Arms-Commander

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  Saryn concentrated on extending the area of the parallel melded flows, weaving her order-chaos flow curtain farther behind her, trying at the same time to strengthen it, to thread in more order and chaos nodes.

  The sunlight darkened yet more, giving a slight cooling to the air around her, yet sweat poured off her forehead and into her eyes, and tiny flashes of light flared across her vision. She felt herself swaying in the saddle.

  Finally, she had to release her hold on the gray light-curtain. White sunlight flowed back over the squad. She inhaled deeply, then exhaled, then did so again, even though she hadn’t been holding her breath.

  Murmurs drifted forward from behind her.

  “…scary…”

  “…most stuff she does that saves your rear is scary…better get used to it…”

  Am I really that frightening? Saryn was afraid she knew the answer to the question, much as she pushed it away, but her answer raised a second question, one to which she had no answer. Why does it have to be that way?

  She eased her water bottle out of its holder and took a long swallow. She’d have to rest before she tried to gain better control of the shield flows. But she couldn’t stop working, not until she had them under control. She’d just have to pace herself…for as long as it took.

  She took another swallow and corked and stowed the bottle.

  According to the maps, the border to Tryenda lay another fifteen kays ahead. She could rest and eat some biscuits and try again.

  LXXV

  The lands of northern Tryenda held the same kind of rolling rises as Cardara and the area south of Lornth, but the ground itself seemed less fertile, with occasional rocky outcrops, more meadows with sheep and scattered cattle, less cropland, and far more forested areas. The air was heavy and damp. Saryn kept blotting her forehead, face, and neck, and her undertunic was soaked through by midday on fourday.

  Part of that was because of her own extra efforts in trying to find better ways to fuse the flow of order and chaos in the air into a flowing, sliding curtain that would hold against the chaos-bolts of the white mages. She could now shield both squads, but not for all that long, at least not without exhausting herself. Since she doubted that any chaos-mage she might face would conveniently go away when her flow curtain failed, she’d begun to work on her technique to put it together. At least, if she could raise it quickly, she might be able to hold it just long enough to deflect fire-bolts and then raise it again…if she could develop the proper technique. Or…she might be able to raise it just where the fire-bolt was aimed.

  While she took several long swallows of water and rested, she studied the road and the fields and scattered woods through which they were riding. After a time, she realized that she had seen few tracks on the road, except those of her own outriders, for the last five kays, but she also hadn’t sensed anyone around—not closer than two kays, at least. Abruptly, it hit her, and she wanted to pound her own forehead.

  “Squads! Halt!” she ordered.

  As soon as the guards came to a stop, she dismounted, then knelt and studied the sandy, dusty surface of a road whose spring ruts had long since been softened by a hot summer and the passage of hoofs, feet, and wagon wheels. Close inspection showed only traces of one set of cart wheels and two set of hoofs. The dust showed faint wavy lines…covering deeper imprints.

  Saryn frowned…They dragged branches. But why bother? The roads always have some horse men…unless there are lots of riders…

  The entire situation screamed of ambush…but how exactly should she handle it?

  Klarisa glanced down at Saryn.

  “They hid their tracks. It’s hard to tell, but I’d guess several companies rode this way. Not today. Yesterday or the day before. The locals must know, because there haven’t been many riders or carts since then. They’re keeping their heads low and hoping things blow over.” Like Zeldyan has been, but some troubles don’t ever blow over. They just get worse.

  The hidden tracks suggested that a number of riders had used the road, but it couldn’t have been too many because there were no obvious marks on the shoulders and no deep wagon traces. No wagons meant few supplies, and few supplies implied that whoever was riding either intended to live off the land or wasn’t hostile. Given the intrigue and double-dealing that Saryn had already seen, she suspected the former…but suspicions were only that.

  “Call in the outriders!” Saryn swung back up into the saddle.

