The Jack of Souls

by Merlino, Stephen

  Nevertheless, Willard breached her defenses and gave her a good, loud smack with the flat of his blade. “You’re not trying, girl. Give me all you’ve got.”

  Harric had to hand it to the old knight: he was fair; he seemed to want her to impress him.

  Caris drew his attack with a feint, took his blade high with her shield, dropped, and swung at his unprotected legs. However, her stroke was intercepted by a quick move of the knight’s crutch, and the next moment her helmet rang with the impact of his sword.

  “That was the Thresher…” The knight laughed, breathing heavily and replanting his crutch. “You don’t see that too often these days, I’ll wager.” Caris glared from within the helmet. “Don’t give me that look. You aimed the Millstone at an old man’s legs! You deserved it.”

  Caris flew at him anew.

  Harric could not resist closing his eyes again to see her soul afire in the Unseen. He experimented with widening the window, and found he could do it by pressing more of his consciousness up and through the opening, but only with much exertion, and success brought with it an odd, detached feeling, which was not at all pleasant. His shirt clung to the sweat of his back, and his lungs began to labor as if he stood on tiptoes and with someone else on his shoulders. Gasping, he abandoned it and opened his eyes to watch in the Seen.

  “It’s all right, girl,” Willard said to Molly, as she glared at Caris from the spot where Willard had picketed her, pawing up clods of earth.

  Crows scolded from the branches of the fire-cones above.

  None of this penetrated Caris’s focus.

  She changed tactics, circling away from his sword arm and leveling most attacks to his head, which made it difficult for him to riposte, since he was continually forced to readjust his crutch amidst the hail of blows.

  The sound of steel on steel resounded off the ridge above.

  Willard stumbled several times, and his breathing grew ragged. When his crutch faltered on a stone, he tottered sideways and Caris lunged for the opening. In the same instant the knight’s control returned as if it had never been gone, and with a quick turn of his weapon Caris’s blade spun from her grip. He placed his point lightly on her shoulder, his crutch set firmly.

  “I’ve seen that one, too,” he panted, eyes blazing. “But never from a novice. Pick it up! Show me again.”

  Something caught Harric’s attention beyond the spirit window. Peering through, he realized it was Caris: despite the dimming effect of approaching dawn in the Unseen, her spirit had grown brighter. The looping black rings that bound her wavered, trembled—actually smoked, it seemed, like grass too close to a fire.

  “Come at me!” she shouted to Willard. “Come on!”

  “I can’t, girl. I have to wait for you to come to me. As you know, I’m not very mobile.”

  “You’re not lame.” Caris snorted. “It’s a trick. To make me overconfident. To distract me and lure me in. Let’s see you come at me. Come on!”

  “I tell you, I have to wait for you to come in range.”

  “Bah!”

  Large square teeth flashed behind Willard’s gigantic mustachios. “Go ahead and wait, then. I can use the rest.”

  Caris lunged, engaging, retreating, rotating and lunging, circling and forcing him to turn to face her. Grass tore and flew beneath her boots. Willard kept the crutch planted and pivoted on his skinny legs, kicking the odd rock from beneath his footing. She tried a dozen feints and attacks in a dozen combinations and scored a few glancing blows against him, but she refused to count them in light of the solid strokes he’d landed on her.

  Harric let himself become hypnotized by the steady succession of movements and themes, and marveled at this window to her identity. To watch her fight, Harric realized, was to watch the deepest fires in Caris, and it was profoundly moving. In that moment, he desired her more than ever.

  Caris landed the final blow—a solid cuff to the knee. A heartbeat later, the sun peeked over the hill, and the window in Harric’s mind vanished as if it had never been.

  “Gods leave me, that felt good,” Willard said. He stripped the helmet from his head, beaming. “I haven’t had a good sweat like that in moons. I’m going to pay for this in pains tomorrow. Down to my last roll of ragleaf, too, but it might just be worth it.”

  As they caught their breath, Willard studied her. Caris’s eyes glinted with stoic pride, and he frowned.

