The Bandit King (26 page)

Steel ringing like a smithy. Another hoarse cry. Chill touched my nape. I dismounted, caught Arran’s bridle, and gave him to understand what I wished.

When I let loose of him with a
“Ha!”
he shot down the slope, into the culvert’s mouth. They would do well by him inside.

I drew my rapier. Settled my dagger along my other forearm, ignored the repeated plea from above. “
D’Arcenne!
Do not be a fool! Come!”

Jierre di Yspres had held the survivors of the Old Guard on the slopes of Mont di Cienne, waiting for me to appear, those many months ago. I could not do less for the men under my care now.

Never too late to begin becoming the man she once thought you were. Ware now, they come.

Great gaps tore in the fog. Through the thinning screen, an absurd three-headed shape. Twas d’Embrail and di Haseault, on foot, with Tieris di Siguerre slumped between them. Blood dripped, and he hung in a sodden mass. Their illusion-shells were gone, and they had all shed layers of protective cloth. Tieris was all over mud and missing his hat.

And behind them, the Damarsene. Just four pursuers for now, and gaining on the men carrying their wounded lieutenant.

“Move!”
I barked, and the echo of the drillyard acted as a tonic. Their heads rose—except Tieris’s. They hastened, and I lengthened my stride, ignoring the cry from the tower above. Was it Vianne, watching this?

All the more reason to do what I must, then.
I set myself, ignored the aching in my chest, and broke into a run.

In Damar, those who fight afoot are largely peasants, and trained for it. The officers are a-horseback, and noble, since only a nobleman can afford a horse. It used to be a crime for any of the lower orders to own horseflesh. Oxen for plowing and pulling carts, horses for war and pleasure, is still their custom. Their peasants fight with pike and sword, and had I been facing four pikes twould have been a much different battle.

But these were officers, one could tell by the quality of their swords and by the half-armor they had been laced into. The extra weight would tell on them—or so I hoped. One let out a watch-cry, and the fog about us roiled afresh.

Behind me, Tieris and his helpers struggled down the stone slope, boots clattering. A short cry of pain before they began splashing, damnably slow, and I closed with their pursuers in a furious spatter of chiming steel and a short-snapped word of Court sorcery.

When you are faced with one-against-many, speed and maneuverability are your watchwords. My chest flamed with tearing pain, but it did not matter. The battle-madness was upon me, and in that fiery glow it did not matter that the wound might reopen, or that my limbs were leaden and weak, or that the fog had shredded and the Damarsene had realized what we were about.

Inquatorce
, half-thrust, my rapier darting for the throat and I faded aside, shuffling, as two of the attackers tangled with each other. They are not normally bumbling idiots, but awakened roughly and forced to battle afoot in the heart of their own camp does tend to maze men used to discipline and a-horseback charges. Even the hounds of Damar trained from childhood to the martial.

My dagger left my hand, buried itself in the throat of another—he was not quick enough, and fell a-gurgling. The next I took
intierce
, his blade slid aside just slightly as I turned, inside his reach and thrusting, the rapier ramming into his lower belly where the half-armor was cut away for freedom of movement while horsed. Pulling it free with a twist, my hand searching for another knife and finding it behind my hip—not dagger but poniard, more suitable for throwing, but I had already tossed one knife and been luckier than I deserved. More choking, more cries and running feet. The fog lifted, flushed with red, the green tendrils shrinking as they folded into the earth’s embrace. More splashing behind me, grunts of effort.

A crossbow quarrel bloomed in the chest of my third opponent just as I slashed at his arm. His sword fell with a clatter, but the fourth had recovered his wits and I was almost lung-pierced again. I saved myself by lunging aside, chest tearing afresh and sick liquid heat in my throat. A line of tents before me blocked us from view, but that would not last. Already I saw motion, the fog retreating in rivulets as the crimson
Hekz
ate at it. There was no longer truly “fog,” merely patches of thin vapor as if a cloud with mange had fallen to earth.

