Lescari Revolution 03: Banners In The Wind (33 page)

Then Failla smiled inside her cloak's collar. Tathrin would never allow her or Anilt to sink into such poverty. Such nonsense about living barefoot was a pointless flourish of rhetoric, worthy of Master Reniack. Her smile faded at the thought of the rabble-rouser, and of Tathrin, departed on his perilous quest into Parnilesse eight long days ago.

She missed him so dreadfully. Abandoning all pretence, he had shared her room through the five days of festival. They had celebrated the anniversary of his birth alongside everyone else in the castle household who'd been born in some past For-Winter. With his silver ring on her finger, they had danced with the wedded and betrothed in Duke Garnot's great hall.

They could wed when all this was over, so she must do all she could to bring on that day and not fret about him in the meantime.

Further down the hill, the walled gardens and spacious merchant dwellings gave way to closely packed grey stone houses. Householders and shopkeepers were busy with shovels and brushes clearing snow. Her uncle was sweeping around the gate in the low fence that surrounded the ancient flint-walled shrine.

As always, the door stood open. As ever, the dark oak was hidden beneath coins and rags nailed to it, tokens of pledges and entreaties that the townsfolk had brought to Saedrin, whose ancient statue stood within. Now the shrine's doorposts were equally covered with patches and halved and quartered coins. Failla couldn't recall seeing that before.

'I should see if the boys can knock some of that down.' The priest was looking up at the thatch, piously maintained despite the fear of fire that saw every other building tiled or shingled. Successive snowfalls had built up into a thick layer, as white as Ernout's uncovered head. His only concession to the cold weather was a thick flannel shirt under his faded, shabby jerkin.

'You should,' Failla agreed. Saedrin save anyone standing underneath those bristling eaves if a great slab broke loose.

'Till then, let's get warm, my dear.' With a smile, he set down the broom and they walked round to the brick-built house behind the shrine. Failla was pleased to see the old man was finally moving without stiffness. It had taken him a long time to recover from the kicking and beating that Duchess Tadira's henchmen had inflicted.

'Go through to the kitchen.' Ernout opened the front door. Rather than follow her down the panelled hallway, he turned into the schoolroom.

Failla caught a glimpse of the boys within. They had all drawn their stools close to the modest fire, many still wrapped in their cloaks. They turned, young faces drawn with apprehension, stilted conversation abandoned.

She recalled her girlhood, when all Uncle Ernout's persuasive authority had been needed to still the youths' exuberance. So many of those boys were dead or gone, Poldrion only knew where. Or they had returned maimed, like Milar, who so desperately loved Serafia. But now Serafia was drawn to Kerith. Could that possibly be love or just base, lonely lust?

'I didn't expect to see you today.'

Aunt Derou looked up from her darning as Failla opened the kitchen door.

The warmth from the black-leaded range embraced her, along with the chatter of little children. Three girls knelt on a rag-rug playing with battered wooden animals. Two boys were skidding brightly coloured blocks across the tiled floor. At least they were free of the cares weighing down the older children.

'You can watch the little ones while I see what's to be had in the victualler's.' Derou rose from her chair, prudently placed between the scampering children and the hot range. She set the oiled wool stocking and her needle out of reach on the windowsill and took her dark-blue cape from a peg by the door.

'Will there be anything fresh?' Failla knew every trader in the town was despairing of replenishing stocks with none of the usual wagons and pack mules on the roads.

'I don't imagine so.' Buttoning her cape, Derou raised the hood over her tidily pinned grey braids and shook off slippers to step into her boots. 'But there'll be gossip, and we don't want despondency spreading like mould in a damp cellar.'

As Derou closed the kitchen door, Failla hung up her own cloak and took the chair between the children and the range. She saw one of the little boys contemplating the enticing flickering behind the iron bars. 'You play with Yeni, Kip.'

The lad, Serafia's fatherless son, looked at her, mischief still bright in his eye. Then he sighed and went to join Yeni making a rickety wall with the wooden blocks.

Failla saw one of the girls regarding her with some curiosity. Her own daughter, Anilt. She held out her open arms. 'Chick?'

