Squire Derel

by Rachel Ford

  Was that by design? I wondered. Had Valarian come here, rattling his saber precisely to throw us off?

  I didn’t know. I supposed I never would. I wasn’t even sure it mattered if I knew. Whatever his intent had been, that’d been the result.

  I wasn’t the only one, either. Lidek had recovered quickly, but I’d seen his eyes widen and his brow furrow in confusion. That at least made me feel a little less like a fool. If Valarian had surprised the commander – quite possibly the most suspicious man alive when it came to the South – I could cut myself a little slack.

  I dragged myself out of my own head with an effort and attended the rest of the business. Our session did not end with the South’s admission of guilt. It changed the direction of the day to a far more productive bent, though. Instead of wasting hours verbally sparring, we discussed how our two nations might make it right.

  Valarian requested his knight’s body back. Speaking with a humbleness that seemed to cost him dearly in pride, he petitioned, “For the return of the guilty party’s body, that it might be interred according to the rituals of our people.”

  “Of course,” Alduran ceded. “And we make our facility available to you, so that you may perform whatever rites are demanded upon receipt of the corpse.” By priestly law, there were certain prayers and observances that were due the dead when a body was discovered. They varied between our two nations, but we each had them.

  “Your magnanimity is commendable, KP Alduran,” Gandril nodded.

  Valarian was a little less effusive. “I am in your debt, sir.”

  When it came to recompense for the Ilyen family, Gandril seemed keen to repay that debt. “We know that no amount of gold will ever compensate the family for the loss of KP Ilyen. But King Agalyn has empowered me to offer a yearly stipend that, we hope, will go some way toward easing the survivors’ suffering.”

  It was a generous sum. Hell, it was more than generous. If Agalyn kept to his word, the Ilyens would live like lords for the rest of their lives. It, too, stunned us all a little.

  Even I wondered if my cynicism of earlier had been misplaced. Was this all acting and politicking, or was there something genuine behind their contrition? It wasn’t impossible, was it, that Trajan’s attack had been the work of a malicious malcontent?

  He had no reason to believe he’d die or even be discovered that day. He was a wyvern rider, ambushing a quiet camp. The odds were entirely in his favor. And once he was done? Well, he could have flown away without a witness to his crimes. It might have taken weeks or even months before the remains were discovered, as remote as they were. And by then it would have been almost impossible to trace it back to the South with any kind of certainty – much less to him specifically.

  Perhaps Trajan was a madman with a murderous streak. Maybe killing provided some kind of twisted rush. Perhaps, as a man born a slave, unable to exercise control over his own life, he craved the thrill of exercising the power of life and death over others.

  Who could say what caused men to kill in cold blood?

  Was it sin? Was it a curse? Was it madness, or the affliction of devils, or a pestilence of the brain? Not even the priests seemed to be of one mind on that. I certainly couldn’t begin to guess.

  But as the day wore on, and the visiting delegation’s offers and overtures continued, I found my own cynicism waning. If Agalyn’s men were here just to cover their own tails, well, they’d done that already. None of the rest of this was necessary. They could have walked away blaming the slave and left it there.

  Maybe Agalyn isn’t the snake Lidek thinks he is.

  As we broke for lunch, I mentioned these musings to the commander. He shook his head at me. “Tell me you’re not taken in, Callaghan? It’s bad enough to see that simpering fool Alduran pat himself on the back for whatever victory he thinks he’s won here. But you?”

  I was, I suppose, a little taken aback by the vehemence in his tone. “I…well, I don’t see why they’d bother with all this, if they didn’t mean any of it.”

  “Me either,” he nodded. “Which is a lot more worrying than if they came in here threatening to burn the place to the ground. Agalyn’s kind don’t make nice, Lilia. They don’t apologize or make up for past wrongs. If they did, they’d still be making up for the last war. So what the hell are they up to? That’s the question.”