  After the three outriders had returned and gathered around Saryn, Klarisa, and Yulia, Saryn cleared her throat. “There are armsmen somewhere ahead of us. There could be several companies. Whenever you near a ridge or a higher place in the road, I want you to slow down and move up just enough to see what lies beyond. If you see any sign of anything that looks out of place or any sign of armsmen, slip back down and make your way back here. Don’t raise any dust in doing it. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, ser,” came the chorus.

  “We’ll also need a place to rest, or to bivouac, where there’s clean water.”

  Once the three had headed out again, Klarisa looked to Saryn. “How far away do you think they are?”

  “More than two kays, but less than eight, because that’s about how far Tryenda is from here. That’s a bit of a guess, though.”

  “Would they not be closer? I cannot believe they would sweep the road for ten kays.” Klarisa raised her eyebrows.

  “They might, if they were told some women were after them…and they’d get a certain…pleasure…or reward, or something like that. Besides, they’d want quarters in the town.”

  “They would.” Klarisa nodded, but there was a certain anger behind the gesture.

  That was fine with Saryn.

  Given what awaited them ahead, there was no point in pushing the horses, and Saryn slowed their pace to an easy walk. Even so, they covered almost two kays before the outriders returned, and Saryn halted the squads to confer with the scouts and the two squad leaders.

  “What did you find out?” she asked.

  “It’s hard to tell for certain, ser, not without being seen,” offered Chayara, the stocky older outrider—from somewhere in Gallos, as Saryn recalled. “There’s a woods on a rise to the right of the road, and there are cots below it. There’s no one in the cots, and it’s harvesttime here. That doesn’t seem right. There’s no one on the road, either.”

  “How far do you think the town is?”

  Chayara shrugged. “I couldn’t say, but I’d be guessing it’s less than a few kays beyond where the road turns west beyond that wooded ridge.”

  “Is there anywhere we can make camp out of their sight?”

  “There’s a tiny stream over the next rise, and it winds sort of west…” offered Leisi, the youngest outrider. “There’s a big woods there.”

  Saryn turned to Klarisa and Yulia. “I’m going back with Chayara and Hanira. You take Leisi and the squads along that stream and behind or around the first rise. If there’s no place suitable to make camp, just wait there. Otherwise…that’s where we’ll stay. No fires. None.”

  “Yes, ser.”

  Saryn nodded to the outriders. “Lead on.”

  They covered slightly less than two kays before the road angled to the left around a slightly larger rise covered in scrub and grass that looked to have been overgrazed.

  “The road’s too open,” said Chayara. “We just went uphill here, by that path next to the stone fence there.”

  “Thank you. Follow me.” Saryn extended her senses before she reached the top of the rise, but she reined up the mare short of the crest once she saw how open the ground was there. She closed her eyes and concentrated, building up a better picture from what she was sensing.

  Chayara had been right. There were empty cots in the vale below the rise where Saryn had halted. Above those cots were armsmen and mounts—possibly two companies, although all were concealed in the trees, which comprised more of a managed woodlot than a true forest.

  Could al
l the armsmen be there for a reason besides rebellion…or an ambush?

  She considered what she knew. Lord Mortryd had been very clear in his missive to Zeldyan that he had barely a company of armsmen to his name. The tracks she had sensed were for far more than a single company, and that suggested several more companies’ worth of armsmen waiting somewhere beyond. She very much doubted that Mortryd would send all his armsmen kays away from his hold if he were under attack.

  So…Mortryd was under attack by those waiting in ambush, and those waiting wanted to ambush any forces sent to relieve Mortryd…or good Lord Mortryd was part of the rebellion, and the missive to the regents had been a ruse. Saryn would have bet on the latter. Either way, it didn’t make much difference so far as those armsmen the outriders had sighted were concerned. Saryn and the guards needed to deal with them.

  Saryn continued concentrating, trying to relate the exact positions of the armsmen who guarded the road. There was one squad drawn up in readiness—or semireadiness—just behind the first line of trees on the ridge overlooking the road that led into the town of Tryenda, and behind them, under cover, was at least a company.