  “Don’t be smug, girl,” said Willard. “Your disengage is over-large, and your eyes tell me where your next blow is coming almost every time.”

  Caris blinked in surprise. She opened her mouth, closed it, and before she found her voice, the old knight had turned away to face Harric.

  “You’re as wet as if you were the one sparring, son. Get fit. Set a practice dummy in the stable and practice what you’ve learned here. I don’t say it’s necessary for a valet-squire to carry a sword, but it would shame your blood not to.” He indicated the green blood line on Harric’s bastard belt with a nod. “Dawn again tomorrow. The both of you.”

  “Yes, sir,” Harric said.

  “Yes, sir,” Caris mumbled, turning to the barn. Her hands rose to cover her ears as she strode off through the doors. Harric felt a twinge of embarrassment for her, even though Willard had already turned and hadn’t seen her reaction. The old knight limped along the side of the tower, gouts of ragleaf smoke swirling in his wake. “I expect that tower stocked for horses by midday,” he called over his shoulder. “Get it done before the day’s heat.”

  Harric sighed, and followed Caris into the barn. He wouldn’t approach her now, but he’d be near if she needed to talk. Rag nickered in greeting as they entered, her ears pricked and alert. Caris went to her, and Rag nuzzled her ear. Rag seemed eager for a run in a field. Indeed, all signs of her exhaustion had vanished, something he wouldn’t have expected to see until after a week or two of rest.

  “Looks like she’s had a visit from the healer too,” he murmured.

  Caris disappeared behind Rag, retreating farther from communication. Into the horse world, Harric guessed.

  He picked up a bucket to bring water into the troughs, and was just leaving when Willard’s voice startled him from the yard outside. “Harric? You in there?”

  “Here, sir.”

  The old knight appeared in the doorway. In silhouette, the incongruence of huge arms and torso over spindly legs seemed more absurd than ever. The knight’s eyes found Harric, then scanned the barn from under bristling brows. “I suppose you think you’re pretty smart setting me up against the girl.” The eyes twinkled in a cloud of ragleaf.

  Harric returned his gaze without expression. “Told you she could fight.”

  Willard snorted. “You did not tell me.” His brows rose for emphasis. “You said she could ‘fight.’ You never said she could fight. Trying to get me killed?”

  “No, sir.”

  Willard grunted. He scanned the barn again, then stumped back out the door.

  When Harric heard the tower door bang behind the knight, he turned and peered into the darkness at the back of the barn. “Hear that?” he said, trying to locate Caris in the gloom. “I think that’s as close to a compliment as you’re going to get.”

  Caris stepped from Rag’s stall, beaming. A laugh of shared joy burst from Harric’s lips as he crossed to her and snatched her into a tight embrace before she could recoil. In spite of herself, she gave him a swift squeeze.

  He let her go and stepped back. “He knew you were here, you know. I think you shocked him out of his mind for a while, and he had to wander off to collect his wits.”

  She blushed. “He made me so mad I had to come in here.”

  “That’s as close to approval as you’ll get, so savor it.”

  “I don’t care. He said it, and now I know it.” Her chin rose, but her gaze also softened. She seemed to want to speak or reach out to him, but didn’t know how, so she stood there, brow pursed.

  “You’re welcome,” Harric said gently.r />
  She flushed, and nodded curtly.

  “Girl!” Willard called from somewhere outside.

  “Coming.” She gave a rueful smile and left.

  Harric watched, heart rising. He ran his gaze over the shapely shoulders under her clinging shirt, and the graceful hips no longer enfolded in steel.

  “Fool,” he muttered to himself as she disappeared. He turned back to brushing Idgit. “It’s not her that wants you; it’s the ring.”

  Rag glanced over and snorted.

  “Not worth it?” Harric said, as if she had spoken. “Oh, I think you’re wrong there.”

  *

  By midday they’d filled the troughs in the tower and packed the hoppers with hay. Once they’d moved their saddles in, Caris climbed the stairs to rest in the gallery with Abellia and Willard, and Harric went to the barn loft, where he fell fast asleep.

