The Swordsman's Oath Read online

  “If you need any help, any advice, any introductions, don’t hesitate to ask.” He moved a little closer. “Do you have a lodging organized?”

  “Thank you, but I’m sure my uncle will see to everything.”

  Temar’s gaze followed her gesture and saw Den Fellaemion’s narrow back, an arm pointing emphatically to something in a sack.

  “The Messire is your uncle?”

  “His late wife was my father’s sister.” Guinalle untied her cloak to replace her knife, its plain sheath on a girdle of gold chain, complete with jewelled pomander, silver mesh purse, several keys and a chased silver note case. Her dove-gray dress, though plainly styled, was of unimpeachable cloth.

  “I didn’t realize.” Temar hurriedly tried to remember what he knew of Den Fellaemion’s family. His wife had been a daughter of For Priminale, hadn’t she? Even from a cadet line of the House, this demure girl could claim precedence over half the nobles at a Convocation, if she was so minded.

  Temar stood and made a formal reverence. “I must be about my business, but I am at your service, should you require me.”

  Guinalle looked up at him, squinting slightly into the sun.

  “Thank you, Esquire,” she said gravely, but Temar had an uncomfortable feeling a smile was hiding behind those full lips.

  He walked briskly back along the quay, growing busy again as people hurried to complete their tasks. There was an air of expectation now. The moons would soon be sending a double tide to speed them on their quest and the ships had to be ready to reach the unknown lands with as much summer as possible left to them.

  “Temar!”

  “Not now, Vahil.” Temar’s step did not falter as he continued on his way.

  “Oh, come on, let’s find a drink.” Vahil matched Temar’s stride and looked around with lively interest. “These inns must have done more trade since Equinox than they’ve had in the last generation,” he observed with a laugh. “So, what are the bawdy-houses like? Where does a fisherman go to plant his anchor around here?”

  “I’d stay well clear, if I were you,” advised Temar, his expression serious. “You’ll end up with a dose of the itch or crotch lice the size of blackbeetles.”

  “You’re not serious?” Vahil’s square jaw fell slightly, his hazel eyes dismayed.

  “No, I’m not.” Temar shook his head with a grin. “I’ve no idea what the brothels are like; I’ve not been looking for whores.”

  “Plenty of girls looking to start their adventures before they set sail?”

  “I wouldn’t advise that either; it’ll only lead to inappropriate expectations or misunderstandings.” Temar kept any tremor out of his voice but was glad Vahil kept looking in the other direction until he felt the faint wash of color ebb from his face.

  “What’s a man to do for excitement then?” Vahil turned and his expression of broad good humor faded a little. “The road’s too bad to get to the Gulf side of the city and back in an evening, and Mother will raise three kinds of riot if I stay out all night.”

  He stared back up the long slope where a tree-lined track wound up to the low saddle of land that broke the line of mountains marching down to the Cape of Winds. Temar looked too; tempted by the thought of a night sampling the entertainments offered by the larger part of the town on the far side of the isthmus.

  “I only came over to bring Mother a message from Elsire and now Father’s saying I should stay until we sail.” Vahil was grumbling, but Temar’s thoughts had already moved on.

  “Someone’ll have to do something about making up that roadway when the colony really takes off,” he said slowly. “Hauling sleds full of fish up gravel is all very well, but we’ll really need a decent footing for carts and mules, proper cobbles at very least.”

  “Saedrin save me, you really are taking this seriously!” Vahil laughed in disbelief.

  “It wouldn’t hurt you to do the same,” replied Temar, nettled. “This colony’s going to be the future of your House, isn’t it?”

  “Oh, my father takes care of all that,” Vahil said airily. “Come on, let’s get a drink, there must be a game of runes going somewhere.”

  He draped a long arm around Temar’s shoulders, who shook it off in sudden irritation.

  “I’ve got work to do; I’m the only one there is, since Saedrin saw fit to find his keys for my father and uncles.”

  Vahil stood dismayed, contrition in his rough-skinned face. “I’m sorry, singing out of tune again, you know me. All right then, what can I do to help?”

