“And what about me?”
“You don’t have the authority to have me jailed or worse without trial.” Aldric smiled thinly. “Help me here, will you?” There was a fresh shirt in the loose-cut Alban style laid out over a chair, and with Kyrin’s assistance he managed to wriggle into it with a minimum of discomfort and close it in front with his weapon-belt. “When I’ve put on something warm we’ll go up on deck to talk—it attracts less attention than staying behind a locked door.”
“You are so suspicious…”
“Call it cautious.” He put out one hand and touched her gently under one ear with his fingertips. “I’m a man with a blade at his neck, Kyrin-ain. In such a circumstance, -can you blame me for avoiding sudden movements?” The Alban donned an overmantle and unlocked the door, then bowed as deeply--and as sardonically-- as his wounded side permitted. “I know it is not good manners, lady, but I will follow. If there’s anyone standing about doing nothing, let me know. Anyone at all.” He allowed himself what was almost a mischievous grin. “Apart from what I have already said about not wanting Dewan to know, I think I owe him something for being so quiet about this thing’s cargo. Eh?”
Kyrin stared out over the dark water for a long time when Aldric had finished speaking. There was a slender waning moon hanging near the horizon, and stars glittered in a sky which seemed to have been washed clean and clear by the tempest. There was still something of a choppy sea, and the occasional glimmer of a white-capped wave slid past
En Sohra’s
hull. Finally Aldric broke the silence.
“You see now why I wasn’t making free with that sort of information,” he said quietly.
“Oh, indeed.” Kyrin’s voice sounded as if she had to summon up the words from a great distance. “I see a great many things now that I was unsure about before.” She moved a little closer and the
eijo
slipped his arms about her waist, “I’m cold, Aldric. The whole world’s becoming cold, and harsh, and brutal.” The girl turned away from the sea and embraced him tightly. “It’s growing so very, very dark. Where will the light come from, when the darkness covers everything?”
“From the sun, as it always has,” Aldric replied, and kissed her. He draped a fold of the long overmantle across her shoulders and they watched the moon set, Kyrin with her head snuggled back against his neck and the body-heated silver of his crest-collar pressing warmly on her cheek. There was no passion in the contact; only a tender caring which Kyrin recognised reluctantly as the love she did not want. She shivered and Aldric held her closer. “You are cold,” he muttered. “Better go below and get some rest.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll stay here for a while. I doubt if I could sleep anyway.”
Kyrin glanced at him; his words had lacked all inflection, as if he was thinking about something else long ago and far away. “There’s something troubling you,” she said, not asking but telling. “What is it?”
“I was remembering. Right now, that’s not a good thing to do.”
“Because of those pirates? Aldric, I mean no insult to ar Korentin, but if it hadn’t been for you—
you
—we would all be in pieces now. Or worse.”
“The men I cut down don’t concern me. Much… They had an even chance to do the same to me. Even though that brings my tally up to six—and I’m not yet twenty-four.”
“Those swine deserved to die.” Kyrin’s voice was flat and vicious.
“Perhaps. But honourable death by the
taiken
is a part of my heritage. A firedrake is not. That was too deliberate, too well-thought-out for me to feel any pride in my cunning. Your lover’s not a warrior any more, Kyrin-
ain
. He’s just a calculating killer—a deathbringer. That’s a fine, dramatic title, but it makes me feel dirty. I wish there had been some other way.”
“There wasn’t. Forget it. If the tables were turned, would your death be preying on Khakkhur’s mind? I doubt it very much.” Kyrin pulled free of the clinging mantle and walked away, then glanced back at him. “My father’s a bigger, fiercer man than you, Aldric, but he told me once that nobody should laugh if they don’t know how to cry. Think about that.”
The
eijo
did, for a long time.
Kyrin was scarcely undressed and into her bunk before the expected knock came at her cabin door. Pulling the sheets modestly high, she said: “Come in.”
Dewan ar Korentin slipped inside, closed the door behind him and sat down with the muted rustling click of a man wearing armour under his outer clothing. Mail-rings sparkled momentarily at his collar. Kyrin looked, listened and raised one eyebrow, but the Vreijek paid no attention. Instead he removed the stopper from a wine-jar, filled two cups and offered one to the girl before taking a thoughtful sip himself.
“Well? What did he tell you?”
