The Dreel had helped polarize things very quickly because of his devotion to Neal and utter lack of respect for Berengar. And Berengar, while an intelligent and skilled man, had not traveled much in the northern nations and not at all by the circus translatio. The exertion of using that route to get from Cygestolia to the grove to the east of Jarudin seriously wore him out. As a result his temper was shorter than usual, and he did not rein it back in.
Neal, on the other hand, seemed to weather travel by the circus better than even she did. She felt embarrassed awakening to the sound of Neal and Stulklirn dumping armloads of wood near the edge of the campsite to feed the fire that kept her warm. "How can you be so full of energy?"
The Man shrugged. "I'm thinking I must have rested a great deal while I was dead."
Gena yawned. "I apologize for awakening you. Had I known . . ."
Neal shook his head. "Now I'm the one who should be apologizing. Someone brings you back from the dead, and you get angry with them? I'm thinking I was more mannerly dealing with the Reithrese emperor in Jarudin than I was with you and Aarundel. Never was one to wake up all cheery, though."
Gena stretched and tossed her blanket across Berengar's feet. She stood and walked over to where Neal squatted. She held her hands out to the fire. "That feels good."
"Something about a fire that warms the body and prompts talk that warms the soul. Many's the friendship welded together over a campfire."
Gena sat down and poked a stick into the fire. "Did you and my grandaunt spend much time talking over a fire?"
Neal thought for a second, and Gena saw sadness flicker over his face. "Once, for a bit, but it didn't last. That was the night that Takrakor and his warriors took your grandfather away. We had more fires on that trip, of course, but we didn't do much talking."
The pain in his voice made her want to hug him, but as she reached out, he withdrew. "Neal, there is no prohibition against our touching."
He gave her a smile, but it died quickly. "I know this, but I fought so long to keep from hugging Larissa, that it's a habit I can't break."
"You could if you tried."
Neal shrugged. "True, but then I'd have to deal with the fact that I'd be hugging the grandniece of the sylvanesti I love. To go from living in a tomb to robbing a cradle is a bit much right now."
"Neal, I am only slightly younger than Larissa was when you met her."
"Which means I'm twice your age."
"I do not think the five hundred years you lay dead count against you. Would you deny yourself the charms of a woman just shy a score years?"
Neal seemed to consider that for a moment, then shook his head. "That would be a bit different."
"How so?"
"Being as how I'm an old dog, and succumbing to the charms of a woman is an old trick, I can see myself doing it. Actually being able to touch a sylvanesti is a new trick."
"You could learn new tricks if you wanted." Gena laid a thick piece of wood on the fire. "I could teach you." Though it came out innocently, she immediately looked up to see how he would interpret her words. I didn't mean I could teach him about loving a sylvanesti—or did I?
Neal raised an eyebrow, then smiled. "I'm thinking there is one trick you might be able to teach me, if you wouldn't mind."
"Yes?"
He jerked his head toward her baggage. "I saw you packing away some things that Aarundel called flashdrakes. I gather they are some sort of weapon, but I don't recall seeing their like before."
"The Dwarves made them first, and still make the best, but even the Haladina have begun to manufacture them. It is a new weapon, however. These flashdrakes belonged to Durriken." Gena hesitated, instantly afraid of Neal's reaction to what she would say next. "He was my lover, a Man, like yourself. The Haladina murdered him in Aurdon."
Neal did grow a bit distant as she spoke, but remained keenly interested in what she said. "Your grandfather told me of Durriken and how he got the insigne nuptialis back. I think I would have liked him."
"Stories about you intrigued Rik quite a bit." Gena stared down at the fire. "He and I were together for three years, then the Haladina took him away from me."
"So Berengar wants to save his family in this, and you're looking to avenge Durriken's death?"
"I guess so. It started as an expedition to help a friend recover Cleaveheart and Wasp, but Rik's murder has made it personal. I carry the flashdrakes because they, and this ring, are all I have to remember him by. The Haladina killed him with the Death of Eight Cuts."
