Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles (39 page)

“And why do you oppose me?” he asked this defiant young man.

And that, too, he seemed to remember saying.

There was quiet, in which the flame of torches thumped and a step Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles grated on stone, and men on every hand, fresh from their exertions and in danger still, breathed deep and hard.

“For justice,” the young thane said. “For
justice
!”

He said then the third thing it seemed he had once said:

“And do you think I shall not be a just lord?”

Again the silence, in which a man of his own company coughed, a dry, exhausted sound, as of a man who had been running. From the South Court was a distant tumult that sounded as if the townsfolk might be at the gates, no further. Here the young thane faced him in stony silence.

“What would you say justice should be?” Tristen asked in that hush.

“Pardon for them,” the young thane said, with a haughty nod toward the men behind him. But an older man moved forward then, with a clatter of metal and a heavy step. “No, m’lord,” the man said, “none of that for me. I stand with my lord the earl and with my lord’s son.”

Tristen thought of Uwen, seeing that man, a soldier, who would not leave the earl’s son to save his life. Other men moved then, four of them, the earl’s men, standing with the young man, defying him and his offer of justice. In the same moment and with no animosity at all, Uwen moved a little closer to him, and had his shield up and his sword ready for any attack.

Another man joined the five, and then another, all expecting to die, Tristen thought, and every man in the lot surely yearning to join them, and every man else in the courtyard either glad he had no such choice to make or envying the courage they saw.

“I pardon you,” Tristen said. “I pardon you all.”

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles

“M’lord,” Uwen said under his breath, “don’t let ’em free, not that easy.”

“And I forgive the earl, if he will swear to me.” He knew it set him against the viceroy’s opinion, and perhaps against the law, but he had no desire to harm such men as the young thane and the men who defended him. “And provided he has not harmed the king’s messenger.”

“We have the king’s herald a prisoner,” the young thane said, with this time a small tremor in his voice and a fear in his eyes… or it was the uncertain torchlight and the bitter wind. “We have not harmed him. And I will wait to see what this promise is worth.”

“This is a dangerous young man.” It was Anwyll who stood just behind: Tristen knew the voice. “Lewen’s-son’s advice is also the law. Do not release these men, Your Grace. You must not.”

“I have already given my promise,” Tristen said. “And the king will regard it.”

Again a silence, and slowly the young man let down his sword, as he had already let down the shield.

“What my father wills,” Crissand said. “That I will, with my men, so you keep your word, sir.”

“Where is your father?”

Crissand cast a glance up the height of the Zeide itself, and that seemed his answer.

“Have them all lay down their weapons, Your Grace,” Anwyll said.

“I beg you don’t offer any more assurances.”

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles He had no need of Anwyll’s advice at the moment. He wished Anwyll silent, but:

“Do as he asks,” Crissand said to his men, and slowly the ranks came and cast down their weapons, a clang of iron and a thump of shields cast one onto the other. Crissand added his own, among the last.

“Lusin,” Uwen said quietly, “His Grace will have that young man handled wi’ due respect, and the seven of them”—Uwen surely meant the men who had joined the thane—“under special guard. —

Ye’re on m’lord’s word, young lord. Ye come up here.”

The seven were not willing, but the young man cast a forbidding glance and went of his own accord as far as the steps.

“Your lordship,” Crissand said. “I rest on your word, I and the men with me,
and my father
, sir, I ask that.”

“And where is the king’s messenger?”

“In the Aswydds’ apartment. With my father.”

To have taken that set of rooms was entirely understandable in a man who claimed the Aswydds’ place and titles. It was equally within Tristen’s understanding that he could not permit that situation to go on, whether or not it mattered a whit to him: it mattered greatly to Cefwyn and it certainly mattered to the Amefin earls. Edwyll was the nearest kin to the Aswydds Cefwyn had allowed to remain in Henas’amef when he exiled Lady Orien and her sister, and that mercy was now repaid by a gesture every Amefin understood. More, removing the earl with any force would entail damage that itself was significant to the Amefin.

