Crown Duel

by Sherwood Smith

  Khesot’s lips tightened, and I shivered again. “More traps? You’ve already put out a dozen. Bran, I really hate those things.”

  Branaric winced, then he shook his head, his jaw tightening. “This is war. Baron Debegri was the first to start using arrows, despite the Code of War, and now Shevraeth has got us cut off from our own castle—and our supplies. We have to use every weapon to hand, and if that means planting traps for their unwary feet, so be it.”

  I sighed. “It is so…dishonorable. We have outlawed the use of traps in warfare for over a century. And what if the Hill Folk stumble onto one?”

  “I told you last week,” Bran said, “my first command to those placing the traps is to lay sprigs of stingflower somewhere nearby. The Hill Folk won’t miss those. Their noses will warn them to tread lightly long before their eyes will.”

  “We are also using arrows,” I reminded him. “So that’s two stains on our honor.”

  “But we are vastly outnumbered. Some say thirty to one.”

  I looked at Khesot. “What think you?”

  The old man puffed his pipe alight. The red glowed in the bowl as pungent smoke drifted through the tent. Then he lowered the pipe and said, “I don’t like them, either. But I like less the thought that this marquis is playing with us, and anytime he wishes he could send his force against us and smash us in one run. He has to know pretty well where we are.”

  “At least you can make certain you keep mapping those traps, so our folk don’t stumble into them,” I said, giving in.

  “That I promise. They’ll be marked within a day of being set,” Branaric said.

  Neither Branaric nor Khesot displayed any triumph as Branaric reached for and carefully picked up the woven tube holding our precious map. Branaric’s face was always easy to read—as easy as everyone said mine was—and though Khesot was better at hiding his emotions, he wasn’t perfect. They did not like using the traps, either, but had hardened themselves to the necessity.

  I sighed. Another effect of the war. I’ve been raised to this idea almost my entire life. Why does my spirit fight so against it, I wondered.

  I thrust away the nagging worries, and the dissatisfactions, and my own physical discomfort, as Bran’s patient fingers spread out my map on the rug between us. I focused on its neatly drawn hills and forests, dimly lit by the glowglobe, and tried hard to clear my mind of any thoughts save planning our next action.

  But it was difficult. One worry sneaked back: our single glowglobe, whose power was diminishing. With our supplies nearly gone and our funds even lower, we no longer had access to the magic wares of the south, so there was no way to obtain new glowglobes.

  Khesot was looking not at the map but at us, his old eyes sad.

  I winced, knowing what he’d say if asked: that he had not been trained for his position any more than nature had suited Bran and me for war.

  But there was no other choice.

  “So if Hrani takes her riding up here on Mount Elios, mayhap they can spy out Galdran’s numbers better.” Branaric’s voice was a low rumble. “Then we send out someone to lure ‘em to the Ghost Fall Ravine.”

  I forced my attention to the map. “Even if the marquis fails to see so obvious a trap,” I smoothed a wrinkle with my fingers, “they’re necessarily all strung out going through that bottleneck. I don’t see how we can account for many of them before they figure out what we’re at, and retreat. I say we strike fast, in total surprise. We could set fire to their tents and steal all their mounts. That’d set ‘em back a little.”

  Bran frowned. “None of our attempts to scare ‘em off have worked, though—even with Debegri. He just sent for more reinforcements, and now there’s this new commander. Attacking their camp sounds more risky to us than to them.”

  Khesot still said nothing, leaning over only to tap out and reload his pipe. I followed the direction of his gaze to my brother’s face. Had Branaric been born without title or parental plans, he probably would have found his way into a band of traveling players and there enjoyed a life’s contentment. Did one not know him by sight, there was no sign in his worn dress or in his manner that he was a count—and this was even more true for me. I wondered if Khesot felt sad that though today was my Flower Day there would be no dancing—no music, or laughter, or family to celebrate the leaving of childhood behind. Among the aristocrats in the lowlands, Flower Day was celebrated with fine dresses and satin slippers and expensive gifts. Did he pity us?

