Arms-Commander (58 page)

Immediately after breakfast on fiveday—prepared and served in a cheery breakfast room by a kitchen staff that seemed exceedingly happy to welcome Saryn as the new lady-holder, Saryn made her way down the main corridor to the small guest chamber where Dealdron lay on the wide bed, propped up at a slight angle.

“Good morning,” she offered as she stepped into the room.

“Good morning, Commander.” His brow furrowed. “I dreamed you were here earlier. So was Lady Zeldyan…before my chest was bound.”

“We were.”
And I have been several times when you didn't recognize me.
“You didn't dream it. She came to thank you for saving her life. She and the other lord-holders have returned to their holdings for the present.” Maeldyn and Spalkyn had actually provided an escort for Zeldyan, and half of Maeldyn's armsmen would remain at The Groves, along with what remained of Zeldyan's armsmen, to keep order and control over the prisoners rebuilding and repairing the villa and its outbuildings.

Saryn concentrated on sensing Dealdron's ribs and chest, as she had done two days earlier, when he had been slightly feverish and disoriented. There was still some wound chaos in places, but far less than what she had removed or neutralized before.

The younger man shifted his weight on the pillows supporting him.

“Hold still, if you will.”

Dealdron opened, then closed his mouth.

This time, it took only a few moments to remove the chaos, and she could sense that he was beginning to heal. She straightened slightly, then smiled. “You'll be fine, but not all that soon.”

“You're a healer, too, aren't you?”

“I can do some healing. I'm not a healer.”

“I wouldn't be here otherwise.”

“Probably not,” she replied with a smile, “but I wouldn't be here if you hadn't attacked those Lornians.”

“I only got two of them.”

“That was enough. I blocked one other and dived free. Klarisa and fourth squad killed the rest of them. You also saved Lady Zeldyan. She was most grateful.”

“The girls who brought me food, they said you were the new lord-holder here.”

“For now, perhaps for longer. All the lord-holders will be meeting in Lornth an eightday from next oneday. That will decide who will be the Overlord of Lornth.”

“You should be the overlord,” Dealdron said. “You have defeated all who came against you, and you are fair and just. Most of them are not.”

“I try to be fair,” Saryn acknowledged. “Being just is harder.”

“You see that. Most do not.”

Saryn could sense the warmth and the affection. Had Dealdron not still been so weak and injured, she suspected she might well have sensed a great deal more, and for a moment, and behind a pleasant smile, she had to struggle to maintain her composure. She did bend forward and take his hand for a moment. “You see in me what you would like to see.”

“No, Angel, I see what you are and will be.”

Saryn swallowed, taken aback by the faith and affection in and behind his words. Could she ever live up to that faith? Yet…

She managed another smile as she withdrew her hand. “You need to get well. Then we'll talk about what happens.”

“What will happen is what will happen, but what ever happens, you are my angel.”

One way or another you will be his angel, but what do you say?
She managed a grin. “What kind of angel, we'll have to see.”

She did not quite flee his chamber, but she did take several deep breaths once she was back in the corridor alone for a moment.
What ever might be, living up to his faith might be even harder than what has come before.

After a time, she headed out of the villa and toward the barracks area to find Hryessa.

The guard captain was watching as Klarisa directed the newer guards and even some recruits, it looked like, through the morning warm-up exercises. When Hryessa saw Saryn, the captain immediately turned and walked toward her commander.

“More new faces, I see,” observed Saryn.

“There are a few more every day. Some days, more than a few. You have inspired many.”

“Will they stay inspired?” Saryn had her doubts.

“Very few have left. Very few, even after seeing battles and other guards dying.”

It was hard for Saryn to accept that life for women in Lornth had been that hard, but it must have been. Otherwise, why would they remain so cheerfully? “We need to think about forming and training a full second company. Who would you suggest as the undercaptains for the two companies? The squad leaders of first and fourth squads?”

“They have been acting as such…at times.”

“You'll have to watch over them closely.” Saryn grinned. “Not that you haven't been.”

“I have, but they know what to do. They have watched us both.”

Saryn shook her head with a wry expression.
I just hope they've watched you more. They shouldn't be trying some of what I've done.

“They need to see that a woman can be fearless and successful, Commander.”

