland Marlovans they may as well as been as foreign as . . . where was the sandy-haired woman from? Fnor smothered another yawn, longing for bed. Her day always began well before sunup.

  “Remember the shearing, when you got us a month’s gag?” Inda leaned toward Cherry-Stripe.

  “Ah, I’d forgotten. It was fun, wasn’t it, until Lassad made it sour? D’ya know he’s a hero now?”

  “Smartlip Lassad? You set him and the rest onto us,” Inda said, pointing at Buck. “We always thought the Sierlaef was behind it.”

  “Of course he was. We thought he wanted Sponge toughened up.” Buck Marlo-Vayir scratched his nose. “It was fun, watching our little brothers busy shying rocks and scragging beds and the like, all of ’em dead serious. You scrubs were better than anything for laughs. We didn’t think it really meant anything. Nothing did. Except winning.”

  Mran sat beside Cama, her hazel eyes wide, wondering when she could break into the old memories and ask Inda to go back to talking about the sea. She wanted to hear what it was like, being on the ocean that she’d glimpsed just once.

  Jeje listened at first, but couldn’t make sense of much. Her interest shifted, as did Tau’s, to the astonishing change in Inda as he ranged freely among these old memories, to which he had never once referred during all their nine years together. He looked like a ship rat again, despite the scars—younger than his twenty years. Do you remember ever hearing Inda laugh? He laughed now, more than she had ever seen.

  “—and our very first Restday, and Dogpiss’ story about the Egg Dance?” Cherry-Stripe wiped his eyes, thinking Dogpiss, everything was funnier with Dogpiss—and then his thoughts galloped off the road. “Oh, shit. Oh, damn. Inda, that was what ditched you, wasn’t it? What happened to Dogpiss?”

  Tau’s heartbeat quickened. In one conversation they were learning everything about Inda’s past that they’d spent nine years speculating on; Jeje sat there, food forgotten, her lips parted as she tried to catch the quick words.

  “Dogpiss,” Inda repeated softly. The pirate commander was back with that narrow, direct gaze, the jut of his jaw and thinned lips. His words were slow and reluctant. “I tried to stop Dogpiss from running that sting in the prisoner-of-war camp.”

  Prisoner-of-war camp? Jeje sent a questioning look at Tau: Weren’t they just boys? He flicked his hands outward in question.

  Cama said, “All I remember is you reminding him of banner-game rules. No stings. So me ’n’ Flash, we rolled up. Remember how tired we were, the horsetails running us all night long? Slept in a heartbeat.”

  “Night? Nights!” Cherry-Stripe protested.

  “We talked about it for a long time, after,” Cherry-Stripe said. “Tried to figure it out. What happened? What did Dogpiss do?”

  “Argued. Then slipped out when I was half asleep, and I went after him. Hawkeye jumped up. Took us by surprise. Dogpiss slipped on that big rock, I tried to catch him—almost got his wrist. But he fell. You know the rest. Hit his head.” Inda pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I saw him like that in dreams. Still do. If that rock hadn’t been there—if I’d gotten his wrist—”

  Buck said in a low voice, “He also broke his neck.”

  Inda laid his hands on the table. “Noddy was on guard, he saw the most, and I told him everything afterward. Why wouldn’t the Harskialdna listen to him?”

  “Partly Kepa’s lies. Then Kepa’s father called in old promises. Ruse to get rank out of the Harskialdna, and it worked.” Cherry-Stripe spread his hands wide. “But we didn’t find that out until a lot later.”

  “A Harskialdna is a Royal Shield Arm,” Jeje whispered behind her hand to Signi. “It’s the king’s brother. I mean, if he has a brother.”

  Signi gave a sober nod—of politeness, not of sudden comprehension. Jeje suspected that the Venn mage probably knew more about the Marlovans than she did, and blushed. But Signi’s grateful smile made her feel slightly less stupid.

  The escape to the past was now over, they all sensed it. In the Marlovans’ minds these past events connected directly with the threats of the present.

  “We called that one the Summer Without a Banner,” Cherry-Stripe said.

  Chapter Six

  “THE Summer Without a Banner,”Cama repeated,his rough voice quarry-deep with regret.

  “That summer changed a lot of things, though we didn’t see it at the time. We were just boys.” Buck gazed into the fire.

  “And we were only Tveis,” Cherry-Stripe said.

  Later on Tau learned what that meant—second sons, defenders and spare heirs. Inda and his friends had been among the first class of brothers brought to the academy to be trained under the Harskialdna instead of by their families, as was traditional.

  “What about Sponge?” Inda’s expression was troubled. “Did he say nothing?”

  “After you disappeared he cried himself to sleep every night,” Cherry-Stripe said, grimacing as he scratched under his horsetail clasp. “Heyo, most of us blubbed. Dogpiss dead, you gone, and no one would say where. Ev—Sponge—we call him Evred now, y’see. He talked among us—Noddy, Flash, Rat—”

  “Rat?” Inda interrupted. “Rattooth Cassad?”