  He couldn’t understand that I had no regrets for something I’d never known—and believed I never would know. But I controlled my impatience, and my tongue, because I knew from long experience that he was again seeing our mother in us—in our wide, dark-lashed eyes and auburn hair—and she had dearly loved pretty clothing, music, her rose garden.

  And Galdran had had her killed.

  “What do you think?” Bran addressed Khesot, who smiled ruefully.

  “You’ll pardon an old man, my lord, my lady. I’m more tired than I thought. My mind wandered and I did not hear what you asked.”

  “Can you second-guess this Shevraeth?” Branaric asked. “He seems to be driving us up into our hills—to what purpose? Why hasn’t he taken over any of our villages, or overrun Erkan-Astiar? He knows where they lie—and he has the forces. If he does that, traps or no traps, arrows or no arrows, we’re lost. We won’t be able to retake them.”

  Khesot puffed again, watching smoke curl lazily toward the tent roof.

  In my mind I saw, clearly, that straight-backed figure on the dapple-gray horse, his long black cloak slung over the animal’s haunches, his plumed helm of command on his head. With either phenomenal courage or outright arrogance he had ignored the possibility of our arrows, the crowned sun stitched on his tunic gleaming in the noonday light as he directed the day’s battle.

  “I do not know,” Khesot admitted. “But judging from our constant retreats of the last week, I confess freely, I do not believe him to be stupid.”

  I sniffed. “I find it impossible to believe that a Court fop—really, Azmus reported gossip in Remalna-city claiming him to be the most brainless dandy of them all—could suddenly become so great a leader.”

  Khesot tapped his pipe again. “Hard to say. Certainly Galdran’s famed army did poorly enough against us until he came. But maybe he has good captains, and unlike Debegri, he may listen to them. They cannot all be stupid,” Khesot said. “They’ve been guarding the coast and keeping peace in the cities all these years. It could also be they learned from those first weeks’ losses to us. They certainly respect us a deal more than they did at the outset.” He closed his eyes.

  “Which is why I say we ought to attack them at their camp.” I jabbed a finger at the map. “There are too many of them to carry their own water. They’ll have to camp by a stream, right? Oh, I suppose it isn’t realistic, but how I love the image of us setting fire to their tents, and them swarming about like angry ants while we laugh our way up into the hills.”

  Branaric’s ready grin lightened his somber expression. He started to say something, then was taken by a sudden, fierce yawn. My mouth promptly opened in a jaw-cracking yawn that made my eyes sting.

  “We can discuss our alternatives with the riding leaders after we eat, if I may suggest, my lord, my lady.” Khesot glanced anxiously from Bran to me. “Let me send Saluen to the cook tent for something hot.”

  Khesot moved to the flap of the tent and made a sign to the young man standing guard under the rain canopy a short distance away. Khesot gave his order, then Saluen loped down the trail to the cook tent.

  Khesot beckoned to my brother. With careful fingers I rolled up our map. I was peripherally aware of the other two talking in low voices, until Branaric confronted me with surprise and consternation plain on his face.

  Branaric waited until I had stowed the map away, then he grabbed me in a sudden, fierce hug. “Next year,” he said in a husky voice. “Can’t make much of your Flower Day, but next year I promise yo
u’ll have a Name Day celebration to be remembered forever—and it’ll be in the capital!”

  “With us as winners, right?” I laughed. “It’s all right, Bran. I don’t think I’m ready for Flower Day yet, anyway. Maybe being so short has made me age slower, or something. I’ll be just as happy dancing with the children another year.”

  Bran smiled back, then turned away and resumed his quiet conversation with Khesot. I listened to the murmur of their voices and gazed out, but I didn’t really see the steady rain, or the faintly glowing tents.

  Instead my inner eye kept returning to the memory of our people running before a mass of orderly brown-and-green-clad warriors, overseen by a straight figure in a black cloak riding back and forth along a high ridge.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  After a hasty supper I sat in the big tent we’d fashioned from three smaller ones. As I studied each tired, worried face in the circle of riding leaders, I made a private resolution.