  Lidek, I decided, was too close to the situation to be impartial. He’d never gotten over the war. I knew that, and so it didn’t surprise me exactly. Still, Agalyn’s behavior here was wholly unexpected, and commendable. And so, on some level, I was a bit unprepared for his dogged refusal to acknowledge it.

  Still, the day wore on without any significant complications. Valarian spoke little, and when he did, kept his answers brief and his tone icy. Lidek observed all and spoke not at all. But the rest of us seemed to relax by degrees during the afternoon session.

  Even Ana attended to chitchat over lunch. I was glad of that. She had been quiet and reflective through most of the morning. I knew this couldn’t be easy for her. It was easier, of course, than how it might have been, had they come in blaming Ilyen for his own death.

  Still, irrational though it might be, sitting across the table, making nice with compatriots of the man who had killed your KP? Well, that was probably a little more than most could stomach.

  She made a good showing. I could see the pain in her eyes now and again, but she kept it in check. She was gracious and courteous when receiving condolences, and careful in her condemnations of the deceased Southern knight when the point was forced on her by solicitous commenters.

  After another hour and a half of conversation, we transferred the body to the Southerners’ keeping. Lidek had had it on ice in the morgue. Trajan looked much the same as he had the day we found him, just starting to discolor from the heat of that afternoon.

  Now, they took the body to the chapel, and we gave our visitors privacy to say their farewells.

  Alduran spoke with warmth about what a show of good faith and brotherhood this was, of the depth of friendship it signified between our two nations.

  Lidek shook his head, and, despite everything, I had to admit that it rankled me too. Trajan was a murderer, with the blood of one of our own on his hands. Had he been a more skilled murderer, he would have had more blood on his hands. And though he was dead now, he only died because of his own murderous actions.

  Yet here he was, being honored in the Cragspoint chapel, where not many weeks prior his victim had been honored. My squire was quiet again, as grim-faced as she had been in the morning.

  “Let’s take a walk, Ana,” I said.

  “Oh. Alright.”

  The afternoon was warm – not quite as warm as some of the preceding days, but a nice, toasty temperature. I stuck to one of the shaded paths. Aside from being a training facility and, in days past anyway, military stronghold, Cragspoint had extensive grounds. It grew much of its own food, but the early design had allotted recreational space too, to build soldiers with healthy minds as well as healthy bodies.

  Now, I felt, was a time to focus on the former.

  We walked for a ways in silence, until we had left the main compound, and the two dozen buildings that composed it, behind.

  I wanted to ask how she was doing. She hurt. I knew that. I wanted her to know that, if she needed to, she could talk to me. I wanted her to know that I understood something of how she was feeling, because I’d walked in those shoes before.

  But Derel was something like me in that regard. Maybe it was one of the reasons I liked her as much as I did: I understood her.

  When I was hurting, I was more like a wounded animal than the Rational Man our species had evolved to be. Some people needed hugs and a shoulder to cry on. Some people needed human contact and affection. Me? I needed to be left in my dark cave, safe and secure, to lick my wounds in peace.

  But there was a point of spending too long in the cave. It was possible to vanish too deep into one’s own thoughts and c
onsolations, to run the risk of disappearing into a solace that was more isolation than healing.

  I knew that, too. At least, I’d been learning it lately. And, whatever Ana had suffered, however deep her affection for Ilyen and however raw her sense of loss, I didn’t want to see her lose herself. The way I’d lost myself.

  Still, I’d been solicitous more than a few times already. And it had only made her bristle. So I decided to try another tack. I’d engage her brain, rather than try to ascertain the state of her heart. “So…what do you make of all this?”

  “KP?”

  “Gandril. This change of tone.”

  “Ah.” She considered for a long moment. “I guess this makes more sense. It’s obvious what Trajan did. Denying it only makes them look worse.”

  “So, you think it’s politics then?”

  “On Valarian’s part, yes. The way he looked at you?” She shook her head, and I was surprised, and a little touched, by the intensity in her voice. “He looked like he wanted to kill you, Lil.”

  “Oh. Well…uh…the feeling was fairly mutual.”

