Fire of the Forebears, page 44
Grenja bared her teeth. “Not all of us have your years anyway, Cenóri.”
Trofast beheld the dog for a moment with something akin to sympathy. “I suppose you’re right.”
“Good riddance,” Renard said, waving his hand. “Sorry, Trofast, but your plan sounds boring anyway. And besides, when it comes down to it, numbers aren’t going to mean shit if we can control the time and the terrain.”
The centaur gave a bitter laugh. “Eloquently put, Master Soldier, but how do you suggest we do that when over seven thousand men are soon to be standing on our doorstep?”
Renard didn’t answer, and Triston joined him in letting the silence linger. He might still be able to swing an arrangement where he left here with a small company for Edras, but he’d have to be gentler when asking for it.
Erryl rubbed his nose. “Well, while it is the cause of our disadvantage, we may still determine the time if—”
“No,” Trofast said sternly. “We’ll have asked too much of the girl by the end of this as it is.”
Renard stiffened. “Kura will be fine.”
Erryl’s eyebrows rose, and he stared up at Trofast with a taunting sense of surprise. “So, you do believe in the finality of the prophecy? Un bryhte medla debordyur—a gallant heart overflows?”
“As I’ve told you,” Trofast said, tersely, “I do not know what to believe.”
Shock caught in Triston’s chest, and he looked around the council table in disbelief. “You would let her die for you?”
Renard shook his head vehemently. “Absolutely not.”
“But it is what the prophecy says,” Grenja said, jostling the fur that bristled on her back. “All lives end in death. Your years only lull you into thinking it will never catch up to you. Kura is deserving of an honorable death more than many I know. She should be honored to face it.”
“The interpretation is not settled,” Erryl said, eyeing the dog with a frown. “The seventh stanza could refer to self-sacrifice, not necessarily death, and that she has already done. And besides, while I will admit I am less skeptical than before, I am not yet convinced she is the fonfyr.”
“Not the fonfyr?” Renard laughed. “Didn’t you see what she did in Lâroe?”
Erryl fell silent.
Trofast let out a heavy sigh. “She knows what she’s chosen.”
“No one’s gonna die,” Renard said dismissively, and Triston was surprised to see in the seasoned warrior’s face how much he meant it.
A large fist pounded on the council doors, and then one door creaked open. It was the bear, poking his large nose into the room.
Trofast stepped forward. “What is it, Rusket?”
“There’s a group of refugees here for vetting. Feldlanders.”
“I’ll go,” Renard said, rising from his seat. He glanced over at Grenja. “Fill me in?”
The dog nodded, and Renard followed the bear out the door.
“Feldlanders…” Erryl mused as the door fell shut. “Do you suppose any of them practice Pokalfr?”
Trofast’s eyes widened just a bit. “It would be risky. She would have to agree to it.”
“You said Pokalfr?” Grenja tilted her head to the side. “That weird thing the Svaldans do?”
Erryl nodded, solemnly. “It is a strange ritual art—some perversion of my people’s invocations, no doubt. But if done properly, it can bring about a powerful, although temporary, trance. The Grey Lady has likely already seen enough to know our general location, but we might fool her into thinking Nansûr was somewhere else nearby. If Kura was willing, of course.”
Triston frowned. Tactically, the idea seemed viable, but his skin crawled to hear them all speak of Kura so callously, as a tool instead of a person. His father did the same in battle—war turned humanity into weakness—but this felt… different.
“It doesn’t seem right,” Grenja said, tail bristling.
“But if it could be done,” Erryl said, “we would have our advantage.”
Triston shook his head. “That’s not much of an advantage, facing down seven thousand royal soldiers. Get me into Edras, and I’ll triple your numbers while cutting your enemy’s in half.”
Grenja barked a laugh. “Exactly how fast do you think we can run? We’d never make it to Edras before your soldiers made it here.”
