Glasswrights' Progress (10 page)

“Weakness! Do you think I'm weak, my lord?”

“I think you're young.” As if to emphasize his statement, Lamantarino paused, fighting for breath against a sudden wheeze that rattled his chest. When he could speak again, his voice was higher, wispier. “I think you're young, and not well-used to fencing a roomful of opponents.”

“I've had good fencing instructors.”

“You've had instructors who were good enough for a junior prince. It was Tuvashanoran who was supposed to sit at this table.”

For one instant, Hal could see his elder brother, standing strong and proud in the cathedral on the day that he was to step forward as Defender of the Faith. The old king had not been ready to transfer the crown yet, but he'd been eager to bestow a mantle of responsibility on Tuvashanoran, on the eldest son who was beloved of all the people. Thinking of Tuvashanoran, thinking of the black-fletched arrow that had destroyed a proud, able man, Hal's throat tightened. He managed to say, “Yes.”

Lamantarino nodded, or maybe it was only that his head shook with palsied age. “You come from the same blood, King Halaravilli. You can rule with the same power.” The old man started to shuffle back toward the heavy doors, but he turned toward Hal one more time. “Your father always kept one rule in mind as he handled his advisors.”

“What was that?” Hal could not admit that he had scarcely spoken to his father about the council. Until the calamity of Tuvashanoran's death, Hal had not spoken to his father about anything concerning rule and kingship.

“Let them think they're the noble stag, but treat them like the coursing hounds.” The old man laughed at the puzzled expression on Hal's face. “I never said they were words of wisdom, son. But your father lived by them. Treat them like they're coursing hounds.”

Lamantarino started to laugh again, but this time his amusement turned to a choking cough. Hal seized a nearby goblet and rushed across the chamber flagstones. He held the pounded silver against the old man's lips, gently raising the cup so that Lamantarino could drink.

It took a moment, but the baron managed a single swallow, and then another, and another. He settled his hand against Hal's, pushing away the cup with gnarled fingers. “You're a good man, King Halaravilli. Don't forget all you've learned as you begin this chess game with Sin Hazar.”

“I won't. I won't forget anything.”

“Just keep in mind who you're playing here. You're not just matching yourself against Sin Hazar. It's your own men in the fray. Your own men who have to understand your moves.”

“I'll be certain that they do.” As soon as I understand them myself, Hal thought.

“They have to know why Prince Bashanorandi is important. They have to understand about the girls.”

“It's not about the people, you know. It's about my entire rule. It's about whether Morenia will accept me as king.”

“Oh, I know, Sire. I know what's at stake here. Just make sure that they do, too.”

Hal bowed his head and made a holy sign across his breast. “Blessed be Jair, the First Pilgrim. May he guide me in the ways of righteousness.”

The old man snorted. “Jair has little to do with this, son! Ruling a kingdom takes common sense and a firm hand on the reins. The Pilgrim may serve as a guide, but he'll not be much help keeping your council under control.”

Hal bit back a laugh, surprisingly pleased to hear such bluff words. Shrugging, he offered the old councillor his arm, and the two nobles left the chamber. As he walked, though, Hal wondered if he would be able to make the others understand why he must save a bastard prince, a caste-changing merchant, and a wayward Touched girl. And even if the king succeeded with his council, there was still the Fellowship of Jair to convince. Hal did not look forward to that confrontation.

 

 

Chapter 4

 

 

Shea had been a fool to think that she could lead Crestman to safety. She did not know the first thing about traveling through the countryside. She'd only seen one map in her entire life, on the wall of the Greenwood Inn in the tiny village near her cottage. That map had been drawn by a traveling man, as payment for all the ale he had drunk. Everyone in the village joked that King Sin Hazar's roads could not run as crooked as the drinking man had drawn them. Everyone knew that the map was a joke, a game.

And now, Shea was pinning her life and the life of the boy on that game. She knew that they must travel south, away from Sin Hazar's capital of Amanth. She must escape the king's long reach if she dared to walk beside one of his deserting soldiers, one of his stolen captains.