  He woke with Spook warm against his side, when the light in the hayloft window had dwindled to a faint gray square, and the teardrop hole had reappeared in his mind.

  The sight of the hole turned his stomach.

  Part of him had hoped it had been permanently erased by the morning sun. Maybe all he had to do to be clear of the whole mess was find the imp in the forest and return the witch-stone to him. The rest of him, however, knew all too well if he turned over the stone, he’d have no way to drive off his mother. And the thought of her continued haunting was unbearable. Anything would be better than that.

  He’d find the imp that night, and use the witch-stone to drive his mother off for good.

  Despite this resolution, however—or perhaps because of it—anxiety plagued him the rest of the day. He managed to engage in conversation with the others in the tower, and drank rather more of the honey wine than he intended, but none of it diverted his worries, and none of it sped the coming of night, when all would be asleep and he could leave the tower.

  When Willard finally rose with a yawn from his seat at the window, Abellia had long since retired, and Caris was fast asleep by the hearth.

  Harric masked his worry by echoing the yawn. “Dawn practice again, sir? I’ll be there.”

  Willard grunted. He leaned out the tall west windows, frowning, then drew back in and closed them fast. “We’ll close these up tonight, to keep out the damp. I’m a hen’s ass if I don’t feel a fog coming on.”

  It took a moment for this to sink into Harric’s distracted awareness, but when it did, hairs on his neck stood on end, and he froze. “Fog? Here on the mountain?”

  Willard crossed the room and closed the east windows with a noisy sigh. “Doesn’t seem likely, I know. But after your second or third century you get a sense for such things.” He winked at Harric as he limped through the door of the closet they’d converted to his bedroom. “Besides, I can see it in the valley, creeping up the slopes like a line of specters. Sleep well, son.”

  He makes a poor smith who fears sparks. He makes a poor priest who fears death.

  —Arkendian Proverb

  32

  Father Kogan Fills His Belly

  Kogan stared at the signpost, chewing at his beard. There were letters on the sign, which made his eyes ache, and made him wish he had the Widow Larkin with him. She had a head for letters and would straight tell him what they said. The letters stood out clear, and there was a fresh painting of the crown in one corner of the placard, which meant it was the Queen’s sign. But under the paint was a faded mark. A handprint, it was. What you see when a guard bids you stop.

  “Like as not it says, Turn back, Queen’s land,” he muttered.

  He shifted the massive Phyros ax to his other shoulder, and took a long drink from his water skin. The water was still cold from the last stream he crossed, and tasted good in spite of the tang of the skin, which tasted like it once had wine in it. He’d been hiking without sleep since he left Marta and Miles. A day straight, that was, and he was dog tired. But no matter. He’d jog a while and get his blood moving.

  He hadn’t taken a step when he noticed the sound of hoofbeats from the wood he’d just emerged from. Many hooves, and near, by the sound of them. He hadn’t noticed their approach because he’d been puzzling over the sign.

  Stepping behind a boulder the size of a shed, he hunkered down on his heels, cursing the invention of letters and signposts. The deep thud of the hooves and the ring and clack of armor told him it was a company of armored knights on destriers; if he’d been spotted, it would be a short battle.

  When the company of knights drew adjacent his position, the leader called out, and the hoofbeats quieted to the sound of blowing horses. He judged the nearest was so close a normal man could have stood where he was and spit on it, though he himself could likely spit on several, as he could spit farther than any man he knew.

  He sank as low as he could between his heels, and leaned his back flat against the boulder. Intending to hold his breath and listen, he was halfway through a deep intake of air when a whiff of perfume struck him in the nose like an ax and he gagged on the foul stuff such that only the lucky approach of another thundering company saved him from being heard.

  Two dozens of knights and retainers now, he judged. Holding the ax with one hand, he used the other to pull up a fold of his smothercoat to sift the air.

  “Fire-cone pass,” a man called back to the rear of the company. “Sign says no open flames, and no spitfires past this point.” A dozen men laughed in chorus.

  “Good thing we don’t have spitfires,” said one.

  “Indeed. Dismount! We’ll break for a piss and a drink. Fetch wine!”

