Because the harvests were so poor in the south? Or could the Heldyans have blocked the river at Amaershyn? Or just coincidence?
Much as it could be, Lerial has trouble believing it is coincidental. But it could be.
North of the River Square are the factorages of the larger merchanters in Cigoerne. Even they look less busy than he recalls. Is it that he remembers just the busier times? He looks toward Jhubyl. “Are things here quieter than usual?”
“It’d be hard to say, ser, but I can’t say I’ve often seen the river piers so empty.”
“That’s what I thought, but I wondered if it was my imagination.”
“Be mine, too, then, ser.”
“I know the Heldyans blocked the river at Amaershyn some years back. Do you think they could have tried that again?”
“I wouldn’t know, ser. The captain didn’t mention anything this morning, and there wasn’t any watertalk like that at headquarters.”
Still … Lerial wonders.
When they reach the Hall and rein up outside the stable, Jhubyl asks, “You’re sure you don’t want us to stay?”
“Thank you, but I’ll ride back with my aunt and her escorts.”
“Yes, ser.”
Jhubyl and the rankers do wait until Lerial has seen his mount stabled and walks into the Hall of Healing before they turn and ride westward toward the palace.
Lerial makes his way to the first door inside the Hall and enters.
The older woman in pale green, perhaps the same one who had been sitting behind the table-desk the previous time he had been in the Hall, looks up. “Lord Lerial, Lady Emerya requested that you join her in the receiving room.”
“Thank you.” Lerial smiles and turns, making his way along the long corridor to the south end of the building and the receiving room.
He is about to enter the receiving area when Emerya steps out. “Good. You’re here.”
“Why did you want me to come today?” asks Lerial.
“I’d appreciate it if you’d come every day after your sessions with the Lancers. We’re shorthanded here. We had to send the men who are healers north to help your father’s wounded. We’ll see what you can do—or help me do—today. If you can do what I think you can, you can treat lesser wounds by yourself before long.”
“Father’s wounded? And you didn’t tell me?”
“He’s not wounded. He sent word to your mother yesterday. A large group of raiders attacked Penecca. He and his Lancers drove them out. A company of Afritan armsmen attacked. They claimed that Penecca belonged to Duke Atroyan. Your father and his men killed a great many of them, and the rest fled, but many Lancers were wounded. Your father fears that there will be more Afritan attacks.”
“I didn’t think men could be healers.” Lerial knows that’s not strictly so, but he finds he’s slightly irritated, especially at not having been told what has happened in the north.
“That’s not so, and you know it.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about Father?”
“Your mother asked me not to last night.”
“She didn’t say anything this morning.” That’s not exactly fair, Lerial also knows, because he left before his mother had come down for breakfast. But someone should have told you.
“Lerial…”
“Someone should have told me.”
“You’ll have to take that up with your mother.” Emerya looks at Lerial. “We need to get to work. Come with me.”
Lerial follows her from the receiving room back to the entry room, where Emerya insists Lerial leave his sabre, and then to a room with a woman lying on a pallet. She is young, perhaps not even as old as Lerial, and her bulging abdomen and the pain in her face indicates why she is there. The fact that most poor women give birth at home suggests that she is in some sort of danger … or that the unborn child is.
“What can you tell me?” murmurs Emerya.
Lerial does his best to sense the order patterns around the young woman. He swallows.
“That’s what I thought. But what do you sense?”
“The child is weak, and there’s all sorts of chaos around her stomach … her abdomen … like she’s been beaten…”
“She has, but that’s just part of the problem. Can you strengthen the order of the child? Just a tiny bit … too much could kill her.”
“Her?”
“You’ll learn to sense the difference. I need to help the mother.”
“I can do that.”
While Emerya and a midwife help the girl, Lerial stands back slightly and eases tiny flows of order into the child, as directed by Emerya.
More than a glass later, a baby girl rests in the arms of her mother.
Emerya turns to Lerial. “Thank you.”
“You could have done what I did.”
She shakes her head. “Not at the same time. There was chaos all around the birth canal. I had to keep that from her and from the child.”
When they leave that chamber, they find that a woman perhaps ten years younger than Emerya stands out in the corridor. She wears faded brown, and her head scarf is worn and has fallen away from her face and across her shoulders. Her face is damp. With her is a grizzled man.
“You should not be here,” Emerya says quietly to the man. “This part of the Hall is for those who need healing.”
“How is she?” pleads the woman. “My Irnina?”
“She will be well. She has a daughter.”
“A daughter?” growls the man, whose skin is darker than Emerya’s and Lerial’s, but much lighter than that of most Hamorians. “She should not have … she has brought dishonor upon my house!”
“Why?” asks Lerial politely. “Because she bore a child?”
“Because she is not consorted and the child is a girl. Unwanted boys are worth something.” He turns away and marches toward the south entrance to the Hall.
“But how is my Irnina?” asks the woman.
“Her body will heal from the beating,” replies Emerya. “Her daughter will be healthy.”
“Let her stay here, I beg you, Lady Healer.”
“She can stay for a few days.”
“Thank you…”
Lerial eases back while Emerya talks to the girl’s mother. His eyes turn to follow the older man, but he has already left the Hall.
