The Dragon’s Path (9 page)

“Cousin!” she said, taking Clara’s hands. “I am so happy to see you.”

“Yes, Phelia,” Clara said. “I’m sorry that we only ever seem to visit one another when our boys have been misbehaving.”

“Osterling,” Feldin Maas said, using Dawson’s more formal title.

“Ebbinbaugh,” Dawson replied, bowing. Feldin retuned the bow with a stiffness that said the pain of his new cut still bothered him.

“Oh stop it, both of you,” Clara said at the same moment Feldin’s wife said, “Sit down and have some wine.”

The men did as they were told. After a few minutes of chatter, Feldin leaned over, speaking low.

“I hadn’t heard whether you were joining the king’s tourney.”

“Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I?”

“I thought you might be leaving some glory for your sons, old friend,” Feldin said. “That’s all. No offense intended. I don’t think I can afford much more of your offense. At least not until I’ve healed.”

“Perhaps next time we should duel with words. Insulting couplets at ten paces.”

“Oh, blades will be fine. Your couplets do permanent damage. People still call Sir Lauren the Rabbit Knight because of you.”

“Me? No. I could never have done it without his teeth and that ridiculous helmet of his. I know they were supposed to be wings, but by God they looked like ears to me,” Dawson said and took a drink. “You acquitted yourself well today, my boy. Not as well as I did, but you’re a fighter and no doubt.”

Clara rewarded him with a smile. She was right; it wasn’t so hard being magnanimous. There was even a kind of warmth in it. The wine was rich, and the servants brought in a plate of dry cheese and pickled sausages. Clara and her cousin gossiped and touched each other’s arms and hands at every chance, like children flirting. It was much the same thing, he supposed. First insult, then violence, and reassurance afterward. It was women like theirs who kept the kingdom from bursting apart in a war of ego and manliness.

“We are lucky men,” Dawson said, “to have wives like these.”

Feldin Maas startled, considered the two women deep in conversation about the difficulty of maintaining households
in Camnipol and their family holdings both, and gave a rough half-smile.

“I suppose we are,” he said. “How long are you staying in Camnipol?”

“Until the tourney, and then another week or two. I want to get home again before the snows.”

“Yes. Nothing like the Kingspire in winter for catching every breath of wind off the plain. It’s like his majesty had a sailmaker for an architect. I’ve heard the king’s thinking of touring the reaches just so he can spend some time in a warm house.”

“It’s the hunting,” Dawson said. “Ever since we were boys, he’s loved the winter hunts in the reaches.”

“Still, he’s getting old for it, don’t you think?”

“No. I don’t.”

“I bow to your opinion,” Feldin said, but his smile was thin and smug. Dawson felt a tug of anger, and Clara must have seen it. Part of peacekeeping, it appeared, was to know how to stop playing at friends before the illusion faded. She called for the servants, gathered a gift of violets for her cousin, and they walked together to the entry hall to say their farewells. Just before he turned away, Feldin Maas frowned and raised a finger.

“I forget, my lord. Do you have family in the Free Cities?”

“No,” Dawson said. “Well, I think Clara has some obscure relations in Gilea.”

“Through marriage,” Clara said. “Not blood.”

“Nothing in Maccia, then. That’s good,” Feldin Maas said.

Dawson’s spine stiffened.

“Maccia? No,” he said. “Why? What’s in Maccia.”

“Apparently the Grand Doge there has decided to throw in with Vanai against his majesty. ‘Unity in the face of aggression’ or some such.”

Feldin knew about Vanai’s reinforcements. And if he knew, so did Sir Alan Klin. Did they know whose influence had brought Vanai its new allies, or did they only suspect? They must at least suspect, or Feldin wouldn’t have brought it up. Dawson smiled the way he hoped he would have if he’d had no stake in the matter.

“Unity among the Free Cities? That seems unlikely,” he said. “Probably just rumor.”

“Yes,” Feldin Maas said. “Yes, I’m sure you’re right.”

The dog-faced, small-cocked, hypocrite bastard son of a weasel and a whore bowed and escorted his wife from the house. When Dawson didn’t move, Clara took his hand.

