Rhapsody, Child of Blood (80 page)

'What are you going to do about it, then, Tristan?" The Lord Roland couldn't stand it anymore. He grabbed Prudence's hips and pulled her onto him, shuddering as she wrapped her legs around his waist. In the heat that enclosed him he felt the fire he had seen in Rhapsody's eyes, her internal warmth, the warmth he had imagined in his hottest dreams.

'I'm going to rout them," he gasped. "I'm going to—send—every soldier I can spare and—and—destroy the bastard, and every—last—one of his—miserable kind." His mouth closed on hers, ardently, vehemently, stealing her breath.

As he plunged desperately, repeatedly into her, Prudence's lips broke with his, and went to his ear. She ran her hands through his glistening hair, damp with exertion and fury, then whispered as she clung to him as if for her life. "Tristan?'

He could barely force the word out. "Mhhnmm—yes?" "What is this woman's name?" "Pru—" he panted. "Her name, Tristan."

'Rhapsody," he moaned, the fire exploding inside him. "Rhapsody," he whispered again, as the thunder rose up and consumed him. He fell across Prudence, spent and ashamed.

He lay there until he returned to his senses, until he felt her body cool beneath him.

When he couldn't avoid facing her any longer he pushed himself up on his arms, suspending himself over her, and looked down.

The expression on her face was not at all what he had expected. Where he had feared he might see rejection, and embarrassment, and hurt, there was calm understanding, and nothing more.

'I'm so sorry, Pru," he said softly, his face flushing.

Prudence kissed his cheek, then slid out from underneath him. "No need to be, dear," she said, picking her dressing gown up off the floor and wrapping it around herself.

'You're not angry?"

'Why would I be?"

Tristan ran a hand through his soggy hair. "How did you know?"

Prudence walked to the absurdly tall windows in the sitting area, and pulled back the drape, looking into the vast, starry sky beyond. After a long moment she turned back to him, the expression on her face solemn.

'I've known you all my life, Tristan. That was me, if you recall, that urchin daughter of your scullery maid, hiding from your father with you in the pantry. I've had your hand up my skirt for almost forty years; I can tell when it's me you're groping, and when your mind is elsewhere.

'I know you love me, and you know I love you, too; I always will. You don't have to want me, Tristan; loving me is more than enough. In fact, these last few times when you've made love to me out of pity 'I have never done that, never" he interrupted angrily.

'All right; lie to yourself if you have to, but I won't. These last few times I've known there was someone else on your mind, and at least one other of your organs. You're more aroused in your sleep lately than you have been for the last ten years during sex.

I'm just grateful to know it wasn't Madeleine you were dreaming about; I was beginning to think you'd lost your mind. She's a hag, by the way." Prudence smiled, and Tristan smiled with her in spite of himself.

At last she came away from the window and went to the dressing table, where she picked up her dress, and donned it quickly while he watched. She ran his platinum comb perfunctorily through her tangled locks, then turned and regarded him seriously.

'If you don't hear anything else I've said tonight, Tristan, hear this: whatever obsession you feel for this woman, whatever she makes your body long for, don't lose your head, or the hand that holds your scepter. I sense you are considering this escalation in violence out of lust, or anger, out of something that comes from between your legs, not out of anything from your brain. Forbear, Tristan. Wars started over women only lead to disaster."

Tristan's face fell. "I'm astounded that you would say that to me," he said in an injured tone. "Any commitment I make of Roland's soldiers is purely out of concern for the safety of the provinces and our subjects. I can't believe you think I would escalate a war to impress a woman."

'No? Perhaps it is to pay back her master, then, for winning, for being her choice over you. Even if it is neither of those things, if it is your pride that's injured, don't fall prey to it."

Tristan turned away, awash in angry emotions. It was painful to hear her say such demeaning things, and even more so to know she might be right.

'Prudence?"

When he looked back, she was gone.

Che end of winter brought dread to the Bolglands each year, for a short time anyway. The annual thaw was the time of the Lottery, the means by which the most expendable citizens were chosen to be positioned in the artificial villages that were hastily constructed at the outskirts of the Teeth.