Neal winced. "That is not a nice way to die." He shook his head. "I guess things have changed a great deal, because I can't imagine a sylvanesti in the arms of a Haladina."
"Nor can I. The Haladina have taken to setting gems in their teeth to remind themselves of the days of the Reithrese."
Neal looked confused for a moment, then glanced again at her baggage. "So will you show me how to use these flashdrakes?"
She nodded. "We will have to walk away from camp, because they are very loud."
Neal stood and brushed his hands off on the thighs of his breeches. "Stulklirn, will you watch Berengar and make certain he is not harmed while he sleeps?"
The Dreel nodded and crouched down at Berengar's side. "Watch, I will." The creature's feral grin suggested to Gena that the Dreel would have waited an eternity just to see the moment of terror in Berengar's eyes when he awoke he found a Dreel hunched over him.
Neal hefted the saddlebags containing the flashdrakes and led her off on a little path away from the grove. They walked over a series of leaf-covered hills and descended into a little valley with steep walls that ran roughly twenty-five yards before it curved off to the south. "This should channel the noise away from the grove, I'm thinking."
Gena nodded and cast about for a suitable target. She [yfipw] a large mushroom, from which she tore the cap and ["red] on down the gully. She leaned it up against a tree that had fallen across the ravine, then returned to Neal's side. "That should do."
Neal set the saddlebags down, then took a step back from them. Gena dropped to one knee and opened the one with the flashdrakes. She took them out and handed one to him, then carefully explained and walked through each step of loading her weapon. Neal aped her movements, watching her intently, and asked no question.
Gena found being under his scrutiny both challenging and thrilling. She worked methodically and slowly to load the flashdrake and, in doing so, found the job rather akin to the various ritualized forms of magick she had learned from Larissa. That helped her overcome some of her nervousness and gave her confidence. Neal seemed to appreciate her precision because he worked to imitate her exactly in all she did.
It struck her as being utterly incongruous that she was standing there in Ispar teaching a legend how to operate a weapon that had not come into use until well after his death. That she was even able to speak with him after she had spent her life idolizing him and seeking knowledge about him was unbelievable. That she might have something to offer him, that was the sort of thing of which fantasies were spun.
Finally she drew the flashdrake's talon back and pointed the weapon at the toadstool. "There will be one initial flash, then a larger one and some thunder. Brace yourself."
Neal nodded and she pulled the trigger. The talon struck a spark down into the pan, and the priming powder flared up bright red, then collapsed into a gout of smoke that obscured the target. She held her hand steady, then the pistol charge went off. The thunder from the flashdrake hid any sound of the lead ball hitting the target, but when the smoke cleared, the toadstool was gone, as well as a bit of the tree.
Neal smiled sheepishly, a yard back from where he had been standing. "It was loud, wasn't it?"
"Indeed. Come, let's see how I did."
The both of them ran down to where the toadstool had been and laughed as they pulled up short. The fallen tree showed a splintery furrow where the ball had plowed into the wood a bit to the right of the toadstool. The beige target had
been knocked from the log by the impact and lay on the ground. Gena picked it up, inspected it, and frowned. "We are shooting a long way off, and I am not that good a shot."
Neal fingered the bullet groove. "Were that ball an arrow and the toadstool a warrior's chest, you'd have skewered his liver. And the way it splintered the wood, I'm thinking armor's of little use."
Gena set the toadstool back in place. "Your turn." They returned to the saddlebags, and Gena watched as Neal loaded the weapon. The only mistake he almost made was in reaching for the finer-grained priming powder for the primary charge, but when she pointed out the difference, he nodded. "Big grains for the big fire, small grains for the small fire."
"Exactly."
He smiled and cocked the flashdrake. "I'm ready, am I? How do I aim?"
