Echoes of Betrayal, Page 3

  Cheaper lodgings were full, he was told, as the city was full of wintering soldiers. Nobody questioned his identity or purposes as he inquired at one inn after another. Finally, he found a room at the White Dragon, a substantial inn in the northeast quarter. Here, near the winter quarters of several mercenary companies, streets teemed with traders, crafters, and off-duty soldiers. The innkeeper gave the two of them a piercing look, but a gold nata changed his expression. He sent them up to his remaining empty room with a boy to lead the way.

  When the boy had left, Arvid sniffed. The room smelled reasonably clean; empty clean chamber pots stood at the foot of each bed. A thick blanket of undyed wool and—amazingly—a pillow were on each bed. Arvid turned the pillow over and smacked it; nothing ran out. Better and better. Dattur would have preferred a ground-floor room, but he himself liked being upstairs, without windows … it felt safer.

  Chaya: the Palace

  Kieri Phelan, Lyonya’s king, paused at the top of the steps down to the palace courtyard. Despite all he had said to hearten his Council and the small guard he would leave in Chaya, the cluster of Siers and palace servants gathered near the palace entrance looked scared. He could understand that. Beyond them, the fifty Royal Archers on their horses and his half dozen King’s Squires looked nothing like an effective army: too few and too new. He did not doubt their courage, but he would have been very glad of a cohort of his former Company. For the first time in his life, he was going into battle without any veterans, with nothing but his own ability to mold these novices into a fighting force by sheer strength of will.

  And that meant hiding his own concerns—not only about his troops, but about the whereabouts of the elves who had promised, not two days before, to bend all their powers to aid him. Since then he had seen or heard nothing of them. Were they doing anything to heal the taig or repel the Pargunese, or had they withdrawn yet again into their own protected world? And the dragon: could it really prevent more scathefire attacks? The Pargunese troops: how many had landed, how many more were crossing the river even now? How close were they to Chaya? And how many more days until Aliam Halveric, with the rest of Halveric Company, arrived from his steading in the south? Had he even started yet?

  He smiled at those waiting and came down the stairs briskly, demonstrating his confidence, but though they bowed as he passed, their faces did not relax. Only Arian, her gaze steady as ever, her expression resolute, reflected his own feelings. He had convinced her to stay behind, to wait for Aliam; she had understood his reasons and agreed without protest.

  “A Lyonyan king has not gone to battle in generations,” Sier Belvarin said. He had led the Council’s argument against Kieri’s commanding in the field.

  “A Lyonyan king has not been needed in battle for generations,” Kieri said. “The war is not over, even though no more scathefire has come. Pargunese invaders are on this side of the river. There’s no one else to take command. I’m needed.” He signaled the groom who held Banner, his gray charger; the man led the horse nearer. He clasped Belvarin’s shoulder. “It will be well, Sier Belvarin, if we all do our duty. You have your orders.” Orders he had to hope Belvarin and the others would carry out, could carry out.

  He ran his hand down Banner’s head, checking the bridle, then the girth, as if for any ride. At least he had this familiar, war-experienced mount. Banner flicked his ears and snorted. “Easy,” Kieri said; the horse stood quietly as Kieri mounted and picked up the reins. He nodded to the groom, who stepped back. Between his thighs, he felt the horse tremble with eagerness, and up from the ground, through the horse, surged a plea from the taig itself. Whatever the elves had done, the taig had not fully healed. He had a vague impression of elves busy on or near the upriver scathefire track, but this call had come from downriver.

  “We will survive,” he said to the worried faces tilted up to watch him. “I’ve done this before.” No change in their tension. “After all,” he said, forcing a grin, “we have a dragon on our side.” That didn’t help, either. “And the Lady approves.” That did; their faces relaxed. He felt a wave of pity … most of them did not know yet how she had been involved in the disaster that had befallen the realm, how fallible she was, and it was not the time to shake their confidence further. To them, she was the great, the beneficent, the all-powerful elven queen who could do no wrong, whose desire was law.