  Someone dismounted so near that their shadow in the early morning sunlight flashed across the dirt next to Kogan. Kogan reset his grip on the ax. This is it. The first to step around the boulder with his cob in his hand to piss would fall in two pieces. Then he’d make his stand against the boulder and he wouldn’t be satisfied until he took at least twelve with him and he’d know when he lost count that he could rest.

  “Hold!” the leader called. “Belay that order. Something stinks like a pig’s ass here.”

  “Rot, you’re right,” said voice so loud its owner could be no more than a stride from rounding the boulder. “It rotting stinks to the moons. That Phyros piss?”

  “No. If we find confirmation of Willard’s passing, I’ll send you with word to His Holiness. Saddle up! I’ll find a spot that doesn’t fist rape my nose.”

  Kogan ground his teeth. Least I don’t smell like a lady’s pillowcase, ye silk-button cockerel. Wouldn’t know a proper smell if I rolled you in it.

  The company remounted and rode. When he judged the last had gone, Kogan shifted until he could see their diminishing backs in double file on the road. A shining company of oranges and yellows and one green, with lances and pennons flying. He counted them to twelve almost twice. Half were armored knights, the rest squires and grooms with heavy spitfires and crossbows balanced across their saddles.

  Willard may have come that way, too. Gods leave me, I hope I haven’t led them to ye, Will.

  He sat back down against the boulder and laid the ax across his thighs. He wouldn’t travel again until nightfall. No telling where the company would camp or leave spotters, or when they might send messengers back down the road.

  He woke to the sound of creaking axles and the murmur of men’s voices. By the sun’s position, he guessed it late afternoon. When the source of the noise passed, he peered out and saw a cart full of workmen and another full of tools and great piles of hemp rope like they were going to a siege. It occurred to him then that Willard could be holed up in the very tower Kogan had set out to find. “I’ll be a pig’s ass after all.” He chuckled. He toyed with the idea of following the troupe and causing mischief amongst their ranks. Not that I owes you anymore, Will. But I might like it if you owe me one for a change.

  He waited till sunset and the Bright Mother rose, then set out hiking east on the road. As he chewed the last of the bread Marta had given him, he crested a ridge and got h
is first view of the fire-cone stand and its thunder-rod. He’d nearly make it there before sunrise, he gauged, unless darkness slowed him or he encountered a camp of knights.

  He’d scarcely thought this when he heard a rider approaching from ahead. He hid in the trees in time to see a knight pass, heading back down the road with a message. Too late it occurred to him he might have waylaid the man to intercept the message and take the food in his panniers.

  The next time he heard a rider’s hooves, he stepped behind a tree and waited with ax in hand. Peering around the tree, he tried to determine if the rider were a knight or perhaps just a workman. He didn’t want to take out a workman. Likely as not, they were good common folk forced into service by the knights. But the moonlight under the trees was broken and he couldn’t get a clear look before the man got too close and he had to duck back. He could call out, “Who goes there?” but that risked revealing himself to a squire who could loose a crossbow bolt into his gut or spur past and alert the priest hunters.

  Cursing, he’d resolved to let the man pass unmolested when the stink of perfume relieved all doubt of innocent workmen. When the horse’s head passed the tree, Kogan grabbed the reins with one hand and swept the hapless squire from the saddle with the broad side of the Phyros ax.

  The man crashed into another tree on the way down, and the horse went berserk. Kogan held the reins down and kept the beast’s head low until it responded to his cooing and gentling and ceased to struggle. The man didn’t move. Even the broad side of a Phyros ax left few survivors. He stroked the animal’s nose, and spoke kindly, and soon he was able to loop the reins over a branch and leave it while he explored the saddlebags. He had a way with beasts that way. Never panicked himself, and they responded to that.

  In the panniers he found cheese and bread and a flagon of wine, all of which he downed while the horse munched a handful of carrots. When he pilfered the rest of the food—a bag of dried beef and apricots—he set the horse free and left the squire his purse so it would appear he wasn’t robbed, but thrown from his horse.