King's Shield

  “We would call a halt.” Durasnir also spoke Sartoran, hands spread, empty palms up. “Our king is dead. Prince Rajnir returns home. We are finished here.”

  Evred’s first response was disbelief. It had to be some kind of trick, but even as he thought it, Durasnir walked to the edge of the trail head, Inda’s face turning to track him. Tau slithered in the gory mud, keeping himself and his sword between Durasnir and the other two. Vedrid took up a stance beside him.

  Below, Talkar was with Ulaffa, of necessity shouting. Durasnir saw the Hilda commander gesture violently behind him, and he saw Talkar’s lips shape certain words: rear-guard action . . . massacre. Then Ulaffa indicated the cliff and Talkar stiffened, the light glimmering on his armor, his horse backing, ears flat, when he recognized Durasnir on the cliff.

  Talkar raised his arm, reluctance and anger evident in the set of his shoulders, but he too would do what needed to be done to protect the lives of his men. Rigidly he made the hand signal ceding Durasnir the right to parley.

  “Wind the halt,” Evred said sharply.

  Vedrid had brought a trumpet in case they needed aid; he lifted it and blew a fair version of the “Halt Battle,” to be picked up from below and then from above.

  Cama’s men straightened up from their cover, bows lifted high. “Yip! Yip! Yip!”

  Cherry-Stripe’s men joined, and then Tuft’s down in the pass as they reformed into lines, Runners bringing lances forward as they lined up, watching for a signal.

  Talkar gestured, hand flat down, and then a sideswipe.

  Cease and retreat!

  The signal men stared, but one was quicker than the others. Two toots and a blat, two toots and a blat, hastily joined by all the other horns, and with more rapidity than either side would have thought men disengaged, backing up a step, then another and another, some cursing, some spitting, others wary, shields up, weapons out as gradually the distance widened a few paces between Venn and Marlovan, revealing a horror of mud and bloody, hacked figures sprawled together in the mindless intimacy of death.

  Ulaffa transferred to the cliff. He tottered, but this time he did not splat into the gore-thickened mud because Tau and Vedrid caught him, one on either side, guiding him in silence to a flattish rock. Ulaffa was scarcely aware of them. He drew in a shaky breath, his heart laboring. One more transfer, he thought. One more.

  He hoisted himself to his feet and reached for Durasnir for the last transfer.

  “Wait.” Evred stumbled forward. “Are you coming back against us next year?” Then hated himself for so stupid a question. As if he would hear the truth—as if he could believe anything they said!

  Durasnir paused, studying the troubled young face before him. “I go where I am ordered. That decision is not mine to make.” And then, because Evred Montrei-Vayir reminded him with unexpected pain of Vatta, his own son, he added, “Had your defense been less effective, we might have been ordered to stay and see the objective through.”

  No reaction.

  How to convey meaning within the requirements of honor . . . He transferred his gaze to Indevan Algara-Vayir. That peculiar glow from the sun-shafts was gone, of course, leaving an ordinary young man sitting there, filthy and sweating. There was no wit whatever in that face right now, just the scars, the earrings, all testament to his surprising career.

  Durasnir addressed him. “Did you meet Ramis of the Knife?”

  Indevan the Pirate’s Sartoran turned out to be the same curiously old-fashioned accent of his king. “Yes. He commanded me to meet him at Ghost Island.” A brief smile. “I thought you sent a fleet to chase me.”

  “I chased you myself. Can you tell me what Ramis said?” By the Tree, let it be pertinent . . .

  Indevan’s eyes narrowed: there was the wit, or maybe just wariness. “Yes. That the three greatest dangers to me were your Prince Rajnir, Dag Erkric, and you.”

  And there was his chance. “Two of us,” Durasnir said, “must obey.” He nodded to the waiting dag.

  Ulaffa closed his hand around Durasnir’s wrist. They wrenched in and out of the world, then Durasnir stumbled forward, breathing hard. But now he was on his own captain’s deck.

  Ulaffa fainted with a quiet thump, ensigns rushing to his aid.

  “Ah,” Erkric said, standing behind Prince Rajnir. He flicked a glance at Ulaffa, who was being lifted up. Then turned his attention back to Durasnir. “Your report?”

