Blood in the Water

For Steve

First published 2009 by Solaris, an imprint of Rebellion Publishing Ltd., Riverside House, Osney Mead, Oxford, OX2 0ES, UK

www.solarisbooks.com

ISBN(.epub): 978-1-84997-242-0

ISBN(.mobi): 978-1-84997-241-3

Copyright © Juliet E McKenna 2009

Cover illustration: David Palumbo

The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Designed & typeset by Rebellion Publishing

Also by Juliet E McKenna

The Hadrumal Crisis

Dangerous Waters

Chronicles of the Lescari Revolution

Irons in the Fire

Blood in the Water

Banners in the Wind

The Aldabreshin Compass

Southern Fire

Northern Storm

Western Shore

Eastern Tide

The Tales of Einarinn

The Thief’s Gamble

The Swordsman’s Oath

The Gambler’s Fortune

The Warrior’s Bond

The Assassin’s Edge

CHRONICLES OF THE LESCARI REVOLUTION

Blood in the Water

Juliet E. McKenna

Chapter One

Thathrin

The Road from Losand to Carluse Town,

Autumn Equinox Festival, First Day, Morning

When Captain-General Evord ordered the army to march at first light, he meant just that. The long column had been walking for nearly two leagues and the sun still hadn’t cleared the tops of the oak trees.

Tathrin stifled a yawn. At least dawn wasn’t so brutally early now the Equinox was upon them. Though that was a double-edged blessing. While the oak trees’ leaves were still green, the hedges were showing seasonal gold.

He’d have been up this early at home. On the first day of the Autumn Festival, excitement would have roused him before the sounds of his mother and sisters down in the kitchen. They’d be preparing mutton, fat from the summer’s grass, geese plump from gleaning in the wheat fields, succulent mushrooms and puddings sweet with plums and pippins, quinces and pears. His father and brothers by marriage would ensure ale flowed all day, a stronger brew than usual until the five days of festival were done and the year turned to Aft-Autumn.

They’d be joined by aunts and uncles and cousins and any guests still enjoying the hospitality of the Ring of Birches inn—those few who’d suffered some unexpected delay on their journey home. They would all give thanks to Drianon for the bounty of fruit and grain. The motherly goddess’s statue was placed by the hearth and every meal concluded with grateful libations.

After sunset, Tathrin’s father would set out wine and white brandy, gifts from the merchants who traded along the Great West Road cutting across this country of Lescar. Their mules and wagons carried luxuries and necessities to the wealthy Tormalin Empire in the east and brought different dainties back to the prosperous realm of Caladhria. Some even travelled further westwards to the fiefdoms and city-states that made up the land of Ensaimin. Such men valued clean beds, good food and secure stables and storage lofts. They soon learned that Jerich Sayron hired honest men, found them sound horses and changed their coin without cheating them.

Tathrin’s feet mindlessly followed the tramp of the ranks ahead. Banners hung limp from poles slanted over standard-bearers’ shoulders, their bright colours muted. Thankfully the dew kept down the dust. It would be a different story by noon, with the recent lack of rain.

Not that they wanted rain. He’d seen a youthful mercenary wishing for a shower harshly rebuked for tempting Dastennin, god of storms. All the experienced swordsmen knew that waging war so late in the year meant the weather could be a foe to equal any enemy.

Tathrin shivered, and not just from the lingering chill after the cloudless night. This was about as far as he could get from a carefree festival. Then again, how often had his family enjoyed a festival of peace and plenty? Only a handful of times that he could recall.

All too often his father had been forced to sell whatever precious liquors he’d garnered to raise the coin for Duke Garnot’s quarterly levy. The duke’s men would seize livestock and stores from anyone who couldn’t pay what the reeve decreed. Tathrin’s mother would offer what festival charity she could to those who’d been left destitute. Quarterstaffs and fowling bows to hand, his father and brothers by marriage would keep a nightly watch by the light of the capricious twin moons. Men bereft of home and hope all too often turned to banditry.

Sometimes a dispossessed man or a friendless widow would hammer on the gates of their local lord or lady’s manor. They would demand justice, a tenant’s rights from this noble who was in turn the sworn vassal of their duke. It never did any good, not that Tathrin heard. A good day saw such appeals fobbed off with insincere sympathy. On a bad day, the suppliant was lucky to escape with a horsewhipping instead of a noose.

And that was in a good year. If Duke Garnot was waging war against one of his neighbours, then his own forces and those of the retaliating duke could lay the country waste between them. Tathrin’s mother comforted those mourning brothers, sons or husbands forcibly enrolled in Duke Garnot’s militia, already fearing they were as good as dead. His father would retreat to the cellars with the other local guildsmen, grim-faced.

Not that Carluse suffered worse than any other of Lescar’s six dukedoms, Tathrin reminded himself.

“Long lad!”

Only two people called him that. Sorgrad and Gren. Sorgrad was away and wouldn’t return for a few days. Gren was supposed to be marching with him here at the tail end of Captain-General Evord’s retinue. But Gren preferred to range up and down the column, picking up gossip and grumbles, flirting with the women among the mercenaries and cadging whatever he could for the sackcloth provisions bag slung on his hip.

“You look as glum as a man with a three-day cake baking up his arse. Cheer up. Life will look sunnier once you’ve dropped some prunes in a ditch.” Gren held out a rich orange lump flecked with green herbs. “Want some cheese?”

“Thanks.” Tathrin had learned to eat whenever the chance arose.

“The scouts reckon they’ve seen something.” Gren’s words were muffled by his mouthful, his blue eyes bright with anticipation.

Tathrin considered the thickly leaved hedges flanking the track. They wouldn’t be thinned till Aft-Winter. With no work in the fields and their valuable herds penned, farmers could repair the damage done by malice, misfortune or merely the past year’s weather. At the moment, half a company of swordsmen could be lurking in the next field and he’d be hard put to see them, even though he was half a head taller than most. Gren barely topped his shoulder.

He frowned at the shorter man. “The captain-general doesn’t expect to encounter Carluse forces today.”

From the outset, Tathrin had been present for Evord’s meetings with his lieutenants and the gallopers who carried his instructions to every one of the eighty-some companies that made up this army’s full strength. After all, as far as anyone knew, Tathrin was Evord’s personal clerk, his scholar’s ring proof that his writing was legible and his reckoning reliable.

Gren ran a hand through his tousled hair, pale as newly sawn wood in the strengthening light. “Could be brave lads from that last village, slipping their leashes to take us on.” His grin broadened. “To save their pretty kittens from a nosing by us dirty dogs.”

Tathrin had noted every door and window was shuttered as they’d marched through the village with the sky still darker than a wood pigeon’s wing. But it wouldn’t be hard for someone who knew the local byways to slip out of a back door and overtake the marching column. Were men and boys hiding out here, clutching mattocks and hoes, believing they must fight to the death to defend their homes and families?

What would Carluse’s commonalty know of this army and its true purpose? What would they fear when they saw the companies of blond uplanders like Gren? Mountain Men were rumoured to be brutal savages and marching mercenaries of any stripe only ever brought death and destruction. Until now.

“Arest and his Wyvern Hunters are in the vanguard.” Gren had lived a mercenary life long enough to lose every trace of his Mountain accent. He washed down his cheese with a swallow of ale. “Me, I’d kill them all and they can argue the roll of the runes with Saedrin when they reach the door to the Otherworld, but Arest wants you and Reher to come forward, in case we’re tripping over farmers. If it’s Duke Garnot’s militiamen, you two can fall back while we cut them down. All right?” Without waiting for Tathrin’s answer, Gren headed for the front of the column.