Valkwitch (The Valkwitch Saga Book 1) (18 page)

A man in his middle years called the various
attendees and applicants to attention. He cradled a clipboard in one arm and
wore an expression that floated between perpetual disapproval and grudging tolerance.

“I am Serik van Rild, Kadrich’s Cadre’s Master of
Arms. The Cadre keeps only a few traditions from our pre-Rift past. Namely,
we’ve kept the short gauntlet of testing for new recruits. On a normal day this
yard would be awash with the sound the morning’s training sessions. Instead
they get to test you all. It’s a very popular diversion and I had no shortage
of volunteers. Each man in that line is better than you and eager to prove it.”

Another van Rild. Tyrissa could see a passing
resemblance between Serik and Jesca. He was right about these tests being a
popular diversion. In addition to the line of volunteer ‘testers’ they had a
respectable audience lining inner walls of the guildhall and watching from the
second floor balconies. Tyrissa spotted Jesca among their audience, leaning
against the shadowed wall of the training yard and speaking with a pair of
other women.

Serik continued. “This is more a test of
competence than any sort of winnowing out. That will come with time. However
please keep in mind that we’re looking to be impressed. ”

Serik walked along the line of recruits and read
through pairs of names, assigning one prospect to one veteran. Some paired off
into basic forms and defenses. Others were more contentious, the Cadre member
surprising his assigned applicant with a more vigorous trial.

The Master of Arms reached Tyrissa’s place in
line and flipped to her page on his clipboard.

“Jorensen. Cultural youth training in
quarterstaff.”

Something about his faint, dismissive twist on ‘cultural’
got under Tyrissa’s skin.

“It’s not a quarterstaff,” Tyrissa said.

That was
probably a mistake. Why would
you say that?

“Pardon?”

Tyrissa held out her staff horizontally and said,
“Morg staff, not quarterstaff. A quarterstaff is always six to, say, eight feet
long, while a Morg staff is specifically tailored to the user’s height and
reach. Also, the three metal bands are standard while they’re optional on a
quarterstaff.”

Serik gave her a steely look.

“Sir,” she added.

He glanced down at his notes and said, “You’ve
had short term training under a Weapon Master?”

“That’s right.”

“Who?”

“Kexal Rawlins.”

“Oh? Excellent,” Serik turned and pointed to a
pair of waiting Cadre members. “Fiers and Arveld, would you give Miss Jorensen
a proper test in the Jalarni style?”

“Two at once? I thought this was a test of
competence.”
I knew I should have kept quiet about the staff.

“Consider it an opportunity to prove yourself
exceptional.”

Tyrissa decided it would be best if she said
nothing more.

Fiers and Arveld both gave respectful nods then
broke from their line and moved to an open space near the center of the
training yard, their wooden swords already coated in dust and readied.

Tyrissa followed the example set by the other
recruits and went to the closest trough of black dust. She dipped both ends of
her staff into the clinging powder, spinning it to get a thick coating. She
could feel the build-up of extra eyes watching her.

Serik said Jalarni style. I might as well give
them a show
.

She stepped away from the trough and summoned as
much swagger as possible as she approached her opponents. At two paces away she
spun her staff overhead, creating a thin haze of black dust around her. Then
she snapped it down, striking one end to the packed dirt of the training yard
and birthing another cloud of excess black dust. Tyrissa dropped into a loose,
defensive stance and held there, studying the two men.

Her opponents made a mismatched pair. Fiers was
compact and dark haired while Arveld was just about Tyrissa’s height with a
hooked nose and the sandy brown hair that seemed common among the Khalans. The
first kept a neutral face through her display, but Tyrissa was sure she saw the
flicker of a smile from Arveld. The two slid into basic forms and rushed in to
attack without warning.

The first few deflections were trivial, simply
the two testing the waters. They struck in cooperation, but never in a rhythm,
and Tyrissa responded by flying through different stances. Her staff thrummed
with each impact, an echo of her rising adrenaline. These two were a step above
the caravan guards, honed by their profession and without the slightest hint of
not taking this seriously. Tyrissa took that as an unspoken compliment. After a
few more exchanges, Tyrissa could just barely stay ahead of them, making use of
wide sweeps to keep them back. She couldn’t go down so easily, not after
opening her mouth like that. Serik wanted her to prove her skill, but keeping
them both in front of her and deflecting their attacks was the best she could
do. Soon Tyrissa found herself constantly stepping back, circling.

She shouldn’t have even lasted this long. She
hadn’t been practicing
that
much.

With all this room, why fight in a little
circle?

Tyrissa cried out as she spun a wide arc, forcing
the two to jump back and giving her just enough space. She turned and ran
through another pair of trainee and tester, sliding through the layer of dirt
on the ground beneath their crossed blades.

