Darknesses

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “Are you sure you are all right, dearest?”

  “I am not so well suited to being a mother as we had hoped. Or my body is not. Perhaps you did not pick so well.”

  The Lord-Protector slipped behind her chair, then bent and slipped his arms around her, gently. “I prefer the lady I picked, and nothing will change that.”

  “I am glad.” For a moment, she leaned her head back against him. “There is more, I fear.”

  “There is. He has changed his view of the herder overcaptain. Now he is pleased that Overcaptain Alucius is on his way to Tempre. He is almost excited that it is so, and before he was most fretful.”

  “Fretful? As I recall, he was angry and spoke most sharply to you.” Alerya tried to conceal a burp. “Would that food would rest more easily in me.”

  “That will pass, they say.”

  Alerya shook her head. “A most terrible word play, Talryn. Most terrible.” She took the smallest of sips from the goblet. “Do you think it a mistake that you ordered this Alucius here?”

  “I think not, but men do not change long-held views without reason.”

  “Men seldom change views, long-held or otherwise. That is why I asked if the Recorder were truly Enyll.”

  “I would swear that it is Enyll.”

  “Could it be the Table?”

  “There is no record of any such, and I have searched the private archives.”

  “Have any spent the time at the Table that he does?”

  “He is the first true Recorder in generations.” The Lord-Protector sighed. “And now I must watch every action and every word with him.”

  “As you must with everyone.”

  “Except for you, for which I am most grateful.” The Lord-Protector squeezed her shoulders. His eyes went to the goblet on the desk, the level of the liquid scarcely diminished, and his eyes darkened.

  91

  Slightly before noon on Septi, Alucius and third squad turned off the lower east–west high road and onto the shorter stretch that ran northwest to Tempre and the River Vedra. With each vingt that they rode, the land became ever so slightly more hilly, with fewer tilled fields and more orchards. The orchards were of apples and pears, not almonds. Alucius also saw more flocks of what he would have called town sheep, the white-and-gray fleeced animals that bore the rougher and weaker wool, and whose flesh was edible, unlike that of nightsheep.

  A quarter glass after passing an oblong stone set beside the high road indicating five vingts to Tempre, Alucius saw Makyr riding back down from a long and low incline in the high road.

  “There’s something ahead,” Alucius told Faisyn.

  “Another honor guard, sir.”

  “You think so?”

  “Yes, sir. Seems to me that the Lord-Protector has ways of knowing things before the rest of us. Might be why we’re now part of Lanachrona.”

  “That could be.”

  Before long, Makyr was less than twenty yards away.

  “Sir!” the scout called. “There’s a squad of Southern Guards headed this way, sir. Captain, he’s leading ’em. Says they’re to escort us to the Southern Guard headquarters.”

  “That’s where we’re supposed to go. We’ll keep riding until we meet them. Just fall in behind Faisyn and me.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Alucius and Wildebeast had almost reached the top of the incline in the high road, so gentle that it had taken several vingts to climb less than fifty yards. Given what he had seen in the Upper Spine Mountains, Alucius wondered why the ancient builders had not just cut through the large and gradual ridge, but he supposed there were all too many matters like that, and a man could spend his whole life puzzling over such without ever learning the reasons.

  Drawn up in the turnout at the top of the incline were Waris, the Southern Guard captain, and a squad of Southern Guard in very crisp blue-and-cream uniforms. The captain rode forward.

  “Squad, halt!” Alucius ordered.

  “Overcaptain Alucius, sir?”

  “Yes, Captain. With the third squad of Twenty-first Company. Reporting as ordered by Marshal Wyerl.”

  “Sir.” The officer stiffened. “Welcome to Tempre. Captain Gueryl and the honor squad at your service.”

  “Thank you, Captain. I imagine you’ll take us where we’re supposed to go.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Would you join me?”

  “Yes, sir.” The captain nodded to a squad leader. “Lead the way, Byryn.”