"Close your left eye." She reached up to block it, but he pulled his head aside. "Sorry. Look down the barrel and keep it pointed at your target. At this range the bullet will drop an inch or two. Compensate."
"Done." He smiled like a child playing with a new toy. "Brace yourself."
The talon fell, and in the second before the main charge exploded, Gena noticed how Neal's thickly muscled arm held the heavy flashdrake rock-still. Then the flashdrake vomited fire and smoke, and an earsplittmg roar echoed through the forest. As the thick white smoke evaporated, Gena saw no trace of the mushroom's cap.
Neal looked at the smoking flashdrake. "It has quite a jolt to it."
"Rik used to call that 'recoil.' It varies with how much powder you use, and too much can make the flashdrake explode in your hands." Her ears ringing, Gena started to walk down to the target area. "Poor-made imitations of these Dwarven handcannons have been known to kill the person using them."
Neal fell into step beside her. "Slower to use than a bow, but not an arbalest." He stopped as they came to a circle of toadstool fragments, and squatted. Using the gun, he pointed at some of the larger pieces. "Looks like I hit it a bit high and to the left."
"But you hit it on the first shot!" Gena clapped her hands. "You are very good."
"Or very lucky."
"Or," called Berengar from the firing line, "you have discovered what we did in Aurdon—these things take no skill at all to use. This is why they are restricted from the lower classes."
Neal stood and nodded to Berengar. "Had the Steel Pack had these weapons, we would have swept the Reithrese from the face of Skirren a year or two before the Elven crusade."
"Thank the gods there are few enough of them, and most of those so wretched that they kill those who use them." Berengar dropped his left hand to the hilt of his rapier. "Those flashdrakes require no skill and bring no honor on those who use them."
"Still, they are clearly effective." Neal looked at Gena. "This Durriken of yours must have killed at least two of the Haladina who took him before they killed him."
Gena shook her head and remembered how small Rik had looked stretched out on the table at the Fisher mansion. "He did not shoot his assailants."
Berengar's head came up. "When we found his body, the guns had not even been drawn from the scabbards he had fashioned for them."
Neal's eyebrow rose. "In the time I have slept, the Haladina have become very stealthy, it seems."
"Very." Berengar spat on the ground. "And they have Riveren allies who provide them a safe haven in Aurdon."
"Well, we shall see about that, will we not?" Gena smiled and tried to mediate between the two of them. She headed off any growing argument by agreeing to let Neal practice more with the flashdrakes while she enlisted Berengar in helping her forage for some herbs to spice the gruel she intended to prepare as their meal.
Away from Neal, Berengar could not have been more pleasant or solicitous. He did not shy from her touch and bantered with her effortlessly. He worked to anticipate her needs and very much assumed the leadership role she had expected of him. He did not shy from performing tasks that would have been beneath his station in Aurdon, and some of the camaraderie they had shared on the road returned to their camp.
Gena knew Neal had good reason for his distance—he had become alive again in a world that had passed him by, but she could not help but judge him harshly for it. His inquisitive nature stood him in good stead in adapting, and the varied volume and cadence of the flashdrake reports suggested he had already begun to experiment with the weapons. Still, his willingness and desire to learn about the weaponry of the day mocked his resistance to let down his guard concerning her, and that hurt.
She toyed for a second with the idea of sleeping with Berengar, but she rejected it when she realized she would be doing that to punish Neal. She wondered if, in the same way bringing him back had allowed her to feel superior to Larissa in the realm of magick, seducing Neal would allow her to feel superior to her grandaunt. The instant that question entered her mind, she blushed and felt ashamed. To do such a thing for so petty a reason would dishonor her and mock what Neal and Larissa had shared. While Neal had been dead for five hundred years, to his mind not a day had passed since he died thinking of Larissa.
Neal returned to the camp with the flashdrakes in their scabbards, fastened against the flat of his stomach. "This is how Durriken wore them?"
