Kingmaker (34 page)

Dafed hugged Ellie, told her he'd brought most of his squad over, and sat down around the council table like he'd always been with them.

"Can we trust him?” Lart demanded, glaring at Dafed like he carried a stench from the capital.

"I trust him,” Mark answered. “Now let's hear all the details of Sergius's campaign against Ranolf."

Dafed didn't know the political decision-making, but he knew the mercenary companies Sergius had thrown into the fight. The king had kept his best troops to guard the capital, but he'd sent an army of more than a thousand soldiers, including a siege train, after Ranolf. Against maybe fifty guards and a not especially defensible manor house, Ranolf wouldn't last more than a couple of days.

"We're too late already then,” Arnold announced. He slumped at the table.

Mark tried to look sympathetic, but Ellie could see he was straining at it. “Sergius has made a terrible mistake. All of the nobles are going to have to wonder whether they're going to be next."

She tried to bite her tongue but Mark's tone made her suspicious. Mark wasn't above trying a bit of disinformation if he thought it would help the cause.

"Any idea why Sergius made that mistake?"

Mark just stared at her for a moment, his face completely free of guile. “Who knows what went through the tyrant's mind? Anger over Arnold's honor? Perhaps. Or greed for rich fiefs near the capital? Or perhaps, he simply tired of having someone urge him to keep his word."

Mark held up a hand just as Ellie opened her mouth. “Whatever reasons Sergius might have, no one held a sword to his throat and insisted. His own greed, shame over broken promises, and unwillingness to accept a strong honest voice in his council drove his decision. Arnold's honorable behavior and own revolt might have given him the excuse, but he is solely responsible. He may have been pushed, but he went willingly."

Arnold swallowed hard but nodded, then drew his sword. “Sergius's attack has absolved me of my oath. I will join your revolt and cast the false King to hell where he belongs."

The man had charisma oozing from every pore. Most of the guerilla leaders were ex-bandits and outlaws, men who had been oppressed by Arnold's class and culture from their childhood. But the knight's words had them on their feet cheering, slapping him on the back, and kissing him on the cheeks with their garlic-ridden lips.

Mark waited patiently, like a spider that had trapped a fly. “In the history of my own world, there was a King who seized the holdings of one of his Dukes. By violating the laws of inheritance, he showed himself to be no fit King. And the Duke cast him out and became King himself."

Which had led, unfortunately, to one of the great civil wars of history, the War of the Roses. But Mark didn't go into that. He was setting Arnold up.

"It is true that a King must not arbitrarily strip a Baron of his fief,” Arnold said.

Ellie was torn. Arnold was her friend and Ranolf had helped her when she and Mark had arrived alone and friendless. She didn't like Mark's manipulation, but Mark was right. Whatever hints Mark's spies might have sent him, Sergius had already moved against Ranolf. She would have to make the best of it—and watch Mark like a hawk afterwards. He might decide the movement needed a martyr after all.

Now, though, it was time to assert the illegitimate nature of Sergius's hold on the thrown.

"Did you notice that the flail and hammer gave off no spark of magic when Sergius was crowned?” she asked the room. “I must think, even then, that Lubica rejected him as King because he was an oathbreaker in his heart. The land needs a new King. Someone of noble blood, of course. Someone who can rally the aristocracy to our cause, joining with the workers and farmers to cast out this evil pretender and to create a nation that is ruled by law rather than by arbitrary decisions."

Arnold looked at Ellie and opened his mouth, but Mark beat him to the punch. “Long live King Arnold."

Between them, they thrashed out a constitution. A single set of laws for both people and the nobility. Feudal property rights would be respected, but the peasants would own their lands outright subject to modest taxes paid to the Barons for protection. Since monasteries didn't have military responsibilities, peasants working lands formerly enfiefed by the monks would own their lands outright and pay taxes directly to the central government.

The King would be commander in chief of the army, could appoint judges, subject to confirmation by parliament, and would have the authority to grant any feudal fiefs that eschewed to the nation as a result of a noble line dying out. But he wouldn't be an absolute monarch, couldn't declare war, and couldn't raise taxes without parliamentary approval.

