Magi'i of Cyador (23 page)

There are three lancers laid out in the infirmary bunks, lying in the alternate bunks on the south side. Lorn's eyes flick to the first man, almost sprawled on his back, his undertunic half ripped away from his chest. With each intermittent breath, the lancer gurgles, then shudders. His eyes are wide open, seeing nothing. The captain can sense the whitish red of chaos that envelops the man, chaos so raw and pervasive that Lorn knows the man will die within the day.

Slowly, Lorn walks past the dying man and an empty pallet to the third bed, where a stocky blond lancer is propped up with horsehair pillows, covered with a faded gray cotton cloth.

"Ser?" asks the lancer, who wears a wood and leather brace around his lower left leg.

"I wanted to see how you're doing, Eltak." Lorn offers a smile.

"Be all right, ser."

"I'm sure you will be." Lorn nods and leans forward, his fingers touching the brace. "It's not causing a sore, is it?"

"No, ser."

Lorn has to struggle to summon the smallest bit of dark order, so opposed to the flow of chaos, to squeeze away the clump of red chaos that lingers where the broken bones meet. He keeps smiling as he straightens. While the bone is set, and healing, and Eltak will recover, he will limp. "You'll be riding again in a season."

"Thought so, ser."

Lorn nods and moves past another empty pallet to the third lancer, where he stops. An angular young man with wiry black hair lies propped up with pillows, a dressing across his right shoulder. Lorn has to search his memory for the man's name, although the lancer is in Shofirg's squad. After a moment, Lorn asks, "How are you feeling, Stynnet?"

"Felt better, ser, and I'd feel even better iffn they'd let me go."

Lorn can sense the points of red chaos beneath the stitches and the dressing. While they are small, without a healer, they will grow until Stynnet will be dying like the older lancer in the first bed.

"You're not as well as you feel, lancer," Lorn says gently. "Close your eyes. Keep them closed until I tell you to open them."

"Ser?" Stynnet's forehead crinkles. His mouth opens as if to protest.

"If you want..." Lorn stops and fixes his eyes on Stynnet. "Lancer... don't argue. Just do it."

Stynnet swallows. "Yes, ser." He closes his eyes.

Lorn lets the tips of the fingers of his left hand rest lightly on Stynnet's skin just above the top edge of the dressing. Trying to call up what little he has learned from Myryan and Jerial, Lorn tries to let the black mist of order-the order-death of chaos, but a necessary one here-around the points of wound chaos he can sense, one point after another, until they vanish. They may return, but Stynnet's own chaos-order balance can cope by then-Lorn hopes. He straightens and takes a slow breath, not showing the momentary dizziness that swirls around and through him.

Stynnet's eyes are still closed.

"You can open your eyes, lancer."

"Ser... felt funny... what did you do?"

"Just offered some good thoughts...." Lorn feels as though his smile is lopsided. "We want you back riding."

"Ser...?"

"Yes?" Lorn waits, a more easy smile upon his lips.

"Nothing, ser." Stynnet does not conceal a slight frown.

"You'll be fine, Stynnet." Lorn nods and turns. He still has to break the news to Dielbyn about the lancers of the Second Company being attached to the Fifth. Then, he will ensure that the promised lances are indeed charged and ready-perhaps slightly more charged than Brevyl anticipates. How much of that he can do he is far from certain, and it will entail another splitting headache-in more ways than one.

Once more... he must balance what he can do with what he would choose to do. And without overtly revealing any more than he must to survive.

XXXIX

The harvest sun is barely peering above the eastern wall of the outpost at Isahl when Lorn slips silently through the time-stained white oak door and into the north barracks for another one of his unannounced inspections before a patrol.

He can hear voices from the bunks past the columns on his right which separate the marshalling area from the bunking spaces of the company's two squads. A slender brown-haired lancer walks past the columns barefooted, on his way to the jakes, Lorn suspects.

The lancer's head jerks up. "Ser?"

"Quiet, Yubner," Lorn murmurs, putting his index finger to his lips.

Yubner swallows.

Lorn smiles and motions for him to continue.

With a look back over his shoulder, Yubner hurries away, his bare feet slapping on the cool stone tiles of the barracks floor.

Lorn eases toward the square granite columns, listening as he does, recognizing the rough-edged voice.