  The honor squad swung out of the ancient enternastone turnout and headed down the almost imperceptible slope toward the city. Faisyn held his place as Alucius eased Wildebeast forward, and the captain eased in on Alucius’s right side. Unlike the other Southern Guards Alucius had seen, both the captain and the troopers wore blue shoulder braid.

  “You got here sooner than we had thought, sir,” Gueryl offered. “We had intended to meet you where the high roads split.”

  “You found us early enough,” Alucius said. “How long to headquarters…or wherever we’re being quartered?”

  “Headquarters, sir. Less than a glass.”

  From the rise in the road, Alucius could see Tempre spread out in all directions. The upper part of the wide low ridge that they had just crossed on the high road contained no steads and no dwellings, as if for a vingt or so on each side of the flat crest any building had been forbidden. The unsettled space included open meadows and stands of hard-wood and softwood, but neither walls nor fences, nor any evergreens. Alucius wondered about the lack of evergreens.

  The first steads below the open space contained neat dwellings on small patches of ground, some of them as little as two hundred yards on a side, although most were larger, and all had at least some fruit trees, even some small orchards. The grass everywhere was still green, as were the leaves on all the fruit-laden trees. The high road descended ever so gently toward the river and a pair of twin green towers.

  “Is that the Lord-Protector’s palace?” Alucius asked Captain Gueryl. “Where the towers are?”

  “No, sir.” Gueryl laughed. “Most who see Tempre for the first time think so, but the towers date to before the Cataclysm, and they flank the Grand Piers on the river.”

  “The piers are eternastone, then.”

  “Yes, sir. How did you know?” Gueryl asked.

  “The towers. We have one of those in Iron Stem. There is a pair in Dereka. Tempre was a trading center in the days of the Duarachy. The Grand Piers were probably the reason why Tempre was important then. I’d wager that most trade went by the river down to Faitel and Elcien.” Alucius offered a laugh. “I don’t know, though. Do you?”

  Gueryl was silent for a moment. “I hadn’t thought about it. Most long-distance trade these days goes by the high road to Southgate or east to Lustrea.”

  “Is there more trade now that Lanachrona holds Southgate?”

  “Quite a bit, they say.”

  Looking down the high road through the space between the towers, Alucius could see that, across the River Vedra, beyond the smooth dark waters, rose the southernmost part of the Westerhills, but unlike the northern Westerhills, where the trees were junipers and pines spread widely on rocky and sandy ground, the trees north of Tempre were mixed pine and softwoods, and formed a near-continuous canopy of foliage.

  On the river itself were barges headed downriver, and sailing craft headed upriver, the sails augmented on at least one craft by a bank of oarsmen. Alucius couldn’t help but think of the ancient ship in the mural, speeding across vast oceans without sails or rowers.

  Before long, the steads flanking the road were replaced by more of the yellow brick dwellings on smaller plots of land, and by occasional groupings of shops. All appeared neat, well maintained, and cleaned.

  “The dwellings here are well kept,” Alucius said.

  “Yes, sir. The Lord-Protector places a tariff on any dwelling not kept in good repair.”

  Ahead, on the right side of the high road, was a far larger dwellin
g, more like an ancient mansion of greenish white marble, except that the stonework was crisp and new. Long and low stables were set on each side of the three-story structure, which boasted arches and large windows above a circular portico where two retainers in green livery waited. A low wall surrounded the property, and two guards, also in green, flanked the open gate.

  Alucius looked again at the structure—one that looked more like a small palace—and out of place amid the more modest shops and dwellings. “Who owns that?”

  The young captain did not respond, and Alucius could sense his reluctance.

  “Captain?”

  “That’s the dust palace. Drimeer owns it.”

  “And those who are wealthy pay golds for the slightest sniff of the dreamdust? And this Drimeer gets more and more golds?”

  Gueryl nodded, curtly. “What do you know about dreamdust?”

  “That it ruins people.” Alucius wasn’t about to mention that Iron Stem was one of its sources.

  “More than that.”

  “How did this Drimeer…?”

