The King's Peace (56 page)

I did not go to Demedia, or to raid Oriel. I stayed in Caer Tanaga with the ala. We trained hard, until we were even better than we had been. There had probably never been an ala as good as we were in those first years of the Peace. We could turn on an arrowhead and we keep spears lined up so straight charging that the points were not a handbreadth before each other.

Some of the veterans left to settle down and have babies.

To some of these Urdo gave gifts of land and horses and told them to be ready to come back to the banner if they were needed. Others stayed in the alae but went to join other alae stationed nearer to their homes. Some were very restless without fighting and begged to be sent to Demedia. I had some sympathy for them and sent them up to ap Erbin. In return he sent us his tired and lightly wounded armigers. I learned later this gave us a reputation among the Isarnagans for having tireless and invulnerable troops.

There were always people in other alae who wanted to come to us, too. After all, they knew we were the best. We also took in recruits. Once they had the basic skills I spread them among the pennons, where they worked hard until they were as good as the veterans. Some of them were better.

Ulf took to his silly ax as if he had been born with it in his hand. Some of the others in his pennon asked if he would make them axes, so we ended up with almost as many axes as longswords in that pennon after a year or so. Urdo spoke to me seriously about Ulf and made me promise not to drive him harder than the others. I did not, nor had I intended to. I drove them all hard, and myself with them. I avoided seeing Ulf alone, but I did not torment him. He became a formidable warrior and a loyal and steady armiger. He had a tendency to have nightmares and wake half the barracks screaming, but he took teasing about this in good part.

Alswith asked me quite seriously if I had cursed him, but I told her firmly that any grudge between me and Gunnarsson had been settled at Foreth.

Among the others he became quite popular. The Queen liked him, too. When Urdo could not ride with her, she would always take an escort from the ala; and she often chose Ulf.

He was nobly born, and his conversation amused her. I could say nothing against it without telling her things I had sworn had been ended. All the same I let her know that I could not eat with Ulf. There were plenty of people in the same situation for bloodfeuds old and new, so it did not cause remark, she just made sure never to invite us into her alcove at the same time. Even Urdo seemed to show him some respect, consulting him now and then about Jarnish issues.

Morthu of Angas was the other notable recruit. He seemed to shape up well enough, though his skills were not outstanding, and I paid little attention to him. I did not like him.

He was not an heir to land, yet he acted like one, and somehow the others treated him like one.

He seemed to have a great ability to get on with people, though he never bothered to exert this skill on me. I guessed that he blamed me still for his mother's death. It did not cross my mind that he was holding a real grudge against me still, or against Urdo. I thought that he was a very young man who would learn better. Yet even then I would often see him with a group of armigers, talking and laughing, and when I drew near they would fall silent. He spent time out of the ranks, going when he could to see his sister in
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Aylsfa or to Thansethan where he had friends. He was also a great letter writer, sending great sealed messages whenever the red-cloaks went off. I did not then think anything of this except that he was in love with his own importance.

We had very little real fighting to do. We fought off the occasional raiders, and there were fewer raiders every year now that Ayl was offering land to those Jarnsmen who would settle in Aylsfa and call him lord. We talked about raiding Jarnholme the way we were raiding Oriel, once the Isarnagan war was over, to discourage the raiders. Many of them had learned already that attacking Tir Tanagiri meant death and turned to raiding other less-defended shores. Meanwhile we trained, we practiced formations and drills, we played war games, one half of the ala against the other, and on ceremonial occasions we paraded.

There were a number of ceremonial occasions. Garah married Glyn the summer after the Battle of Foreth. This set off a spate of ala weddings. Urdo gave Glyn and Garah a house just inside the gates of the citadel of Caer Tanaga. I was amazed how many people gave them gifts—all the praefectos sent something and many of the armigers. I was very glad for Garah. I gave them a chest of new linen from Derwen and two plates, newly made by the potter at Caer Tanaga, black and lustrous, as good as anything the king ate from. I

also made Garah's plait-bread—it was a little untidy. Veniva had always made it look so easy, folding the bread over and over on top of the fruit while talking about something else. But nobody complained. Garah's parents came down from Derwen for the ceremony.