"...don't know what he did... don't care... they didn't think I was going to walk out of there. Gwinnt died. Eltak and I didn't...."

"Maybe he's a black one...." The words choked off, as if they had been stopped by Stynnet's angular hand around the other lancer's neck.

Lorn has to strain to make out the words hissed by Stynnet. "You say one word... and you'll end up with a lance in your back... I was dead... didn't know it... don't care if he's the head of the Black Angels... first one in line and stands behind his men... angel-damned few officers do... you hear me?"

"Ulp... hear you..."

Lorn steps back toward the barracks door, where he turns and waits for Yubner to return, or for another lancer.

Yubner returns before another lancer appears, walking far more cautiously, eyes surveying the open marshalling space between the two ends of the barracks. The south end is empty, since the Fourth Company had left on patrol the day before. Yubner glances apprehensively at his captain, but does not speak.

Lorn steps toward Yubner. "You can announce me, Yubner. Make it loud."

"Yes, ser." Yubner squares his shoulders. "Captain in the barracks! Captain in the barracks."

Boots scuffle. Several wooden foot chests shut, and the murmurs of various conversations die away as Lorn steps past the pillars. His voice is not loud, but carries. "Let's take a look at the gear you'll be using today."

Lancers stand beside their foot chests, waiting.

The barracks are standard. Each lancer has a pallet bunk, the head to the brick wall, the foot to the center, with the wooden uniform chest flush against the food of the bed. On the wall beside each bunk are three pegs- one for the winter jacket, one for the uniform of the day, and one for the lancer's garrison cap. Each bunk set opposite another and is separated from those that flank it by six cubits. A single narrow window also separates each bunk from the next. The aisle between the foot chests is six cubits. A single narrow window also separates each bunk from the next. The aisle between the foot chests is six cubits. The first squad bunks on the east wall, the second on the west wall.

At the third bunk on his left, Lorn pauses, sensing as much as seeing a spot on the hilt of a sabre. "Westy... show me the blade, if you would?"

"Yes, ser." The lancer swallows, but complies and lays the bare sabre out for Lorn to check.

Lorn studies the cupridium blade. "You're not getting it clean under the guard."

"Yes, ser."

The captain nods and continues down the aisle. At times, he barely glances at a lancer's pallet or gear. At other times, he stops.

"Would you open the foot chest, Sherzak?"

"Ah... yes, ser." The muscular lancer flushes, but lifts the top, to reveal uniform tunics neatly folded.

"And the tunics, too, if you would."

Under the trousers beneath the tunics are three bottles of Alafraan. Sherzak looks impassively at his captain.

"I could break them and have you clean up the mess," Lorn says mildly. "Or I could make you scout alone on patrol today." Lorn pauses, but not long enough for the lancer to speak. "But anything like that would hurt the Company and waste good wine. Take those to Kielt-right now- and tell him that I said they're to go in the strong room, along with other personal valuables, until you have furlough. It is valuable." Lorn's smile is wintry. "There won't be a next time, Sherzak. Is that clear?"

"Yes, ser."

Lorn nods and continues down the center of the barracks, then halts opposite a foot chest. "If you would open the chest, Skyr?"

"Yes, ser."

A muffled snicker comes from somewhere at the lancer's resigned tone, but Skyr lifts the lid.

"At the bottom... in the rear."

Skyr removes all the tunics and trousers and smallclothes. A slightly more curved sabre, another antique Brystan sabre, lies there in a worn dark brown scabbard.

Lorn lifts his eyebrows.

"Wanted a trophy, ser. I'm sorry, ser."

Lorn smiles, not unpleasantly. "Just turn it in to Kielt. After patrol. Less questions that way." He still wonders how the barbarians had obtained Brystan sabres, especially ones relatively new, like his, although the style of Lorn's is antique, as is that of the one picked up by Skyr.

"Yes, ser!"

Lorn stops one more time, at the next-to-last bunk on the right side, where he addresses a stocky red-haired lancer.

"Teikyl, have those boots resoled after this patrol, and tell the bootmaker to use the thicker leather this time. Tell him that I said that."

"Yes, ser."