Coele deserved far more than a purse; twas a charm well-wrought.
I had no time for the thought, twas there and gone in a blink. I braced myself, moved forward, the intended strike countered in a flicker, and now I was faced with just one man to kill as two of his companions gurgled their last and the one with the bolt to his chest lay drumming his heels in futile nerve-death, the body not knowing quite what had befallen it.

The fourth was a stocky Damarsene youth, his dark hair cut in the bowl-shape their
chivalieri
fancy, ghosts of the skinspoil still on his cheeks. He had not even achieved a respectable beard, such a thing being a mark of virility among them. Wisp-fuzz touched his cheeks, but for all that, he was strong and quick, well-trained. And he had perhaps shaken off his amazement, his wits fully engaged in the fight before him.

Which meant he had to be killed quickly, before he thought to raise another cry and bring more of his fellows a-running.

The splashing behind me cut off. They were through the culvert. His eyes narrowed, and he lunged
inprimier
, a textbook-perfect move.

That is the trouble with the young. They still think “correct” in a book is always correct in a fight.

I flung myself forward, my blade-tip circling and the edges grating. Sparks spat as he flung sorcery at me—but the Damarsene
Hekzen
is inelegant and ineffective on a personal level, and he did not have the Aryx singing in his veins and bones and breath. I batted it aside with a countercharm, reflexively tilting forward as my blade-tip caught the shieldcage around his hand and stung him. But twas the poniard, flickering forward and burying itself in his throat, that did the murder. I wrenched it back and forth, the sudden gush from the artery bedewing my face and hand. I wrenched back as my chest cracked afresh, glanced at the battlefield, and turned to flee.

Smoking with blood, slipping, stumbling, I splashed through cold thigh-high water. Shouts behind me, and a cry from above. The crossbows hummed, quarrels streaking overhead. Twas cover, and I was grateful for it, even though my feet shot out from under me and I fell into the water. Floundering, desperate, clumsy as a newborn colt, I plunged into darkness and safety.

*   *   *

The hedgewitch—a heavily pregnant peasant woman with a wide face and grave dark eyes—shoved my shirt aside. Her blunt callused fingers tested the charmed wound.

I jerked as the scar twinged sharply. “What are you
doing
, whittling it deeper?”

“You have breath to complain,” Jierre retorted. “Count yourself lucky,
sieur
. That was a fool’s job, d’Arcenne.”

“He’ll live,” the other hedgewitch—a man with a heavily bandaged foot and a crutch—said, straightening from the side of Tieris di Siguerre’s cot. “Tis merely bloody, and that arm will pain him in the winter. I’ve put him asleep. He needs boneset and charming; I shall return with both.”

“Very well.” Jierre nodded. He was even leaner than he had been, gaunt and worn, but his face had changed little. Set and imperturbable, his hair haphazard and dark with soot, he was much the worse for wear. “Thank you. Find some food too, Aranth.”

“Too much to do,” the limping peasant said cheerfully, and stumped away. Jierre sighed.

The woman nodded and mumbled to herself, burying her chin in her dirty lace-ruff. This time the charming was a mass of razor spikes, twisting at my heart and lungs. I choked, hot water rising to my eyes, and was glad my face was a-filth with blood and muck to disguise the tears.

“Serves you right,” she finished, and took her hand away, flicking her fingers as if to rid them of foulness. “Am’mist tore the charm clear through. Are you
mad
?”

The
Merúnaisse
are known for speaking their minds. And a woman bearing may speak as she pleases, rank and station be damned. They are sacred to Jiserah, those heavy with new life, and that gentle Blessed’s only curse is reserved for those who injure them.

“Not mad,” I countered, when I had gained enough breath to speak. “Merely stubborn,
m’dama
. My thanks.”

She heaved herself to her feet, cupping her belly with one hand and ignoring Jierre’s proffered hand. “There are other wounded to tend to. I canna answer for’im,
sieur
; it could take a bleed any moment.”