  The truth was, the riding leaders were afraid to attack the Galdran camp. I didn’t blame them. Each had a turn to speak. Some were hesitant, some apologetic. They didn’t sound like warriors, they sounded like the exhausted men and women they really were. Calaub: a blacksmith by trade, brother to Julen. Hrani: a weaver. Moraun: a miller. Faeruk: wounded thirty years before, when fighting pirates for the old king. Only Jusar favored the idea, but he was a rarity: a young man trained in arms, though for defense of the castle, not for the field.

  And even Jusar seemed tense, voicing his worry that trying to locate the enemy’s main camp might bring trouble down on us. “They’ll surely have more sentries watching than we can find,” he said.

  “More sentries than we have warriors,” Faeruk joked, and the others laughed uneasily.

  “Who knows? Galdran might even have managed to hire some magician. For that matter, how did they get so many Fire Sticks?” Hrani’s voice held a little of her old spirit, but there was a stricken expression in her eyes that I could not account for.

  “One person in each riding took his or her family’s Sticks,” Jusar said. “Heard rumors about what is required of new recruits: Obey or die.”

  Calaub’s heavy brows met over his big nose. “Makes sense. Galdran’s not going to care about Fire Stick custom—not if he’s breaking the Covenant.”

  “Or trying to,” Khesot said with a faint smile, bringing the subject back. “So let’s use our alternate plan. Tomorrow, if this weather clears, we can sort out the details.”

  I stayed quiet as the war council wound up. Then I followed as they filed down the trail to the cook tent to get their evening dose of the thick soup that was tasting each day more of ground corn and stale vegetables and less of chicken-stock and herbs.

  What we need is information, I thought. And no one wanted to send anyone on what might be a suicide mission, to spy out their camp. The problem was, we had only one good spy—Azmus. And he was in the capital trying to garner fresh news.

  During Debegri’s command we’d used some of the older children as horse tenders and arms bearers, but only in isolated places. Some of these youths had willingly climbed very tall trees to survey and report on Debegri’s movements. Now, with Shevraeth in command, no one wanted to send a child to spy.

  Staring upward through a tangle of branches at the glowering ranks of rain clouds, I saw a gleam of blue sky. If the latest storm lifted, I’d do the job myself.

  As the last of the light disappeared, the showers diminished, and early stars glimmered between the silent clouds moving southward. Wind whipped through the camp, drumming the tent walls. I wandered to my tent, thinking that if I really were to go spying that night, I’d better get to sleep early.

  Just before I reached the tent I heard a giggle, sharply broken off. I lifted the flap—and gasped.

  Oria stood there grinning, her dark eyes crinkled to slivers, and behind her, Julen smiled. Flowers had been set all around my little tent, early spring blooms of every color, some from peaks a long ride away. The air was sweet with their combined scents.

  “Everybody brought one,” she said. “I know it doesn’t make up for no music and no dancing, but…Well, it was my idea. Do you like it?”

  “It’s wonderful.” I sniffed happily at a silvery spray of starliss.

  “Sit down, Mel,” Oria said. “Forget the war, just for a bit. I’ll brush out your hair for you.”

  With a sigh of relief I untucked the end of my braid and let it roll down my back. Perching on a camp stool, I shut my eyes and sat in silence as Oria patiently fingered the long braid apart and then brushed it out until it lay in a shining cloak to my knees. The steady brushing was soothing, and I felt all the tensions of the long day drain out of me.

  When she was done, I said, “Thanks, Ria. That’s as good as an afternoon nap in the summer.”

  “A shame you have to put it up again,” she said, smiling. “It’s so pretty—the color of autumn leaves. Promise you’ll never cut it.”

  “I won’t. It’s the only thing I have left to share with my mother, the color of our hair. And she always wanted me to grow it out.” My fingers worked quickly from old habit as I braided it up again, wrapped it twice around my head, and tucked the end in. “But I can’t parade around in long hair during a war. Or, I suppose I could, except then I’d end up carrying half the mountain in it.”

  “You can wear it down after we win, then, and start a new fashion.”

  “You’ll be the one starting the fashions,” I said, laughing up at her.

  “Duchess Oria,” she said, swishing around my tiny tent. “New silk shoes every day—twice a day! I can hardly wait.”