As long as she was traveling toward the south, Shea also knew that she would go east. East toward the ocean, toward the Swancastle. She needed to see that massive fortification, needed to see the magical place that she had turned to all her life, in times of strife and misery, in times of need. She needed to see the place where the nobles of her province had first rebelled, where the Uprising had been born. The Swancastle had cost her her son, her daughter, the peaceful life she had known and loved.

Shea was afraid of the Swancastle, and of the ocean beyond it. She had never seen the moving, seething water, but she had heard tales. In fact, she had heard tales about so many things along the road – the dark forest through which she walked, the ravening hordes of the king's riders. Shea had heard of wild beasts too, voracious animals that would snap up a sunwoman with two short clicks of their jaws.

Crestman did not seem afraid. He walked beside her like any sullen youth, like her own son had, before he had gone off to fight. She judged him to be fifteen years old. A difficult age. A stubborn age.

“Make sure that you gather enough wood,” Shea remonstrated with Crestman as they started to settle in for the evening. “It's going to be cold tonight.” Her back ached as she eased herself to sit on a fallen log. The day had been long, and every muscle in her body protested the abuse of walking, walking, walking endlessly beneath the forest canopy. The autumn chill settled in her bones. Already, it seemed like a lifetime ago that she had taken her babes to harvest the last autumn berries, centuries since she had lazily fallen asleep in the warm sunlight of the clearing near her cottage.

“I'm working as fast as I can,” Crestman grumbled, shuffling his feet through the rotting dust of years-past leaves.

“No, you're not. It will be dark soon.”

“I'm not a sunboy, for you to order me around!”

“No, you're not,” Shea repeated, disapproval spicing her backhanded agreement. “If you were, you'd listen to what I have to say.” Shea huffed and pulled herself to her swollen feet. She dug about in the shadows to the side of the path, stooping low to lift the loose branches that had fallen by the roadside. They were on the very edge of the forest; this would be the last night that they could sleep beneath its protective branches.

It took only a few moments to shame Crestman into helping her. At first, she refused to let the boy carry the wood that she had gathered. She dragged it back to the forest's threshold, to the place where they would pass the night. She relented, though, when she felt a sharp pang in her back. She had to take several deep breaths before she could see clearly again, and even then it was difficult to find a comfortable sitting position, difficult to find a way to sleep in the cold, dark night. She was too old for this adventuring.

She was too old, and too frightened, and too ignorant. She should be jostling her children's children on her knee, sitting in front of a warm fire. But she had no choice. She needed to be on the road, with her newest ward. With Crestman.

The next day, they were almost caught by soldiers twice. Perhaps the men had seen the smoke of their fire on the horizon. Whatever the cause, the horsemen were thick on the road. Crestman was responsible for watching for riders. He'd cry an alarm, and the two travelers would leave the road, roaming across wild-grown fields until they could crouch in weeds. If Shea had realized how close the soldiers were before she began this foolish journey.… If she had known the danger that she was in, with her skychildren, with all her precious lions and suns and owls, with her one little swan.…

As the last of the soldiers rode off and the sun began to set, Shea decided that she should turn back. She should return to her cottage and her children. Who said that Hartley and Tain would be able to protect the children? Even now, they might all be hungry and cold. They might need her.

Shea started to turn around, but she realized that she might put the children at greater risk if she returned. Who was to say that the soldiers were not tracking them this very instant, playing with her like a cat with its prey, waiting for the night time, for the next day, to take her captive? Who was to say that Shea would not lead King Sin Hazar directly to her children, if she turned around to save them?

Better to press on, then. Better to keep moving toward the Swancastle.

At least Crestman seemed to be gentling a little under her ministrations. Of course, he still cried out in his sleep – that she was unable to stop. If Shea startled him awake from a nightmare, he woke grasping for his knife. He also shied away from anyone touching his face – Shea had learned that lesson inadvertently, when she'd reached out to rub away a smear of berry juice from his cheek. He still kept his hair pulled tight in a soldier's clout, emphasizing the harsh lines of his hungry face.