Arveld and Fiers followed, barely missing a beat
even when she changed the tempo, splitting around the nearby pair of dueling
men who found themselves suddenly part of the terrain. It was enough of a
window. She jumped to her feet and charged at Arveld.
That
caught him by
surprise, forcing a quick, sloppy deflection and creating an opening. Tyrissa
hooked her staff behind his knee and sent him tumbling to the dirt. She spun
away to face Fiers and raised her staff to catch his attack. His wooden sword
crashed against the central metal band of her staff, sending sprays of black
dust into the air between them.

Weapons locked against each other, Fiers pressed
forward, turning her hasty block into a contest of strength, one Tyrissa knew
she’d never win. She heard the scrape of Arveld rising to his feet behind her
and felt her time to make a move slipping away.

“That’s enough,” Serik said, his voice cutting
through the sounds of a half dozen duels. Fiers pulled away, looking
disappointed but giving her an ever-so-slight nod of approval.

The trials continued through the morning, but the
subsequent rounds were closer to standard testing procedure, basic gauges of
fighting ability. After her little display, Tyrissa could sense a higher level
of respect from her assessors.

At the conclusion of the trials, Jesca approached
her with a welcoming smile after briefly conferring with Serik.

“It’s good thing my uncle called those two off
when he did,” Jesca said. “I was about to jump in and lend a hand.”

Uncle. Noted.

“You’ll have to wait a little while to get a
chance for that.”

“Well, at this point it’s safe welcome to
Kadrich’s Cadre. I’ll have a hand in much of your training and I hope you learn
quickly.”

“I don’t learn any other way,” Tyrissa said.

“Good. I’m glad to have you with us. We’ve been
on the lookout for more female recruits in recent months. There’s been an
increased demand of late, of our kind specifically.”

“The Thieves,” Tyrissa said. She knew next to
nothing, but threw it out there to try and impress.

“Right. If only they were just thieves, they’d be
less of a problem. They’ve started to dabbled in kidnappings lately, holding
wives and daughters of wealthier merchants for ransom. Some of our clients are
more comfortable with women as guards. Add to that the oncoming social season,
and the contracts are flooding in.”

“Social season?”

“It’s the most magickal time of the year, when
the ranks of the various guilds and foreign guests flood into the city for an
endless chain of parties, galas, and balls. We’re something of a new and unique
feather to put in their hats, even if hats themselves fell out of style a few
years ago.”

“So we’re a fashion statement?” It was hardly
what Tyrissa expected of a security guild descended from mercenaries.

Jesca smiled at that.

“This is Khalanheim, Tyrissa. We’re nothing if not fashionable.”

‘
No god or king but coin’
.

On the surface the Khalans stuck to their motto,
eschewing a formal nobility and religion. Anyone can rise and fall based on
their own wits, making and losing fortunes by their own actions, not thanks to
a ruler or reverence or birth. While there was no king there certainly were
kingdoms, as Tyrissa saw on her first real job with the Cadre. She was one of
four hired guards, a ‘band’ in the guild’s parlance and their charge was Astor
van Delmor. He was one such king, lacking a crown but with a monetary kingdom
all the same. He was a King of Food, a rotund man who clearly loved partaking
in the fruits of his rule. When they arrived at his modest mansion to escort
him to the Harvest Market he barely gave them a second glance, as though an
armed accompaniment was part of his normal day. Perhaps it was. To his credit,
he walked everywhere with a wide, swinging gait.

They made their way up Farmer’s Row, a street
that paralleled the Heartroad but was totally hidden from Tyrissa’s eyes on
that first trip into the city by the rambling blocks of row houses. Tyrissa
shrugged often in the red and white Cadre guild coat. It was cut for a man and
hastily found for her use while the Cadre waited on their next order of
tailored uniforms. It felt like she was playing dress up in her father’s
clothes, the sleeves too long, the shoulders too broad, and no amount of
cinching or tucking could remedy it.

The Harvest Market lined the street ahead and was
packed with throngs of buyers and suppliers perusing the fruits and grains of the
Khalan Federation’s vast farmlands. As they entered the chaotic din of the
market, Tyrissa kept a mantra of everything the Cadre’s training tried to cram
into her head over the last two weeks. The density of the market should have
amazed her, but failed to do so. She could still measure her time in Khalanheim
in days, yet already her view of this crowded market was shifted from wide-eyed
wonder to narrowed-eyed suspicion.

Watch the crowd, not the client.

The crowds were thick with women in sturdy and
colorful dresses out to restock their family’s stores. Dotted between were
merchants in their finer silks or bright cotton guild coats, seeking larger
amounts for their employers or a new supplier deal. Sun-bronzed farm workers
pushed carts through the crowds or hawked their produce from the hundreds of
stalls and storefronts.

