by Unknown
Precious stared down at him. Sand-tears once again sifted down her cheeks. She hung her immense head.
"What's wrong?" I said, glancing back at our royal audience. Prince Carleton was occupied with smashing a strawberry in his sister's golden hair. She was squealing in outraged disgust.
"I think he hurt her feelings," Gerta said.
"Apologize!" I said to Balwick.
"I will not!" he said, his back stiffening.
"Apologize or I'll cut your liver out and stuff it into the lava cake volcano!" Gerta said. "In fact, that sounds like fun. I might just do it anyway!" She drew her dagger.
"You're not helping," I said under my breath. "Precious, just whirl him a bit. It's so lovely when the two of you dance."
Balwick threw up his hands and snorted.
Precious collapsed in a heap and covered her spiky head with both arms, sobbing sand-tears as though she would never stop.
The two children had left off fighting and were now staring in fascination at the despondent djinn. "What's wrong with it?" Prince Carleton said. Chocolate was smeared across his cheek.
"Oh, the djinn is in love with that wretch of a sorcerer," Gerta said, gesturing at Balwick, "but he doesn't even like her."
Princess Daisytoes picked a pulpy strawberry out of her golden hair and dropped it fastidiously into the grass. "That's sad," she said, then turned to an older woman in a gray gown. Her young brow knotted with the effort of thought. "Isn't it?"
"Yes, Lovey, it is." Tears brimmed in the attendant's brown eyes. "It certainly is!" She clasped the girl in her arms. "Summon the King and Queen!" she said to one of the guards.
"Um," I said. "Maybe we should go."
"Certainly not," the woman said. "You must all stay." She waved a hand at the contest official. "Send the remaining contestants away, Jonton. The competition is ended."
He nodded and went to shoo off the hellhound, a mummy, and all the others waiting for their turn to amuse the royal progeny.
Gerta sidled closer to me, her blue gaze wary. "Did we break the contest? We didn't mean to!"
"Dunno," I said. Precious was still sobbing. Balwick clutched his head with both hands, looking uncomfortable.
I was thinking of slipping out, despite instructions. It didn't look like any gold ducats were coming our way.
"Your Majesties!" The attendant curtsied as King Mytchell the Extremely Picky and his Queen, Maeve the Moderately Bright, swept around the corner. Gerta and I hastily bowed.
"Mama! Papa!" Princess Daisytoes pointed at the sobbing djinn. "Look at her. She's so sad. That makes me sad too."
The Queen took the girl's hands. "You can tell, sweetheart?"
"The bad man doesn't love her, Mama," the Princess said.
The Queen, still a handsome woman, smiled tremulously, then crossed to the sobbing djinn. She laid one hand on the spiky head. "Rise, beast. You have done my child a great service."
Precious's gray granite eyes looked up at the Queen.
"Never once in her entire life has my lovely daughter been able to perceive the emotions of any living creature. And now—" She glanced back at the golden-haired girl. "You have shown her what it is to feel another's pain."
Precious lurched to her feet and seized Balwick. "Dance, girl!" I said to the djinn. "You've earned it."
"No!" Balwick said, but Precious whirled him around and around, leaping, pirouetting, and then dipping him so far back that his head scraped the ground. The orchestra joined in.
Prince Carleton chortled at the sight of Precious's antics and left off, at least for the moment, trying to smash strawberries in his sister's golden hair.
"My sweet boy!" the Queen cooed. "So thoughtful of others!"
King Mytchell turned to us. "Hallah Iron-Thighs and Gerta Derschnitzel?"
We bowed again. "At your service, Your Majesty."
We had done the occasional job for the crown here in Alowey, though I was surprised King Mytchell would remember us.
"Why aren't you out escorting merchants across the passes?" he said. "This time of year the bandits are at their worst."
Gerta flushed and toyed with the hilt of her sword.
I sighed. "It's our—dues, Your Majesty," I said. "Our Amazon Sisterhood licenses expired and we're a bit, well, short of funds. Even our horses have been impounded."
"So you've become dance masters?" he said.
A muscle twitched beneath my eye. "Temporarily," I said.
