Three Coins for Confession (25 page)

“I need you to keep an even closer eye on Dargana. Stay between
her and the Aerachi if you can.”

“As you say, lord.”

The distance between the two of them gave her voice the crispness
of new ice underfoot. Chriani tried to soften his own tone, tried to focus.
Conscious of a sudden brittleness to his thoughts. “It’s not her I’m worried
about, mind you. It’s any Aerachi that gets close enough to her…”

“As you say, lord.”

Dargana was riding outside on the Brandishear side. Kathlan
spurred ahead to slide in beside her, not looking back.

The weather stayed clear for the remainder of the day, though
cloud from the north came and went as the rangers rode. They made good time with
Jeradien and Jessa leading them, the landscape not much changed from
Brandishear but wholly unfamiliar all the same.

Though the Greatwood was still too far away to be seen, its green
darkness loomed along the horizon to the south and west. But the juxtaposition
of sun and forest created along that horizon seemed wrong to Chriani somehow. A
lifetime in Brandishear had fixed the impression in his mind of the Greatwood
standing always south and east, far out of sight but gleaming green along the
horizon with the light of each rising sun. Here, though, the sun slowly falling
marked the unseen wood as they rode, a line of shadow spreading to the west. No
glimmer of mountains seen as the day was swallowed by the distant trees.

They set camp the first night well past dusk, a good distance
from the road and out of sight of the last farmstead village they had passed.
Both squads ate field rations over a shared fire, but there was precious little
conversation between them. Jeradien and Dargana both stayed in their tents.

Chriani’s only conversation with Venry involved the setting of
the watch, the lieutenant’s tone cold. He ignored that tone as he offered to
take the first watch himself with one of Venry’s rangers. Knowing he wasn’t
likely to sleep anytime soon. He hoped the tangible tension in both squads
would settle during the next day’s ride, but expected that he was hoping in
vain.

The Hunthad River marked their movement toward the frontier
starting on the second day. They crossed its muddy waters as the sun was
reaching high, taking a broad stone bridge that arced up and over a rushing
narrows, just past where the trade road curved east for Teillai. Chriani knew
from experience that the river could be forded in winter when its waters were
low, though he was happy to not have to do so now. But it was that memory that
caused him to feel the landscape’s sense of strangeness shift to an unexpected
and unwelcome familiarity.

As the less-traveled track they followed twisted south, he
recognized the wild meadowlands through which he and Lauresa had emerged from
Ilvani territory. The unmarked and shifting boundary between the exile lands of
Crithnalerean and their current destination of Laneldenar to the south.
Memories of that flight were a year and a half old but still fresh in his mind.
Not like the memories of the Bastion, wrapped now in their own sense of
distance. These were raw as yesterday’s thought, even as much as Chriani wanted
to push them away.

As he’d expected, the angry silence hanging over both squads the first
day had worn on and grown even heavier by the time they stopped for the second
night. Jeradien and Jessa led them to a collection of farmsteads whose stables
were large enough to accommodate the horses of both squads. The rangers pitched
their field tents in the adjacent just-mown meadow, Dargana and Kathlan’s set
at a distance and the exile kept well out of sight.

It took the farm families inviting the rangers to share their
communal meal for the animosity of the Brandishear and Aerachi squads to finally
melt. As they were in Brandishear, patrols were commonplace through the
frontier farmsteads of Aerach, and as the rangers gathered around a large
firepit for spit-roasted pig and the last of the season’s sweet corn, their
hosts showed a profound lack of curiosity about their presence. The uniforms of
Brandishear were noted, with Chriani having briefed all the rangers to explain
that they were traveling to the great southern citadel at Doniver to exchange
training with the Aerachi. However, the farm folk were more interested by far
in tales of raids and Ilvani slain, and the rangers of both principalities were
more than happy to share them.

Chriani spent the meal drifting back and forth between the fire
and the tents, bringing food to Kathlan and Dargana while explaining to the
farm folk that one of his rangers was resting an injured leg. While at the
fire, he spent more time listening than talking, hearing the tales turn bolder
as the spiced wine began to flow. He was surprised to find that he had heard of
more than a few of the Brandishear rangers’ exploits, including Daellyn and
Wilric’s part in defending the southern city of Kaeralith from wolf-rider raids
out of the mountains the previous winter.