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles And removing him even by persuasion and the good offices of the man’s son would entail going into that place and claiming it for the night, when he had as lief camp in the courtyard tonight, or sleep in the stables, rather than that cursed premises. He wished he had a choice, and he wanted nothing more now than to sit down where he stood.

“Let him come out with no harm and we will settle all the rest by daylight.”

“I will go up and try to persuade him, by your leave,” the young thane said, much as if it were something he had tried before, even many times, to no avail, and so saying, Crissand looked suddenly overwhelmed, more than he had when faced with weapons. “Or my father’s men might, where I cannot. Let them speak to him, sir, on your good word.”

The men Crissand proposed were the seven men Uwen had ordered under special guard, he well guessed. And they were not the men he would set free with the earl in reach.

But he had promised, and no good came of breaking his word at the outset.

“You will try. Come with me. We shall both try. Bring a torch.”

“Your Grace,” Anwyll began as he reached the uppermost step, and he found himself very weary of hearing those words in that tone of voice. “Your Grace,” Anwyll persisted. “These men
have
no pardon. I must urge your lordship—”

“Am I duke of Amefel?” he asked shortly, “And did not Lord Heryn do as he pleased in his own hall?”

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles

“Far too much,” Anwyll said on a breath. “And died for it, Your Grace.”

He knew that it was heart-sent advice. Anwyll had done nothing amiss and a great deal right, and faced him with dogged courage and no ill will.

“I hear all you say,” he said, the two of them paused, he on the upper step. “And I take it much to heart, sir. But I will pardon them, all the same. Take them and these other men under guard and under my protection and hold them some safe place elsewhere. How does it stand in the South Court?”

“The gates are shut,” Anwyll said. “The town has turned out in the street, Your Grace, with knives and staves, all shouting for your lordship, but we dare not let the mob in.”

He could hear the uproar past the throbbing in his ears—heard it now beginning beyond the East Gate, in that blind and little-used street that tucked up between storehouses and Zeide defenses. The aid the town offered was dangerous, and he needed none of it now.

But the town also had need of reassurances. He strode down the steps, his personal guard hastening to overtake him, and went past the heap of weapons, into the columned end of the courtyard. At the gatehouse and its first defenses, three of Cossell’s men had stayed and gotten the oaken gate shut again.

“Open the inner gate,” he said, and they raised the bar and dragged the oak doors back.

Townspeople pressed at the bars beyond the portcullis, a mob with the hazard of torches, and bearing all manner of weapons. But Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles seeing him, they began to shout, “Lord Sihhë!”

He lifted his sword, and gained a silence enough to speak. “The earl’s men have surrendered and I have taken them under my protection—do no harm!
Hear me! Do no harm
! Tell it through the town!”

“
Lord Sihhë
!” the answer came in jubilation—and he walked back through the East Court as he had come, leaving the gates open for the crowd to witness through the bars whatever might befall here.

“Take these men to safekeeping,” he ordered Anwyll regarding the prisoners. “Uwen! Bring the thane with us. And bear a light inside.

Five men with us, to persuade the earl to surrender and end this.”

“Lights,” Uwen called out as he climbed the steps and men opened the doors into darkness. “Light, there, on the duke’s order! ”

Then: “Bring a light here!” he heard soldiers echo inside, up the short stairs and down the hall.

He went in, up dark and bloody steps, past moaning wounded, with men treading cautiously beside him, until he reached the level of the main hall and a crazily spreading firelight along the ceiling. From the far other end of the corridor a man came carrying a torch.

Illumination flared erratically along a hallway littered with wounded and dead, shone on polished floors, on ornate carvings.

“Light the hall!” he heard men still shouting to the farthest doors as they trod a crooked course among the dead. The light-bearer reached them, then guided them to the center of the building.

“Come with us,” Tristen said to the man with the torch, and started up the left-hand stairs, with Uwen, with his guards, with Crissand.