Saryn didn't want to get into that. “How many should we take to Lornth?”

“I will take a full company with you. If you are to be overlord, we must be prepared. But we must leave some guards here.”

“What do you plan?” asked Saryn.

“Second company will be what remains of fourth squad and the newer trainees and the new recruits. Klarisa can be most forceful. We will even have enough for a third company before long. For now, they should certainly be able to hold Duevek.”

Saryn winced. Every time she heard the name Duevek, it grated on her. The holding name needed to change as well. “How are those of the holding staff taking matters?”

Hryessa raised her eyebrows, as if to ask why Saryn would even ask.

“Because everyone is so respectful around me. I'd like to know how they feel when I'm not around.”

“The women who know how to do things are most happy. Those who try to get others to do their work are not. Most of the men were either armsmen or have left. Those who remain seem pleased. We have had a score of women arrive here who have inquired about work at the holding, and even a few men.”

“I take it that you are working on the complainers?”

Hryessa laughed. “I do not have to. The other women are taking care of that. Within a few more days, everything will be close to what it should be.”

Saryn nodded. For a time, she was silent, wondering if she should ask the next question.

Hryessa looked at her inquiringly.

Saryn decided to go ahead. “I've just seen Dealdron.”
Again.
“What do you think of him?”

“He is a good man. He loves you.” Hryessa shrugged. “What else is there to say?”

“What else?”
There are a million other things to say.

“If you were a poor and powerless woman, other things might matter. You are not poor or powerless. He will never harm you, and he adores you. He is also not dumb. He is good with coins, and has saved much for you and for us.”

In short…exactly where are you going to do better?
The problem was that Hryessa was clearly right, at least from what Saryn had seen of the men in Lornth and elsewhere in Candar. And she couldn't deny that she definitely felt something for him.
More than just something.

“Oh…a messenger just delivered this, Commander,” Hryessa said with a smile, extending an envelope. “He wore green and cream.”

“Lord Shartyr…no doubt a missive of congratulations and support.”

“He is not to be trusted.”

“No…but he's been most careful not to offend or provoke us.”

“Those men are the most dangerous.”

“Women can be exactly the same if they have power long enough,” replied Saryn dryly, thinking about Ryba. “Let's see what he has to say.” She broke the seal and opened the envelope, taking out the single sheet and scanning the beautifully written lines.

The signature and seal were those of Shartyr, Lord-Holder of Masengyl.

Saryn nodded. As she had suspected, Lord Shartyr was extremely astute, and not to be trusted in the slightest.
Especially not when your back is turned.
At the same time, the letter did reinforce what Maeldyn had told her.

“He offers you congratulations and support,” suggested Hryessa.

“Of course,” replied Saryn with a laugh. “You said he was not to be trusted.”

The meeting in Lornth was going to be most interesting, especially when she told them what she expected of them. Yet…if she wanted to change things, she couldn't leave matters as she had found them. And if she didn't change things, what was the point of all the deaths?

Late on threeday afternoon, Saryn sat in the small study, looking at the missives stacked to one side. She picked up the top one, from Lord Whethryn of Tharnya, and scanned the lines.

The next, from the widow of Lord Rherhn, was even less palatable.

Saryn wanted to snort at the widow's plea. While the lord-holders had certainly been the prime players, and while the poor women of the towns and hamlets had little say, if even a few of the consorts of the lord-holders had been more forceful, the situation wouldn't have been nearly so bad.
Or would it?
How would she ever know?

Finally, she stood and walked to the bookcase set in the middle of the inside wall, pressing on one of the corner bosses, one that was at the edge of the second shelf and ever so slightly more worn than the others. Then she swung the bookcase away from the wall, revealing a closet—or small room, really, since she'd not yet seen a true closet in any palace or villa anywhere in Lornth. Although she'd sensed the hidden space once she'd started to look for such, it had taken her a while to figure out the trick.

She studied the seven strongboxes on the shelves, then shook her head. She had been required to employ considerable effort with her order-chaos-abilities to open the heavy padlocks without destroying them, since she had yet to find the keys. The number of golds and silvers was considerable, more than enough to pay for the costs of operating the villa and paying the guard companies she would be supporting, possibly for several years. But having that much coin worried her, first because it suggested that the costs were far higher than she thought they were, and second because it revealed, again, that Lornth had nothing even approximating a banking system, another problem that she would need to address—assuming that she could pull off becoming and remaining overlord.