  “Yep. We call him Rat now. And Cama—” A gesture toward Cama, who turned his thumb up, firelight gleaming in his good eye.

  “His Sier Danas.” Cama swept one hand in a circle. “May’s well call ourselves that. No strut, not anymore. Not when Evred said it at his coronation.”

  Cherry-Stripe grinned. “We arranged a nine-times-nine drum corps. He was only going to have the second-son-inherits nine.”

  “We had so many volunteers, it was hard to keep ’em to just eighty-one.” Cherr
y-Stripe rocked back on his mat, grinning with pride.

  “Good.” Inda radiated pleasure on behalf of Sponge, they all felt it.

  It was so odd, having Inda back. Especially looking like he did, with nearly ten years of unimaginable experience evidenced on his face, and in his strange clothes.

  “You should have seen Horsebutt when Evred called us the Sier Danas,” Cherry-Stripe gloated. “Like he’d bit into a berry and found a worm.”

  Inda said, momentarily distracted, “What does being official mean? I remember that the Sier Danas in our day were just you horsetails with the Sierlaef.” He indicated Buck. “I don’t mean translating the words into Iascan. I know that: King’s Companions. But the real meaning. At the academy, you were the heir’s allies. You could strut around, break some academy rules even, and no one touched you.”

  Buck turned his palms up in silent agreement.

  Cama said, “What it means for me is, I can leave Tya-Vayir on King’s Business, even though I’m a Randael. But the king’s order comes first. And since Horsebutt never lets me do anything at home anyway, I’m under what you could say is permanent order from Evred.”

  “And if there’s war, we’d be his first choice for commanders.” Cherry-Stripe thumped his chest, laughing. “Anyway, that summer he talked a lot about justice, but we all knew there wasn’t going to be any. The strangest thing is, the Harskialdna wanted my Ain here—” He indicated his brother with a thumb. “—to be the Sierlaef’s Harskialdna someday. Not Sponge. We never did know why.”

  “I know why,” Buck said, and everyone turned his way. “It was because Evred thinks. I never did. Not in those days, anyway. I believe the Harskialdna thought he’d be alive forever, commanding Aldren-Sierlaef when he became king instead of t’other way around.”

  “Isn’t that—no, I guess it isn’t treason.” Inda’s elbows thumped onto the table, hands pressed over his face as he tried to impose all these new notions onto his old understanding of his homeland.

  “Not as the Harskialdna saw it,” Buck said. “He saw it as protecting the kingdom, but it all had to be done his way. The Tveis had to be trained his way, so everyone would obey him if war came to us. I think Evred scared his uncle, so he had to be kept down, for everyone’s good. ‘Good’ being everyone thinking like Anderle-Harskialdna.”

  Everyone considered the Harskialdna, the only sound the flutter and snap of the fire.

  Buck shook his head, bright blond horsetail swinging. “I never said anything. No use. But I was beginning to see I didn’t want that.”

  “As for us, we banded together, us against everyone.” Cherry-Stripe wound his rough-palmed hand in a circle. “We used your plans, over and over, Evred building on ’em. And we won. All the time, though for years no one noticed. The Sierlaef was out of the academy, see, and started chasing your brother’s Joret all over the kingdom, then there was war against the north—and, well, the short of it is, when the Harskialdna did finally notice we’d become real Sier Danas, he broke us up fast, sent us home, and Evred off to the war.”

  Cama said, “But it was too late. Evred saw us as his Sier Danas, and he never forgot you. He always brought your name up, wondered where you were.”

  Awash in rye-spiked reminiscence, Cherry-Stripe stumbled over the first hurdle he’d earlier scouted around. “Tanrid’s man told us once that Evred was going to have someone search the ports for you, the word having spread you’d been put to sea.”

  “Tanrid? He promised Tanrid?”

  Cama sent Cherry-Stripe a one-eyed glare.

  “Your brother was sent north as his commander,” Buck said reluctantly.

  Inda straightened up. “He was? But Tanrid’s good with command, isn’t he? That brings me to my next question, may I borrow a Runner to send word to him—”

  An indrawn breath from Cama caused Inda’s gaze to snap to the three. He found shock, anger, dismay. “What? No, he can’t be—”

  Buck cast a look of distrust, almost of dislike, at Inda’s visitors, wishing he could shove them out of the room. They were outsiders, not fit to hear personal tidings. But they sat there, uncomprehending, and he was honor-bound to show them hospitality. “You must first know that he died with honor. In an ambush. Took most of them first. As to who set it, well, he too is now dead.”

  “The Harskialdna,” Inda whispered, all the old pain back again, strong as ever. “He always hated my brother. That much I could see. Though I couldn’t see why.”