They looked very shy and unsure of themselves, and her mother wept when she saw how splendid Garah looked in her orange dress. "Like a lord," she said. She would have been even more impressed if she had seen Elenn with the needle in her teeth, sewing it with pearls and gold thread every evening for two months before. It was a splendid present, good enough for an heirloom. I remembered Garah's mother giving me a cup of milk when I had come into her kitchen after the attack on Derwen, and I stayed close to them throughout the feasting, guiding them through it.

About a month after that, Ayl married Penarwen of Angas, at Caer Tanaga, with prodigious feasting. Gwilen ap Rhun made Penarwen's plait-bread, and she also made up a fertility charm. She had once been key-keeper of Caer Tanaga, and Urdo's leman, and she had gone up to Demedia when Urdo married to look after one of Angas's fortresses on the western coast. There she had become friendly with Penarwen, and now she came down to Aylsfa with her. Elenn still did not like her, although she always behaved very politely towards her.

Their wedding was conducted in the church by Mother Teilo, who had come down from Demedia specially. She let Urdo feel the sharp side of her tongue more than once, but it seemed she was more willing than Thansethan to have dealings with us.

Teilo told Ayl at the wedding feast that now he was married to Penarwen he should adopt a banner in Vincan style. Banners were not a Jarnish custom, but since Guthrum had taken up his silver swan Ayl was the only king on Tir Tanagiri who did not fly one. He had a strange blue standard with a dragon's head on the top which he used as a rallying point in battle. He had the same dragon carved on his ship's prow. Ayl smiled at Teilo and promised to consider it. The next time we saw him he had tied great streamers of light red cloth behind his dragon's head.

They certainly caught the wind like banners, but the effect was peculiarly more barbaric than the beast had been alone. The color was one made from a root that only grew in Aylsfa, so it was a good choice in that way. When I

congratulated Ayl on his banner he laughed and said that he had done it for his lady wife.

I don't think anyone at Caer Tanaga ever got up the courage to ask the very regal Penarwen if she was pleased by it.

It was a summer noted for weddings and for abundant harvests. It seemed the land was pleased with Urdo. That year and the year after were noted for babies, too.

Penarwen had a son almost exactly nine months after the wedding, and Garah was nursing her new daughter when the news came in. Masarn's wife had another child, too, a daughter this time, and Masarn was delighted. He liked children. He said he'd even have liked a fifth, if it were possible. I reminded him of the Vincan general Quintus, who was a fifth-born child. He had left the ala by then and was helping his wife with her beekeeping and candlemaking. I missed his steadiness as tri-buno, but I still saw him often.

Occasionally he would even come to practice, though he would never admit that he missed the ala. He called his new baby Sulien in my honor, and I was delighted. Emer ap Allel also bore a daughter that summer, who in later years became the greatest praefecto of her day and one of my dearest friends. At the time the news meant little to me, though I wished Emer well. I had heard no news of Conal since I left Derwen. I guessed that he was back with Black Darag, in Demedia, killing my friends. We stopped talking about the spate of babies when we saw that it distressed Elenn, whose arms were still empty. In any case there were so many babies born every year in the Peace that we almost got used to it.

I was a little lonely in that time. Urdo was very busy, and Elenn had cooled to me for some reason. Garah and Glyn had the baby, and soon another, which kept them occupied.

The ala was not as friendly a place for me as it had been, with Ulf and Morthu there.

Though I name them together they were not friends. Indeed Morthu seemed to dislike and distrust Ulf and Ulf plainly despised Morthu. I took comfort in training and in breeding and raising horses, which has been one of my passions ever since. I had friends at hand when I needed them, just not as much companionship as I would have wished in my daily life. But I was not unhappy.