“I shall tie him to his bed and set a guard, Heloese.” He rubbed at the bridge of his nose, a familiar movement when he was restraining himself. “My thanks. Go to your rest.”

“Canna. Others to tend to.” And with that she was gone, with the peculiar gait of a pregnant woman, sailing with skirts swishing and one hand clasped to the lower back.

The temporary infirmary was in a warehouse, bales of wool and spun linen pushed aside and piled to make walls. Groans and sometimes screams punctuated the morning hush. I met Jierre’s gaze. “The men?”

“Hale enough. The worst is the youngling there; he showed a fair measure of steel.” From di Yspres, this was a high compliment, and I hoped di Siguerre knew it. “What news do you bring?”

News?
“Vianne? Is she well?”

“Well enough.” But his jaw set. “Why are you here? You were left with—”

“Nursemaids and tents, while you came to have a war without me. I cannot let you have all the maying about. I was fit to ride, and so I came. What ails Vianne, Jierre? Have I not some small right to know?”

He sighed. Ran stiff fingers back through his dark hair, disarranging it, and for a moment I saw age settle on him. Soon we would be my father and Siguerre, old warhorses, with a common bond, whether we were quite
friends
or not. And would Vianne be my mother, safe in the Palais with a harp and her garden, and a library of Tiberian philosophy and history stuffed to the brim?

I could only hope. “And we have unfinished business,” I reminded him. “There is the little matter of you believing—or unbelieving—me a traitor.”

“You do not know what I believe.” Yet he merely sounded weary unto death. “We cannot hold this city, Tristan. The walls will crumble before long.
She
says help is coming; she says the gods have spoken. But she is… you do not know. You cannot understand.”

I watched him. This was summat new, practical hardheaded Jierre speaking so oddly. “You try my patience. Pray try my comprehension with this riddle, too.” Dried blood and drying mud cracked as I grimaced. My chest was a tender egg, the scar deep-aching. Once the fever of battle is over, one feels the weariness, and the muscles one has misused.

“
At least Tristan is safe
, she said.
At least I have accomplished that much.
Now you are here, where it is
not
safe, and she is fretting herself dry worrying on what dire tidings could have brought you to risk your life so.”

I almost winced. “No tidings I can give you, Captain.” Perhaps there was a slight emphasis on the title.

Perhaps it was ill-natured of me.

He shrugged. “She required it of me.”

I could not help myself. “And what else does she
require
of you?”

Did he turn pale, eyeing me? It seemed so. “That,” he said stiffly, “is between myself and Her Majesty.
Sieur
.” A half-bow, and he whisked himself forth as I cursed internally.

He did not tie me to the cot after all, or set a guard. But he did not need to. My body finally rebelled at the demands placed upon it, and after seeking to haul myself upright and failing twice, I lay there and waited, listening to the screams of the wounded and Tieris di Siguerre’s labored breathing.

Confused motion. My fist came up, my hand caught and wrist deftly locked, and I opened my eyes to see Fridrich van Harkke grinning like a madman. He was unshaven, his cloth sadly the worse for wear, and looked
very
pleased with himself.
“Son of a potbellied sow,”
he greeted me.
“Thou sleeps as one dead.”

“Can you blame me?” I muttered in Arquitaine, twisting my wrist free of his grasp. “What is it?” My head was clear, at least, and I felt… not exactly strong, but wonderfully rested.

“The
fralein
calls, my friend.”
His grin broadened a trifle.
“I trust this is welcome news.”

I had fallen asleep covered in filth, and now I felt it as the Pruzian helped lever me up. This time my legs held me. “I do not suppose there is time for a bath.”

“If you like.” This time he spoke in Arquitaine, though he could not handle the vowels as gently as they require. “She will not be leaving us behind again.”

I glanced at Tieris’s bed, but twas rumpled and empty. “How does the rest of the Guard fare?”

“Attending to the city’s defense.” He shrugged. “Tis only a matter of time.” The fey smile widened. “Then we shall see what it is to die like men.”