  “That’ll do,” Julen said to Oria. She was vigorously brushing mud off my alternate pair of woolen trousers. “You stop your nonsense and go and get your rest. We’ll have to make a supply run again tomorrow.” Oria stuck her tongue out at her mother, grinned at me, and ran out. Julen laid my other tunic down. “This is the best I can make of these trousers; the mud will not come out. Your brother’s old tunic looks even worse.” She glared. “I wish I could wash these properly! Even so, they wouldn’t look much better. ‘Tis shameful, you not dressing to befit your station. Especially on this day.”

  I dropped onto my bedroll, grinning. “For whom?” I asked. “Everyone has seen me like this since I was small. And truth to tell, Oria would look a lot prettier in fancy clothes than I would.”

  Julen’s square, worn face tightened in a formidable scowl as she considered this. She said slowly, “‘Tisn’t proper. When I grew up, we dressed to fit our places in life. Then you knew who was what at a glance—and how to deal with ‘em.”

  “But that means an orderly life, and when has Tlanth been orderly?” I asked, sobering. “Not in my memory.”

  Julen gave a short nod. “It’s just not right, your runnin’ barefoot and ignorant with the village brats. I count my two among ‘em,” she added with a wry smile.

  “But they’re my friends,” I said, leaning on one elbow. “We know each other. We’ll defend each other to the death. You think Faeruk and the rest would have left their patches of farm or their work to follow us if I’d stayed in the castle, spending tax money on gowns and putting on airs?”

  Julen pursed her lips. “Friends in war—and I hope you’ll remember us when things are put right. But you know we all will eventually have to take up our work again, and you won’t be knowing how to have friends among your own kind.”

  “I don’t miss what I never had.”

  “I’ve said my piece. Except,” Julen added strongly, “I’ll continue to curse the day Galdran Merindar’s mother didn’t strangle him at birth.”

  “Now, that,” I said with a laugh, “is a fine idea, and one I’ll join with enthusiasm! So tell me this: What’s amiss with Hrani? Both her older children are fine. I saw them in camp tonight, joking around with the others. Yet she was unhappy.”

  Julen’s lips pressed in a thin line. “It’s the youngest. Tuel came down with messages from t
he hideaway today, bringing some of yon blooms.” Julen lowered her voice. “Hrani’s baby is fine, it’s just that she’s no longer a baby, and Hrani wasn’t there to see her leave off diapers and use the Waste Spell.” She gave a quick look over her shoulder to see if any men happened to have sneaked into the tent and were listening.

  “Oh-h-h. So they had the ceremony, and Hrani was here with us instead of welcoming her daughter to childhood. Now I see. Poor Hrani!”

  “Don’t say aught of it to her. Might make her feel worse.” Julen sighed and pointed at my other tunic. “Change now, before you catch your death.”

  “All right,” I said, feigning a yawn. It wouldn’t do for her to figure out what I was up to. “And then I think I’ll get some sleep.”

  She bustled about the tent a little while longer while I hastily changed. I wrapped myself up in my blankets and lay down on the cot. By the time she was done I was almost warm. She blew out the candle and left.

  oOo

  Moonlight flooded my tent when I rose, jammed my feet into my winter mocs, pulled on my ancient hat, and slipped out. The ground was still muddy, but I had long ago learned how to move across soggy ground. The air was now still and almost balmy. As I slipped between the tents, tugging my battered hat close about my ears, I gazed skyward, awed by the spectacular blaze of stars. The moon was up, big enough that its silvery glow gave me just enough light to make out my pathway.

  A few paces beyond the last tent, I heard a sudden noise and a voice: “Who’s there?”

  Pleased at this evidence of an alert sentry, I said, “It’s Meliara, Devan. I’m going scouting.”

  “Countess!” Devan dropped down from a tree branch into my path and squinted into my face. “Alone?”

  “I think I’ll be the faster this way,” I said. “And it’s so beautiful tonight, I think I’ll enjoy the going.”

  He paused, a big man used to millstones and bushels of wheat, not to clutching a sword. “Ain’t there someone else to go?”