  “Talkar has ordered the cease and retreat, as commanded.”

  Erkric smiled, then turned his head to the prince. “Quite correct,” he said in a smooth, calm voice. “Though this is not a retreat, it’s a regrouping for the greater cause. We are called to escort a king.”

  “Hyarl my Commander,” Rajnir said eagerly. “We must sail for home.”

  Durasnir stared into those blue eyes, empty of curiosity. Empty even of concern. Rajnir smiled, the sweet smile of youth. “Do you hear?” Rajnir opened his hands, holding them palm up in the sign of good tidings. “The king is dead, and the Breseng will be nigh when we reach home. You will walk at my right hand as I take the golden torc and bring us peace.”

  He turned around, hands out, including Ulaffa in his smile. The old Yaga Krona had roused and insisted on remaining on deck, though the two young ensigns remained by his side. As Rajnir turned his way, Ulaffa made a low obeisance, and Rajnir said again, “Home. At long last.”

  And went to his cabin. The Dag—The Dag of all Venn—followed him.

  Durasnir’s men, high rank to low, showed some of the same shock he felt. There was shock in Ulaffa’s long mouth, his haggard face and distracted gaze.

  There had been no shock in Rajnir’s incurious blue gaze. There had been no shock in Dag Erkric’s calm, serene assurance. Only the affect of sorrow.

  Durasnir walked into the command cabin, where on the desk lay lists of the dead, all written out in red and gold. One of the signal ensigns opened a case and brought out three more lists, the ink fresh as blood.

  Durasnir forced himself to look at the dispatches, and the initials that indicated what was sent to whom. The churning inside indicated his body knew what he would find, even if his mind insisted on evidence: and there they were, the reports on the attack.

  The last one was Talkar’s scrawled report on the trap. The neat initials in the corner indicating a copy sent to Erkric—which meant he was not waiting on the Cormorant.

  So Erkric was in Twelve Towers, the king’s city . . . and then the king died.

  Durasnir looked at those pages and pages of dead. He remembered the pass below the cliff, the mounds of Venn and Marlovan lying together heedlessly. Young and old, the Venn faithful to the Tree unto death.

  All for nothing.

  He slid his hands over his face and wept.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  INDA never remembered descending the last part of the trail to the floor of the pass, once a riverbed.

  He remembered pain. Not just the physical pain, though it bothered him that his right arm had gone from needle stabs to so numb that he couldn’t pick anything up. But that had been happening every so often of late. He’d just tucked his hand into his sash and waited for the sensation to go away. Now it wasn’t going away.

  The pain he remembered consisted of sharp, distinct jabs to the heart. Like the ragged voices singing Hawkeye Yvana-Vayir’s favorite ballad, “Yvana Ride Thunder,” after Hawkeye was discovered under a pile of dead who Inda was helping to straighten the limbs of and then Disappear, one by one. Hawkeye, as a Jarl and Commander, would be Disappeared in front of as many of his men as could be found by nightfall. For now his body was hoisted to shoulders, followed by more men bearing his personal Runners, friends from childhood, who had died trying to protect him. The battered helm fell off, leaving his loosened long yellow hair hanging down in brown-streaked clots, his lifeless hands dangling as men sang in grief-roughened voices.

  Inda did not remember the Venn pulling their own wounded out of the heaps and piles, Disappear
ing their dead. Many looking at him strangely, some backing away as he passed. Men of both sides avoided meeting anyone else’s gaze as they loaded their wounded over the backs of their horses, and then onto hastily emptied carts brought forward from farther back in their lines.

  “Inda. You have to come now.”

  As Inda stared witlessly, motion beyond his shoulder distracted Evred. Most of the departing Venn glanced back at Inda one last time before they vanished down the other side of the pass whence they had come. Later he would think about that. Now grief was too acute, need too immediate.

  “Inda.” As Inda’s blank gaze slowly focused, and Evred knew Inda heard him, he said slowly, “Noddy. You have to come. He—” Is dying? Won’t believe me? “—has to see you.”

  He turned his back on the scattering of Venn mages who recorded and then Disappeared the last of their dead, one by one.

  “Noddy?” Inda exclaimed. “Where?”

