The Pen and the Sword (Destiny's Crucible Book 2) (35 page)

“Denes
would have to keep a close watch,” cautioned Maera.

“Tell
him you’ll look into getting his family out of Preddi,” added Yozef.

“You
mean lie to him,” frowned Denes.

“No
promises, only that you’ll do what you can.”

“All
right. What about his Keelan wife? She has to act normal, too.”

Yozef
shrugged. “Just say it was a mistake and apologize.”

They
agreed and gave the Preddi the choice, not that he had options. All messages
would be cleared with Denes and the man watched closely. Other than those
measures, everything would continue as before.

“It
might sound like I’m overly worrisome,” Yozef added cautiously, “but once I
thought about Narthani spies, something just as bad or even worse occurred to
me. If the Narthani have spies, could there be Narthani agents in place to
assassinate important clan leaders? The hetman being the obvious target, of
course.”

Denes’s
face turned red and Maera’s white.

“Kill
the hetman! Would even the Narthani do such a thing?” Denes spat out.

“I
fear the Narthani would do anything they believed would make the conquest of
Caedellium easier,” Yozef said grimly.

“But–but,”
Maera stuttered, “how would they possibly attack Father?”

“From
what I’ve seen, by just walking up to him, if the assassin didn’t plan on
escaping. Otherwise, a musket, poison, or anything you might imagine.”

“I
have to get a semaphore message to the hetman immediately,” said Denes.

Maera
was getting color in her face, as she thought of how her father would react. “I
think we need to get the message to others besides Father. He may not believe
the threat is real or may think that he can deal with it by himself. I’ll send
the warning to Mother. He won’t be able to ignore
her
. Also, Denes, I
suggest we alert Vortig Luwis and Pedr Kennrick. With the three of them, it
will ensure Father takes this seriously. I’ll write letters right now, and we
can send a rider to Caernford, instead of using the semaphore. We might be
overly worried, but for the moment let’s not let this possibility be widely
known. I know the semaphore messages are supposed to be kept inviolate by the
operators, though with something like this . . .”

“I
suggest warning Luwis and Kennrick to also watch out for themselves,” added
Yozef. “In fact, any Keelander with a leadership position should take care.”

“Yozef’s
right,” urged Maera. “Father, his advisors, and all the boyermen need to be
careful. None of them should go anywhere without several guards accompanying
them, and their homes and places of work should be guarded as well.”

Maera
looked sharply at Yozef. “That includes you, husband. If there are Narthani
agents and they’re looking to weaken Keelan by assassination, you may well be
one of their main targets once you’ve gotten their attention, if you haven’t
already.”

Yozef
was momentarily taken aback. His thinking hadn’t gone as far as himself, though
now that Maera mentioned it, she was right. This might all just be his
scaremongering, but if he were a Narthani, Yozef Kolsko would be number two on
a Keelan hit list, right below the hetman.

A
rider took the messages to Caernford. Maera later learned from her mother that
Culich had been skeptical until word came over the semaphore days later of an
attempt on the life of Welman Stent, hetman of the Stent Clan. The attempt
failed, and the unidentified assailants escaped. Less fortunate was Lordum
Hewell, the Hewell clan hetman. A stable worker from a neighboring estate killed
both the hetman’s younger brother and his wife. The couple was visiting and the
husband looked similar enough to the hetman that it was assumed a case of
mistaken identity. Although a massive search for the killer was underway, he’d
disappeared into nearby mountains. 

After
these events, Culich sent warnings to all other clans to be wary of additional
attacks on clan leaders and other targets such as weapon storehouses.

After
he sent those warnings, Culich stared into the abyss he’d avoided.

It’s
coming. God help us.

Next
Generation

One
evening over their meal, Maera informed Yozef that the coming Godsday ceremony
was also a Naming Day. The Melton family would be there. Yozef and Bronwyn’s
child would be given his name, and Yozef would acknowledge fatherhood.

Four
days later, Yozef was ambivalent as he sat with Maera at one end of a front pew.
The entire Melton family occupied the opposite end. After the main service,
Culich rose again after the service’s closing prayer.

“People
of Abersford, before leaving today we have one more joyous event to celebrate.
The arrival of new souls here on Anyar, by God’s grace.”

There
were six little souls to welcome that day. Each family came forward, and the
child was introduced by name, with the Merton family last. They walked to the
rising where Sistian stood, Bronwyn carrying the baby, her sister, their
husband, and their three other children. They all went to their knees, while
the abbot recited a litany of duties in raising the child, to which the three
adults affirmed. Then Sistian called on Yozef, as the child’s father, to come
forward. Maera had primed him on what to do, and he went through a similar
series of affirmations. Although he felt awkward, no one else thought it odd to
see a mother accompanied by another wife, a husband who was not the father, and
the father who was sitting with his pregnant wife.

“People
of Abersford, the new soul in our midst is now to be given a name. The mother,
Bronwyn Merton, requests that the father, Yozef Kolsko, choose the first name
of the child.”

What!!
No one said anything about this!