  “Let’s go,” he said to his Squires with a last glance at Arian. She nodded: understanding and trust and hope all in that gesture. He turned Banner’s head to the gate. Outside, a crowd had gathered. He lifted his hand in greeting, smiled at them, exchanged greetings with the mayor and Council members.

  “What if they get past you?” someone called from the crowd.

  “Then you stop them,” Kieri said. He waved a hand at the new, small, city militia, their weapons in hand. “You are brave, and you have the will.” Most of them stood straighter at that. He hoped their fragile confidence would not be needed.

  They rode northeast from the city, heading for the near end of the eastern scathefire track. Even though he had explained the marching order before the invasion ever started, and the reasons for it, the small force fumbled its way into formation, taking almost twice as long as the entire Phelani Company would have. If he’d had just one cohort of Phelani, under an experienced captain—! But he didn’t. He pushed that wish aside. He’d started his military career with fewer than this. At least he’d managed to convince Arian she should stay behind in Chaya.

  He set a brisk pace; he wanted to meet the invaders as far from Chaya as possible. If their force was as large as Torfinn had said it might be, he could not hope for a clean victory, but he could delay them, perhaps until Aliam brought up the rest of the Halverics.

  When they came to the scathefire track, Kieri’s heart clenched at the sight of so much anguish for the taig. Nothing but ash remained where the dragonlet had gone, and the blackened sticks and stumps of trees on either side. The others’ faces looked the way he felt—shocked, horrified, heartsick. Whatever the elves had done here, he saw no healing, though the taig no longer seemed as anguished.

  They moved down the track, making better time on that fire-hardened surface; wind blew the soft ash away from the horses’ hooves. Kieri thought the Pargunese troops were also likely to use this open track instead of the narrower, meandering forest trails.

  Toward evening, one of the forward scouts reported that he’d made contact with a wounded forest ranger on his way south to Chaya. Kieri pushed forward with his Squires and a squad of Royal Archers, leaving the supply train behind, and found the ranger, one arm wrapped in a bloody bandage, slumped against a tree.

  “Sir king,” the man said, struggling to stand.

  “Be easy,” Kieri said, waving him back down. “I need your report, not formality.” He squatted down beside the man.

  “Yes, sir king. A large body of Pargunese troops marching this way on the fire trail, only a day away, if that. They got across just upstream of Blackmarsh, following that magical fire; it burned out the Halveric camp there. I was in Blackmarsh, close enough to feel the heat of the fire, but escaped.”

  This close, Kieri could see that the ranger’s eyebrows had burnt away, leaving his face looking peculiarly blank and shiny.

  “How many, and what arms?” Kieri asked.

  “The Pargunese? Maybe five hundred at first, but now maybe two to three hundred foot—pikes and crossbows—and twenty horse. We rangers harried them along the way, sir king, as much as we could.”

  “Rangers only? What about Royal Archers or Halverics?”

  “Not many Halverics left—a few showed up, right after the fire, then more trickled in. Seven hands of them altogether, under a sergeant, but some wounded. They’ve helped. The Royal Archers to the west weren’t sure they should leave their camp—they’d been fighting the first wave, from before the fire, and expected more to come. They did lend us ten of their fifty. When I was hit and couldn’t bend my bow, I came south as fast
as I could, hoping to reach Chaya and give warning, but—” He paused; Kieri could tell that despite the food he’d been given, he was exhausted. “And our supplies are low, sir king. I hadn’t eaten in two days when I met your scout.”

  Kieri cast his mind back over thirty years of war and could imagine every miserable hour of the defense … outnumbered, confused, leaderless, hungry and cold and tired.

  “There’s too many of ’em, sir king,” the ranger said. “We’ve tried, but—”

  “Be at ease,” Kieri said again. “You and the others have done very well; I honor your service. Now I am here, and the Pargunese will not know what happened.” The ranger’s jaw dropped a little. “There are ways for a fox to eat a bullock … not in one gulp, but one bite at a time.” Kieri stood. “You need a surgeon’s care and rest and warmth,” he said. “My supply train is coming, and you’ll be taken care of.”

