Alanna: The First Adventure (9 page)

Until now George had never let her have anything but lemonade. “You think I'm ready?” she asked in a very small voice.

“'Tis not my opinion that matters. The only way you'll win is if
you
think you're ready.”

She saw what he meant. Smiling grimly, she raised her tankard to him and drank the ale down.

The next day all the boys were exercising in the indoor practice courts. Alanna watched Ralon all afternoon as she waited for her chance. She was scared: Her face felt hot, her hands shook. If she failed, she would leave Court. She couldn't be a knight if Ralon continued to beat on her. And today was her day. She had never felt so strong and so prepared.

The teachers left. Ralon was in a corner, punching a straw dummy. Alanna drew a deep breath and walked out into the center of the floor.

She announced clearly, “Ralon of Malven has beggars and thieves for ancestors.”
Excuse me, George,
she added silently. “He's the son of a lizard and a demon. He has all the honor of a weasel. He can't even fight in the open like a man and a noble. He picks his fights in back halls—so no one can see him cheat.”

The boys were open-mouthed with surprise. Suddenly Gary beat on Jonathan's shoulder, grinning savagely. “I knew it!” he whispered. “I knew he'd do it!”

Ralon was staring at Alanna, gasping for words. “
What
did you say?” he finally squeaked.

“Liar. Sneak. Coward. Bully.” She threw the words at him. “You disgrace your name. D'you want me to write it down for you? Oh—I forgot. You can't read, either.”

“Shut up!” Ralon screamed, his eyes bulging. “You pig! You wouldn't be so brave if your friends weren't here to do your fighting—”

“I fight my own battles!” she snapped. “I want satisfaction for all I've taken from you. They're my witnesses.”

Ralon looked at the others. “They won't step in, no matter what?” he asked slyly.

“They won't. I swear on my honor as a gentleman. You'd better swear by something else, though. You don't have any honor.” She slapped him with all her strength and ducked.

Ralon swung at her, missed, and Alanna came up under his swing to ram into his chest. He yelped and grabbed her hair. She punched him twice in the stomach, hard, ignoring the pain as some hair came out of her scalp. Ralon seized her throat, choking her. She shoved her thumb into his eye, stamping hard on one of his feet at the same time. Ralon screamed in pain, breaking away. They circled each other carefully. Now Ralon knew something had changed since the
last time they had fought. He was sweating heavily as he charged.

Alanna lunged forward, thrusting her hip between Ralon's legs. He stumbled. She helped him fall by throwing him over her hip. Quickly she knelt on his back, knowing better than to let him up. Twisting his arms up behind him, with one hand, she used her other hand to pull his head up by the hair.

“Give up?” she panted. Ralon, gasping, nodded. She stood up, and he leaped at her, landing a wild punch on her cheek. Thanks to the dishonorable George, Alanna was ready for this. She slammed a fist up and under, into his stomach again, knocking the breath from his body. Swiftly she broke his nose with the other hand. Ralon collapsed, crying like a small child.

Alanna stood back, heaving as she fought for breath. She wiped sweat from her eyes. “Never touch me again. If you do, I swear—I swear by Mithros and the Goddess—I'll kill you.” Ralon lay there, still crying.

Alanna turned to her friends. “Let's go wash.”

Ralon called out, “Alan of Trebond!”

Alanna turned back to look. Her enemy was on his feet. He was a bloody mess with crazy eyes. “I'll
make you pay for this!” he screamed. “Just wait—I'll make you sorry!”

Raoul clapped Alanna on the shoulder. “Come on,” he said. “It's getting windy in here.”

Myles found her alone in her room, sitting in the dark. “You weren't at dinner tonight,” the knight commented. Alanna blinked at him with surprise as he lit a candle.

“Ralon of Malven has left Court,” Myles went on, sitting in her only chair. “Your servant Coram is bragging to his fellow Guardsmen that he knew you could do it all along. The other boys want to celebrate—they think you're a hero. Isn't that what you wanted?”

She splashed cold water on her face. “Is it? I don't know.” She rubbed her face dry and looked at him. “I threw up after,” she confessed. “I hate myself. I just knew more than Ralon did. And he always loses his temper when he fights—I took advantage of that. I'm as bad as he was.”

“I doubt Ralon ever threw up after he beat someone smaller and younger than he was.”

Alanna frowned. “You think so?”

“I'm sure of it.” Myles nodded. “Alan, there will come a time when you, a knight, will have to fight
someone less well trained than you. It can't be helped, and it doesn't make you a bully. It just means you learn to use your skills wisely.”

Alanna thought about this. At last she sighed and shook her head. It was too much just then.

Myles ruffled her hair. “So now you've proved you're a warrior to the whole palace. Surely you want to celebrate.”

Alanna made a face. No matter what Myles said, she had used fancy tricks to beat Ralon, that was all. She was still a girl masquerading as a boy, and sometimes she doubted that she would ever believe herself to be as good as the stupidest, clumsiest male.

The door opened. “Sir Myles. You beat me here.” It was Prince Jonathan. “How's Alan?”

Myles stood. “I think he's tired. Alan, I'm going, but I wish you'd think about what I said.”

“I always think about the things you tell me,” she admitted. She gave him her hand. “Thanks, Sir Myles.”