“Yozef
Kolsko, what is the given name of this child?”

Yozef’s
mind froze.
Name? What name?

He
never comprehended what came out of his mouth. It may have been a shard of
hysteria at being put in the situation without warning, but “Aragorn” was
clearly heard throughout the cathedral.

Oh,
shit! I didn’t really say that! Wait! Wait! Let me try another one—

“Aragorn,”
repeated Sistian. “A new name for Caedellium, appropriate for the son of a
father cast upon our shores and making himself a valuable member of our society.”

No!
Wait!

“People
of Abersford,” intoned Sistian, “meet Aragorn Merton-Kolsko.”

“Oh,
shit!” Yozef mumbled.

Maera
jerked, as she wondered if she’d heard correctly, having witnessed the
exclamation previously and been given the explanation of its meaning.

Yozef
ignored her look and told himself it wasn’t
that
bad a name.

The
congregation broke into exclamations of welcome for a baby whose connection to
Middle Earth would be forever lost to them.

Well
, Yozef sighed.
At least the first thing out of my mouth wasn’t Frodo. Or, for that
matter—Gollum
.

Yozef
was only half cognizant of the next hour, except that after the service he held
Aragorn for several minutes, while Bronwyn and Maera congratulated each other
for a child arrived and one on the way. When he handed the baby back to its
mother, there was a moment of regret, followed by back slaps and more approving
comments from friends and strangers. Cadwulf declined to hold Aragorn, but
Carnigan commented on how tiny new babies were, while holding Aragorn in one
hand. Maera took her turn, and Yozef had a surreal moment seeing Maera hold
Aragorn against her own growing stomach. When they walked home, Yozef and Maera
had their arms around each other’s back, both thinking of their child to come.

Preparing
for War

Life
in Abersford took on a sense of impending . . . something. New activities were
added to the community routine. Eighty men in unison practiced on foot with the
new musket cartridges. Denes decided that only one-third of Abersford’s
fighting men, called a Third, would be issued cartridges. On his suggestion,
Hetman Keelan agreed that other groups would be trained in Clengoth, the
district center, and in Caernford, the clan’s capital. The rationale was to
train cadres in multiple locations, who in turn would train other men once
cartridge production increased. Denes spent several sixdays traveling among the
three towns to oversee training five hundred men in using the cartridges and,
at Yozef’s insistence, the necessity of firing while on foot—he argued that
this made it easier to use the cartridges and maximize the rate of fire. Yozef
convinced Denes to call the men “dragoons,” without explaining the Earth reference
of men who rode horses to battle sites, then fought as infantry.

They
hoped all of Keelan’s fighting men would have minimal training within six
months. Yet events would overtake the hope.

Yozef
and Denes stood watching what passed for the entire Keelan operational artillery
corps practice against hay bales. Although four swivel gun carriages with two
barrels each were completed, Yozef waffled on which design was best. While the
middle barrel of the original three-barreled carriages weren’t reloaded when
the crew wanted to fire the fastest, they still had the advantage of one extra
barrel in the initial salvo. Unsure exactly which design was best, he settled
on initially focusing on the three-barrel pieces, the three of them providing
nine barrels for the first salvo and six thereafter.

New
additions to the artillery corps were three smaller carriages, each mounting
one of the large crossbows firing the explosive quarrels. While Yozef wasn’t confident
in their usefulness, his workers were so enthused he hesitated to discourage
them.

The
three swivel carriages were lined up twenty yards apart, facing a hundred straw
bales standing on end. Paper covered the sides facing the Keelanders a hundred
yards away, to allow counting holes from the canister. The bales simulated a
block of Narthani infantry standing shoulder to shoulder, as the Preddi escapee
had reported. The three crossbow carriages had a greater effective range and,
if used in coordination with the swivels, should have been placed in the rear
to fire over the swivel carriages. However, Yozef didn’t trust the crossbow
crews enough to fire their contraptions over the other crews, so they were
placed behind, 50 yards to one side, 150 yards from the bales.

He
supposed he shouldn’t be so cynical about the crossbows. After all, the French had
used something not so different during the trench warfare of World War I.
Still, he wanted to be a little more confident.

“All
ready, Yozef,” said Denes. All eyes of six crews, plus extras and onlookers,
focused on the two men.

“It’s
your show, Denes. Give the go.”

Denes
raised a hand holding a small white flag. All of the crews turned to their
carriages, with only the crew captains watching Denes. Seeing he had all of the
captains’ attention, Denes slashed the flag to his side, the crew captains
yelled, and the first swivel barrels fired, followed seconds later by all of the
second and then third barrels, after realigning to the bales. When the third
barrels fired, the crews swarmed to reload the outer two barrels, the third one
now abandoned in an effort to keep up the fastest rate of fire possible.

From
the first barrel to the third lasted nine seconds: fire one, realign from the
recoil, fire two, realign from the recoil, fire three. Another fifteen seconds
passed, as crews swarmed reloading and the two outer barrels fired again. As
planned, after four rounds of reloading and firing, the crews stopped and
viewed the results. Yozef had drilled into them that only the crew captains
looked downrange. The crews’ task was loading and firing, not evaluating and
aiming.