For the remainder of the day, Lerial does what his aunt directs. He even cleans a workman’s wound and stitches it closed, if under Emerya’s close watch, and helps her set a broken arm.
Slightly past fourth glass, Lerial washes up for the fourth or fifth time since he entered the Hall and then reclaims his sabre, and joins his aunt and her Lancer escorts outside the small stable by the north wall. The sky is clear, but a cool wind blows out of the southeast as they mount up and then ride out through the gates toward the Palace. Lerial rides beside Emerya.
“There weren’t that many people who needed healing today,” he says.
“Some days are like that. Some days the receiving room is filled, and the sick and injured spill out into the Hall and outside the south entry.” Emerya pauses, then asks, “What did you think of the father of that woman who had the little girl?”
Lerial can sense that the question is more than casual. “He didn’t seem to think women are worth much. Especially girls. A lot of Hamorians don’t, it seems … at least from what I’ve heard.”
“Did you like Maeroja?”
Lerial frowns. What does Maeroja have to do with Hamorian men valuing women? He guesses. “She left Heldya because she felt unvalued? Is that why she consorted the majer?”
“Not a bad guess,” says Emerya dryly. “She’s somehow related to the Duke of Heldya, and Maeroja is not her birth name. She’s never said what it was, and I’d guess she never will. She was rowing a small boat across the Swarth River, and several flatboats with Heldyan armsmen were chasing her. Majer Altyrn used the firecannon on the Kerial to destroy two of the boats. That was the last time the cannon was used.…”
<
br /> There is something more behind those words, but Lerial cannot say what and loses some of what his aunt is saying.
“… turned part of the river to steam. Altyrn and his Lancers rescued her, and he insisted that she change into a Lancer uniform. Then he used a firelance on her clothes and the boat and had it beached on the west side of the Swarth, farther downstream, later that night.”
“Why were they chasing her?”
“One of the Duke’s close friends tried to take advantage of her. She gutted him with his own blade and fled. So did her sister. The mob killed her sister … after … Maeroja hid for days before she found a boat that wasn’t closely watched … but there was a reward for her return.”
“All Hamorians are like that? About women?”
“Most of them. Not all, but most. We didn’t wear head scarves in Cyador, you know? Oh … Cyad wasn’t perfect for women, either. Your grandfather gave in to the demands that women be put in their place. He was the one who insisted on the gilded chains for women who weren’t healers.”
“He was?” This is something that Lerial has not heard.
“Mother—your grandmere—collected all the chains from every woman on the Kerial and had them melted down. The gold helped pay for the lands that are now Cigoerne.”
Lerial is more than a little confused—not about women being less valued, or valued little, but as to why Emerya has brought up the matter.
“You’re wondering why I’m telling you all this?”
“Yes,” he admits.
“Lephi is like your grandfather, and your father. I don’t wish to see Amaira or Ryalah, or their daughters or granddaughters, treated the way women were in the last days of Cyad or in the way the Hamorians treat them.”
“Or the way that man did.”
Emerya nods.
“What do you think I can do?”
“Far more than you think you can right now. I don’t expect anything from you now. I just want you to think about it.”
“I will,” he promises, knowing that he owes her that, and possibly much more.
His aunt does not offer another word on the ride back to the palace.
Once they arrive, Lerial dismounts, then grooms the gelding and sees to his feed and water before leaving the stable. He is headed toward his chambers to wash up before going to the north courtyard for refreshments when Saltaryn steps out of a doorway.
“Lord Lerial.”
“Magus Saltaryn.”
“I understand you have been back in Cigoerne for almost an eightday, and yet I have not seen you.”
“I’ve been busy with arms training at Lancer headquarters … and studying tactics and maps as well.”
Saltaryn looks to say something, then shakes his head. “Perhaps that’s for the best.” He smiles, almost sadly. “Best of fortune, Lord Lerial.”
For all of his acquiescence, Saltaryn does not sound exactly pleased, but Lerial merely says, “Thank you. I appreciate that.”
Saltaryn steps aside, and Lerial continues to his chambers.
XXVIII
Lerial is about to leave the officers’ quarters at Lancer headquarters on sixday, after changing into clean greens, when his fingers touch the silken pouch—and the lodestone—he still carries. Why, he isn’t certain, except that Rojana had intimated that it was important. Yet while he can sense the faintest flow of order and chaos around it, it is comparatively faint, and he wonders how that might help with handling order. And where did Rojana find it? He pushes away his thoughts on why she has given it to him and slips the pouch and lodestone into his jacket when he hears voices outside.
He thinks he recognizes Lauxyn as one of the two speakers, but not the other man’s voice. He stops and listens, but the voices fade, and he can sense the two men moving away. He eases to the doorway, but sees neither. He feels that they have walked around the corner, and he makes his way to the edge of the building and halts, listening.
“… don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Those words are Lauxyn’s. That, Lerial can tell.
“You and Chaen … sucking up to the Duke’s son…”
Lerial has to know who is accusing Lauxyn and the captain. He feels that whoever the other man is, he has to be an undercaptain, from the tone of voice and the words used. It’s likely that neither man will be looking down, and that the unknown officer might not see if Lerial peers around the corner well below eye height. So he squats and slowly looks, knowing that a sudden movement is more likely to catch someone’s eye.
