He dispelled that emotion quickly. “Do not forget that you are mine,” he said in a low voice. “For now, I allow your playing. But when the time comes, when our union is sealed, I will allow no further dalliances. Do not embarrass me, Jasnah.”
He was not jealous because he cared for her, he was jealous because he saw another man possessing something that belonged to him.
“You disgust me,” she whispered.
This made him smile. “If you’ll excuse me, my lady, I have business to be about. Apparently, this town has a proper brothel. I do hope the ladies there are more satisfactory than the tavern whores available in the other villages. Don’t worry yourself about gossip—some of us know how to be discreet.”
He turned, ducking into his room, then emerged a moment later and strode down the hallway, obviously enjoying her hateful look. He didn’t get far, however, before he was practically shoved aside by a worried Kemnar.
Kemnar ignored Meridas’s look of indignation, instead rushing to Jasnah’s door. “My lady,” he said urgently. “We need to get out of this city, now.”
“They’re about two days’ march away, my lords and lady,” the Galevan soldier explained. “They made a deal with the lords of our city; I carried the messages myself. We’re supposed to keep you in the city for two days, until they can get their forces here to attack you.”
Taln looked nonplussed despite the haste of their preparations for departure. Kemnar had organized the honor guard, and it waited nervously in the street as Jasnah and the others left the building. The night air was damp and cool from the highstorm, and the stones were still slick.
The soldier who spoke was a short, nervous man who bore the beginnings of a bruised face—Nachin was one of the five who had fought Taln at the city gates. He scuttled beside them, speaking in a low voice. “You have to get out before the lords know you’re alerted,” he said. “If you can escape the city, I doubt they’ll pursue.”
“If what you say is true,” Taln asked as they joined the honor guard outside the inn, “why did the guards turn us away at the gates?”
“The city lords didn’t want to appear too eager to let you in,” he said. “They knew you had camped for the night, and planned to send word to you later.”
“And why are you telling me these things?” Taln asked pointedly.
Nachin looked ashamed. “I’m not right sure, my lord,” he admitted. “But, well, I fancy myself one of the best fighters I’ve ever known—I win eight out of ten bouts against serious opponents. I’ve rarely been beaten as soundly as when I fought you today, and with four others . . . Well, my lord, if you’re not a Herald, then you’re certainly like no other man I’ve crossed spears with. Besides, what the city lords do just isn’t right—and I’ll never see any of the coin they get for it.”
Taln nodded.
“You believe him?” Meridas asked quietly—not with the voice of a challenge, but the voice of one who took threats seriously.
Taln paused. “Dare we not?” he asked.
“Agreed,” Meridas said, waving for the honor guard to escort them out of the city.
“You’ll have to go with us,” Taln said to Nachin. “Do you have family in the village? They will be in danger.”
Nachin paled. He might have been a fine warrior as he claimed, but he seemed very new to intrigue.
“You’ve been seen with us by the innkeeper and anyone passing on the street,” Taln said. “They’ll know who spoiled their deal. Kemnar, take four men and go get his family. Go quickly; we’ll wait for you by the gates.”
Kemnar nodded, waving for a squad and taking Nachin by the shoulder. The rest of their group made for the city gates, where a group of apprehensive guardsmen barred their exit.
“Um, we can’t let anyone out after dark, my lord,” the gate leader said, waving for one of his men to dash off in the direction of the city palace. “It’s against city law.”
Taln nodded. “Send a messenger to the city lords, if you would,” he said in a civil voice. “We have just had word of an emergency back at our camp. We need to return immediately.”
The captain nodded, then, a bit uncertain; he waved for a second man to follow the first—obviously just keeping up pretenses.
“Will they attack?” Jasnah asked with worry as Taln rejoined their group.
He glanced back at the gate guards. There were perhaps a couple tensets of them—not enough to face the honor guard and two Shardbearers, but perhaps enough to hold the gatehouses until help arrived.
“That depends on whether or not they have orders to kill us,” Taln said. “The invaders might want you and Meridas alive.”