In the third year of the Peace Alswith Haraldsdottar came to me early one morning in tears. She had her flame-colored hair pulled back hard away from her face. She looked so pale she was almost green, except for the shadows under her eyes, which were almost purple. Jarns are an unlovely color even when they are healthy, but Alswith was clearly ill. I had made her signifer after Foreth. She deserved it, and she was unarguably good enough. Then about a year later in a spate of rearrangements I made her decurio of Second Pennon. That had worked well, and I was pleased with her.

"What's wrong?" I asked. I was sitting on the wall around the paddock watching Starlight's new colt, Brighteyes. He looked as if he would be fast. I wanted him to get used to people being present without being threatening, so I was just sitting for the time being, enjoying the sunshine. Alswith swung herself up beside me.

"I feel awful," she said. "It's horrible. I wake up every morning with my stomach heaving and I have to run to the latrines. I can't stand the sight of food. I throw up half the morning.

Worst of all, I'm sleepy all the time. I thought I'd poisoned myself with some bad mushrooms, because I had eaten a lot of them, and now I can't stand the sight of them. But it's been a month and it's not wearing off. Then I thought I'd got so I couldn't eat bread anymore, like Talog the cook, you know? So I haven't eaten any bread for five days, and I'm still as bad as ever."

"When did the Moon Maiden last strike you?" I asked, with a sinking heart.

Alswith shook her head. "That's another thing, I didn't bleed at all last month, and now I'm nearly due again. I know you know about magic. Do you know what it is? Can you do a charm for it?"

I stared at her for a moment, trying to remind myself that I had once been just that naive. "Is there any chance you could be pregnant?" I asked, gently.

"No, of course not," she said, laughing. "I'm not married, you know that."

"I do know that," I said, carefully, "But even though it's rare, it does happen occasionally that women who aren't married can still catch a baby. It happened to me. I
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have a son growing up at Thansethan." A son I couldn't see, though Elenn had visited him and assured me he was well. She had taken a letter and some tack for Keturah and brought me a letter back, all about how Keturah was growing and what ap Cathvan had said and how Arvlid sometimes let him ride out with her when she went to the hamlets with medicines. The letter began and ended with stilted phrases but came alive when he talked about horses. It had been the same when we talked at Thansethan. She had brought a letter from Arvlid too, saying Darien was growing well and strong.

"But really, I've never—" She lowered her voice and used a Jarnish word which I had often heard used thrown around as a curse but never known the meaning of. "—fucked. I don't even let people touch my belly button when we share blankets."

Alfwin was going to be furious with me. I wondered if he would settle for unarmed combat or if he would demand blood. "I don't speak Jarnish very well," I said, gently, "but belly buttons don't have anything to do with making babies. Haven't you ever watched the stallions with the mares? It's the same for people, you know? If you've been doing that then it seems very likely to me that you're pregnant. Who have you been sharing blankets with?"

"Nobody, not for ages, and then it was only ap Erbin because we were so pleased to see each other when he came back from Demedia!" she said, defensively. There were tears in her eyes.

I sighed with relief, I'd half expected her to say she'd been sharing blankets with half the pennon.

Ap Erbin was someone it was at least possible she could marry. "How do you feel about ap Erbin?" I asked.

She blushed bright red. "I'm very fond of him," she muttered, looking at her feet.

"And is he very fond of you?" I asked. She said nothing, but blushed harder, so that her face was almost as red as her hair. "Look, Alswith, it isn t normal for women to start having babies until they've had a womb blessing when they get married. If they do, it's usually because the gods really want them to have that child."

"I really didn't know that was"—again she lowered her voice—"fucking. I promised Alfwin and my mother I wouldn't do that. I thought it was something terribly bad, not just sharing blankets like almost everyone does. And I was absolutely sure nobody ever got pregnant unless they were married. Nobody in the ala ever has."

"That's not the problem anymore," I said. "The problem is if you want to keep your baby." I hadn't even touched her, I couldn't say for sure there was a baby. But I knew.