The second officer is Undercaptain Veraan, and his concentration is on Lauxyn.
Lerial moves back and continues to listen. He wishes he could use order to conceal himself, the way some of the great Magi’i were said to be able to do, so that he could move closer, but he cannot. So he remains behind the corner, catching fragments of what passes between the two undercaptains.
“… don’t think the captain would appreciate your views on that.”
“I’ll deny it … and my family will back me up…”
Lerial wonders from what family Veraan comes. Perhaps someone at the Palace will know. He stiffens as he senses the two moving, but they are moving away from him. He waits until they have moved well away from the quarters before he begins to walk toward the stables. He does not look back.
Over the past few days, he has been able to sense a certain sliminess about Veraan and wonders if that happened to be one of the reasons Chaen had chosen the slender blond undercaptain as an example when Lerial had first begun to practice with the headquarters’ Lancers.
Again, he rides from Lancer headquarters to the healing hall, where he spends the remainder of the day. Emerya was right. This time, unlike on fourday and fiveday, there are many more people needing healers. He ends up dealing with small injuries that have been neglected and worsened, such as animal bites that have turned bad—but not too bad—and a thorn wound that has filled with pus, and before he realizes it, it is past fourth glass and Emerya is informing him that it is time to leave.
He washes up one last time, then makes his way to the stable, where he mounts the gelding and joins his aunt and her escort for the ride back to the palace. For a time, he rides beside her without speaking, glancing toward the heavy clouds to the south and wondering if they are harbingers of the usual winter rain.
“Your stitches are better,” Emerya informs him, “and your use of order is more measured.”
“Thank you.” He pauses, then asks, “What happened to the young woman … you know, the one—”
“Whose father thought his granddaughter was worthless? Her mother and an aunt took her away last night. That’s what Elnora told me this morning. They said she would be going to live with relatives. They didn’t say where.”
“What about the child’s father?”
“That may be the problem,” replies Emerya. “They wouldn’t speak about that.”
“You don’t think…?”
“In healing, you’ll see the best and worst of people, more so than in fighting and battles … although your father might disagree with me. But then, there are many things about which we don’t agree. How was your morning?”
“I’m getting better with the sabre. It’s helpful to spar against different officers. There is one thing, though…” Lerial turns in the saddle and looks at his aunt.
“Yes?”
“There’s an undercaptain at headquarters that I overheard talking about how important his family is. His name is Veraan. I wasn’t about to ask him who his parents are, but I wondered if you might know.”
Emerya smiles. “It’s good you didn’t ask, but I don’t know everyone of either elthage or altage background here in Cigoerne, not anymore. Oh … I might know the parents, if you knew their name, but their children?” She shakes her head.
“I can ask Woelyt if he knows.”
“That might be best … if asked casually.”
Lerial doesn’t bridle at her suggestion, not in the way h
e would have, he realizes, if either Lephi or his father had uttered the same words.
Once they reach the Palace courtyard, and the stables, Lerial takes care of the gelding first and then sets out to find Undercaptain Woelyt, but he doesn’t have to look far, because Woelyt is walking toward the stable.
“Good afternoon, ser.”
“Good afternoon, Lerial. How is your sparring coming?”
“Well enough, I think. I learn a little more every day.”
“Your father will be pleased with your diligence.”
“No. He’ll expect that. He’d be displeased if I weren’t diligent.”
Woelyt laughs, if gently. “I can understand that.”
“I’ve run across several undercaptains you might know. One is Lauxyn. He seems good with a sabre.”
“He is. He’s like me. We came up through the ranks.”
“Then there’s a younger undercaptain … Versaan … Veraan … I only sparred with him once.”
“Oh … Veraan. He’s pretty junior.”
“He was talking about his family…” Lerial lets the words just drift, not quite finishing the sentence.
“He’s the type. His father’s a magus, Apollyn, I think. Doesn’t matter who your father is. If you’re not good with a blade, you’ll still end up dead.” Woelyt tilts his head. “How did you do against him?”
“Captain Chaen said he was overmatched against me.”
Woelyt cannot quite hide a satisfied smile. “Then you must be doing well.”
“The time with Majer Altyrn helped a lot.”
“I’m sure it did. I never got a chance to serve under him.” Woelyt shakes his head almost regretfully. “Those that did say that he was a fine officer.”
Lerial smiles as he replies, “He still is. He’s very practical, and I think he and Captain Graessyr talk often.”
“Good for Graessyr. Smart, too.” Woelyt smiles. “Maybe we should spar when you have some time.”
“We should.” With a parting smile, Lerial heads for the Palace proper.
By the time he arranges for his soiled greens to be washed and finally reaches the courtyard, his mother is sitting at one of the tables sipping white wine and talking with Emerya. Ryalah and Amaira are at another table, intent on their pegboard. Lerial pours himself a glass of pale lager, perhaps two-thirds full, and takes a seat at his mother’s table, to her left.
Cyador’s Heirs Page 22