  He launched toward the wagons being filled with wounded. Men cleared space to the wagon where Noddy lay, bluish white in the lips, except where an obscene pink froth bubbled. One of his hands being clasped by Tuft, who was almost unrecognizable with one ear almost cut off, the other side of his face bandaged where a Venn blade had sliced just below his helm, nearly spitting his eye. Crusted cuts on his powerful arms and on one leg marked him beyond the edges of his chain mail. He leaned over the wagon, breathing compressed as he labored to keep tears back.

  Noddy’s free hand twitched, and Inda tried to reach, but his right arm still wouldn’t work, so he took Noddy’s hand with his left.

  “See, Noddy?” Evred said, at Inda’s shoulder. “We won.”

  Noddy tugged faintly.

  Inda climbed up onto the wheel spokes and leaned next to Tuft, a spring of burning tears dripping onto Noddy’s chest.

  “You. Were. There. Like. You. Said.” A quirk at the corner of Noddy’s mouth might have been a smile, but the horrible froth bubbled there, and Inda caught his breath. “No. More,” Noddy whispered. “Promise.”

  No more what? “What can I get you?” Inda asked, his voice unsteady as he thought of water—wine—food—life. But Inda couldn’t give life. “C’mon, Noddy. Hold to us. You’ve got to lead the sing for Hawkeye.” His plea broke on a sob.

  “Promise. No. More. No war.”

  Noddy’s voice had sunk to a whisper; was that no more or no war?

  “Yes,” Inda said. Yes, if it will help him hold on. “Yes, I promise.”

  Noddy relaxed; his fingers gripped Inda’s with all the strength he had left. Inda had come, just as he said he would. They’d heard the Venn horns. Retreat, Evred said. The Venn were defeated because he and Hawkeye had held the pass. And now the Venn were going. No war.

  Noddy floated, the thought winging away. He made a brief mental effort to catch it, then decided it could wait. Everything could wait. It was good right now, right here, to drift . . . like being on the lake behind Cousin Nadran’s castle on a sunny day, light splashing and winking on the deep blue waters . . . His friends had come home with him. He could float here in the sun and listen to their voices. The sun was so bright. Shut his eyes . . . contentment . . . just listen to their voices on the other rafts. Inda. Evred. Tuft. Cama . . . Cherry-Stripe . . . as he floated closer and closer to the warm, bright sun . . .

  Inda stayed beside the wagon, holding Noddy’s hand until there was no return grip, and the hand went cold.

  He looked across the wagon straight into Evred’s eyes, taken aback at the hard glare of the Sierlaef, of Fox at his most infuriated. Evred shifted his gaze to Noddy, and in the compressed, downward turn to his mouth Inda saw that he’d mistaken wretchedness for rage: unmasked and bare was the severity of Evred’s pain.

  Evred reached, and with a gentle gesture closed Noddy’s eyes. Then sobs crashed through Inda’s chest with relentless strength. He wept in gulps, and men wept around him.

  There were more shards. The dying men, known and unknown. The uncovered faces of the dead, hands stiff and empty. Strewn mementos from packs. Fallen hair clasps. Inda had to sit down, sick and trembling and dizzy.

  When he shut his eyes, there was the blurred image of Tdor’s face. The blur was perplexing, not quite a blend of Tdor as she used to be and as she was now. He remembered his promise to write. But his hand could not grip anything well, sending more shards of pain up his arm. He got up and found his pack. Pen. Paper. He scrawled, We’re alive. What else could he say?

  Tuft’s voice in his ear. “Inda. There’s more of ’em over the top there.”

  Inda looked around, bewildered. The stars had gone and it was morning. He crumpled the note into the box and sent it. Then he forced himself into motion.

  He must help see to the dead before they Disappeared them. He and Tuft and Evred all worked alongside their captains, taking care to smooth hair, to tug clothing into place, to straighten limbs not obscenely hacked. One by one, because each deserved to be restored to dignity, and then to be Disappeared by the hand of a captain or a commander. This was right and true in the eyes of all the men, who might so easily have lain there.

  More shards. Blood squelching underfoot. Riderless horses leaping lightly over the unbreathing human obstacles and racing about wild-eyed, heads tossing. Carts, once loaded with horse armor, now loaded with wounded, Runners jumping up and down to and from the carts, putting cups to lips as others bandaged and sometimes sewed. And sometimes sawed.