  “But there are so many—” the man said. “And that fire—”

  “The fire is gone,” Kieri said. “It will not return.” He hoped and trusted that the dragon would prevent that, though he would have been comforted to have the beast itself at his side, ready to flame a formation of Pargunese.

  Would you really?

  The thought in his mind bore a tang of smoke and hot iron. Kieri’s thoughts stumbled for an instant, and then he thought, with all his might, Yes.

  We are not tools of the lateborn. I have my work; you have yours.

  Not hostile, not friendly: commanding.

  Kieri gave a mental shrug and turned back to his task. Dragons and elves, both uncanny, but dragons—in this war—far more useful than the other. Once more the tang of a smithy, the ghost of a chuckle, and then it was gone.

  He glanced at his Squires, their faces sober. One, in that interval, had taken off his cloak and laid it on the ranger, over the bloodstained cloak that had been ripped short to make the bandage on the man’s arm. Kieri nodded. “Indeed, that is well thought of.” Then he touched the taig and called a little warmth into the soil under the ranger. The man’s face relaxed as the warmth touched him.

  “Sir king—the taig needs—”

  “Needs all of us. You have given your life and blood to the taig; accept a gift in return.”

  Kieri stepped back, motioning the Squire who had given his cloak to stay close to the ranger. “Here is what we will do,” he said. “I believe that the main force of the Pargunese is this group—and perhaps one on the other scathefire scar. Arian said the dragon killed Pargunese soldiers there, but I don’t know if it killed all of them. More could have come across later. The smaller landings, that we heard of before the scathefire came, may have been diversions only, and may have joined with the larger groups—or not. But we must get the Royal Archers out of their camps and into action.”

  He looked at his Squires. “Which of you knows this area well?” Three hands went up. “Excellent. Each of you will partner with someone who does not—”

  “But that will leave you with only four—”

  “I’m not going to stand in front of the Pargunese army yelling insults,” Kieri said. He turned to Banner and dug into his saddlebags for his writing materials. “Four will be plenty for the plan I have. Now: two pair will go east of the scathefire track. One will head for the Royal Archer camps we expect between here and the border. You will give them my order to proceed to the scathefire track, with rangers you will find as guides, and parallel the Pargunese, harassing them in the flanks and rear but not joining open battle until further orders. The other will parallel the scathefire track until even with the Pargunese and stay even with them as they move. The pair to the west of the track will go directly to that Royal Archer camp this ranger mentioned, bringing any rangers or Archers found to join the harassing teams on this side.” He squatted down, bracing the writing board on his knees, and wrote the orders. “When you reach your assigned locations, one of each pair will act as courier; the other will stay with whatever forces you have found, to receive and transmit my orders. Be alert for Pargunese flank scouts and any stragglers—they’ll be desperate, trying to reach their main party, I’ve no doubt. Evade if possible; kill them all if not. We’re in no state to care for prisoners.”

  “What about steadings?” Kaelith asked.

  “Warn them,” Kieri said. “Any within a few hours’ march of the scathefire should leave—they might be discovered. If we had just a few more troops, we might set up an ambush. The Pargunese may be low on supplies, and faced with an easy source, like a steading with animals and stored grain, they might start looting—might even get drunk and fall asleep. But we don’t have enough troops—yet.”

  As the Squires rode away, Kieri considered what to do next. Fifty Royal Archers and a few Squires couldn’t meet the remaining Pargunese head-on any more than the rangers and Halveric remnants could—unless he could get them all collected, and that would take days.

  For a moment anger flared. This was the situation he’d hoped to avoid: little groups of defenders, disorganized, demoralized, uncoordinated, fumbling about in the forest while a well-trained force invaded. But anger now would do no good. What he needed now was a plan … a specific plan for this specific band of Pargunese. Break them into separate groups, each vulnerable to attack … yes, the obvious but perhaps not the only course of action.