  “Pick up that bale?” Temar suggested with a suspicion of malice.

  Vahil’s brows rose as he hefted the weight awkwardly on to one shoulder and followed Temar down the quayside.

  “Put it in the forehold.” Temar pulled out his lists and began giving concise instructions to the men who were drifting back from their break. Vahil looked at him for a long moment, shrugged, shed his precisely cut and satin-trimmed jerkin and joined the line of porters moving the stacks of cargo steadily on to the vessels.

  “I’ll want you as a witness,” he warned Temar after a while, taking a pause to wipe sweat from his blunt-featured face. “You’re to swear to my parents that I put in a day’s honest work, vows to Misaen and everything, if necessary.”

  “Half a day, if you see it through,” Temar corrected him with a wicked grin.

  “I see I should have got involved in this sooner,” Vahil shouted back as he lifted one of the dwindling number of bundles on the cobbles, “then I could be the one sitting there chewing my pen-holder.”

  “Get on with it, or I’ll dock your pay.” Temar waved his list in a fine gesture of dismissiveness.

  This sort of by-play kept the other workers amused and Temar was pleased to see the day’s cargo loaded and securely stowed before the sun started sinking into the mountains that dipped down to the isthmus before rising again to form the savage cliffs and reefs around the Cape of Winds.

  “You can’t say I haven’t earned a drink now?” Vahil looked ruefully at his reddened hands as Temar dismissed the dockers with thanks and instructions for the morning.

  “I’ll buy,” nodded Temar.

  Vahil slung his jerkin over one shoulder and they made their way to an ale-house. “I am interested in this colony idea, you know,” he said abruptly. “The Empire needs something like this, to give people hope, something positive to work for and to build upon, now that our respected Emperor, Nemith the Witless, has managed to lose us the provinces. My father says the land out there is good for crops and stock, there are metals and even gems to be had, everything we need. That’s where our future’s going to be, Temar, and it’s going to be more than we could ever imagine, I’d lay coin on it.”

  “With your luck at wagers lately, that’s not much encouragement.” Temar pushed a mug across the sticky table-top.

  “Do I hear the mule criticizing the ass for his ears?” Vahil raised his thick eyebrows. “Remind me, just how much was it you lost in that brothel game last time we went to Toremal together?”

  Temar’s reply was lost as Vahil turned to a messenger who tapped him on the shoulder.

  “You are expected to dine with your parents, Esquire and the D’Alsennin too.” The lackey nodded a quick reverence to Temar.

  “Dast’s teeth, that’s what I came to tell you. I clean forgot, we were having such a lovely time hauling your sacks around for you.” Vahil hastily drained his tankard and stood, wrenching his jerkin on with a nasty sound of snapping stitches. “Come on, I think we’ve got a guest coming, niece of Den Fellaemion’s or something.”

  “You really are hopeless, you know that!” Temar fumbled in his belt-pouch for his hair clasp as they hurried through the town after the servant. He tugged at his jerkin to try and lose some of the creases and folded back the cuffs of his shirt to hide the worst of the grime.

  “Vahil!” Messire Den Rannion was waiting on the step of the modest house he was renting, displeasure plain on his usually genial face.
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  “I was helping Temar with loading his cargo.” Vahil was unabashed. “It’s a marvelous way to work up an appetite! Just let me have a quick wash and we’ll be right down.”

  “Lend Temar a clean shirt!” his father shouted up the stairs.

  “Take your time, dear.” Maitresse Den Rannion’s placid voice followed them. “It’s all right, Ancel,” she reassured her husband. “I allowed time for them to be late when I gave Cook the menu.”

  It never ceased to amaze Temar that someone as persistently disorganized as Vahil could be born of two such efficient and capable parents. He grabbed the ewer and took possession of the washstand with scant apology.

  “Find some clean linen, will you?” he demanded.

  “Yes, Messire, at once, Messire, anything else Messire?” Vahil pulled open a drawer and tossed a couple of shirts onto the bed.