Triston took a step back and muttered a curse under his breath. This whole time he’d been measuring the distance with the speed of a royal charger, but a rag-tag group like this wouldn’t make good time. He breathed out, running a hand through his hair to scratch the back of his head. “Then, when those troops do come close enough, find my father’s company—or Lavern’s or Therburn’s—and get me there. If I can speak with any of them I can still end this before it begins.”
Erryl laughed. “Do you really think we’d—”
“We will consider it,” Trofast said. He didn’t raise his voice—didn’t even glance in Erryl’s direction—but the man fell silent anyway. The centaur looked Triston in the eye, then bowed slightly at the waist. “Thank you for your counsel. You are dismissed.”
Triston nodded, ready to offer some kind of similar thanks, before he processed the second part of the statement. Even then he nearly questioned it, but under the centaur’s stern gaze he found better sense than that. As cordially as he could, he returned the bow and then half-stumbled back through the door to wander into the hallway.
The shadowy corridor sat empty, aside from the voices echoing at the far end, and Triston stood there as the door fell shut, clenching his fists at his sides, as his veins still coursed with the urge to do something—anything. They would consider his offer? Given the circumstances he should probably be grateful for that, but at the very least he was not accustomed to being dismissed from a meeting before it reached its conclusion.
The conversation played over again in his mind, but instead of fixating on what he could have done differently, his thoughts settled on a separate problem. Maybe one he could actually solve, while he waited for them to come to their senses. He turned and jogged down the hallway, glancing up only to confirm that he was headed in the right direction. He knew Kura would do whatever she had to do to win this fight, and he wasn’t about to let her die—no matter how honorable the reason.
Chapter forty-eight
Invocations
Kura took a seat in the dusty corner of the training room. The small space, lit by a vein of lenêre stone, was empty except for a rack of training weapons on the opposite wall. She didn’t want to disturb her father’s rest in her own room, but she didn’t feel comfortable wandering the halls of Nansûr, either. Not with Vahleda waiting.
Drawing in a deep breath, she shut her eyes and savored the fleeting moment of solitude. It couldn’t hurt for the Grey Lady to see this room. The silence made her tangle of thoughts resurface, but this time the knot had unraveled. She wasn’t the fonfyr, but she would carry the sword anyway. Somehow.
She unbuckled the scabbard at her hip, then shifted to her knees to place Ìsendorál on the floor before her. What was she doing? Making an offering? She examined the engravings on the leather scabbard. How did Aethan do this?
She placed her hands on her knees and looked out at the stone wall above her. “Essence, speak to me…” Her voice sounded weak and empty as it echoed in the room. “That, that my thoughts may be true.” She glanced down at her hands, feeling ridiculous. “Essence… move in me, so that I…”
Already, she’d forgotten nearly all of it.
With a frustrated sigh, she fell back to sit cross-legged on the floor. That worn scabbard at her knees loomed before her, like a tribute to all that she should be and all that she wasn’t. But that didn’t matter anymore.
She clenched her eyes shut. Essence, I need to do this right. Did that sound pretentious? She set her jaw. Give me the strength.
She wanted to imagine she felt something, she wanted to believe this made a bit of difference, but in the end she found only a foreboding sense of calm. That was going to have to be enough.
Footsteps pattered in the hallway and Kura started to her feet before she saw the silhouette in the doorway. Elli paused, one hand resting on the wall while the other clutched a hunk of bread, and a big smile spread across her face. “Kura!”
“Hey, Elli,” Kura said with a laugh. She buckled her scabbard back around her waist as her sister wandered into the room. “What’re you doing here?”
“Mother said I had to go, ’cause Father needs to sleep.” She peered with wide eyes up at the weapons, raining crumbs on her shirt as she chomped at her bread. “I wanted to look for you.”
“Well, you found me.”
Elli nodded. “Somebody always notices where you went.”
Kura chuckled, but wasn’t entirely sure she found that amusing.
“Father says you have to go to war.” Elli didn’t look up; she kept nibbling at her bread. “Mother says she doesn’t want you to go.”
