Oath of Fealty (23 page)

“And no wonder,” Valthan said. In the barton, steam rose from the sweaty yeomen who had been drilling furiously—formation drills, Dorrin noticed; some were rubbing bruises from the hauks. “When it pleases you, Marshal, I’m ready to take my turn.”

Berris chuckled. “And they’re ready for a breather, I daresay. So am I, though. I daresay this lady, Falkian though she be, will not mind a few touches with you—”

“She traveled all day, Marshal; I believe her fatigued, as I am not.”

Berris glanced at Dorrin. “My apologies, then. Perhaps—”

“I’ve had food and a rest, Marshal,” Dorrin said. “I would be pleased to cross blades with Sir Valthan, though not to his hurt. I understand that your rules do not require blood be drawn?”

“No, certainly not. And should you prefer another mode of combat, you have only to ask. We will be glad to observe two knights of different traditions—”

“And one non-knightly tradition,” Dorrin said. “As you know, Marshal—and many of you may as well—” She looked around at the interested faces. “I was one of Duke Phelan’s—now King Falkieri’s—captains when he was a mercenary.”

“Good,” Berris said. “We shall move into the grange itself, where others are now studying Girdish lore, who tranferred from Falkian fields along the border.”

Inside the grange, Dorrin and Valthan moved to the platform; those who had been outside crowded in, and those who had been
studying moved to the sides. Dorrin had watched the ritual exchange of blows many times and had practiced so many times in front of troops that she had no concern at all except for wondering if Valthan would start with a standard opening or one of his own. She intended to follow his lead; she was sure she could take him in real combat, but she needed him as an ally.

“I’m wearing mail,” she said to the Marshal. “I was traveling and haven’t yet changed.”

“I also,” Valthan said. “It’s fine with me, if it is with you.”

“Perhaps you should go to the training swords,” Marshal Berris said. “No sense risking a nick on a quality blade, just for the exchange.”

Dorrin nodded and, seeing no stand, took off belt and sword together, hanging them on one of the hooks on the wall nearby. Valthan did the same. The Marshal handed them wooden training swords, which had only simple crossguards.

“Knucklebusters,” Dorrin said, grinning. Valthan grimaced, but ended in a grin. She jumped lightly onto the platform and walked back and forth, imprinting its dimensions in her mind; Valthan did the same. Then, from opposite corners, they waited the Marshal’s signal, and when it came, began a slow spiral toward each other.

Valthan held the training blade a little loosely, as he would have a dueling blade, where the play of fingers had more effect. Dorrin, equally skilled with duelers’ weapons, battle swords, and short swords, wondered if it was a feint. The sword he’d been wearing had a scabbard as broad as hers. She feinted; his response was so quick, she grinned as she parried, the clack of the wooden blades loud in the breathless silence. He tried a second thrust, just off where it should have been, and she made a parry that trapped his blade long enough to drive a thrust to his shoulder. A touch, no more than necessary, but he dipped his head, acknowledging. An honest dueler, then. Not all were.

He switched hands suddenly, and with a diagonal pace attempted her unprotected side; Dorrin spun with his move, instinct taking over, and the strong inner third of her blade met the outer third of his—strong against weak—with enough force to take it from his hand and send it clattering across the platform to land in someone’s hands a length away.

Valthan stared at her, empty-handed and wide-eyed, for a moment. She forced herself to stillness, backed a step, and bowed. “My pardon, Sir Valthan,” she said. “Enemies have made that switch before, and I forgot this was a ritual exchange. I struck harder than I should have.”

“How did you do that?” he asked, still staring as if she’d turned into a wildcat. Or a wicked mageborn.

“I would be glad to show you in slow practice,” she said. “It’s a very useful stroke, but only against that particular attack. If the Marshal permits?”

Marshal Berris seemed as awestruck as Valthan. “Please,” he said. “I was taught how to face an other-handed fencer, but only quick retreat and regroup if someone switched hands.”