Precious careened into the goodies table and slopped hot chocolate fudge over the tablecloth. Carleton whooped with joy and began painting his face.
"It doesn't seem to be your strong suit," the King said, plucking his son up and holding him out at arms' length. "I hereby declare you winners of the Contest to amuse the Royal progeny. The prize is yours." He tossed us a leather bag that clinked. "Might I suggest that you use it to renew your licenses, retrieve your horses, and return to the heights where I'm certain your mercenary services are sorely needed?"
We bowed. The bag was cheerily heavy. "Yes, Your Majesty."
"What about the djinn?" Gerta said.
"Oh, she must remain as one of the Princess's ladies-in-waiting," the Queen said. "She'll look just lovely in puce."
"And Balwick?" Gerta said as Precious stopped dancing.
"I don't like him," Princess Daisytoes said, twirling a golden curl around one finger. "He makes my djinn sad."
Balwick's handsome face fell.
"Could he perhaps stay if he made her happy?" I said.
The Princess considered, studying the djinn's bereft face. "Yes," she said finally, "but he must cheer her up."
Balwick sighed, then tentatively patted the djinn's back. "There—there," he managed to croak. Precious seized Balwick and hugged him so tightly, his eyes bulged.
"Time for us to go," I whispered to Gerta. The two of us slipped into the amazed crowd as Precious once again whirled her partner in what I could swear this time was an actual foxtrot.
Gerta dabbed at her eyes with the back of one hand as we hastily made our way under the portcullis and across the drawbridge. "What's wrong?" I said.
She sighed. "That was such a happy ending."
"But no one got killed," I said. "I thought that was always your favorite part."
"True," she said, looking around, "but the day isn't over."
Indeed, I thought, it was not. The mountains—and their infesting bandits—awaited.
The plaintive strains of a wild didgeridoo tune floated back to us and I could hear Precious's dusty voice crooning to the sorcerer with all the sweetness of two rocks being scraped together.
I smiled. How nice, I thought, that occasionally some folks got exactly what they deserved.
Time for Tears
by David L. Burkhead
Kaila was a knight and had fought in actual wars, so she didn't expect fighting a demonstration match as part of an embassy headed by her son to be terribly dangerous. Unfortunately, however, the demonstration was a foreshadowing of a real fight to come.
David L. Burkhead's most recent stories are "With Enemies Like These", in the shared-world anthology Lawyers in Hell by Perseid Publishing and "Time for Tears." He has previously published stories in Analog Science Fiction & Fact and Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy Magazine. In addition to his science fiction and fantasy writing, he has published a number of technical and popular science articles in The World & I and High Technology Careers. He is a physicist working in Atomic Force Microscopy and surface science. He has a webcomic, Cold Servings. He lives in Indianapolis with his wife and daughter, three dogs, and two goldfish.
#
Kaila, Knight of Aerioch and Duchess of Zantor, waited on a bench in the tournament field. High summer meant heat and dryness in the steppe, and for that, Kaila was grateful. The heat eased the aching that had come into her joints more and more often of late.
The sun burned near zenith in a cloudless sky of an impossibly deep blue. The grass of the field, where it
hadn't been crushed by the contestants in the tournament or coated with gray dust fairly glowed a green so pale it was almost gold. The dry air tickled at Kaila's nose and throat and somehow sharpened the scent of sweat and blood. And blood there was, for a long life of combat and contests had taught Kaila that even the friendliest of tournaments could break bones and spill blood. Entirely too many of those bones had been Aeriochnon. Never had she seen supposedly capable men at arms so clumsy. If something did not change, Lord Jian Pah—their host—would think the representatives from her home to be a prize pack of fools.
In the field before her, the last of Jian Pah's horse archers rode across the field at a canter. Holding his short bow drawn and using only legs and seat he stopped his horse, loosed his arrow at the target, and wheeled, drawing and loosing another arrow behind him as the horse raced away from the target. Both arrows struck within a finger-width of the center of the target. Like the others in the audience, Kaila rose to applaud.