He was more surprised by far to hear the tale told by two of the
Aerachi rangers. A daring raid into the Crithnala lands in deep winter of the
year before, they said. Perhaps the local folk had heard of it? When the
Princess Lauresa of Brandishear had been taken by mad monks along the
Clearwater Way, it was the rangers of Teillai who brought her home.

Chriani said nothing as he listened. He marked the names of the
two rangers doing the talking — Nyduri and Tenry — and
made a point of following them back to the tents as the fire burned down and
the watch was set, the farm folk already returned to their homes.

The Clearmoon had been waxing full since the rain passed, almost
daylight bright to his eyes now. He approached the two quietly from behind
while they pissed at the edge of the tents’ field of lantern light, trusting to
the warmth of the wine and their murmured laughter to cover any sound of his
approach. He listened to their talk turn to Dargana, as he’d hoped it would.

“Too long since I rode the exile lands,” one of them said,
Chriani not sure which. “But I’ll tell you true, I’ll see one less Crithnala on
this side of the Hunthad the first time Sergeant Sackless lets his Ilvani scut
off the leash.”

Chriani sent his foot between the speaker’s legs, then twisted to
drop him. He took advantage of the second figure’s surprise to spin, driving in
with a roundhouse kick that sent the Aerachi to the ground beside his friend.
Both the rangers staggered to their feet, fumbling the laces of their leggings
as they backed up, screaming profanities that Chriani didn’t know. Different
customs in Aerach.

Both stopped shouting when they saw it was him, but he felt quite
certain that their silence had more to do with the footsteps racing in from all
sides. Rangers of both squads were bringing light, slowing as they circled. In
the glare of lanterns, he could see where both Nyduri and Tenry had pissed
themselves when they fell.

Chriani saw Daellyn and Wilric before him, didn’t look to see who
else was at his back or how far behind him they stood. Waiting only until the
crowd had settled before he spoke.

“You’re a peace envoy and you’ll act like it. Whether it’s in
your nature, whether you like it or not, whether you can even spell
peace
with all the letters given to you. I hear another word from either of you on
Dargana, or on your exploits in Crithnalerean, I’ll send you both back to
Teillai slung over the same horse. You have anything to say back to me?”

A long silence hung. From the corner of his eye, Chriani saw
Venry pace around him to draw the two rangers’ line of sight. The lieutenant’s
look carried a white-hot rage, but whether it was inspired more by his troops
or by him, Chriani didn’t know.

“I have a question, lord.”

Jeradien called out from behind him. Chriani turned back, one eye
still on the two rangers, wary.

“You didn’t share much in the way of your exploits at the
fireside tonight.” The tall ranger’s voice was ice. “I would have liked to hear
of your experience in the field, vast as I’m sure it is.”

“If there’s ever a day I feel the need to impress you, you’ll know
it,” Chriani said. The words were Barien’s, a favorite saying of the sergeant’s
when dealing with those he had no interest in dealing with. But before Jeradien
could speak again, another voice rose from the shadows.

“Sergeant Chriani took command of his squad outside Alaniver, on
the Calalerean frontier, two weeks past when our troop sergeant took an arrow
to the heart.” Kathlan stepped into the circle of light. She was in loose
leggings and a tunic, like she might have been sleeping, but her hand was set
on her sword belt, her rapier hanging there. “He took her off her horse as she
died, led two squads out of the Greatwood at speed, firing all the way. Dropped
back to lead a sneak attack on their flank that got us clear in the end.”

She ignored Chriani as she stepped up to Jeradien, green eyes
flashing like emerald fire. If she cared that the Aerachi ranger towered almost
a full head taller than her, she made no sign. “We left a half-dozen Ilvani
dead that day, but Chriani went back for more. He led the capture of four of
them, then captured magic in the deep wood that the war-mages are still looking
at. Nine days later, he and I were fighting a Calalerean war-band that struck
inside Rheran itself. He killed four that I saw, but it was dark. I might have missed
one. Later that same night, Chriani sat with the Prince High Chanist and
Captain Ashlund of the prince’s guard in private meeting in the Bastion throne
room. Now he’s here. You have any other fucking questions?”