Bit by bit, though, like a sparrow growing accustomed to taking breadcrumbs, Crestman began to relax around her. During the day, he let his hand stray from the curved knife that he kept tucked into his leather belt. Once, when Shea slipped in a muddy rut in the road, Crestman hovered over her, a look of anxiety twisting his face where annoyance had played only the day before. When they were caught in one of the frequent autumn downpours, Crestman no longer hesitated to pull close to Shea, to take shelter under her oiled cloak.

The morning after the heaviest downpour, though, Shea had her first true fight with the boy. Not surprisingly, it was about their destination.

“Why go to the Swancastle?” Crestman had complained. “There aren't any swans there, anymore. The castle lies empty.”

“You've been there?”

“Aye.” Crestman looked uncomfortable, as if he wanted to forget a bad dream. “My unit trained on the castle grounds.”

“Trained? What do you mean? What did you learn at the Swancastle?” Crestman refused to meet Shea's eyes, but his fingers strayed to the scar that melted beneath his eye. “Is that where they did it, then? Is that where they cut away your tattoo?” Crestman only tightened his belt and hefted his meager pack. “You can't ignore me, boy! You answer your elders when they speak to you!”

Crestman would not reply, though. Shea's anger flashed behind her eyes, as sharp as the pain in her back, and she badgered him for a few minutes more. “Are the troops still there? Does King Sin Hazar use the Swancastle to train his Little Army?”

“I don't know! Stop asking me questions! I don't know who's there now! I just know that the king's troops fought long and hard for it, to take it from the rebels years ago. After the Uprising, Sin Hazar decided to use it to train his armies.”

Fought long and hard.… That's right. King Sin Hazar had paid in blood to defeat his rebellious swans. He had extracted a toll as well, though. Now, more than ever, Shea
had
to go to the Swancastle. Now that she was free from protecting her orphans, she had to see where the Uprising had been born, where her world had been turned upside down. She had to see the place that had spawned the battles that cost her Pom. Pom, who had died in the Little Army's first camps, who had fallen learning how to protect the king's loyal swans in the precarious years just after the Uprising. Pom, who had been learning how to protect his way of life.…

By the time they'd been a week on the road, Shea had grown tired of fighting with her lionboy. Crestman's initial obedience, his early sense of gratitude, had faded away like stars bleached by the morning sky. The farther south they moved, the more Crestman challenged every statement that Shea made. She needed to explain why they started at a particular hour of the morning, why they traveled down a particular fork in the road. She needed to justify why they stopped to fish at a particular rill, why they could not eat those particular mushrooms. She needed to prove every decision, every choice.

And she did. She stood up to the lionboy, as if she hadn't spent her entire life acting on decisions made by others. She stood her ground, as if the sun had burned away her old self, crisped her ancient identity and blown it away with the autumn winds that came with increasing frequency. Shea had become a different person from the meek sunwoman who had lived her entire life one day's walk from a village, from the comfort of Father Nariom, from the familiar skycastes.

Now that Shea was not acting like a sun, she had freedoms she'd never dreamed of. Once, while they wandered, they came across a stand of curling sweetleaf. Shea knew that she should harvest the dark green leaves, stow them away for future use and throw the seeded fruit far over her shoulder, to spread the patch of the precious herb. She did not care to, though. She would have no time to use the sweetleaf, no time to bake, or even to boil the herb down to its sticky syrup. She walked on, ignoring the tug at the back of her mind. She might be a sunwoman, but she was no fool. She'd do what needed to be done, here and now, not just what she'd been raised to do.

Another time, a couple of days later, she and Crestman were skirting the edge of a village. Crestman had spent the better part of the morning complaining about their food, or more precisely, their lack of sustenance. Shea had listened to him with a mother's concern at first, but then she had grown tired of the sulking boy. Certainly he was hungry. So was she.