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles He had his shield, and Uwen carried his own, but his guards, who had had the banners, had their hands unencumbered, and Sergeant Gedd took the idea to snatch a stub of a candle from its holder and borrow fire from the torch-bearer. Then Gedd went ahead, enterprisingly setting light to at least one candle in every sconce, all the way to the upper floor, making the steps more visible, bringing a wan, ordinary light to the heart of the Zeide.

But from above another source of light spread along the ceiling, and that proved to be a torch in the hallway, where three men of the viceroy’s Guelen Guard besieged the door of the Aswydds’ old apartment.

“Your Grace,” their sergeant said, recognizing him, “we’ve sent for axes.”

“No, sir. By no means.” He was appalled. They were beautiful doors, carved and very heavy. “Not yet. —Have you spoken with the earl? And has he answered at all?”

“His servants answer, your lordship, and won’t open for our asking.”

That was no surprise. He beckoned the young thane forward, among the viceroy’s guard and his own. Crissand rapped uncertainly at the door.

“Father? Father? Do you hear me? Answer.” Crissand rapped harder. “Father? I need your advice, sir. Please.”

There was no response.

Uwen rapped the door with his sword hilt, no gentle tap. “You mayn’t stay there, your lordship. Open. Your son is asking. Soon it may be others wi’ less goodwill.”

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles There was no sound at all within.

“This is His Grace Tristen of Ynefel asking!” Uwen shouted this time. “His Grace has brought your son in his safekeepin’, and your son is asking ye kindly to open an’ surrender the king’s messenger, your lordship, which would be very wise to do, before His Grace’s patience runs out, an’ afore we spoil these fine doors. Ye come out, now!”

There was still no answer, but more, no sound within the apartment.

“Could they have gotten out beforehand?” Uwen asked.

“Not by us,” the viceroy’s men said.

Tristen knew the place. The same as most rooms of the Zeide, its windows had only a small vent, and if the earl and his men damaged them to get out that way, they were on the second floor above pavings and the courtyards occupied by king’s men. It was possible that they had escaped down the stairs into the dark before the fighting, but if that were the case, the earl and his company might be lying among the dead downstairs, or they might be anywhere in the upper floors.

Most urgently, there was the king’s messenger to account for.

Uwen thumped the door with his gloved fist, a frown on his face.

“Now’s certainly a finer time to come out than tomorrow, your lordship, and it won’t get better. His Grace is patient, now. And your son is anxious for ye, wi’ increasin’ good cause.”

Still there was no answer.

“Open the door,” Tristen said. The question of Lord Edwyll’s fate had become more important than the fine doors, and one of the Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles viceroy’s men had by now brought up an axe from a martial display down the hall.

“Father!” Crissand shouted out loudly, leaning against the door.

“Will you not answer your son?”

There was still no response. Tristen gave the signal and the garrison soldier plied the axe, wonderful dark carving reduced to chips about the lock, and with a widening gap between the latch and the frame.

It was wrong, Tristen was increasingly convinced, remembering Lady Orien, who with her sister had had these rooms after her brother. It was all wrong. They would find nothing friendly in this room. And if not friendly, they had best not have the young thane loose in their midst.

“Sergeant,” he said to the viceroy’s man in charge, and quietly, as the blows continued and the chips flew, “move the young lord away.”

“No,” Crissand said, but the sergeant’s men laid hands on him, and moved him firmly back.

In that same moment the axe had cleared enough wood from the edge for a sword to lift the bolt, and the soldiers shouldered in an armored rush into a dim, narrow foyer leading to a well-lit room.

Men lay all about that room, dead, down to the man tied with ropes to a chair, near the tall, green-draped windows.

Tristen stood still, surrounded by the green-velvet drapery and the rich bronze-and-gold furnishings of Lady Orien’s residence… and the ill feeling in the room was stifling. He had not tried the gray space, until now—and it was cold, and ominous. He let down his Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles shield, let it stand against the side of a chair, but he did not let down his defense against the insubstantial hazards he felt.

There began to be an argument outside, passionate and suddenly loud. “No, Your Honor!” someone said, and Crissand reached the foyer in his struggle, stopped as Lusin allowed him no further progress.