The
crossbows firing couldn’t be heard, but their crews had launched four quarrels
each before the swivels ceased firing. The quarrels’ flights were silent, though
the trail of sparks and smoke outlined their arced passages. One quarrel lost
its gunpowder/shrapnel container shortly after firing. The explosion was only
forty yards in from of the carriage, and Yozef winced. It would have landed
within the swivels if the crossbows had been directly to the rear. Four
quarrels passed over the bales, three impacted and exploded short, and four
landed within the formation.

When
firing ceased and the smoke cleared, the results were gratifying or nauseating,
depending on the viewer’s perspective and imagination. Of the one hundred
bales, eleven stood unscathed. Twenty-one had single canister holes in their
paper, twenty-nine had multiple holes, and thirty-nine bales were
unidentifiable—either shredded by canister or shattered by quarrel charges.

Denes
gathered the crews together and had to shout to silence the
self-congratulations.

“It
was a successful test. You all performed well, and I’m proud of you. Don’t
forget that your victory was against hay bales. No one was shooting back at
you. If we have to face the Narthani, it will be different, and not all of us
will return home to our families.”

A
more somber artillery corps packed up and returned the carriages to the storage
buildings.

Nights
Out

The
arrival of Maera Kolsko-Keelan in Abersford refashioned Yozef’s social life, though
not as much as expected. Most evenings they spent together, and although
invitations from Abersford and the abbey came regularly, Maera limited them to
one evening a week.

Yozef
had been concerned about Maera finding a social circle of her own, but he
needn’t have worried. She dove into planning the university and found
association with the abbey’s scholastics fulfilling. To both his surprise and
her own, friendships developed with several young mothers and mothers-to-be
from different strata of Abersford society.

Maera
insisted Yozef go with Carnigan and Filtin at least one night a week to the
Snarling Graeko, with or without her. “I saw how much you enjoyed being with
the other men. You need that occasional night of relaxation, and I’m not going
to be a wife who expects her husband to stop what he enjoys to pamper her. Just
try not to get too drunk too often.”

She
also enjoyed an occasional evening at the pub but had to forswear beer on
Yozef’s insistence.

“One
thing, Maera. Now that you’re with child, you’ll have to stop drinking any
spirits until the baby comes. American medicants know that spirits can affect
growing babies. The worst consequences are when the woman drinks to excess, though
even a little can have effects. It’s safer for the baby if the mother abstains
completely.”

By
now, Maera was accustomed to Yozef making assertions pulled as if haphazardly
from a bag of his people’s knowledge. Most of the time he was worth listening
to, but it got annoying. This time, Maera went to Diera.

“My,”
said Diera, “he hasn’t said anything like this to me. If what he says is true,
then I wish he’d shared this before, but that’s Yozef. I don’t believe he does
it deliberately; it’s just something that doesn’t occur to him until triggered.
In this case, it’s your child coming.”

“Is
it always like that? A trigger?”

“No,”
said Diera carefully and then with a quieter voice, as if saying something not
quite to be shared, “then there’re the rumors of his acting like the knowledge
is being whispered to him. I know it sounds silly. With Yozef? Who knows?”

Maera
smile ruefully. “Merciful God, do I know. It’s so frustrating at times. I try not
to let it bother me.”

“This
spirits warning he mentioned,” said Diera, “let me look into our records. I’ll
check for new babies with unusual problems and see if there’s any connection
with medicant notes about the mother.”

Four
days later, Diera came to Maera in the abbey library. “I suppose I shouldn’t be
surprised, but once again one of Yozef’s droplets of knowledge seems to be
true. I checked records for births the last five years, and too often to be
coincidence we had new babies enfeebled or deformed from mothers known to drink
spirits to excess. It’s not connected in every case, but in enough that I’ve
shown the other medicants at St. Sidryn’s the evidence and we agreed to issue a
general warning. I’m also writing to other Keelan abbeys for them to check
their records for confirmation. If it comes, we’ll expand the warning to the
other provinces.”

Maera
still accompanied Yozef to the pub on occasion, but for a different purpose
than beer, jokes, and loud camaraderie. One corner of the Snarling Graeko was
the turf of Go players. It wasn’t the same game as on Earth, but so similar
that Yozef kept the name and wondered at some genetic predisposition in human
brain wiring.

Maera
had played the game by the time she was seven, usually with staff at St. Tomo’s
abbey when visiting with her mother. By twelve, no one she played could beat
her, and she stopped playing as she grew older. It was a revelation to find a
Go culture in the Snarling Graeko, but a humbling one after losing first to one
of Cadwulf’s bank clerks and then to Brother Wallington, the naturalist scholastic
from St. Sidryn’s. The pub’s patrons weren’t sure how to react when the
hetman’s daughter and the wife of Yozef Kolsko let loose a stream of curses
after her loss to Wallington.