With a shy smile, Anilt came to return her hug. Did the child truly understand she was her mother? Failla buried her face in the little girl's curls and breathed in the familiar fragrance of the herbs Derou used against moths in her linen chests.

If she didn't, no matter. There would be plenty of time to become a family, Failla told herself fiercely, once Lescar's peaceful future was settled. When Anilt would never know any father but Tathrin. When she would stare down all the curious eyes and dare them to whisper their suspicions behind their hands.

They had to secure this peace, for the sake of all Lescar's women and children; for her redoubtable aunt and the women she had met in Ashgil. Their families deserved a future free from any duke's tyranny.

She must repay those women's faith in her, as privation pinched their children's cheeks. As they nursed sons and husbands through wounds and ailments borne home from the autumn's battles. As the old and frail succumbed to winter sicknesses all the more punishing in such a hungry season.

'That game should stop them fretting for a while.' Ernout entered the kitchen with a smile of satisfaction. 'What news from the castle?' He pulled a chair closer to the range and stretched his bony hands to the warmth.

Failla reluctantly loosed her hold as Anilt wriggled and the little girl hurried back to her friends and their giggling game. 'We have unexpected allies in Relshaz.' Unlacing her reticule, she handed over the letter.

Ernout leaned back and shoved his feet towards the range. 'Don't tell Derou. She scolds me worse than ever, for lack of Vrist to chide.'

Failla saw he had gone outside in his embroidered felt slippers. Sodden, they steamed in the heat. 'Have you heard from him?'

For all his sufferings at Tadira's orders, her cousin, Derou's youngest son, had insisted on marching with Reher and the Carluse contingent. Failla wondered if his nightmares of that dungeon, shackled to a corpse had begun to fade.

'He came safely through the battle for Wyril, Saedrin be thanked.'

The old priest read Mellitha Esterlin's news. Failla watched Anilt's carefree game.

He refolded the paper precisely and offered it back. 'What do you make of this? You and your allies in the castle?'

Failla took the letter and stowed it safely away. 'Will this persuade Marlier's guildsmen to work with Carluse's, to hunt down these brigands?'

'It may just tip the scales. They see Ashgil secured and Wyril reclaimed and Triolle holding its own without any need for a duke.' Ernout nodded slowly. 'I'll write to Reher and Milar. They'll know who's most inclined to our cause over there.'

Failla felt a pang. Milar was striving so hard to bring peace to Lescar. If he couldn't hold a weapon with his useless crushed hand, he was still Reher's lieutenant, as the two of them rallied and trained Carluse Town's militia. One day, Failla knew, Milar dreamed of Serafia setting aside her grief for Elpin and rewarding his unwavering devotion.

But it seemed Kerith had stolen a march on him; another reason for Failla to hate the scholar, not that she needed one.

'I will write to those of Marlier's shrines served by men and women of good faith.' Ernout raised a warning finger. 'Who are sorely troubled by all these current uncertainties. You must propose some lawful governance for Lescar as soon as a thaw opens the roads.'

Failla bit her lip. 'As soon as Master Aremil recovers.'

'Serafia tells me he fares no better.' Ernout shook his head. 'I pray for him daily.' He sighed. 'As long as he lies senseless, Draximal wavers like a river barge that's lost its rudder. The Guilds and the shrines grow more dissatisfied with Duke Secaris's flight by the day but see no one else to take the helm. They see Emperor Tadriol's legions massing and I hear tell that this murderous rabble in Parnilesse have been raiding across the river now, to rob and plunder Tormalin lands.'

'We hear the same,' Failla admitted reluctantly. 'Reniack is buying loyalty with bread and meat and his stores are running as low as everyone's at this season.'

Ernout shook his head. 'Draximal may yet welcome Secaris back, if they believe that will secure their safety, as they fear Parnilesse's anarchy will spread to engulf all of Lescar and bring in the Emperor's wrath from the east while Caladhria's barons march from the west.'

'Tathrin has a plan to foil Reniack,' Failla assured him, 'and to leave Parnilesse free to determine its destiny.'