Kyrin tasted her wine before replying. “Little enough. The Dragonwand staff is, as he said before, a gift for Gemmel-altrou.”
“His foster-father. And a wizard.”
“So it seems.”
“That young man asks a lot of questions, or simply stands quiet and listens—but have you ever noticed how seldom he volunteers any answers?”
“Of course I have. It doesn’t match the rest of his character—about which, I would remind you, Lord-Commander ar Korentin, I know much more than you do.”
“I wasn’t about to question that fact, my dear.”
“I told you I’m not… but let it pass. This time.”
“So then, his secrecy seems to you more like an assumed habit; one he has acquired from somebody. The wizard, maybe?”
“Maybe. Some more wine, please.”
The Vreijek poured a second cupful for them both, then rose and walked quietly to the cabin door as footsteps approached down the passageway outside. They passed and receded and Dewan smiled to himself before returning to sit—this time on the foot of Kyrin’s bunk. She jerked her own feet aside just in time.
“Aldric…” mused Dewan softly, then shook his head. “No, not yet. Much as I’d like to, I cannot trust him until I’m sure.” Kyrin tried without success to stifle a snort of ironic laughter. “And what do you find so funny?”
“Just a coincidence, that’s all.” She did not elaborate further.
“Indeed? Kyrin, be careful. Don’t let your emotions into any relationship with him. You’re only an observer, after all.”
“Just because you persuaded the king to grant me use of a ship doesn’t give you permission to take liberties with my private life, ar Korentin.”
“In exchange for which you agreed to help me keep an eye on him.”
“That was only to prove what I thought—your suspicions were groundless.”
“It depends rather on whose viewpoint you take,
Kyrin-ain
. Oh yes, I’ve heard that lover’s endearment before. I warned you not to get involved too deeply—it affects your judgement.”
“Is that jealousy I hear… ?”
“There are high-clan
arluthen
who would be very dubious about how nonchalant he is where magic is concerned—”
“And others who would wonder at how friendly you seem to be with an Imperial ship-captain of the Warlord’s faction. To say nothing of what your dear, so-possessive wife would say if I told her—”
“—What? There’s nothing to tell!”
“You’re a man, I’m a woman. I’ve seen you watching me. Oh, there’s no harm in looking, but if I gave you the chance to do more you’d take it, wouldn’t you? Ly-seun would think so. All I need to do is substitute your name for Aldric’s and you wouldn’t be done explaining this side of the grave.”
“Now let’s not be foolish…”
“Get off my bed!”
“You are in love with him, aren’t you?”
“No, I’m not.”
“What?” Dewan got off the bunk as if he had been kicked. “But I thought…”
“Quite clearly, you did not.” Kyrin favoured Dewan with the sort of smile he had not received from anyone since he was about ten years old; a smile which said “amusing simpleton, aren’t you!” with altogether too much clarity. The Valhollan girl had regained some of her good humour now, thanks to the way she had succeeded in bringing ar Korentin down to a more manageable size. With the threat of his wife suspended like a battleaxe over his head, he was less inclined to bluster and hide behind his rank.
“Then what exactly
is
the situation?” He asked the question rather than demanded it.
“I’m four years older than Aldric. I like the boy—he deserves that much—but for several reasons I cannot and do not love him. Nor does he love me, though he thinks he does. Infatuation describes it better. Dewan, he was a virgin before we met.”
Ar Korentin blinked, started to laugh and then thought better of it. “I was thinking such a claim would be easy to make and hard to disprove,” he explained. “But he would have no reason to lie. And I remember his brother Joren. He was a very moral gentleman, one of the old type you seldom meet nowadays. I think Aldric told you the truth…”
“And I’m sure he did. I won’t see him hurt, King’s Champion; not simply because you’re suspicious of the way he behaves. So long as we understand each other, Dewan, your wife will hear nothing but good about you. You do see what I mean, don’t you?”
“In every detail, lady. But remember what I told you and discourage Aldric from any romantic thoughts he might be entertaining. You’ll be going home within the month, and… well, he is a Talvalin, after all. Very shrewd, very clever—and very dangerous.”
“I said I did not want him hurt. Especially by me. I’ll manage somehow.”
“I hope so, Kyrin. For both our sakes.”