“Are you well, dear? You look pained.”

“Excuse me,” he said.

Once in his library, he locked the doors, lit the candles, and pulled his maps from their shelves. He’d marked the paths from Maccia to Vanai and the roads the army was sure to take. He measured and made his calculations, fury rising like waves whipped by a storm. He’d been betrayed. Somewhere along the chain of communications, somebody had said something, and his plans had been tipped to the ground. He had overreached, and it left him exposed. He’d been outplayed. By Feldin Maas. One of the dogs whined and scratched at the door until Dawson unlocked it and let it in.

The dog climbed onto the couch, wrapping its haunches in close and looking up at Dawson with anxious eyes. The Baron of Osterling Fells sank down beside the beast and scratched its ears. The dog whined again, pressing its head up into Dawson’s palm. A moment later, Clara appeared in the doorway, her arms folded, her eyes as anxious as the hound’s.

“Something’s gone wrong?”

“A bit, yes.”

“Does it put Jorey in danger?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Does it put us in danger?”

Dawson didn’t reply because the answer was
yes,
and he couldn’t bring himself to lie.

A
mist lay on the valley, white in the morning sun. The banners of the houses of Antea hung limp and damp, their colors darkened and greyed by the thick air. The world smelled of trampled mud and the cold. Geder’s horse shook its head and grunted. He reached forward a gauntleted hand and patted the beast’s shoulder.

His armor had been his father’s once, the bright steel of the plate dimmed a little now where the smith had bent it to more nearly fit Geder’s back. The straps pinched even through the brigandine. The march had been a long, weary foretaste of hell. The pace had never been fast, but it was relentless. From that first hungover morning, he had ridden and walked for four days without more than two short hours’ rest at a time. In the night, he draped a blanket across his shoulders and shivered against the cold. During the day, he sweated. The army passed down the wide green dragon’s road, the tramp of feet against the jade becoming first an annoyance, then a music, then an odd species of silence, before cycling around to annoyance again. With only one horse, he had to spend a fair part of each day walking. A richer man would have brought two or three, even four mounts on the campaign. And plate that hadn’t seen decades of use before he was born. And a tent that kept out the cold. And, just perhaps, a little respect and dignity.

The other titled nobles rode in groups or with their personal retinue. Geder shared their place at the head of the column, but significantly at the rear of the grouping. The supply carts came just behind him, and the infantry and camp followers behind them, though there weren’t many camp followers these days. It said something when a march was too much trouble to be worth a whore’s time.

The order to stop had come last evening an hour before sunset. Geder’s squire had erected his little tent, brought a tin plate of lentils and cheese, and curled up into a small Dartinae ball just outside Geder’s tent flap. Geder had crawled onto his cot, pressed his eyes shut, and prayed for sleep. His dreams had all been about marching. With the first light of dawn, the new order had come: prepare.

All through his boyhood, he had imagined this day. His first real battle. He’d imagined the wind of the charge, the heat and speed of the horse beneath him, the fierce cries of battle in his throat. He hadn’t thought about the numbing hours sitting in the saddle, his armor cooling against him, while the infantry formed, shifted, and re-formed. The noble line of knights, sword and lance at the ready, was a clump of men laughing, trading dirty jokes, and complaining that the food was either sparse or spoiled. It felt less like the noble proving ground of war than the ninth day of an eight-day hunt. Geder’s spine was a single burning ache from his ass to the base of his skull. His thighs were chapped raw, his jaw popped every time he yawned, and his mouth tasted like sour cheese. His squire stood by his side, Geder’s battle lance in his hands, shield slung across his back, and a wary expression on his hairless face.

“Palliako!”

Geder shifted. Sir Alan Klin rode a huge black charger, the steel of its barding all enameled red. The man’s armor
glittered with dew and the silver worked into a dragon’s wing design. He could have stepped out of an ancient war rhyme.

“My lord?” Geder said.

“You’re with the charge on the west. The scouts report it as the mercenary forces Vanai’s bought, so it should be the easiest fighting.”