  Still, there had to be others…but where? Most likely, they were quartered in the town, another kay or so to the southwest…if her maps were correct.

  She opened her eyes and looked to the outriders. “We can head back to the others.”

  “Yes, ser.”

  Saryn turned the mare, urging her back down the east side of the rise, thinking about how they could deal with the armsmen.

  The woods weren’t that thick, more like a woodlot, and she thought that, if she attacked before dawn through the woods, hitting the sentries with the archers, then the camp itself, that might be enough to scatter the first company. Then…if she moved her squads across to the other side of the ridge…

  She nodded. It should work.

  And if it didn’t, they had the high ground and a way to retreat—even if she really didn’t want to think about that possibility.

  LXXVI

  Saryn awoke in the darkness, jerking awake from a dream in which chaos-bolts had rained down upon her and the guards from all directions, and no matter what direction she lifted her shield, chaos flew in from another angle and turned guard after guard into flaming charcoal, then ashes.

  She sat up on her thin bedroll and blotted her steaming forehead with the sleeve of her undertunic. Let’s hope that’s not prophetic. After reaching for her water bottle and uncorking it, she took a long swallow. Then she corked it and looked eastward at the starry sky. Above the hills she caught sight of a fast-moving star—except stars didn’t move that fast. Had that been the Winterlance? Or just a slow meteor? Did she want to lie on the hard ground and try to rest for the little time left before she’d need to prepare? She shook her head. All that would do would be to make her more uncomfortable. She pulled on her boots, then her tunic, and stood, thinking.

  There might be as many as three companies in different positions, poised to close in and surround whoever took the road that led into the town of Tryenda. Saryn pushed that thought away. One objective at a time, and the first one is to crush and scatter the company guarding the road before they know they’re under attack.

  During the last battle, using the chaos-knife wedge had prostrated her after a single effort. Even if all three companies were in one giant formation, there was no way she could create a chaos-knife big enough to encompass all of them…not and stay conscious.

  Does the energy required for using order-chaos flows increase arithmetically or geometrically with the size of the application? She couldn’t help but smile at the pedantry in her mental question. But still…could she just use a smaller chaos-order-knife at a key point? Or several of them? Without totally exhausting herself?

  She’d have to see.

  Saddling the mare in the darkness was little different from doing so in the day, except that Saryn relied more on senses than sight. Once all her gear was ready, and the mare tethered to a tree, she donned her battle harness and went to find Klarisa and Yulia.

  They were awake, fully dressed, and talking quietly. Saryn paused and listened for a moment.

  “…don’t know what she’ll do…”

  “…what ever…Lornians won’t like it…”

  “…can be ruthless…”

  “Does she have any choice…how they are?”

  Saryn cleared her throat and stepped forward.

  “Ser,” offered Klarisa.

  “We’ll need to get everyone up in a moment, but I want to go over what I expect from each of you. Klarisa, you and fourth squad will be with me. We’ll come up the back side of the woods and get as close as we can. Then we’ll ride into and through their camp. Slash and disrupt. Keep your guards mounted and moving. Tell them not to stop. Once they stop they become much easier targets. The Lornians will either scatter, or they’ll regroup. If they scatter, make sure no one’s left in the campsite, then form up at the front of the woods. If they regroup, we withdraw. I’ll give the order. If something happens to me, it’s your task to get everyone clear.”

  “Yes, ser.”

  Saryn turned to the other squad leader. “Yulia…you and second squad will ride along the top of the cleared area that’s below the forest and above the cots. You’re to wait in position beside the first barn…when the sky begins to lighten, move farther around the hill until you’re within a hundred yards of the area just below where the Lornians were hidden in the trees. Hold there until you hear yells from the Lornians or something else that makes it clear that fourth squad has attacked. When that happens, be ready to sweep across the cleared area and cut down anyone you can. Don’t chase stragglers, and keep the squad together as a unit. It’s better to let some escape than to scatter the squad.”