Thankfully, Kemnar arrived before the messengers returned. He towed a worried-looking woman and three children along with the soldier Nachin. As soon as Taln saw them, he turned to the gate. Without warning or preamble, he whipped out his Blade and launched himself at the wood. Three swings flashed in the darkness, then Taln kicked a door-shaped rectangular chunk of wood free from the gate. It thunked down against the stones outside.
“Through,” Taln ordered as the gate guards cried out in alarm. Kemnar took position on the other side of their group, holding out his Blade threateningly as several soldiers approached. Jasnah ducked through the opening in the gate; outside, she could see movement on the walls. Taln was right—their escape depended a great deal upon whether or not the townspeople had been given orders to kill. A squad of archers atop the walls would have little trouble picking them off as they escaped.
No arrows fell, though Taln walked at the back of the group nervously, Blade held at the ready as if to swipe the missiles from the air. Either the city lords didn’t respond in time, or they feared Taln’s retribution, for no pursuit was given. Jasnah didn’t relax until they reached camp, however, a few minutes later.
“Break down the camp!” Taln commanded. “We leave tonight. You,” he pointed at Nachin “come with me.” He led the man to Jasnah’s canopy, where Kemnar prepared their makeshift map of Riemak—drawn from memory by Taln and Kemnar with help from some of the local mercenaries.
“Where are they camped?” Taln asked Nachin.
“Here, my lord,” the man said, pointing at a place on the map not far from the city. “Or, that’s where they were when I spoke with them—that was only yesterday. They seemed very rushed to try and catch up with you. They sent riders ahead to the city, but my masters wanted confirmation of their size—and your size—before choosing sides. I was the one who scouted you both out.”
“How many?” Taln asked.
“Looked like about a thousand,” Nachin said. “Mostly on foot—only about ten riders. Most of the riders were noblemen, though, and only half of them carried swords.”
“Five Shardbearers,” Meridas cursed. “And an entire tensquad of infantry. They want to capture us badly indeed.”
“They must have managed to keep their capture of Ral Eram a secret,” Taln said. “And fear we’ll bring troops to warn or to flank.”
“They’re traveling quickly, my lord,” Nachin said. “No wagons at all.”
“How do they eat?” Jasnah asked.
Nachin shrugged. “I only know what I see. They didn’t even carry sleeping tents.”
Outside the canopy, soldiers and people were rousing, and shouts were called as camp was broken down. Jasnah understood Taln’s consternation. Their own army was ragged, underequipped, and was accompanied by an increasingly large group of civilians. They could never hope to outrun the larger force, and they certainly couldn’t fight it. They would be slaughtered.
“The city?” Jasnah asked.
“Will never let us in now that we’ve fled,” Taln said. “The guards were right, no matter what I claimed—we’d have trouble capturing it, even with three Blades. Even if we did, the Veden force has more Shardbearers than we—if we can get through the fortifications, then they will have even less trouble following.”
“Well, we can’t stand here,” Meridas said angrily
. “We may need to take the lady and escape quickly.”
“And leave everyone else to die?” Jasnah asked, horrified.
“They’ll leave the army alone if you’re not with it,” Meridas said unconvincingly.
Jasnah regarded him with a flat expression. “These soldiers belong to the same force that tried to massacre everyone in the palace just to keep word of the attack from escaping. They won’t leave a force of eight hundred troops at their back.”
“She’s right,” Taln said.
The group fell silent. The map ruffled slightly in Taln’s grip, wind blowing through the camp carrying the sounds of frightened men, many still new to war, barely trained and inexperienced. Jasnah breathed in the wet air, trying to think in the darkness.
“Meridas, I’ll need my Blade back,” Taln said, taking out his own weapon and jabbing it into the ground, then knocking the opal free. “You can have it back if I return.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Meridas said, summoning his own Blade. The implication in his voice was blatant—it wouldn’t be necessary because Taln wouldn’t be returning.
“What?” Jasnah asked as they exchanged weapons.