Two of the younger knights in the contingent from Aerioch sat at opposite ends of the lists atop their warhorses waiting for the horse archers to finish. Both held lances and shields and wore the cumbersome tournament armor of heavy iron plates.
Kaila had seen enough jousts in her sixty-five years and so she turned to look at the spectators.
Jian Pah presided in his curtained pavilion. He wore a bright red tunic trimmed with gold braid. Over it he wore a blue cloak, the rich dark blue of western sky the moments after the last reds of sunset have faded. His lady Xia, sat with him, her gown the pale green of the first willow leaves of spring. Neither Jian Pah nor Xia's clothes were of local cut, appearing instead to be an attempt to copy Aerioch court fashion and while the cut of the clothes was close, those colors....The dyemakers in Aerioch could not make such brilliant colors. If they could arrange trade for such dyes that, by itself, would make the embassy worthwhile.
Kaila's son, Marek, serving as the ambassador from Aerioch, sat in the pavilion with Jian Pah and Xia, as did a man who Kaila did not know. This other man wore flowing, light gray, Schahi court robes.
A loud crash of colliding metal drew Kaila's attention back to the lists. Kaila stood as both knights fell from their horses in a double-unseat. Her turn would be next, a demonstration of swordsmanship. She pulled a padded leather gambeson over her torso and buckled it down tight. The cut of this gambeson left her arms and her legs below mid-thigh uncovered. While she had lost weight and strength over the years, relentless drill kept her body trim.
The helmet was lighter than she preferred. Although the demonstration she would be giving used weighted whalebone swords instead of steel, a heavier helmet would better absorb the force of a blow.
Once the two fallen knights were cleared out of the way, Kaila approached her opponent across the lists.
The man facing Kaila was one of Lord Jian Pah's personal armsmen. He stood about her height, making him taller than most other people, either men or women. Even with the thick padding he wore from the bottom of his helmet to the tops of his heavy boots, she could see that he was heavier and more muscular than she had been even in her prime.
"What is this?" the man shouted and turned to face Jian Pah's pavilion. "I do not fight old women!"
"These folk from Aerioch," Jian Pah said, "claim that their women fight as well as their men. Let us see."
The warrior grunted and turned back to Kaila, "I will be quick, old woman, and spare you such pain as I might."
Kaila shrugged and dropped into low guard. After so many years of fighting where the price of failure was pain and death, to fight for show, even to impress a potential ally, brought her no joy.
The practice sword she held was not her ideal. She would prefer a sword half a hand longer, but with a blade lighter by half a pound. The slight curve and single edge did not match her favored style either.
She watched from under lowered eyelids as her opponent approached. His sword was longer than hers, as were his arms. Given the difference in their ages, she had to concede that he would have more spring and speed in his legs.
She considered drawing on the power of the Knightbond. With its power, she could for a time restore some of her youthful strength and vigor. But no. It would not be right to use the sacred power of the Knights of Aerioch for something so trivial as this contest.
Kaila waited as the man drew closer then sprang forward in a rush. Overconfidence made him careless. He rushed in with an overhand swing. Kaila kissed his blade aside with her own and rebounded into a straight thrust to his chest. The impact jarred Kaila up to the shoulder, but her opponent jerked to a stop as his breath rushed out.
Kaila frowned. Something had pulled at her arm as she had made the parry. She had had to use more strength than she had wished. So that was it. That was why the men at arms had seemed so clumsy.
She glanced back and caught Marek's eye then made two quick gestures of hand-speak, "Magic" and "enemy." Marek had always been quick. Kaila felt the Knightbond settle around her, shielding her from magic imposed from outside. Kaila turned back to her opponent and saluted. To use the Knightbond to win a fair contest was one thing. To use it to shield against another's use of magic? That was something else.
Kaila's opponent growled. "Again."
Kaila nodded and dropped into low guard again. This time her opponent was more cautious but still came in with a flurry of blows. She deflected every strike, using the barest breath of strength to slip the incoming blows scarce hair's thicknesses past her body. Despite her best efforts, the power of the blows forced her back, and back again. Her back pressed against the fence of the lists.
For a dozen exchanges, Kaila deflected blow after blow, as her blade grew heavier in her hand in response to her growing fatigue.