  “He bought up ten or twelve dwellings and built this…” Gueryl gestured to the mansion as they rode past the gates. “He obeys all the laws and keeps it in good repair. If the Lord-Protector did anything against him…all the merchants would fear that the laws would mean nothing.”

  Alucius nodded. He also suspected that the dreamdust mansion was a good way to show that the Lord-Protector respected those laws.

  “We’ll be turning shortly, onto the Avenue of the Guard. It’s east of the Avenue of the Palace, but both avenues run north from the high road.” Gueryl pointed to his right. “You can see the square towers of the palace there.”

  Alucius followed his gesture and took in the yellow-cream stone structure.

  “To the right—the long lower structure behind the park? That’s the main building of Guard headquarters. The senior officers’ quarters and the meeting rooms and spaces for the senior officers are there. That’s where you’ll be quartered, sir. Then the regular officers’ quarters, and the stables and barracks are behind across the rear courtyard.”

  Immediately after the column turned onto the first avenue, a Southern Guard rider pulled away from the honor squad preceding Alucius and first squad and hastened down the avenue.

  Before Alucius could say anything, Captain Gueryl spoke quickly. “Marshal Alyniat had indicated that he wanted to greet you when you arrived, sir. That is quite an honor. He is second only to the arms-commander.”

  The honors he was supposedly receiving were making Alucius more than a little nervous, and he shifted his weight in the saddle as they neared the gray granite walls of the headquarters, modest in size against the low hills directly behind the buildings. Once more, he noted that the low hill behind the headquarters, more like a ridge that ran westward toward the river and toward the palace of the Lord-Protector, held no structures or walls or fences within a half vingt or so of the crest.

  Alucius half expected trumpets as they rode through the gates to the Southern Guard headquarters, but the four guards flanking the gateposts, for there were no actual gates, barely gave the column of riders a glance. That was more what Alucius would have expected for a mere overcaptain in a land where even colonels were common.

  The main building was a good four stories in height, and its clean gray marble walls loomed over the smooth granite paving stones that covered most of the space inside the walls—except for the small walled garden set forward of the squared-off portico that was the main entrance. There were two handsome carriages drawn up short of the mounting blocks at the portico, clearly waiting for someone of importance, and the first carriages of such workmanship that Alucius had ever seen. Only wagons were used in Iron Stem.

  The honor squad led the way around the east side of the main headquarters building and into the expansive paved rear courtyard. The rear courtyard had been cut out of the hillside, with the stables to the right, and barracks and quarters behind, but forward of a stone wall that rose almost fifteen yards. The effect was to conceal—or minimize—the extent of the buildings as seen from outside the walls.

  The Southern Guard squad turned to the left again, heading toward a smaller rear entrance, smaller only in comparison to the impressive nature of the one in front, but almost as large as that of the Landarch’s palace in Dereka. Alucius could see several figures in Southern Guard uniforms standing on the steps above the mounting blocks.

  “Is that Marshal Alyniat?” Alucius asked quietly.

  “I think so, sir. I’ve never seen him close, but it looks like him. I know it’s not Marshal Wyerl, and there aren’t any other marshals in Tempre now.”

  The honor squad rode past the steps, leaving space for Alucius to rein up opposite the marshal and a small set of personal guards—and a majer and a colonel of some sort. Alucius reined up, and inclined his head. “Marshal.”

  “Overcaptain Alucius. Welcome to Tempre and to headquarters. I wanted to greet you personally. It is not often that one has a chance to meet an officer who has triumphed against such overwhelming forces.”

  “Our success came from the sacrifices of troopers and officers who fought valiantly, knowing that they faced both Talent-creatures and vast numbers. We would not be here without their efforts.”

  “That is certainly so.” Alyniat smiled. “But never in any history that I have read has a junior overcaptain commanded so brilliantly and fearlessly. I must ask, tactless as it may be, if it is true that your uniform was burned off you, and that every span of your body was so bruised that your skin was purple from head to toe?”