Gena nodded. "He could draw them quickly and use them while riding."
"While riding?" Neal looked at Berengar. "And you said these required no skill."
"I stand by my statement. Weapons for old men who can no longer use a sword, or in Durriken's case, a small man who made good use of a weapon that extended his reach."
Neal shrugged his way out of the leather harness holding the flashdrakes in place. "I'm thinking I'm not that small, but I don't know if I'm too old to be using this sword."
Berengar smiled effortlessly. "I think it is good you have practiced with the handcannons."
Stulklirn made a rude buzzing noise. "Denman idle-speaks."
Berengar glared at the Dreel. "I have dogs that would not deign to take your scent, much less worry your ragged pelt with tooth."
Stulklirn's eyes brightened and his lips smacked together.
Neal frowned at the Dreel, "Stulklirn, be still. My lord Count, I was thinking I was, that you might honor me by teaching me all that I have yet to learn about swordsmanship. Same as these flashdrakes are new, this rapier you wear was not known in my time. The rapier Aarundel had made for me still isn't familiar. If you would be willing."
Berengar nodded gladly.
Neal smiled broadly. "Shall we pad the blades?"
The count shook his head. "I won't touch you, and I won't let you touch me." He drew his blade with a flourish, then saluted Genevera. "For you, my lady."
Chapter 36:
Hatred Fills A Heart Of Ice
Early Winter
A.R. 499
My 536th Year
The Present
***
BEING DEAD FOR so long must have played hob with my brain, because I should have seen the confrontation with Berengar coming more clearly than I did. I had been brought back to life to help him deal with a situation that he saw as incredibly important. I understood that, but given the magnitude of what I needed to understand about my own situation, his concerns slipped a bit back in line.
I also realized that I had been dealing with him as I would have the Red Tiger. While they looked very much alike, they were not the same person. They shared a drive to accomplish their goals, to be certain, but the Red Tiger had risen from poverty and slavery to revolt against the Reithrese. Berengar came from a noble family and seemed to have an underlying arrogance, which he needed to sustain his mission. As with most people, he saw himself as the hero of his own epic, but his arrogance made him think it others must see him as a hero as well.
His attitude toward the flashdrakes surprised me because I would have thought he was smart enough to see how powerful they were. Actually, he was, but of the two courses of action open to him, he chose the reactionary one. By restricting the handcannons he guaranteed his people would
not be able to deal with them. He should have embraced them, learned about them, and learned ways to use and defeat them. An army armed with flashdrakes would be formidable, but knowing their weaknesses would make them vulnerable.
For example, it struck me that these flashdrakes would be singularly useless when a battle was being fought in a rainstorm. Granted, fighting under adverse conditions is never desired, but soldiers can be trained to deal with almost anything. Creating a unit like the Steel Pack that practiced moving and attacking in driving rainstorms would allow him to destroy flashdrakers and win against all sorts of odds.
Arrogance sometimes leads to vanity, and that often causes an overvaluation of honor. I should know because part of my anger at Aarundel and Larissa in using Genevera to bring me back to life revolved around my pride at not having used magick for healing during my career. Vanity, pure and simple. Granted, I had a lot to learn about the world, but being alive definitely beat eternity in a stone house in Cygestolia,
Being brought back from the dead left me with a few questions about myself, which was why I asked Berengar if he would be willing to fence with me. Going into the assault on Alatun, I had seen myself as old and slow and breaking down. The magick that had revived me had not cleared up any old scars, but it might have taken the edge off the damage done by aging. Then again, my attitude slowly turning positive might have done the same thing. Either way, the result was the same—I had no idea how good I was in comparison to the contemporary world.
Berengar appeared ready to go immediately, but I held up a hand and stretched my legs out a little. "Lying in the tomb left me a bit stiff." Joints popped and muscles slowly loosened. I laughed when my right shoulder cracked like a dry twig under heavy tread, Berengar smiled, and Gena winced.