This yearly sacrifice to the bloodthirsty men of Roland, probably more than any other single factor, had convinced Achmed of the Bolg's sophistication when he initially assessed their development. That this cunning, if grisly, program could be designed and executed for centuries without the invaders catching on was impressive enough, he reasoned, but the weighing of impact, of loss versus gain, proved to him beyond a shadow of a doubt that they were a force to be reckoned with. Even the system's corruption by which it was regularly rigged pleased him.

All had been summoned to the canyon beyond the Teeth on the day following the first thaw. The Bolg were unusually silent when Achmed appeared on the heath above to address them;

generally the strong and the influential were excused from the Lottery, and to have been called together without regard to crude social position was disturbing and insulting to the powerful among them. Their attitude changed quickly when he began to speak, however.

The Lottery had been abolished, he said; no more would they offer themselves as lambs for the slaughter to Roland. This year the ritual would be very different, and open to all who wanted to take part. When he explained the plan, there was none among them who would have sent his regrets had he known of the custom.

C,'ristan Steward watched the troops assemble from the window of his study.

Generally the recruits and noncommissioned forces assigned to the Spring Cleaning ritual met in the stable area; his Knight Marshal never sent more than three or four hundred. But since he himself had decreed that all available soldiers would take part this year, that place was far too small to assemble, so they were quartering here in the courtyard, making a tremendous racket. They numbered almost two thousand.

Stephen Navarne looked down into the throng uneasily. He had endeavored to persuade his cousin that this was inadvisable, but had been scoffed at, not only by Roland but by Quentin Baldasarre, the Regent of Bethe Corbair, as well. Ihrman Karsric, the Duke of Yarim, had kept his opinion to himself.

There was a knock on the study door, and Rosentharn, the Knight Marshal, entered the room.

'M'lord?"

'Yes?" The Lord Roland turned and eyed him in surprise; generally the soldier stayed with the troops until after the men had returned, and only came into the keep if there was something extraordinary to report, which there rarely was.

'If you would be so disposed, would you consider addressing the men, sir? There is some belief that this is a pejorative assignment, and morale is quite low; so low, in fact, I believe the success of the mission is in doubt."

'Really? And why would that be?"

The Knight Marshal coughed. "Well, sir, cleanup duty in the Bolglands is generally a task assigned to trainees and people under disciplinary action, so the other men, who have served this duty before, are wondering if they are being disciplined."

'Well, if they aren't, perhaps they should be," said the Duke of Bethe Corbair. "My army never feels the need to question the orders of its commander."

'Oh, shut up, Quentin," the Lord Roland snapped. "I'll thank you to keep your opinions to yourself. You haven't seen fit to commit any of your soldiers to this little undertaking, a rather strange position given that the monstrosity borders your lands.

This is a nuisance for me; my soldiers are seven days' ride from the Bolglands. In fact, I am thinking of assessing you taxes annually from now on to help pay for this action which we have been undertaking on your behalf for centuries."

'Our taxes maintain that army of yours now," interjected the Duke of Yarim. "If you are going to assess on a mission basis, I say we look at the need to continue supporting it at all. My troops can easily take this task on if it proves to be necessary, or additionally costly."

'Perhaps we should be looking at the necessity angle, Tristan," said Stephen Navarne. "I have told you, the people you are going up against are not the Bolg leaders of old. They are exceptionally well trained, and very powerful. I again advise you against this invasion. Why would you not want to pursue a peace treaty instead?

Perhaps it will open a new trading partnership."

The Lord Roland looked at his cousin incredulously. "Are you insane?" he asked, his voice indicating he had already determined the answer. "Trade with the Bolg? Sign a peace treaty? No wonder I had to bail you out of your own peasant revolt. Get out of my way." He swept his subregents aside and strode out of the room with the Knight Marshal.

cAchmed watched them come—two thousand, by his guess, confirmed a moment later by Grunthor.

'

'E's sent a ful brigade, three, maybe four cohorts, sir," the Bolg commander reported from the Cauldron lookout. "Oi think we ought to take it as a compliment."

'We must think of a very special way to say thank you, then," the king said.