Geder frowned. That seemed wrong, but fatigue made it hard to think through. Mercenaries were professional fighters and veterans to a man. And that was where the fighting would be
easy
? Klin read his expression, leaned to the side, and spat.

“They aren’t protecting their homes and wives,” Klin said. “Just follow where Kalliam goes and try not to knock your horse into anyone. Knees get broken that way.”

“I know that.”

Klin’s pale eyebrows rose.

“I mean… I mean I’ll be careful, my lord.”

Klin made a clicking sound, and his beautiful charger shook its head and turned. Geder’s squire looked up at him. If there was any amusement in the Dartinae’s glowing eyes, it was well hidden.

“Come on,” Geder said. “Let’s get in place.”

The hell of it was, what Klin said might be true. Perhaps he was sending Geder and the youngest Sir Kalliam into the easiest part of the coming battle. A charge, a few sword strokes to one side and another, and the paid forces call surrender before anyone got too badly hurt. It would be a mark of Klin’s ability if he could have all his knights alive, and increase his own glory by keeping the fiercest fights for himself. Anything to impress Lord Ternigan and stand out from the marshal’s other captains. Or perhaps Klin wanted Geder
to die in the battle. Geder thought he might be ready to die if it meant not riding anymore.

Jorey Kalliam sat high on his saddle, speaking to his bannerman. His plate was simple steel, unadorned and elegant. Six other knights were with him, their squires all close and ready. Kalliam nodded solemnly to Geder and he returned the salute.

“Come close,” he called. “All of you. To me.”

The knights shifted their mounts in. Sir Makiyos of Ainsbaugh. Sozlu Veren and his twin brother Sesil. Darius Sokak, the Count of Hiren. Fallon Broot, Baron of Suderling Heights, and his son Daved. All in all, a pretty sad bunch. He could see from their own expressions that they’d drawn similar conclusions from his arrival.

“The valley narrows about half a league from here,” Kalliam said. “The Vanai are there, and they’re entrenched. The scouts are saying the banners here on the western edge belong to a mercenary company under a Captain Karol Dannian.”

“How many men’s he got?”

“Two hundred, but mostly sword-and-bows,” Kalliam said.

“Brilliant,” Fallon Broot said, stroking the mustache that drooped down past his weak chin. “That should leave enough for all of us to have our turn.”

Geder couldn’t tell if it was meant as a joke.

“Our work,” Kalliam said, “is to hold tight to the edge of the valley. The main thrust will be on the eastern end where Vanai’s forces are thickest. Lord Ternigan has all his own knights and half of ours. All we need is to be sure no one flanks them. Sir Klin is giving us three dozen bows and twice as many swords. I’ve sent the bows ahead. At the signal,
they’ll start the attack and try to draw out their cavalry. When we hear the charge, we’ll go in with the swords following.”

“Why are they here?” Geder asked. “I mean, if I were them, I’d try to be behind a wall someplace. Make it a siege.”

“Can’t hire mercenaries for a siege,” one of the Sir Verens said, contempt for the question dripping from his words. “They take contract for a season, and Vanai can’t raise money to renew.”

“The city’s less than an hour’s ride from here,” Kalliam said, “and there’s no place more defensible until you reach it. If they hope to keep us from reaching Vanai, this is the first defense and the last.”

A distant horn sang. Two rising notes and one falling. Geder’s heart started beating a little faster. Kalliam smiled, but his eyes were cold.

“My lords,” Kalliam said. “I believe that’s the first call. If you have any last business, it’s too late for it now.”

The mist hadn’t vanished, but enough had burned off that the landscape was clear before them. To Geder’s unpracticed eye, it looked like any of the other small valleys they’d passed on their way through the low, rolling hills north of the Free Cities. The enemy was a dark, crawling line like ants from a hill. The other knights’ squires began the final preparation, strapping shield to arms, handing up the steel-tipped lances. Geder suffered the same. The Dartinae finished with him, then nodded and prepared his own arms for the battle; light leather and a long, wicked knife. And not half a league away, some other squire or low soldier was cleaning another knife just as wicked to push through Geder’s throat if the chance came. The horn sang again. Not the charge, but the warning of it.