“Cut east,” Taln said, still speaking to Meridas. “The lady has agreed to travel to the Holy City, and you might as well start now. Perhaps it will throw them off. Even if it doesn’t, there are ruins there. They could provide a defensible position.”
Meridas nodded, affixing his old opal to the new Blade. The claw grips on the pommel immediately bent back into place, grabbing hold of the new stone, and the metal flowed like liquid, changing into his straight-backed, shorter Blade.
“Taln?” Jasnah demanded of him. “What are you thinking?”
Taln nodded farewell to Kemnar, to Meridas, and finally to her. Then he turned, hefting the Shardblade onto his shoulder, and began walking into the night.
Jasnah dashed over, grabbing him by the arm. “Taln, this is foolishness!” she snapped. “One man cannot face a thousand men, even if that man is you.”
“One man can slow them,” he said. “If he attacks at night and in storms, killing lone men.” His eyes were grim. He intended more. He intended something very foolish. He was a madman, with no understanding of his own limitations.
“Taln, I—”
“Think before you say those words, Jasnah,” he warned. “Before you forbid me, think about what you said earlier. You told me that only Alethkar mattered—that you would use me to your ends if it would save your homeland. Even if I buy you only a short amount of time, would it not be worth the chance you might find better ground for defense, or even reach the Holy City and find a way through its Oathgate?”
“Slim hopes,” she whispered.
“But less slim if I go,” he said. “You either let me go, or you send back a couple hundred troops to stand and die as a delaying move. You can either sacrifice two hundred men, or you can sacrifice just one. What will you decide, Jasnah Kholin—she who loves Alethkar?”
Jasnah stood in the cold night, then slowly let her hand slip from his arm. Taln nodded, then continued walking. She watched him disappear into the darkness, then stood there until Meridas came to get her. The self-satisfied smile in the man’s eyes sickened her even more than her own guilt.
“Kemnar,” she said, looking around. As usual, he stood only a short distance away, waiting quietly—almost unnoticed—upon her needs. “Go after him,” she said. “Watch him and see what he does. Try and keep him from killing himself. I need . . . we need him to hold this army together.” Assuming it lasts long enough to matter.
Kemnar stood for a moment, then nodded in the darkness, face illuminated by one of their few lanterns. He turned, waving to Vinde, second in command of Jasnah’s guards. Jasnah watched with confusion as Kemnar pulled out his Shardblade, then knocked the opal free.
“What are you doing?” Jasnah asked.
Kemnar handed the Blade to Vinde. “You’re probably going to need that here,” he said, then moved to quickly gather some supplies.
Vinde watched Kemnar go, holding the Shardblade with awed fingers.
“Kemnar!” Jasnah said with alarm. “You are not allowed to get yourself killed. Do you understand? Watch over him, but don’t endanger yourself.”
Kemnar slung a waterbag over his back. “I don’t intend to,” he said. “But I also don’t know that I’ll be back in time to help defend you. Don’t worry—I fully expect to reclaim that Blade. Vinde, don’t get too attached to it.”
Vinde smiled a toothy grin, gripping the sword with a firm hand. “It’ll be waiting for you,” he promised. “Even if I have to wet it on a bit of Veden blood.”
Kemnar nodded to him, bowed to Jasnah, and jogged off into the night—obviously intent on catching up with Taln. Meridas’s smile only deepened as he watched Kemnar’s retreating figure, and Jasnah was forced to confront what she’d just done. Without Taln, or even Kemnar, to counteract Meridas . . .
Meridas turned to the camp, barking orders without reservation now that Taln was gone. The Herald’s Army would have to do without its Herald for a time.
chapter 60
Dalenar 5
Crossguard was a fine city. While many men looked to the past for great architecture—idealizing cities such as Kholinar or Ral Eram—Dalenar had always been impressed with the modernity of Crossguard. The ramparts were designed to shelter bowmen, and the walls were constructed of fine stone. The inner architecture used contemporary techniques of construction, allowing for buildings much taller and thinner than traditional squat, columned Aleth structures. Many even had a second story, like buildings in Shinavar.