  “Actually, it was the Sierlaef,” Cherry-Stripe said, and then the two exchanged glances. On his brother’s slight nod, Cherry-Stripe added, “Look, you’re here for what, better horses and some gear, right?”

  Inda had his hands pressed to his eyes. His last memory of Tanrid was so vivid, there in the guard cells: Tanrid looking so old and tough, his fingers tousling Inda’s hair behind his ears—

  Strange, how grief hurt far more than a sword cut. But now was not the time to sit and bleed. He was here for—

  The reminder of the Venn wrenched his mind to the immediate. “Yes. Yes! I came back because the Venn are coming. To take word to Sp—to Evred.” He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes again. Tanrid is dead.

  Cherry-Stripe grimaced; Cama was the first to comprehend Inda’s news. “Venn? When? And where?”

  “Venn?” Buck and Cherry-Stripe said together.

  Inda looked up. “Soon as the winds change. Maybe sooner, though I doubt it. But they have to suspect when I broke their line up north that I’d come here to warn the king.”

  Cherry-Stripe’s mouth dropped open. “You mean they’re really coming?”

  Buck added, “After all these years?”

  “The army’s other side of the strait, the ships maneuvering. We slipped past the whole southern war fleet.”

  “Then we’ll need to get you on your way,” Buck said. “I’ll send a Runner tonight to warn Evred. What should I say? Prepare for invasion?”

  Inda raised a hand. “No. That is, tell him I’m coming, but not why. Better if I’m there to explain it. That way rumor doesn’t start traveling around, getting crazier with every new person shoving their opinion in as fact.”

  “Right,” Buck said, grinning. “Coming and news it is.”

  “And you better get some rest,” Cherry-Stripe said.

  “But first Baukid has to string you.” Buck went to the door, and sent his Runner to summon the tailor to measure Inda. Trying to recapture their earlier good feeling, he added, “And I’ll find you a hair clasp. You’re going off to the royal city looking proper, not like something the Venn dug out of a pirate’s port.”

  Inda glanced down impatiently at his shirt, vest, and the deck trousers below. They were terrible to ride in. “No,” he admitted. “I guess you are right. There’s been nothing proper in my life so long I’ve forgotten what proper is.”

  “Don’t ask me,” Buck said, smiling faintly as he thought of the events of the previous year. “But you’ll have a proper coat come morning.” He appraised Inda. “Baukid can remake my old first-year horsetail coat. You’re no taller than I was at seventeen. Shorter. But you’re a whole lot broader here.” He smacked his own chest. “Do you have a decent sash?”

  Mran showed the guests their bedchambers, and the Marlovans parted as soon as the tailor had measured Inda.

  Fnor, giving in to her yawns at last, said to her husband, “Who is that piece of art Inda brought? If I thought all pirates were that pretty I’d go to sea tomorrow.”

  “No you won’t,” Buck replied, kissing her on the neck.

  Cherry-Stripe, Mran, and Cama wandered down the hall the other way. “That was bad, having to tell him about Tanrid,” Cherry-Stripe said low-voiced across Mran to Cama. “And after we were so careful not to tell him that his father was there that day. Should we tell him the details?”

  “You leave that to Evred,” Cama replied. “Now, who’s sleeping where?”

  Mran slipped her hand into Cama’s; Cama turned his eye to Cher
ry-Stripe, who returned a comical grimace. He considered going over to the pleasure house, where he had five current favorites. But no, he did not want to risk oversleeping and missing Inda before he left for the royal city. So he retired alone—for once.

  “Did you understand any of that?” Jeje asked Tau when they stopped outside the row of rooms Mran had showed them.

  “Some,” Tau began.

  “Was that Inda’s big secret? Somebody slipped and died? At first I couldn’t figure out if Dogpiss was a little boy or a horse,” Jeje said.

  “They were all little boys,” Tau reminded her. “Sounds like the older people used them in their own games. Makes it worse, somehow. And explains a lot about Inda.”

  Jeje stretched. “You’ll have to tell me how, but later. Who would ever call himself ‘Cherry-stripe’? What can that possibly mean?”

  Tau yawned. “No idea. I didn’t really follow what the little one said just now. Do we get the same room, I hope?”

  Jeje grinned. “I thought your balls were crushed?”

  “Let’s find out, shall we?”

  “What are you thinking?” Inda asked Signi, as he closed the guest room door behind him.

  She sorted through her impressions of the great, imposing castle, the short light-haired people with martial comportment, so like the Venn and yet so unlike, and shook her head. She had not comprehended much, except how they’d said the word Venn at the end with attitudes of hatred. She was worried what would happen when they found out who, and what, she was. Inda seemed too overwhelmed by emotion at being in his homeland again to have considered this. She would not disturb him now. “They are fine friends, these brothers,” she said.

  “And to think old Cherry-Stripe was once my worst enemy in the world,” Inda said, laughing silently. “Oh, to have life that easy again.”

  “But it was not easy at the time.”