The knight bowed to Jonathan and left. The Prince looked at Alanna. “What was that about?”

Alanna shrugged. “I think we were talking about what makes a bully.”

“A bully fights people littler and weaker than he is
because he thinks it's fun,” Jonathan said flatly. “Did you enjoy fighting Ralon? We'll forget for now that he's older than you and a squire.”

“When we were actually
fighting
—maybe,” she replied slowly. “After—no.”

“You won't find anyone smaller than you are, so you can't beat on them,” the older boy said practically. “And after today we're all going to think twice about whether you're the weakest. Look, young Trebond—what did you think studying to be a knight was about?”

Suddenly Alanna felt much better. “Thanks, Highness.” She grinned. “Thanks a lot.”

He put a hand on her shoulder. “You may have noticed my friends call me Jonathan, or Jon.”

Alanna looked up at him, not sure what was going on. “And am
I
your friend, Highness?”

“I do believe you are,” he told her quietly. “I'd like you to be.” He offered her his hand.

She took it. “Then I am—Jonathan.”

D
UKE
G
ARETH'S LECTURE THE DAY AFTER
A
LANNA
fought Ralon was long and impressive. He spoke to her about the duty one noble owes another noble, about keeping the peace on the palace grounds and about people who became bullies. He informed her that fighting with the hands was an undignified pastime taken up by commoners, or an art practiced by Shang warriors—and that she was neither a commoner nor a Shang warrior. She had to make a formal, written apology to Ralon's father, and she was restricted to the palace for two months.

Alanna stood at attention, listening. She loved the way the Duke talked. She knew he was pleased that she had beaten Ralon, not angry. She also knew he could never tell her so, because she had broken the rules, and that she had to take her punishment without complaint, because she had known the rules when she broke them. Alanna's world was governed by rules, with a rule to cover every situation. Fighting a fellow noble in the palace was breaking the rules, and Gareth had to teach her that. Yet the rules governing what a noble could take in the way of insults said that Alanna
had
to fight Ralon, and Duke Gareth was proud of her because she had protected her honor as a noble.

Once you know the rules,
she thought as she listened to the Duke with one ear,
life is pretty simple. I don't get mad at Duke Gareth because I know he has to obey the rules just as I do, and I know he isn't truly angry with me anyway. Maybe our Code of Chivalry isn't such a bad thing.

On the second day of the eight-day-long Midwinter Festival, King Roald made Gary, Alex, Raoul and several of the other fourteen-year-old pages into squires. Each squire was placed in a knight's service. They still waited on table, but afterward they took their meals
in the squires' hall. If they were needed, they also served the nobles during the evening parties, when the pages were dismissed. Alanna helped her friends move to their new quarters—rooms connected to those of the knights they now served—and wondered how big a change this would bring to her life.

Things changed, and they didn't change. The squires joined Alanna and Jonathan in what little free time they had, but Alanna missed them during the classes she had with the other pages. There was no more Gary to make wicked jokes in Deportment, and no more Alex to explain the snarls of mathematics.

Then one night Jonathan came by her room with his book on battle histories. He'd gladly help her with mathematics, he explained with a grin, if she'd show him how the battles that were so dull in the book were fought. He'd noticed in class that her way of explaining them made them seem real and interesting.

Alanna was more than happy to accept her new friend's offer. Many evenings after that they could be found in each other's rooms, their heads bent over a map or a piece of paper.

The Sweating Fever struck in March without warning. It spared no one: people in the city, palace servants,
priests, even the queen. Duke Gareth was next, and the Lord Provost. Sir Myles stayed healthy. “There's so much wine in me that I don't have room for any sickness,” he told Alanna. “So now will you stop telling me not to drink anymore?”

Alanna herself was fine. She was working harder than she ever had before; each time another servant got sick, her chores increased. There were no classes; most of her teachers had the sickness. Instead Alanna made beds, washed dishes, cleaned the stables. She had been taught from birth that no job was too dirty for a true noble. Now the theory was put into practice.

The pages and squires—the youngest, healthiest people in the palace and the city—were the last to fall ill. It was then that the Dark God came to the palace to take his pick of fever victims. In the city, where the sickness had started, so many had died that the Dark God's priests took the dead away in cartloads. Within a week, the God of Death had claimed three pages, five squires and the Lord Chamberlain. Raoul was the first of Alanna's close friends to get sick. When Alanna stopped for a visit, he grinned weakly at her.

“I feel silly, lying in bed when I should be working,”
he confessed. He shivered beneath his heavy blankets. “How are you? And how's old Coram?”

“We're both fine.” She tucked the covers more firmly around him.

“And Jon?”

“Not even a sniffle. He stays a lot with the king.”

“I don't blame him. Mithros willing, the queen will get well.” He let Alanna wipe his sweating face before giving her a shove. “Get out of here, before you catch it.”

Alanna found then that she couldn't sleep because she couldn't forget Maude's warning to use her Gift for healing. She knew the gods punished people for ignoring magical abilities. Yet the thought of using sorcery gave her the shakes. She and Thom each had more magic than anyone she had ever known, and she knew if she used her magic and lost control of it, she would destroy herself and anyone who was nearby. Thom liked that sort of power—she didn't. She was never sure of her control over her Gift.