“Let’s have that blade,” Dorrin said, as if the fellow holding Valthan’s wooden blade were one of her own cohort, and he handed it back, hilt-first, very politely. She checked the tip. “I’m sorry, Marshal—I cracked this blade. You’ll have to get another. I’ll be glad to pay—”

“No, no … these are practice blades; they break; it’s their nature. Here—Sir Valthan, do you wish to be the demonstration model, or shall I?”

“I,” Valthan said, reaching for the replacement blade. “I’ve never had someone disarm me with that move; I want to see how it was done.”

“Very slowly, so they can see,” Dorrin said. “Do exactly what you did. Do you have a count for it? If so, call it out.”

He complied. The feint before the switch, one and two; the change of hands, three and four, but his foot was already moving in the diagonal step.

“If I had stood still,” Dorrin said, standing still, “he would have had an excellent draw cut here …” As he moved past her, she allowed the cut, fore and aft. “That’s how it’s supposed to work. Now, if you don’t mind, at the same speed, repeat.” He returned to his place and began the same moves.

This time, moving at his speed, she demonstrated the footwork that moved her out of danger, and gave her opening to strike. She held up her hand and they both halted at the moment of contact, showing how the leverage was all hers by correct placement.

“It’s a viable parry even if you don’t disarm your opponent,” she said. “But at full speed, it will usually jar them enough to cost them their blade, if your own has some weight.”

After that, the Marshal wanted to try it, and soon Dorrin was tiring. It had been a very long day. He recognized that, and agreed to meet her at the inn the next morning to talk.

“That trick,” Valthan said, on their way back to the inn. “It’s just a trick of fence?”

“Yes,” Dorrin said. “What did you think? Magery?”

“It was so … unexpected.”

“I learned it in Valdaire,” Dorrin said. “My third campaign year with Phelan. I’d taken a gash from someone who did what you did, only with steel, and a man with a withered arm approached me after, and said he had a foolproof response for such attacks. I didn’t believe him, but it turned out he was a fencing master famous there, and though it cost good gold, it has been worth it since. He had lost the use of one arm to a poisoned blade, and knew more about fencing one-handed against many attacks than even the Duke’s armsmaster Siger. Practice it in your mind, and in a salle only in private; use it only at full speed, and no one will know what you did.”

“But you taught it to an entire grange of Girdish yeomen,” Valthan said.

“I showed it to them. Not one in a dozen will work enough to make it useful to them. And I taught it to Siger, in the Duke’s Company.”

“You puzzle me,” Valthan said, as they neared the inn.

“I puzzle myself,” Dorrin said, grinning. “I must get some rest. I’ll see you in the morning.”

D
orrin woke before dawn and fumbled for the candle at her bedside. A chill draft came from the window, through both the inner and outer shutters. Above her, she heard a faint creaking of floorboards; below, the steady slop-slop-slop of someone mopping a floor, probably the inn common room. Somewhere outside a horse whinnied and mules brayed, the sound growing louder as more animals joined in. In the candle’s dim glow, she could see the leather case with its contents, her pack, yesterday’s clothes hung on a stand before the fire, now a bed of warm ashes.

Someone tapped on the door. “Light your fire?”

A very superior inn. “Come in,” Dorrin said, and reached for her belt with its pouch of coins. A serving girl, with a canister of kindling and a lighted taper.

“Breakfast soon,” the girl said, kneeling to place the kindling. “Can bring it here, if you’d like.”

“I’ll come down,” Dorrin said. She swung out of bed—a clean one, she’d noticed the night before—and as the fire caught, crackling, she handed the girl a copper. “Thank you,” she said. “What’s the weather outside? Clear or snow?”

“It’s not clear but there’s no snow,” the girl said, picking up the canister of kindling. “Cold, though.” She left, and Dorrin heard her tap on another door. Already the room felt warmer.

Dressed in cleaner clothes from her pack, Dorrin made her way
downstairs and out to the jacks. On the way back inside she stopped at the barn and spoke to the two guards Selfer had posted. Selfer himself was coming out the inn’s side door.