It wasn't a bad constitution and Ellie felt proud of it, even with her knowledge that Mark had written much of it out well before Sergius had attacked Ranolf.

Once they'd created a constitution, Ellie figured it was time to pay Arnold back some of what she owed him.

"I'm going to take the fight to Sergius.” It was only one day after she, Arnold, the ex-bandit leaders, and a couple of minor barons who'd struggled into Harrison signed the new constitution but there was no point in waiting. “The ninjas and I will leave tomorrow."

Arnold nodded. “I'll come with you."

Mark held up a hand. “We need you to help form a cavalry, Your Majesty. Of everyone we have, you've got the most experience with heavy cavalry."

"But—"

"I'll try to free your father and sisters,” Ellie offered.

Arnold's face turned red. “If I am King, even a constitutional King, surely I can decide whether to lead my soldiers in battle."

Mark gave Ellie a nasty look. “I can't control either of you guys. If you both want to go out and get killed, there's not a lot I can do about it. But think about this, Arnold. Ellie is a natural at guerilla war, but she can't help build a real army. Her martial arts training doesn't really mean much when it comes to the size of army we need to build to take on Sergius. Her strategic skills are about on par with those of a mosquito. And she's already done the big thing she needs to do, which was to create the idea of a nation and government that is for the people rather than for the King. Taking the fight to Sergius, making his life a bit miserable, giving some encouragement to the fighters we've already got in the field, and possibly freeing some prisoners and recruiting a few more nobles over to our side is the kind of thing she would do a great job at. If she dies, you and I will be sad, but she'll be a martyr to the cause.

"But you are different. If we lose you, most of the army and all of the nobles are going to think it's over. You know how the nobles react, and you've got the sense to help us build an army that can stand against them and defeat them."

Arnold looked at Ellie. “Tell me that I should come with you."

She shook her head. “You know Mark is right, Arnold. I mean, Your Majesty."

"You can always call me Arnold, princess.” He sighed, toyed with the sword on his belt, then sighed again. “Go in my place, then, Ellie. I will stay here and work."

Ellie promised him she would be careful, which wasn't something she had to lie about. She intended to be very careful. But she intended to make Sergius pay for being a low-down oath-breaking back-stabbing, assassin-sending jerk, too.

They left thirty ninja, mostly soldiers who had been wounded in the battle for Harrison, as a cadre for training the next generation of guerillas and Ellie set off with the rest—a hundred and twenty experienced fighters about evenly divided between men and women.

Mark rode up just as Ellie reached the gates of the city. “Take care of yourself, huh?"

"You don't need me to be a martyr?"

He shook his head. “I understand that you're angry and I don't blame you. I don't like some of what I'm doing, either, Ellie. It isn't like
Civilization III
where you figure you're going to have to backstab your allies from time to time. It hurts. But I'm doing the best I can to help you create the nation you risked your life for."

"That's what Pol Pot and his cronies said, I'll bet."

Mark nodded abruptly. “Don't you think I worry about that all the time?"

"I don't know, Mark. You always seem like the
whatever it takes
kind of guy to me."

He kneed his horse closer. “Maybe. But that doesn't mean I like it."

He brushed a knuckle against her cheek, then quickly, as if worrying about changing his mind, pressed his lips where his knuckle had rested. “Take care of yourself, Ellie. Better a live princess than a dead martyr."

He reined his horse and trotted back toward the ducal palace leaving Ellie more confused than ever.

She touched a hand to her cheek. What had that been about?

By American standards, Lubica was a small country. Three Lubicas could rattle around in a state the size of California. To a small band of soldiers on foot, it felt huge.

Two days after they left Harrison, the mother of blizzards struck.

In three hours, more than two feet of snow fell. Marching became an exhausting and painful effort made ever more dangerous by unexpected pitfalls covered by snowdrifts and just waiting for a ninja to stumble on them.