Ernout pursed his withered lips. 'What does he propose?'

'I can't tell you. I don't know.' Despite herself, Failla's voice shook. 'Since Jettin turned spy for Reniack, Charoleia says the fewer people who know the details, the better.'

Was that really the truth, or did they still not trust her, Sorgrad and Gren and Charoleia herself?

Ernout surprised her with a grin that deepened his wrinkles. 'I cannot approve of that lady but only a fool would wager against her.'

'Indeed.' Not for the first time Failla wondered what had passed between Charoleia and the priest, when she had taken that urn to his shrine, containing her dead maid's ashes; Trissa, her friend and confidante. Tathrin had agreed something lightened the grief in Charoleia's violet eyes.

Ernout's thoughts had moved on. 'Let's hope young Tathrin's plans prosper.' He patted her hand. 'I'd like to see you a spring bride and Derou tells me she approves.'

'Bless Drianon for that.' Failla smiled. Did Ernout guess she had been braiding ribbons into her hair, imagining Tathrin cutting her wedding plait short, their offering to the mother-goddess's altar?

'Have you met his family?' Ernout enquired.

'Not yet.' Failla gazed into the glowing range.

Tathrin had written letters from Triolle, from Ashgil, to tell them he had come unscathed through the fires of Wyril. But he'd had no reply. Would his parents ever forgive him for rejecting that safe life in Vanam they had sacrificed so much to secure for him? For taking a dishonoured woman to wife?

Would she first meet them carrying the urn of his ashes, if this hideously dangerous plan was the death of him?

Chapter Twenty-Two

Tathrin

Parnilesse Town,

10th of Aft-Winter

It was quite different from Carluse and Triolle. Tathrin couldn't really compare it to Sharlac. He'd barely seen anything beyond the panic, smoke and slaughter engulfing the castle there.

They were riding down the Inchra Road. Ahead, Parnilesse Town's walls were formidably high and Duke Orlin had plainly forbidden so much as a pigsty to be built outside. A grassy bank below the masonry slid into a broad ditch now choked with snow. Beyond that the ground had been cleared for two plough-lengths. Anyone approaching would be spotted long before they came within bowshot of the vigilant turrets.

Tathrin coughed as the capricious wind shifted. He was heartily sick of this journey through the most dismal days of the year. 'I take it that stink's the marshes?'

Sorgrad had explained how the higher ground that thrust Parnilesse's rocky coast out into the sea fell away in a long escarpment here. Brackish swamps stretched towards the River Asilor, with one safe channel cutting through the mire to bring ships to the deep pool at the base of the scarp.

'Do you suppose Branca and the scholar are baffling Reniack's lad by now?' Gren looked ahead to the great gate looming over the road.

'Let's hope so.' Apprehension knotted Tathrin's guts.

He had seen how reluctant Kerith was to use his Artifice against their erstwhile colleague, when the Adept had shared the latest news from Carluse. Would that unwillingness fatally undermine that aspect of their stratagem? Would Branca have the strength to frustrate Jettin's aetheric spying on her own?

'We'll know soon enough.' Sorgrad was unconcerned. 'Less chatter. Let's close up with the others.'

Tathrin urged his weary horse forwards. Sorgrad and Gren encouraged their shaggy ponies with broad Parnilesse accents.

He was saying as little as possible, uncomfortably aware of the Caladhrian intonations, common in Carluse and Marlier, which marked him as a stranger here. Parnilesse speech held more closely to the Tormalin spoken across the border.

As they caught up with the travellers ahead, though, a couple of faces turned to offer tired smiles. There were all too few on this road; just these apprentice carpenters who'd braved the menacing weather to pay festival visits to their families in nearby farmsteads.

Whatever they might have thought of his accent, they had welcomed Tathrin's honest face, the breadth of his shoulders and his razor-sharp sword. No one paid much heed to Sorgrad and Gren. No one had, since Serafia had dyed their fair hair muddy brown. Along with voluminous cloaks to hide their battle-hardened muscles, they adopted hangdog, fearful expressions, befitting two runts accustomed to ill-treatment.