  She smiled. It was one of the few smiles I’d seen this afternoon, and I was glad for its appearance. “My point is, I think if it was up to him, there’d be blood before peace.”

  “I agree. Fortunately, it doesn’t seem to be up to him.”

  “No.” She fell silent for a moment. “But you know what?”

  “What?”

  “I’m still surprised by it all.”

  “Me too.”

  “It seems out of character for Agalyn.” She shrugged. “At least, what we know of Agalyn. But that, I suppose, is as much propaganda as anything else.”

  I laughed. That was true enough. With limited communication or commerce between our nations, and all of it through official channels, there was nothing that reached us that had not already passed through a filter. “Don’t let Lidek hear you say that.”

  “No,” she agreed, “I suppose I’d better not.”

  We lapsed into silence for a minute, and I tried again. “Still, I’ll be happy when it’s all done.”

  “Me too. I know…well, it probably sounds bad, after everything Gandril’s done. But…I don’t know. I wish they were gone already.”

  I nodded. “Me too. I’m glad for Ilyen’s family that they’re here to make restitution. I’m glad for our nation’s sake that they’re not here to start a war. But it’s hard to sit in conversation with men who broke bread with Trajan.”

  “Especially…well, when they’re honoring him. In our chapel.”

  I didn’t move my head, but I did glance in her direction. She was staring into the horizon. “Yes.”

  “It doesn’t seem right. That’s where we said our last rites for Ilyen. It’s hallowed ground. It’s…it’s not right that his killer should be afforded the same honors, in the same place.”

  “No, Ana. It’s not right.”

  “I know we have to,” she said, almost apologetically. “I know that. But…”

  I nodded. “Alduran would call that a small price for peace. And he’s probably not wrong. But it doesn’t make it feel any better.”

  “No.” She fell silent for a long moment. “I don’t know, KP. When they said that, earlier…I couldn’t believe it. I keep wondering what Ilyen would say, if he were alive. If he knew. After what Trajan did – it’s a slap in his face. He must be turning in his grave.”

  “Maybe. But Ilyen was a KP. And when you’re a KP…well, you know there’s a certain amount of political bullshit inherent to the job. I can’t speak for him. But if it was me? I’d be pissed, if I knew.

  “But I wouldn’t want to start a war over it, either, Ana.”

  “No. No, neither would he. Still, Lil…I’m going to be glad when they get the hell out of here. I’ll be happy if I never have to see another Southerner again.”

  Chapter Twenty – Derel

  At first, lost to my own thoughts, I didn’t realize what the KP was up to. But after a while, as we disappeared on Cragspoint’s quiet walkways, I caught on. She was keeping me away from base.

  It was heavy-handed, maybe. But the fact was, I was grateful for it. I hadn’t been exaggerating when I said I’d be happy if I never saw a Southerner again. I knew it was petty, and small-minded. But in the moment, it was true. In the moment, with Ilyen’s death fresh and heavy in my mind as they honored his killer, I meant every word of it.

  The best thing, then, was for me to be far away from it all – far away from the ceremonies remembering his murderer, from the consoling voices and smiling faces.

  These men, with perhaps the exception of Valarian, weren’t to blame for Ilyen’s murder. On a rational level, I knew that. But I wasn’t feeling particularly rational in the moment.

  The KP seemed to understand almost instinctually. So we walked for a long time, until the anger and pain of the day was dulled by the weariness of my feet and the heat of the day.

  Then, we turned back. “Dinner will be ready soon,” she said. “Lidek had the cooks working early, so it will be edible, anyway. But tomorrow, I guess, Alduran has a feast in the works.”

  I snorted, unsurprised. He was the bigger man, perhaps: the peacemaker. But I resented him for his overtures almost as much as I resented the Southerners for their presence.

  I didn’t want a war. I was not so vengeful or foolish as all that. But neither did I want to play at niceties.

  Still, the call wasn’t mine to make. And I’d been the one to insist to the KP that I wanted a part in all this. It’ll only last a few days, if that. Then they’ll be gone.