The second time a man walked into one and broke his leg, Ellie called a stop.

They were still in Free Lubica controlled territory and it looked like this particular front in the guerilla war against Sergius was already grinding to a halt.

They found a relatively protected spot in a second growth woods and Ellie had them gather firewood, dig holes in the snow down to the frozen earth, and start fires. Although ninja are supposed to be able to ignore the elements, adding frostbite and hypothermia to their problems was piss-poor strategy.

Micael found her strolling around the outskirts of the camp and signed something to her.

She didn't have a clue. “What?"

He signed again, stared at her blank face, and vanished.

Two minutes later, he was back with Alys. “He says you can make gliders,” she translated.

That was a brilliant idea, Ellie thought sarcastically. If they only had some way of pulling them in the air, they could fly above the blizzard and go wherever they were needed. If real magic worked the way it did in Mark's fantasy books, she supposed she could fly or even teleport them somewhere. But reality can suck sometimes.

She started to tell them that but Alys shook her head. “Small gliders. For the feet. Don't sink into the snow."

Torrance had more than its share of rich kids, who disappeared every winter and went—skiing. Ellie realized that was a Lubica word her parents hadn't taught her. Okay,
gliders
were skis.

"We don't have any skis,” she told them. “And I doubt that many of the ninja know how to use them anyway."

But that wasn't a problem. Her ninja were willing to try anything.

An hour later, Micael produced his first pair of skis.

Four hours later, they had two more broken legs and an army who was getting accustomed to a sort of skate-gliding that had relatively little to do with the downhill and slalom skiing that Ellie had seen on television, but that managed to cover the ground about twice as fast as a woman could walk. Which was about twenty times as fast as their army could march through the drifts.

If she had any effectives left by the time they got to Sergius's territory, she would have a workable strike force. Because, as long as there was snow on the ground, she could actually outmaneuver cavalry.

Sergius had turned Ranolf's Barony over to the highest bidder, equipped him with a couple hundred guards, and demanded a doubling in the taxes the fiefdom would supply.

The peasants weren't happy with the added taxes, but they didn't know they had an alternative. Ellie intended to give them one.

The first day after they arrived, a pair of ninja infiltrated the manor house and suggested that the servants leave.

The next day, they started picking off guards.

She captured the first one herself—a kid, really—when he was at the small village near the manor looking for food.

He and another guard had their arms loaded with hams, flour, and, in the case of his fellow, a keg of wine from the tavern.

Ellie stepped behind them, slit their sword belts, and gave the older one a kick in the rear to send him on his way.

He took a quick look at the ten ninja Ellie had with her, shrugged his shoulders, and ran for home.

The young guard held up his hands. “What are you going to do to me?"

"That depends on you, kid. You can head up north and join the Free Lubica Army. Or you can run back to Moray and wait for Free Lubica to arrive. Or you can stay here with the rest of the guards."

"And die,” Micael signed.

Ellie smiled. “My friend here wanted me to tell you that if you stay, you die."

Two weeks later, Ellie and her ninja had the barony to themselves. Some of the guards had died. More retreated with the fake baron back to the capital. Most deserted.

The ninja practiced with their skis and their new white uniforms which Micael designed to blend with the snow, prepared for Sergius's counter-attack, and raided baronies surrounding Ranolf's.

The raids were pinpricks, mostly. Late-night attacks on minor nobility who remained loyal to Sergius. Sabotage against toll collectors and taxmen. But their guerilla army swelled with each trivial victory. She even recognized some of the bandits who'd waylaid her on her way to the capital months earlier in her growing band.

Although the pinpricks couldn't do much damage to Sergius, they were annoying. And they proved that he didn't have his country under control. A wise and mature king would have recognized that Ellie would have to come to him and hunkered down behind his defenses. But Sergius was not wise and definitely not mature.

He sent an army, commanded by his uncle, the Duke of Sullivan, after her.

After letting that army march, unmolested, for three days until they were well away from any succor from the capital, Ellie and her ninja struck.