Lorn nods and checks the last two bunks. When he is finished, he turns and walks slowly back up the center space between the bunks, his eyes meeting those of each lancer once more as he passes. He stops and turns just short of the pillars that form the barrier separating Fifth Company's space from the marshalling area. "You and your gear look good. Carry on."

Then he continues past the pillars and turns toward the door to the courtyard.

"...never know when he'll show up..."

"...just knows..."

Lorn pauses, as if to check the pointing on the bricks beside the doorway, letting his chaos senses try to pick up what Stynnet is saying to Yubner.

"...he hear... ?"

"...don't know... got that smile... told me to announce him...."

Lorn steps through the doorway and into the faintly orange light of dawn.

Fifth Company has another patrol to ride, one that Lorn hopes will be uneventful, even as he prepares for it to be otherwise.

XL

Lorn steps into the study in the square tower and glances toward the outpost commander. The darkness under the Majer's eyes is obvious for the first time Lorn can recall. Brevyl's face is almost gaunt, and his short bushy hair is thinner. The faintest hint of raspiness edges his voice as he gestures. "Take a seat, Captain." He lifts a scroll slightly, then sets it on the table-desk.

Lorn nods and settles into the armless wooden chair, his own eyes remaining on the white-haired majer.

"You're being ordered to the main outpost at Geliendra, Captain Lorn. You will command a company whose duty is to guard the ward-wall and to protect the Mirror Engineers. After home leave in Cyad." Brevyl snorts, lifting the order scroll from the desk again, before dropping it on the polished wood. His eyes flick to the doorway, as if to ensure that the white oak door is securely closed. "Stupid orders. Waste of training."

There is little Lorn can say. He says nothing, waiting for the majer's next words.

"I didn't like you, Captain, when you came here as a green undercaptain. Well... you're as good a captain as I've got, better than most I'll ever get, and I still don't like you." The majer leans forward. "That doesn't matter. I respect you. You work hard. Lancers all want to serve under you, and they follow your orders to the word. You kill more barbarians and lose fewer men than any officer I have. I have to respect all that. I don't have to like you."

Lorn nods slightly.

"You know that most of the senior officers in Cyad don't like Magi'i - trained lancer officers. Neither do the Magi'i. And they like the good ones even less. In a word, they're afraid of you. They have been afraid of men like you for the past four generations, ever since Alyiakal made himself emperor. They don't want it to happen again." Brevyl snorts. "It couldn't happen now, but they don't see that. If it did, it wouldn't last because the chaos towers won't last that much longer. What earthly good would a magus-born Emperor be without the chaos powers of the towers?"

The majer studies Lorn, then continues. "You didn't blink an eye at what I said. You knew all that before you came here. You said it didn't matter that they were twisting a splintered staff up your rectum. I've heard that before from others. All words." Brevyl leans back. "You believed those words, and you went out to learn how to kill barbarians and lead your men... and save them."

"Yes, ser. I tried."

Brevyl brushes away Lorn's words with his left hand. "So... now they'll send you to Geliendra, and if you're not careful, one night a stun lizard or a big cat will appear, and you'll disappear. No one will see the creature of the Accursed Forest, but you'll be gone." Brevyl's smile is harsh. "I don't like you, but sending you to Geliendra is a waste of a good captain when I don't get many. They'd rather see half of Cyador fall to the barbarians than risk another emperor like Alyiakal. They forget he was the best emperor in a century. All they recall is that he was a magus-born lancer." The majer laughs once more. "He was an emperor who didn't bow and scrape to the Magi'i... or ask the price of everything from his oh - so - dear - and - valued merchanter advisors."

Lorn has not heard more than offhand references by his father to the origins of the mighty Alyiakal, references that had prompted covert research in his sire's books. He waits, sensing that Brevyl has indeed told the truth in all of what he has said. Lorn hopes the majer may add more.

"That's all, Captain." Brevyl stands and extends the scroll. "You can leave tomorrow, or the day after, at your choice. You're off patrols, right now."

Lorn stands quickly, gracefully, and takes the scroll. He bows his head. "Yes, ser. Thank you for everything, ser."

"And, Captain?"

"Ser?"

"I never said anything except to give you your orders and wish you well with Majer Maran. He's very good at what he does."

"Yes, ser." Lorn bows again. "Yes, ser."