  “Looks like they’re moving the body,” she commented as we neared base.

  “KP?”

  She gestured to the horizon, and I shuddered. Dragons. It looked like the full procession we’d seen earlier, touching down again, but now near the chapel instead of in the field outside Cragspoint. “Full military honors,” I fumed.

  “He was kaladorn. It’s tradition to honor a slain kaladorn knight.”

  “Even a murderer?”

  “He wasn’t found guilty of any crime,” she said in mild tones.

  “Because he died first. Died, committing those crimes.”

  “Yes. But they have a strange relationship to their slave warriors, Ana. It’s a kind of cultural conscience cleansing, I think. They honor them in death, so no one complains when they dishonor them in life.”

  I shook my head. “The whole thing is twisted.”

  “It is. But it’s their culture.”

  That, to me, was only a condemnation of their culture. But it was no excuse. Still, I said no more on the matter, and we watched in silence as one of the dragons ascended again. This, I knew, would be the transport to Southern territory, taking Trajan back to his own people. The rest of the knights and wyverns would remain, for as long as our parlay lasted.

  Well, I suppose that’s one less Southerner to have to deal with, at least.

  It was petty. I knew that. But in the moment, it seemed a scab had been picked off, and the wound Ilyen’s death had left behind was as fresh and raw as ever.

  I was glad for his family that Agalyn had allotted gold and accepted responsibility. But Ilyen was still dead, and his murderer was receiving honors afforded knights who served with distinction and died in battle.

  That felt like salt, ground into the wound.

  Not for the first time, I was glad of Lil’s presence. I was grateful to have her to talk to. I was glad of her company, and her quiet sympathy. I was glad for the understanding that lit her blue eyes, and the concern that colored her pretty face.

  I suppose, I was just grateful for her. She was a hell of a KP.

  Ilyen had been a hell of a KP too. But it had been different with him. He’d taken me on as a green squire and showed me the ropes. He’d taught me what I knew and recommended me for knighthood. Ilyen had helped to mold me into the person I was now and shape the knight that I would be.

  Lilia took me in when all of that was
done. She’d be that person to Aaronsen. But to me? Ilyen had filled that role. Lilia was more a friend than a KP. Not that there wasn’t plenty I could learn from her. She was a hell of a fighter, for starters, and didn’t shy away from a little verbal sparring either.

  But she hadn’t taken me in to teach me. She’d taken me in so I’d have a roof over my head, and a KP’s name to attach to my own these last few months. She’d taken me in so I wouldn’t spend the final weeks before my promotion a pity project, haunting the halls of Cragspoint, living off the charity of Commander Lidek.

  I knew that. And I would have been in her debt if she’d left it there, even if she’d ignored my existence for the duration of our short time together. But she hadn’t.

  She’d treated me with the respect of an equal, and the regard of a friend. Where Aaronsen was concerned, she was his commanding officer. But where I was concerned, she seemed to see me more as a guest than a subordinate. She didn’t enforce the distance Ilyen had observed, when we’d first met. She didn’t require me to prove myself in exchange for her respect; she just gave it. She concerned herself with my comfort, but respected my autonomy and decision making.

  She was, in short, a better friend to me during our brief acquaintance than I could recall having made in my entire life. And I, in turn, was almost surprised by the strength of my affection for her.

  Maybe it was just the newness of it. I’d been too busy training to make good friends. It wasn’t the kind of life suited for it. There was no stability, no certainty: you went where your knight went, and that was that.

  Maybe it was how freely her regard was given. I hadn’t had to earn it, like I had Ilyen’s and Aaronsen’s. It wasn’t conditional or withheld for specious reasons, like my own family’s. It was just there, given without expectation.

  “Ana,” she said, and I started at the sound of her voice. We’d been walking for some minutes in silence. “I know you hate when I ask…but, are you alright?”

  I laughed, at her timing if nothing else. “I’m fine, Lil. No, really: I am. I was just thinking.”