The other thing that she had noticed was the coins themselves. She'd observed earlier that the golds, silvers, and coppers were a mixed lot, some clearly Cyadoran, others Suthyan, or Gallosian, and even a few from Hamor and from someplace called Lydiar. None bore marks of having been coined in Lornth, yet another difficulty ahead. The other thing was that, what ever the source, the golds were all identical in weight and size, as were the silvers, but the size of the coppers varied a great deal, although the weights seemed to be the same.

She smiled briefly. In a way, that all made sense.

Her eyes drifted to the smallest of the strongboxes, the one that Dealdron had used to collect the loot and other items of value from battles and the like. It held close to a hundred golds in coins, and rings and jewels most likely worth several hundred golds, if not more.

He never took a copper himself.

She stepped back and closed the bookcase door, making sure that the catch and hidden lock were both engaged. Then she left the study, walked halfway down the main corridor, and took a side hall out to the north terrace, knowing that Dealdron was seated there.

As she neared, he put his good hand on the arm of his chair.

“Don't get up. Your ribs still aren't healed, and if you slip, you could hurt the arm.”

“I am much better, Angel.” He grinned.

“I can tell that.” Saryn managed not to flush as she took the chair in the afternoon shade beside his. He'd taken to calling her Angel after he'd sensed her reaction to the salutation, although he always spoke respectfully, and the feelings behind the words were a combination of respect and affection.

“Hryessa turned your strongbox over to me the other day. I forgot to tell you that it's safe. I counted over a hundred golds.”

“It is all for you.”

“I know.” While some men would have said so after the fact, Dealdron had told her before the fact as well, and she could also read the truth in what he said.

“What do you think of this place?”

“It is much grander than Westwind. It is not so grand as the Prefect's palace in Fenard, but it is much more pleasant.”

“You will have some time to explore it and offer your thoughts on how to change it for our needs.”

Dealdron frowned.

“The day after tomorrow, Hryessa and I and first company will ride to Lornth to meet with the remaining lord-holders and perhaps some of the heirs of those who died.”

“I will be much better.”

Saryn shook her head. “We'll only be taking one wagon, and your injuries are not healed enough for travel, not when such travel is not necessary.”

“But…”

“You have done enough for now.” She smiled. “Besides, I like this place—except for the name—and it's closer to the southern lords and to the roads across the Westhorns. Also, the lords or overlords of Lornth have left a bad impression on everyone. So…if matters work out, and they agree, however reluctantly, to my becoming overlord or the like, this is where the center of government will be.”

Dealdron gave a quick quizzical frown at the Rationalist word
government,
a term Saryn realized she'd never heard in Lornth, before saying, “You should call it Sarron.”

“That's rather vain, don't you think?”

“No.
Sarron
means
peace
in the old tongue. That is similar to your angel name, but it does not sound quite the same, and it is not spelled the same.”

“But the similarity would be helpful, you think?”

“You wanted to bring peace to Lornth, did you not?”

Saryn shook her head.

“Do not let them talk you out of being overlord, Angel.” Dealdron's voice was firm. “All you have done and all the lives that have been lost will be wasted.”

“Become overlord at the point of a blade, if necessary?”

“As it must be,” he corrected her. “I am but a plasterer and an ostler, but I have seen enough to know that a weak ruler is the worst fate for any land.”

“What about those who rule by fear?” Saryn wanted to hear what he said.

“Those who rule by fear alone are weak. The proper use of strength is to create respect, not fear. Only those who wish to do evil should be fearful of a ruler.”

Saryn wouldn't have phrased it that way, but she certainly agreed with the ideas and the sentiment behind his words.

“And to whom should a ruler listen? Besides you?” she asked with a smile.

“Listen to all,” he said, “but make your own judgment.”

Saryn sat back in the chair, letting her eyes take in the Westhorns and the dusty road she had ridden down three times, and back only twice…and which she now doubted she would ever take again to the Roof of the World.

Her eyes drifted to Dealdron…and she smiled.