Kaila's opponent stepped forward just as Kaila parried and the blades met forte to forte, met and locked.
The armsman's strength was greater than Kaila's, and he shoved her sword back toward her. Kaila could not stop the approaching blade and there was no more room for her to retreat.
Kaila smiled then disengaged her blade from her opponents, letting her tip duck under her opponent's wrist and drive upward toward his stomach. Two swords struck as one: hers into her opponent's stomach and his into her side.
"Splendid!" Jian Pah leapt to his feet and applauded. "Splendid! A double kill!"
Kaila stepped to the side, away from the fence and around her opponent, and felt her side. She did not think any ribs were broken but could not be certain.
"What courage!" Jian Pah continued. "To let yourself be killed in order to kill your own opponent."
Kaila snorted. "It's a tournament. I've fought in many tournaments before. One risks bruises and perhaps some broken bones, but one's life is rarely at risk. Those on the field know it and will do things they never would in combat."
"Kaila knows the difference between training and combat well," Marek said. "After all, she was one of our greatest warriors in the Chanakran wars."
Kaila grinned at that. Chanakra may have started the war, but Schah had been their willing partners. Yet he could not say that with the Schahi ambassador sitting right there.
Kaila met Jian Pah's measuring glance. She guessed what he was thinking. She was a woman, old enough to have grandchildren of her own—she did have grandchildren of her own—and she had stood against one of his own warriors and taken the best he could offer.
"I...see," Jian Pah said.
* * * *
A burst of laughter came from the lower tables. Kaila sighed and longed to be with them rather than at the high table. If she did not get away soon, or if the Schahi ambassador did not cease his sniping, she was going to kill him.
Lord Jian Pah was holding a high feast. At least he thought he was. The courses were in the wrong order. The servants both served and removed dishes from the right. Still, if it had not been for the oh-so-polite insults of the Schahi ambassador she might have enjoyed it. That Jian Pah was going to such lengths in an attempt to
please his Aeriochnon visitors told her far better than any words that negotiations were going well.
"Are there no men in Aerioch—" The Schahi ambassador launched another sally, "—that they need their women to defend them?"
"In Aerioch, we welcome those with the will to defend the land, whether man or woman."
"She has you there," Jian Pah said.
The Schahi ambassador scowled and took a deep drink from his winecup. "Are your men such cowards then?"
Kaila bit her tongue and silently counted to five. "Cowardice has nothing to do with it. In Aerioch, man or woman, it makes no difference. What counts is the heart. A good heart is welcomed. An evil heart is rejected."
"While that is true of the army," Marek said, "it is even more true of the Knights of Aerioch."
Jian Pah laughed. "Oh, this is marvelous! Please continue."
"Hmph." The Schahi ambassador kept his eyes on Kaila. "Perhaps that strange outlander has poisoned the minds of those of Aerioch." His voice rang, cutting through the babble of the hall.
Kaila slapped both hands flat onto table and pushed herself to her feet in the sudden silence.
"Mother?" Marek whispered at her side.
She set one hand on his shoulder as she leveled her gaze at the Schahi ambassador. "Kreg was a better man than you ever will be, and, were we not under our host's peace, I would prove so on your body."
The silence dragged for several seconds.
The Schahi ambassador twirled his wineglass and stared down into it. "And what became of that outland lover of yours?"
Kaila waited until he looked up and caught his eyes with hers. "Five years ago, a krayt attacked a small town, including a temple orphanage dedicated to the Threefold Twins. Kreg was the only Knight of Aerioch nearby and rode in to slay it or drive it off."
"A Krayt?" Jian Pah shuddered. "I would not want to face one of those without a hand of horse archers at my back."
"Nor would I," Kaila said, not removing her eyes from the Schahi ambassador. In Chanakra there was an aquatic snake that was called a krayt, but in northern lands such as Aerioch the word named a far more dreadful beast. While not a true dragon, it was almost as dangerous as one. Ten times as long as a man was tall and it could spew fire from it's mouth. Its wings would not lift it into the air, but they could fan flames into a fury that even seeing one could scarce believe.