  “Yes, ser. We’re to sweep and reform, then sweep back and forth across until they stop coming and you join us.”

  “That’s right.” Saryn straightened. “Get your squads ready to ride.”

  Less than a half glass later, both squads were mounted and formed up. Saryn rode toward the two squad leaders and reined up.

  “Squad four, ready to ride,” reported Klarisa.

  “Squad two, ready to ride,” added Yulia.

  “Quiet riding,” returned Saryn, easing the mare around. “Forward.”

  “Forward…”

  Close to half a glass passed before the two squads split, and Saryn led fourth squad up the long, gentle slope on the back of the rise. By the time they rode into the trees, the eastern sky was beginning to lighten. After several hundred yards, Saryn could clearly discern with her senses three figures standing in the trees some yards out from the three small clearings where most of the armsmen still lay sleeping. She’d hoped to get closer than the thirty or forty yards between her and the nearest sentry, but, quietly as she was trying to ride, and as widely spaced as the trees were, almost every hoof that touched the detritus of moss, twigs, and old leaves created a crackling sound. There was just no way to approach silently.

  She turned in the saddle. “Forward…fast walk…no talking…pass it back.” Then she guided the mare directly toward where she sensed the nearest sentry to be, drawing the first of her blades. She rode to within fifteen yards of the man before he jerked into full awareness.

  “Who goes there! Who is it?”

  Saryn kept riding toward him and threw the blade, guiding it with order-chaos flows.

  The sentry’s next query ended in a gurgling sound.

  At that, Saryn drew another blade and urged the mare forward into almost a trot, as fast as she dared in the gloom amid the trees. As she burst into the small clearing where close to forty armsmen were sleeping, she angled toward the fire, where a handful of troopers had gathered, her blade out and ready.

  “Attackers!”

  Two of the armsmen dived to the side, but a third wasn’t nearly that fortunate. Saryn cut him down, then the man next to him.

  “Someone’s out there!”
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  “To the horses!”

  After that, Saryn just concentrated on keeping clear of other guards and cutting down or wounding any armsman she could. Her senses definitely gave her an advantage in the gloom. In time, as the eastern sky changed from gray to deep green-blue, Saryn and fourth squad found only themselves and severely wounded or dead Lornians in or around the camp clearings in the woods.

  “Reform on the open slope!” Saryn used a touch of order to boost her voice, then turned her mount toward the open space she could make out through the trees, winding her way through scattered bodies. The only organized group she could sense was fourth squad, waiting on the slope.

  As she emerged into the early-morning light, Saryn saw three guards with cuts or slashes being dressed and one empty saddle. Below her on the slope were bodies in olive green uniforms strewn everywhere. Saryn swallowed, then rode toward Yulia.

  “They never really saw us, ser. Then they panicked. We just did what you ordered.”

  “You were very effective. Second squad casualties?”

  “One dead, three wounded.”

  “Keep several guards in the saddle and on alert. Have the others recover weapons, but have them hurry. I’ll need another blade, too, if they can find one. Then they can stand down for a bit. Oh…send a pair to check on the teamsters. For the moment, they can stay where they and the wagon are. And post someone at the back of the woods so that the locals can’t do what we did.”

  “Yes, ser.” Yulia nodded and turned her mount.

  Saryn watched as the guards of fourth squad emerged from the trees and formed up. She waited until Klarisa had taken muster before she rode across the sparse grass and churned ground and reined up beside the squad leader.

  “Fourth-squad casualties?”

  “Two dead, five wounded, none seriously.”

  “Thank you, squad leader. Good work.” What else can you say to her? That we have to lose guards fighting in Lornth so we don’t fight under worse conditions in the Westhorns? “Send out a pair of outriders to watch the road from the town. Have the others recover what they can, then stand down. We’ll likely have a glass or two before anyone decides to attack.”