“Morning, Captain. Favors of the day to you. They’ve almost got breakfast service started.” He looked wide awake, eyes bright, cheeks flushed with the cold.

Dorrin grinned. She had been that young once, and Selfer could have been a son. “And a fair morning to you, Selfer. I’ll be meeting with the local Marshal and possibly other town officials sometime this morning; we’ll stay here another day, let the animals rest up.”

“I’ll see the troops get some drill in, then,” Selfer said. “Any other orders?”

“Ears and eyes open. No one to wander off alone, but if you let Tam and Amisi go shopping for something, they might hear …” Tam and Amisi, Dorrin knew, found information the way pigs found acorns.

“Oh, I think we need several things. One of the mules’ halters is worn; I noticed that yesterday. I’ll ask the landlord if there’s a leatherworker in town. And two horses need a loose shoe reset … have to take them to the smithy. Can’t say I like the look of a girth or so …”

Dorrin chuckled. “You’re learning, Selfer, indeed you are. Take care of it, then. Don’t forget to eat your own meals.”

She went on into the inn, where the smell of frying ham permeated the common room. A few locals huddled at one table over mugs of steaming sib. By their clothes, they were workmen of some sort, young and probably still unmarried. Through the door to the kitchen, she saw a file of her cohort, moving slowly past two serving women who piled ham on half loaves of bread and handed each a bowl of porridge, and then out the kitchen door toward the barn.

Dorrin caught the landlord’s eye and he jerked his head at a table to one side, closer to the fireplace than the windows. She took the small table, and in a few moments he appeared with a wooden platter of ham and eggs and a pottery bowl of hot porridge. He went back and fetched a pitcher of cream and small pot of honey as well as a small loaf of hot bread.

She was halfway through breakfast when Sir Valthan came down the stairs, yawning. He blinked when he saw her. “You’re up early.”

“Not really,” Dorrin said. “Just habit.”

“I hate mornings,” he said. “May I?” She nodded, and he pulled out a chair and sat down. “My da believed in early rising and used to yank the covers off and slap my feet with a wet towel.” He rubbed his eyes. “I can stay up all night easier than I can get up before daylight—broad daylight.”

“Breakfast will help,” Dorrin said. She pushed the remainder of her bread across the table, and stood. “I’m full—get started. I’ll tell them to bring you the rest.”

“Thank you,” he said.

Dorrin went into the kitchen; the last of her cohort had a tray of mugs and a big pot of sib. She told the kitchen staff about Valthan and followed her cohort out. They had the barn’s big doors open and enough light came in to let them eat, sprawled on the earthen floor. They started to rise, but she waved them back down.

“I’ll let you know what I find out later today,” she said. “Selfer’s looking for a good drill field; the grange here—which isn’t Harway Grange, but Thornhedge—may let us use their drill field, or a Field of Falk may have some space. Some of you will be given errands in town; the rest stay close, don’t wander about.”

“Think there’d be trouble, Captain?” one of the younger soldiers asked.

“No more than we ever have in towns, but some of you have just made it into the Company. Listen to your sergeants: If you get drunk, gamble, or swive, you can be punished by locals and I can’t interfere.”

“I thought—”

Kefer shook his head. “Don’t argue, Selis.” He grinned at Dorrin. “He’ll learn soon enough, Captain. Selfer said you had assignments.”

“I won’t know until after I talk to the Marshal whether we’re marching tomorrow. Selfer’s probably already set it up, but be sure the farrier checks all the shoes, not just the ones we know are loose.”

Back inside with Valthan, Dorrin told him what she expected. “They would have had word their attack on Phelan failed—quicker here than in Vérella. I am sure the Duke and his brother had plans for that contingency, known to those at Verrakai House. They would have followed those plans and awaited word from the Duke.”

“And no word would have come—”

“We cannot know that,” Dorrin said. “Haron could have assigned
messengers not known to be his agents—ordinary merchants, they might seem, innocent travelers—who’d carry word from Vérella of his success or failure there.”