  Short of supplies, the ranger had said. How short? What would they do for a royal supply train? Would they be fool enough to attack the obvious?

  “I need to look at the maps again,” Kieri said. “We won’t try to move at night—” Difficult enough with experienced troops used to night maneuvers; these were at the limit of their ability in daylight. “—and it’s darkening. We’ll camp off the scathefire track and build a barricade.”

  It should not have taken as long as it did, but the camp was finally reasonably secure, though as the snow ended, the marks of their passage on the scathefire track were clear enough.

  Kieri was still awake, poring over the maps and his guesses about the location of the Pargunese, when he heard sentries outside his tent.

  “Come on,” he said to the Squires on duty. “Let’s go see what we have.”

  “Sir king, you must be careful—”

  “I am always careful,” Kieri said, wrapping his sword belt around his waist. He set his helmet on his head. “Don’t call me by name.”

  At the north side of the camp, he found the sentries—Royal Archers—bows drawn, arrows pointing at a group of soldiers in a curious mix of uniforms.

  “They say they’re Halverics,” one of the sentries said without looking away from his target. “But they could’ve stolen what Halveric gear they wear.”

  Kieri looked at the faces, indistinct as they were in the flickering torchlight. Glints of ornaments—Halverics wore none on duty—but he felt no menace through his taig-sense. He had seen all the Halveric cohort once, before they had left for the north—but these troops were clearly exhausted and cold and had come through hard fighting. “Who commands?” he asked.

  “I do, m’lord,” said the one in front. “Vardan, second sergeant.”

  The name was right, and her accent was pure Lyonyan, but her face was so streaked with ash and blood that Kieri didn’t recognize her, and she wore a wide neck ring over the leather gorget with the Halveric stamp. “What happened to your uniforms?” he asked.

  “Burned off, m’lord,” the woman said. “There was that fire—purple-white, it burned—”

  “Scathefire,” Kieri said. “And you survived?” He could scarcely believe it.

  “A few of us, sir. In a ditch of water, near our camp—coming back from patrol.”

  “That’s a Pargunese crossbow you carry,” Kieri said. “How did you come by that?”

  A flash of white teeth in the grimy face. “Surprised a patrol of Pargunese—killed ’em all. But m’lord, there’s a crowd of Pargunese on the fire’s track. We’ve been sniping at them—”

  “I’ll want your report,” Kieri said. “But fi
rst I’ll see you fed and warm. Good work, sentries, but these troops are what they claim.”

  Vardan went with her troops, as he expected, to see them fed and settled—however much they might get that night—and then came to Kieri’s tent. She had scrubbed the grime off her face and hands but still wore the neck ring. In the brighter light in his tent, he could see that the design looked foreign. Kieri recognized the woman now that her face was clean—she’d been a corporal in one of Aliam’s cohorts that last year in Aarenis.

  “I knew you, sir king,” she said, bending her knee. “But I didn’t like to say, out there in the woods, if one of them Pargunese was about.”

  “Good thinking,” Kieri said. He pointed to a chair on the other side of the table where he’d spread the map. “Have a seat. Do your troops need anything more?”

  “No, sir king.”

  “Tell me what you know, then.”

  Vardan began to talk, pointing out on the map where her unit’s encampment had been, where they had patrolled, and the location of the ditch. “Days go dark so early. We were past sunfall coming back, but once we had our feet on that dike, we had naught to worry about, I thought. Out of the swamp, firm ground. Then … then this light came. Not any natural light—”

  “I saw it, too,” Kieri said.

  “Well, we went on, to make it to camp, we hoped, but it was faster—it rose up, the trees burning before it—and I felt the heat and ordered ’em into the water. We were in it up to our necks, staring as it came down on us, then we dived—most of us—but it burned off the top handspan of the water and whatever was that close—my cloak, for one thing. Four of us didn’t go deep enough.”