  Alucius smiled in return, understanding full well the reason for the question. “So I was told, sir, but since it was sometime after the last battle before I was able to look at myself, I could not personally confirm that. I can attest to the fact that all my hair was burned off. It is still rather short.”

  Alyniat laughed. “Marshal Wyerl sends his best as well, and we look forward to dining with you this evening. Again…on behalf of the Lord-Protector, I welcome you all to Tempre.” He nodded, clearly ending the unofficial ceremony.

  Alucius bowed from the saddle. “We thank you, and the Lord-Protector, and are pleased that we have been of service.” Then he waited to see what would happen.

  “Forward.”

  The honor squad moved from the portico, and Alucius and third squad followed.

  “You must have truly impressed the arms-commander,” Gueryl said.

  “It may just have been that we’re the first unit of the Northern Guard to visit Tempre and headquarters,” Alucius suggested.

  “That could be,” Gueryl said amiably.

  Although Alucius sensed the other’s doubt, he was glad that Gueryl did not say more.

  Outside the stables, once both squads had halted, Gueryl gestured, and the senior squad leader from the honor squad joined them. Alucius turned Wildebeast so that Faisyn was included.

  “Byryn here will work with your squad leader…”

  “Faisyn,” Alucius supplied, nodding to the third squad leader.

  “To make sure that your troopers and mounts are quartered and well taken care of,” Gueryl concluded.

  When Alucius had finished with Wildebeast, the two officers left the stables. The walk back to the main building was almost half a vingt—or so Alucius felt. He still carried both rifles, but the captain made no comment.

  Once inside the main building, Gueryl led the way up a wide stone staircase. “Your quarters are on the third level on the west end. The sitting room has a direct view of the Lord-Protector’s palace and of the towers.”

  The mention of quarters with a sitting room didn’t ease Alucius’s concerns in the slightest, not when he recalled Feran’s warning about the Lord-Protector wanting something.

  At the third level, they turned left, past a pair of Southern Guards, with blue braid on their shoulders, similar to that worn by Gueryl. As the two officers continued down the marble-floored corridor, Aluciu
s picked up the faint murmurs from the two guards.

  “Overcaptain…on this level?”

  “…more than that, they say…big hero…saved the whole eastern expedition…routed the nomads…”

  “…some honor…”

  “…nomads broken through…would have had to send scores of companies east…maybe you…”

  There was only a grunt in return.

  Was the Lord-Protector overcommitted? With too many forces in the west? Alucius’s lips quirked into a smile. Was that just human nature? To reach for more than you had the ability to hold against adversity?

  Gueryl stopped at the very last set of doors—golden oak double doors that shimmered with polish and care. After producing a shining brass key, he opened the lock and door, then presented the key to Alucius.

  Inside was a small foyer, the floor tiled in blue and gold. Beyond the foyer, through a square archway, was a sitting room a good ten yards in width and fifteen in length, the long side containing three side-by-side wide windows, offering a view of the Lord-Protector’s golden cream palace. In the sitting room were a dark blue upholstered settee, two matching armchairs, an imposing carved fruitwood desk set against the north wall, with an equally imposing and matching carved desk chair. Five wall lamps were spaced around the chamber, and in the center was a dark blue carpet bearing a design of intertwined eight-pointed green stars, outlined in gold.

  “The bedchamber is this way…”

  Roughly five yards by ten, the bedroom was only small by comparison to the sitting room. It also had a view of the palace, and a high triple-width bed and two matching armoires. Alucius set down his saddlebags and laid the rifles on the weapons rack, then followed Gueryl to the next doorway. Beyond the bedchamber was a bathchamber with a tub carved out of an oblong marble block, and with two spigots, both of shimmering bronze.

  After showing the bathchamber to Alucius, the captain returned to the sitting room. Alucius followed.

  “You’ll need your uniforms cleaned, of course. To summon the orderly, just use the bellpull here. If you let them know tonight, they can have them cleaned and pressed before noon tomorrow.”