"Rhapsody, perhaps you and Jo had best stay out of this one."

'Not me," said Jo indignantly. "I've been practicing all week with boiling pitch. I'm really good at it now; don't you dare make me waste all that smelly training."

'Suit yourself," replied Achmed.

-

'Atta girl," Grunthor whispered approvingly.

Rhapsody sighed. "Gods, Roland, you fool. Well, I warned him. I had the feeling he was none too bright when we met. It seems a shame all his soldiers are going to pay for his stupidity."

'It's an age-old shame," said Achmed. "Well, look on the bright side. If we're really convincing, perhaps he won't try next year, though that is probably giving him too much credit."

'And besides, it'll be great fun," added Grunthor. "My troops can't wait."

'Well, then, let's have at it," said Achmed. He spurred his horse and the others followed him over the battlements and down to the crags above the outer Firbolg villages.

C,'he rout took less than an hour. Instead of the weak, infirm, and incompetent losers of the annual Lottery, the soldiers of Roland were greeted by the elite forces of the Bolg mountain guard, personally trained by Grunthor, lying in wait inside the empty huts.

The reckless soldiers had beheaded two mannequins and lost one horse and rider to a sinkhole of boiling pitch before the realization took hold that they had ridden into a trap. Retreat was not an option either, owing to the sudden, mammoth eruption of armed Bolg from beneath and behind every crag and rock formation. Like an avalanche they appeared on the ledges and hills above, grinning down into the canyon defiantly, then swarmed over the crags and onto the terrified army below them.

It began with a rain of fist to head-sized stones, hurled from the mountaintops by the Ylorc army, which outnumbered the unfortunate Orlandan brigade almost five to one. In the chaos that ensued from the deadly hailstorm, the Bolg mountain guard, hiding within the makeshift huts of the sacrificial village, grabbed and pulled the trip wires that had been wound through the dust of the valley floor. Horses lurched and fell, or stumbled, throwing riders into the fray.

By then the tide of Bolg had reached that part of the army stil standing amid the rubble and screaming horseflesh. The soldiers of Roland had frozen in place. A few scrambled to draw forth their bows, but most had come armed only with swords, clubs, and torches, weapons that were swept away from them in the initial moments of the Bolg flood.

A few at the outskirts sought to flee and were consumed in the inferno of boiling pitch, hurled by the four barrel-throwing catapults that had been erected at the mouth of the canyon to cover any attempt at retreat. Rhapsody stood with her arms wrapped around herself, shuddering at the sound of Jo's maniacal laugh blending with Grunthor's as she sliced through the trigger cords of the wooden launchers with her bronze-backed dirk.

She looked back at the Bolg, for centuries the victims in the annual sacrifice, moving quickly amid the turmoil, dispatching what remained of the Spring Cleaning force. They seemed infinite in number and intense in their concentration. Grunthor later observed he would be hard-pressed to recall a more efficient slaughter.

cXhapsody stared down at the desolate sight, the gruesome aftermath of the battle turning her stomach. She had not participated in the fighting, either with sword or musical accompaniment, and watched as Achmed's ragtag army methodically stripped the dead of their weapons and armor, then stacked the bodies near the pit of pitch.

'What an unholy mess," she said.

'Not to worry, Duchess; we always cleans up our messes," said Grunthor cheerfully.

He was sparring with Jo, preventing her from joining in the looting.

'Yes; now that you mention it, perhaps this would be a good time for you and Jo to go back to the Cauldron," said Achmed. He was counting the casualties, making sure none had been dragged off as personal coup.

'What, no booty?" Jo demanded.

'Later, lit'le miss," said Grunthor affectionately. "We gets the pick o' the lot, and we'll share."

'Right. Come on, Jo," said Rhapsody, taking her elbow and leading her away.

Something in Achmed's expression convinced her of the wisdom of a hasty return to the Teeth.

When the women were out of sight, Achmed turned to Grunthor and the generals, waiting at the scene below. "The army will now feed," he said.

create in the night a week later, the Lord Regent of Roland was in the midst of a nightmare when he awoke to strange clicking sound.