  Temar shivered, bare-chested as he reached for one of them. He pulled it on and grimaced at his reflection in the inadequate glass; he’d have to wear his work-soiled jerkin to hide the fact the shirt was both too short in the body and too wide in the shoulder. At least it was clean and, with luck, the quality would be more noticeable than the fit.

  “Come on.”

  Vahil was sorting through a tray of oddments with unhurried good humor. “Just a moment, where did I put the cursed thing? Ah!” He pulled a scrap of leather thong out of his hair and snapped a rather florid gold clasp into his wiry, chestnut locks. “The perfect gentleman!”

  Temar smiled, shaking his head. Vahil took great pleasure in assailing the heights of fashion, unbothered by his incongruous stoutness or the pockmarks pitting his cheerful face.

  A bell rang and they hurried downstairs to find Messire Den Rannion enjoying a quiet glass of wine by the fireside with his guest.

  “This is Guinalle, Demoiselle For Priminal.” He rose and bowed to her, Temar and Vahil doing the same with the instincts borne of childhood training. Guinalle answered with an elegant curtsey, spreading her flame-colored skirts in a rustle of silk.

  “I gather you have already met, D’Alsennin?” Den Rannion passed Temar a fine glass goblet of richly fragrant red wine.

  “We have.” Temar was heartened to see a friendly answering smile oh Guinalle’s face.

  “I don’t see much point in Imperial ceremony when we’re eating in the parlor; do sit yourselves down.” Maitresse Den Rannion swept in ahead of several servants with laden trays; for all her claims to informality, she was splendid in a full-skirted sapphire gown, silver combs glinting in an immaculate coiffure.

  “Demoiselle.”

  Temar watched with some irritation as Vahil managed to offer his arm first and escort Guinalle to a seat at a comfortable distance from the hearth. Temar took the chair across from her, despite the warmth of the fire on his back.

  “So, my dear, you are recently arrived from Sarrat, I hear?” The Maitresse’s eyes were wide in her plump, powdered face.

  “Two days since.” Guinalle smiled politely as she reached for a dish of spiced beans and served herself a modest portion.

  Temar passed her a plate of cheeses lightly fried in herbs and noted that the table bore an unusually wide choice of meatless delicacies. The Maitresse had always enjoyed a reputation among other women for being remarkably well informed, although at the cost of being dismissed as an inveterate gossip by men such as his grandfather.

  “Your uncle and I are extremely grateful that you agreed to leave your studies and join us.” Messire Den Rannion regarded a glazed onion tartlet with some suspicion and took a slice of bloody beef instead. “We are sorely in need of expertise in the higher techniques of Artifice.”

  Temar managed not to drop the plate of baked beets he was trying to offer Guinalle but it was a close run thing. He cleared his throat and tried not to stare at her as he took a drink of water.

  “I thought you’d said you had plenty of message-takers and the like?” Vahil commented as he skewered a couple of slices of peppered lamb with his knife point.

  “Indeed?” Guinalle’s attention sharpened slightly. “What manner of people are they, Messire?”

  “Oh, mainly clerks, stewards and the like, people with sufficient instruction to send messages to another trained mind, but little beyond that.” Messire began pouring everyone more wine. “Many of them have been displaced as the Empire draws in and, frankly, there is less need for such accomplishments these days.”

  “Just how far can one send a message using Artifice?” Vahil looked expectantly at Guinalle.

  “As yet we have discovered no limit in terms of distance,” replied Guinalle easily. “The attainments of the practitioner are what determine how far and with what clarity he or she can reach another’s mind.”

  “We will have people with the expertise to send messages across the ocean, won’t we?” A faint shadow of concern flickered in the Maitresse’s eyes as she looked to her husband. “We shan’t be cut off from home? That’s what you told me, Ancel.”

  “That is one thing that my uncle has requested I ascertain.” Guinalle smiled with serene confidence as she reached for a tray of stuffed apples.

  Temar passed her a bowl of onion sauce. “You’re not actually joining the colony, then?” Of course, it would be stupid to expect such a well-connected and evidently well-educated girl to give up all her advantages.

  “Oh, I am,” Guinalle assured him. “It’s a tremendous opportunity for me.”