The Valhollan stared at him as he gathered up wine, cups and the cloak he had used to cover them, then smiled carefully. “I didn’t have the pleasure of meeting Joren Talvalin, but I can tell you this, distrustful Captain-of-Guards ar Korentin,”—she pronounced the title as if it was some obscure and subtle insult—”his brother is as much an honourable gentleman as Joren ever could have been.”
“That’s as may be—but Joren had the devil’s own temper when he thought he had good cause. Remember that when you start explaining things to Aldric—and choose your words with care. Good night, lady.”
The door closed behind him with a solid, final click.
Kyrin awoke to the sound of more clicks. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and opened the shutters on her cabin’s port, blinking as the newly-risen sun shone full into her face. As she washed and dressed the sharp, brittle clacking noise continued intermittently, although she was sure that nothing was wrong with
En Sohra’t
the galion was sailing easily through a gentle deep-sea swell, and the creak of structure and cordage sounded as it should.
Tying back her long hair with a ribbon, Kyrin walked up the companionway and on to the ship’s main deck, thinking deeply. There was a familiar quality to the clicking, an irregular rhythm reminiscent of something other than wood. Awareness came an instant before sight.
The sound was that of a duel.
Aldric and Dewan faced each other across the deck, both unarmoured but carrying long staves of polished oak. Kyrin recognised the weapons as
taidyin
—staff-swords—which were usually rolled in a bundle among Aldric’s gear, hardwood foils with which he practised daily before exercising with Isileth’s live blade. He had never used them against an opponent until now, something which the girl found suspicious in itself. What if he had overheard last night’s conversation? Or only a part of it? What if… ?
Her thoughts were interrupted by a stinging crack as Dewan blocked a vicious cut at his leg. Aldric darted past him, half-spinning to slice again at the Vreijek’s face and Kyrin winced as the
taidyin
crashed together; there was an awful ferocity in that assault, more than seemed justified by a mere training routine. Ar Korentin assumed a defensive attitude and Aldric glided sideways, analysing his opponent’s stance before launching another attack.
“Stop this, both of you!” shrieked Kyrin in a mixture of rage and fright. “Stop it at once!” The duellists moved apart, Aldric lowering his
taidyo
to regard her with open astonishment while Dewan, realising at once what she thought had caused the fight, favoured her with a wicked smile.
“What’s wrong with you?” Aldric snapped. He had just succeeded in getting ar Korentin where he wanted him and considered the intrusion ill-timed to say the least. “You’ve seen me practising before, haven’t you?” he demanded irritably, then winced a little and pressed one hand to his side.
Kyrin noticed the movement and allowed herself a frown. “I didn’t think you were…that is, I didn’t think you would be training this morning.”
“Not Without good reason, my dear?” purred Dewan. The Valhollan’s frown deepened and Dewan’s grin became if anything wider still.
“The reason, Kyrin-ain, is just that I don’t want this to stiffen up,” said Aldric quietly. He tugged up his shirt. “See—no bleeding. The skin’s just badly grazed, but all that bruising is going to ache if the muscles are not kept working.” He paused, considering, then smiled crookedly. “Not that it doesn’t ache whatever the hell I do…”
“I thought last night you wouldn’t be moving for a couple of days,” Kyrin pointed out, tucking the shirt carefully back through his belt.
“Last night somebody had just drenched a raw wound with neat grain spirit!”
“Oh… Well, at least it seems to have done some good.”
“Some… but that wasn’t the only thing to make me feel better. You did. You helped me get some sleep. Thank you.”
“Then let me help again. Put those sticks aside; rest; take some food.”
“Not just yet. There was someone long ago—I’ve forgotten his name—who claimed there are two sorts of people, the quick and the dead. He was wrong. There are three: the quick, the dead—and the very, very lucky.” He grinned and touched his bandaged side. “Like me.”
Kyrin smiled a wan little smile and stepped back to watch the next exchange. They were using two
taidyin
each this time, in the
dyutayn
or two-blade style of fighting. It was a complex blend of sidesteps and gliding turns, spinning displacements of the body and circular cuts with the swords.
Aldric was sensible enough to avoid the more vigorous waist-twisting moves, but taking such care slowed him down more than either he or Dewan realised until it was far too late. Halfway through the horizontal double-cut called “interlaced windmill,” ar Korentin found that Aldric was a foot closer than he should have been.