No one spoke. Jeradien’s dark eyes flicked from Kathlan to
Chriani with undisguised hatred, but her look cooled when she met Venry’s gaze.

The lieutenant broke the silence to relieve Chriani of the
awkward obligation. “We have two more day’s hard riding ahead of us at least.
We should all take our rest.”

The way he spoke, it wasn’t an order, Chriani noted. Though it
looked like doing so had cost the lieutenant significant effort.

He nodded. “Troop dismissed,” he said.

Kathlan was the first to turn and go.

Chriani wandered the edge of the makeshift encampment for a
while, wanting to give tempers time to cool and needing to be nowhere within
earshot until they did. In the moon’s-light, his eyes had no trouble spotting
one of the two he’d attacked — Nyduri or Tenry, he still didn’t know
which — slipping into Jeradien’s tent. The tall ranger’s anger made
more sense suddenly, even as it suggested that anger wasn’t likely to flag
anytime soon.

From his own rangers, Chriani was surprised to receive actual
salutes as he passed Wilric and Jessa on first watch. A subtle change in their
attitude toward him, though how much of that was his standing up to the Aerachi
and how much was Kathlan’s impassioned speech, he didn’t know. As he slipped to
his tent and beneath his bedroll, Chriani found himself suffering from the
faint hope that whatever other complications were bound to come his way,
leading the Brandishear rangers might have become easier at least.

He just had absolutely no idea what he was leading them into.

They crossed the loop of the river again just after setting out
the next morning. That second crossing was a military ferry, two squads of
guards stationed at either end. They would keep the water on their right now,
following it for fifteen leagues more and watching as they drew closer to the wall
of the forest, rising to the west. The field maps he had obtained from the
Bastion libraries showed that where the river met the Greatwood, it would turn
due south. Crossing over into Valnirata territory, and marking the meeting
place Dargana had said they were bound for.

Beyond the ferry, the cart roads grew sparser. The farmsteads
began to cluster tight around fortified towns protected by patrols from Teillai
and Doniver, the river winding on toward the still-unseen forest. They shadowed
that water throughout the day, stopping the night at a hilltop farmstead whose
houses sat behind a stockade wall that was brightly lit by watchfires even
before dusk. As with the previous night, they slept in a quickly assembled camp
but ate with the farm folk, then paid for the gift of the meal by purchasing
oats for the horses, replenishing the stores that the Brandishear contingent
had used up along the Clearwater Way.

The mood at the evening meal was a great deal quieter than it had
been the previous night. That suited Chriani fine.

As in Brandishear, the folk of the Aerach frontier made no secret
of their respect for the patrols of the prince’s guard. Most of the frontier
farmsteads held back a fixed portion of their harvest and goods, whether root
crops for storage, smoked meats, oats or autumn fruit. They kept it set aside
and ready for when the patrols passed, selling it for minimal cost, or
sometimes just offering it in thanks.

Close by the farmstead stood one of the leaguestones Chriani had
noticed for the first time that morning, just beyond the ferry. These were
border markers consisting of unadorned standing stones, whose weather-beaten
look spoke to how long ago they’d been placed there. From time to time
throughout the day, he had also noticed ash-grey Ilvani arrows shot into lone
trees well on the wrong side of those stones.

The Brandishear border held no such formal markers, but Chriani
recognized that the true frontier on both sides of the Greatwood was marked off
not by stone or trees, but by a near-identical swath of open rangeland that
fronted those trees. An empty space into which the settlers of Aerach and
Brandishear knew not to tread, understanding that as much as anything else, the
border of Valnirata stood where the patrols of Ilmari and Ilvani alike said it
stood.

Their fourth day out from Werrancross, Chriani’s troop sighted
that unseen border with the sun at its height. The rough track they had been
following broke at last from the Hunthad, curving off east toward the Doniver
townships, so they left that track to follow the river across open grassland.
League after league, they watched the shadowed wall of the forest slowly
appear, curving out and across their path. The muddy course of the Hunthad
twisted its way toward those trees, distant and bright beneath clear sky.