  “How so?” Vahil looked intrigued.

  Guinalle wiped her fingers on her napkin before continuing. “These days, Artifice is mainly used to send messages, to find those lost or absconded, for truth-saying in the Justiciary, things like that. All of this is essential work and in recent generations has been vital in maintaining the Empire. Don’t think I don’t value those trained in such skills, I do, but there are far more uses of Artifice that we simply have no need for in the present day. Joining your colony should give me opportunities to test their efficacy.”

  Temar got the impression this was a speech she had given before.

  “What sort of thing are you talking about?” Vahil leaned his elbows on the table, intrigued, waving away his mother’s offer of a portion of chicken.

  “Well, for instance, there are ways to understand the speech of people who don’t know your tongue; how are we to try those when everyone this side of Solura speaks Formalin? Even the Forest Folk and Mountain Men use it as the language of commerce and learning these days.”

  “There has been no trace of people living in Kel Ar’Ayen, the land across the Ocean.” Messire Den Rannion looked up from his plate, faint concern in his eyes.

  Guinalle smiled demurely. “That’s merely one example. Would you find it useful if I could tell you exactly where game was hiding in a thicket? If we find predators there, wolves and the like, would you like me to hide your trail from them, set wards to keep them clear of your stock?”

  “You could do that?” Temar began to feel Vahil was overdoing the keen interest just a little.

  “Talagrin granting,” Guinalle nodded confidently. “There are ways to request that Saedrin open the way between the worlds and to travel from place to place or to move goods, covering many leagues in little more than a breath. One can request Maewelin to quit her rights of decay in food, to purify water, to hasten the rotting of waste to put fresh heart into soil. The correct incantations to Ostrin can staunch mortal wounds or fell a beast painlessly in its stall for the butcher. Drianon’s care can keep women from conceiving and then ease them into child-bed at the time of their choosing; Larasion’s mercies will keep frost from tender crops or send rain in time of drought. Artifice gives us the means to call upon such bounties.”

  She looked at the awed faces around the table and Temar saw a faint blush on her cheekbones as she helped herself to some salt.

  “I had no idea.” Maitresse was plainly astounded, social graces notwithstanding.

  “These days medicine and good husbandry mean we have practi
cal remedies for such things,” shrugged Guinalle. “In many ways that is preferable.”

  “And anyone can learn how to do these things you mention?” Vahil was gaping, his meal forgotten.

  “Misaen marks some folk for his own, for some reason, and they cannot; but most people can learn the lesser tricks of Artifice, if they care to.” There was a serious undercurrent to Guinalle’s light tone. “It is a question of scholarship, of applying oneself. The demands become greater the more complex the tasks that are undertaken and so, inevitably, fewer people find they have the mental aptitude for such rigorous study.”

  “But you do.” Temar looked at her, wondering if she ever stepped down from the lofty heights of such learning to tread a measure in everyday dances.

  “I have found so.” There was appropriate modesty in Guinalle’s reply but no hint of apology. Her eyes met Temar’s across the candles with a hint of a challenge.

  He smiled at her, sufficiently intrigued not to be daunted by her talents or her relations. “I think you will be a valuable addition to our expedition, as well as one of its leading ornaments.” He raised his glass gallantly.

  “You’d better not let my sister hear you saying that!” Vahil laughed robustly. “Elsire’s determined she’s going to be the leader of beauty and fashion; I reckon it’s the only reason she’s coming, to get away from the competition at court.”

  “Never mind that,” Maitresse Den Rannion looked around the table. “If everyone’s served, let us eat.”

  The House of Mellitha Esterlin,

  Relshaz, 28th of Aft-Spring

  It must have been the touch of salt in the air, muddy though it was; I realized I had been dreaming of home when a servant’s discreet knock woke me the following morning. It was a strange dream, though; something felt not quite right about the city, but as I opened my eyes the thought evaporated. I smiled as I shaved at an elegant marble washstand; my father would certainly be impressed with the quality of Relshazri stonecutting, for all that the city was largely built on little better than a mire.