Van Delmor visited each stall bearing the crest
of Khalan Northwest: a green circle with the upper left quadrant painted gold,
usually with a wheat stalk curling through the green. Tyrissa’s time in
Khalanheim was an immersion lesson in the ins and outs of the guild system, of
the interplay and unsaid rankings of the Minors, Majors, and Primes, and their
kaleidoscopic variety of crests and logos. It was like learning a second
language, the city’s symbolic shorthand. The King of Food had no real agenda
today, this visit to the market was merely an extended, distributed social call
to the hands and backs that filled his bank accounts and built one pillar of
Khalan Northwest’s business. He buzzed like a honeybee from stall to storefront
to cart-pushing youth, chatting briefly with whomever stood behind the counter,
occasionally taking a sample without payment or complaint. He ate as he walked,
his four guards keeping a tight perimeter around their portly charge, a white
and red ring drifting through a green and gold sea.

Eyes betray intent.

Tyrissa could see no such intent today. One thing
the training hammered into her head was the recent growth of paranoia among
Khalanheim’s wealthy. They were spooked by the sudden boldness of the resurgent
Thieves and would pay for the comfort and security of firms like Kadrich’s
Cadre. But today, in the shifting masses of the Harvest Market, no one paid
them any undue attention.

“Master van Delmor,” said a gruff voice from one
stall bearing the guild badge, “A word?”

Five sets of eyes went to a farmer standing
behind a table densely packed with fresh greens. He had a grievance to air upon
van Delmor, nothing more. The King listened with periodic and polite
jowl-wobbling nods. Tyrissa kept her eyes on the market crowds as they passed
through a nearby square. The center of the square was decorated with an aged
stone fountain composed of stacked bushels of wheat, streams of water arcing
out from the center of each bushel. A fire juggler in the middle of her routine
stood at the pool’s rim.

Judge distractions benign or malicious.

The juggler was a waif of a girl, about Tyrissa’s
age with the thin figure and shabby clothes of a life lived on the streets.
Despite that, her motions had the graceful and wild elegance of a burning
torch. Five pins spun through the air, the ends all wreathed in fire. She had a
modest group on onlookers and Tyrissa had to admit it was impressive, the
rhythm of her hands catching the safe ends of the pins an enchanting sight. At
her feet was torch held by a tripod, its tall and narrow flame leaping at her
hands. Next to that sat a black hat, set upside down to receive donations. A
metal tub filled with water completed the set.

Rhythm. Every time the juggler caught a pin,
Tyrissa could feel an ever-so-slight tug at the center of her chest, like her
heartbeats were urging her forward. Her mind raced back to the firekin attack
on the caravan. She had felt the same faint attraction towards the magick
fueled creatures. Then she noticed that the juggler bore no burns on her hands.
Everyone made mistakes, and in her profession mistakes left their mark. That
is, unless you had an alternate understanding with fire. The girl was
Pactbound.

Tyrissa forced her attention back to the shifting
crowds, ignoring the steady internal beat as the juggler worked her magick with
each catch. Soon Van Delmor resumed his walk with a barely-there frown, leaving
with the farmer placated but without a donation to nibble on. He paused in the
middle of the street, and then approached the juggler, the show catching his
eye.

The beats grew stronger as they drew closer and
Tyrissa felt that tell-tale chill grow in her fingertips and settle into her
bones, a faint mirror of what she felt in the Vordeum Wastes. The juggler’s
brow furrowed and the beats got stronger, the torch rising in intensity, the
flames leaping higher to lick at her hands. Her once flowing movements started
to waver and her eyes darted around the assembled crowd. She met Tyrissa’s gaze
and all color drained from her face.

She knows I’m causing it. It must be a
disruption, as well as a general sense of magick.

Her dismantling of that flamekin in the wastes
was proof enough of that, but this was a second confirmation.

One of the pins fell to the paving stones,
sending the closest audience members jumping away. The juggler played it off by
letting the remaining four pins fall into the water tub in a series of hissing
splashes. The subsequent bow brought scattered applause, though her eyes never
left Tyrissa for long.

Van Delmor dropped a single gilder into the
juggler’s hat and said to his retinue, “I’ve done enough for today. Let’s
return.” As Tyrissa turned away to follow her charge back down Farmer’s Row,
she gave the juggler a faint smile. It was meant to be friendly, reassuring,
but instead the juggler froze in terror and remained nearly motionless until
Tyrissa lost sight of her among the crowds of the market.

Tyrissa studied the icy sensation in her hand as they
exited the Harvest Market for sparser side streets on their way back to the
Guildhall district. The chill only reached the wrist of her left hand. She
flexed her fingers, noting how she felt cold only internally, as if the chill
held a latent power that begged to be used. She
wanted
to use it. That,
along with the naked fear the juggler showed, left her unsettled.

She had let herself get caught up in a whirlwind
of integrating into the city and training with the Cadre, allowing her focus to
drift away from her real reason for being in Khalanheim: to figure out her
Pact, find the so-called Pact Witch, and perhaps find a way out. Aside from a
few visits to the library, she’d accomplished nothing toward that end. If
anything, as she focused on the raw elemental cold in her fist, on that feeling
of potential power, Tyrissa couldn’t say what she actually wanted anymore.