The majestic city walls had not fared well beneath Elhokar’s siege. In fact, ‘siege’ was too calm a word—it implied time spent in blockade. Elhokar had not come to force surrender, he had come to destroy. The once-proud walls, walls that had served Alethkar so well during the Jarnah War, now lay pocked with blackened scars—their stone remade to fire by attacking Awakeners. A particularly massive hole gaped in the eastern wall, revealing rubbled remains of some buildings. The bodies of soldiers—followers of the king or of Jezenrosh, but all Aleths—lay in heaps.
A double-line of spears stood driven into cracks in the stone a short distance from the broken wall. Each was tipped by a decapitated head. The wretched displays were only shadows in the distance, yet Dalenar turned away, sickened, lest he imagine his son’s face on one of the spears.
Elhokar’s army waited in Crossguard’s shadow. They hadn’t sought refuge within the city—that wasn’t the Kanaran way, and Jezenrosh’s loss proved the relative ineffectiveness of fortifications. No, Elhokar would meet Dalenar head-on and arrogant. The king would ride against his Parshen with the same bravado he had used against both Pralir and Crossguard.
“Jezenrosh put up a good fight,” Echathen said, riding at Dalenar’s side. “It looks like he forced the attack all the way into his city, up to the palace itself, I’d guess. Elhokar may have taken Crossguard, but it cost him a good number of his men.”
Dalenar nodded. Elhokar had suffered great losses, but his force was still a good twenty-five thousand strong. Dalenar had barely twenty thousand at his command—and it was a wonder he had been able to gather that many. Fortunately, Echathen hadn’t been the only one to quietly gather troops in preparation for Dalenar’s possible call—it almost seemed that everyone in the nation save Dalenar himself had known that he would eventually go to war with his nephew.
The parlay tent was ready. Dalenar nodded for Echathen and his Shardbearers to join him, then rode down the slope to meet with the king. As he approached, the destruction was even more vivid. Dalenar kept his eyes off of the corpses—the corpses of dead men, as well as the corpse of the city itself. The blackened holes in the wall were unnatural. Awakeners should not be used in such a manner—on that topic both Heraldic lore and The Way of Kings were quite firm.
Elhokar waited in the tent, sitting in a rich wooden chair—Dalenar wouldn’t have be
en surprised to find the chair had been pillaged from Jezenrosh’s own room. A fine wooden table stood at the center of the tent, with an empty chair at its other side.
So civilized, Dalenar thought to himself. The gesture, like so many other things in his life, seemed incongruous. Rich woods sitting among the smell of burning bodies; courtesy on the part of a man who had just executed his own cousin.
Dalenar’s son. Aredor. With the boy’s face firm in his mind, Dalenar climbed off his mount and walked to the tent.
The first time Echathen Khardinar had seen Elhokar, the boy had been a youth, come with his father to make allies of its northern friend. Even then, Elhokar had been a spoiled child. Echathen could still remember the young prince’s haughty demands and quick temper during that feast so many years before.
Power had only made the boy worse—and a boy he still was, despite his age. He sat with a dark, almost pouting expression, as Dalenar took the offered seat. They faced each other, one in golden sunburst armor, the other in simple—yet elegant—silver and blue. Echathen had met the Tyrantbane for the first time during that same feast two decades gone.
He had been waiting for Dalenar to take the throne ever since.
You should be proud, Elhokar, Echathen thought, taking off his helm and holding it under one arm as he moved to stand beside Dalenar’s chair. In your own way, you’ll help build a greater Alethkar. If not for your incompetence, Dalenar would never have had a reason to become king.
If Dalenar had one weakness, it was a romanticized sense of duty. A more pragmatic man would never have let the kingdom come to such ruin under Elhokar’s reign—there were ways of making certain an unstable king did not live long enough to destroy his nation. Dalenar would never consider such options. Yet Echathen could not find it within himself to blame the man for his sense of honor. Those very ideals—outdated though they may be—were what had earned Dalenar the loyalty and respect he now carried.
The Way of Kings Prime Page 67