  Vedrid easing off Inda’s crimson Harskialdna tunic so that his own cuts could be sewn—he had two, and a lot of nicks—and bandaged. Someone put his right arm in a sling, and he tried to protest—he wasn’t wounded—but it was so much easier on his shoulder to let his arm rest in the cloth.

  He remembered daylight fading as Signi walked out from behind a group of men bearing one of the few wounded left untended, a bag of cloth for bandages over one of her shoulders, her trousers mud-and blood-splattered, her arms held out, fingers distended. She stared into the air, or something beyond the air.

  Ghosts? Inda thought. Tired as he was, his heart pinched hard in his chest.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, meaning her countrymen who had died that day, and she said something in a tear-choked voice over and over, something in Venn, but it was all right because he couldn’t hear her anyway, he just sought her mouth and lips met trembling lips in a sticky, salt-tear tasting kiss.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  OLA-VAYIR, Buck, Rat, and Barend sat on their horses atop the highest sand dune. Buck was supported by his Runner; they’d wrapped his half-severed arm tight against his body, the opposite knee stump was stiff with bandages, and his usually trim middle was bulky. Pain came and went in waves, but he insisted on being there. He said (once they got a heavy dose of green kinthus into him and he could talk at all) that he owed it to the king, but internally he vowed he’d be damned before he’d leave that strutting old man to scarfle up all the credit.

  Ranged directly behind them, in lines nearly a thousand men across, their riders outlined the shape of the dunes down the beach, bows ready, swords loose in the saddle sheaths, their rich silken House tunics glowing with a splendid array of colors as they talked quietly back and forth. A closer look would reveal bandaged heads under helms, arms in slings, bulky lines under trousers indicating various sorts of bindings, hastily mended tears in the tunics, others stained badly.

  No one moved, except horse ears twitching, tails flicking, the occasional cock of a equine hip. No one put arrow to bow, though everyone had bows strung and ready.

  That battered impression was reflected in the mostly silent Venn on the beach as they waded out to the launches in orderly lines, climbed in, raised the single sails, and thumped back over a running sea driven by the brisk offshore breeze.

  The Marlovans watched, passing water jugs down the line and sharing out travel bread—except for Buck, who gently dozed, leaning against the shoulder of his Runner, who’d eased up on his side and shifted to the extreme edge of his saddl
e. The sun had begun its downward drop toward the west before the last of the Venn boats reached the tall ships out on the horizon.

  When the last boat was taken up, the sails on the big ships dropped down, tightened, and filled. The ships slowly turned about and then began to rock away, slanting as they gathered speed.

  Ola-Vayir finally sat back in his saddle, smiling. “They’re gone, boys,” he said genially.

  Life was good. He’d made it in time, he’d won a smashing battle, only losing a hundred men. True there were ten or twenty times that in wounded, but most of those would be able to ride in a few days or weeks at most. He cast a glance of mild scorn at Buck. Young fool, who’d be impressed with his strut? Look at that green face. Ah well, live and let live, the point being, they were all alive. The number of wounded, he gloated inwardly, gave him the best reason in the world to linger. He looked forward to riding up to that white tower, there, where the others said young Evred would return: by the time Ola-Vayir reached his own home again, the old Jarl would have convinced himself that his wild ride had won the war.

  “Let’s go see what the king wants us doing next, eh?”

  Buck jerked awake, and wiped drool off his chin with his good hand. Then he rolled his eyes, prompting a muffled snort from Barend. Rat just sat, face tight with pain. He hadn’t drunk green kinthus, and wished he hadn’t been so quick to turn it down so it would go to the worse wounded fellows; he was nearly fainting in the saddle, and just longed to lie down.

  “I’ll go find out,” Barend said, and because he had the rank as former Harskialdna and no one could stop him, he wheeled his horse and galloped along the beach, cursing Ola-Vayir as he rode.

  As the sunlight vanished in the Andahi Pass, Cama and his men had just reached the bottom of a cliff after a solid day of picking their way down, sometimes feeling like spiders on a wall. Only they hadn’t eight legs to help them; half a dozen had lost grip and slid, one man had fallen to his death.