Kura let out a heavy sigh and joined her sister beside the weapons rack. “Well, I don’t really want to go, either. But I have to.”
“I know.” Elli spoke simply—so confidently—Kura had to laugh.
“You know?”
“Sure. You’ve got the fonfyr’s sword!”
Kura grinned and glanced down at the sword on her hip. “Yeah, I guess I do.”
Elli peered up at her, look as stern and piercing as only a child’s could be. “You promised to float bark boats with me.”
Huh? I don’t think I— “Oh.” Kura laughed. How her sister remembered that, after all that had happened, was beyond her. “We didn’t get to do that back home, did we?”
Elli shook her head. “Father says there’s a stream nearby.”
“How about after all of this, you and me can check it out.” Kura’s smile faded. There was no guarantee there would be anything for her after this.
Still, Elli’s big grin returned. “I’mma make a sailboat.”
Kura nodded, forcing the proper veneer of interest, and she traced her finger along the sword hilt at her side. She had been about Elli’s age when Benger died. Elli didn’t even remember Benger—she’d been younger than Rowley was now. Kura shuddered. If she died tomorrow, would Rowley remember her? Would Elli spend the rest of her life trying to forget the night she’d lost her?
Elli reached into her pocket and pulled out a wooden medallion hung on a hemp cord. “I think you lost this.”
Kura squinted at the trinket for a moment before realizing what it was. “Oh, that’s a necklace I bought in Tarr Fianin. It’s got a flicker on it, see?”
Elli ran her hand over the crude image. “I like it.”
Kura took the necklace by its cord, chuckling at the circumstances that had led to her buying it. “Here.” She knelt down in front of Elli. “Let me put it on you.”
Elli straightened, proudly, but fidgeted as Kura brushed back her tangled brown hair to tie the cord behind her neck. “It’s very pretty.”
Kura planted a kiss on the top of her sister’s head. “Well, it is now.”
Another set of footsteps carried from beyond the door, heavier this time, and a dark shadow passed over the light from the hallway. Kura rose, expecting to see either another family member or Aethan, but the black boots in the doorway didn’t belong to anyone she knew. She lifted her gaze, then froze as it fell on Triston’s face. Elli let out a startled cry and pressed herself against Kura’s leg.
Triston took a step back. “I’m sorry, I—”
“It’s alright, Elli,” Kura said, placing a hand on her sister’s shoulder. Elli clung to her leg, peering up at Triston with wide eyes.
“I…” Triston began to take a step back as he stared at Elli, but stopped when he looked at Kura. “I was hoping I could talk to you?”
Kura studied him for a moment. He was dressed in new clothes—new for him, at least; as almost anything else in Nansûr, they were certainly years old—and the bruises on his face were now a sickly yellow instead of a harsh purple. Idris worked quickly. Some silly part of her had to point out that he’d looked better before, in his riding clothes, even if they had been a bit muddy. This indigo tunic had ornate stitching at the hem, but in the end it was still masquerading as noble when he was the real thing.
“Sure,” she said finally, with a shrug.
Elli tightened her grip. “Kura!”
“It’s alright, Elli.” Kura pried her sister’s cold hands from her pant leg, then knelt down to look Elli eye-to-eye. “He’s a friend.” There she was, using that word so flippantly again. “You can wait in the hall if you want, or I can come find you this time.”
Elli nodded, and Kura got to her feet as her sister reluctantly made her way through the door—darting past Triston—and out into the crowd in the hallway.
Kura tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, then met Triston’s gaze again. His eyes flicked to the weapons rack on the wall, and he gave a hint of a smile.
“Well, it might be easier if I just showed you. Is that alright?”
Kura shrugged. He picked two wooden training swords and tossed one of them to her. She caught the hilt—it felt odd to hold a blade while another sat sheathed on her hip—and he stepped back into a guard stance.
“This is, um…” He gave her an apologetic glance. “Just something I noticed after you—well, I mean, after we met in the Deorwynn.” Kura watched him quizzically, but he beckoned her forward with his free hand. “You move first.”
She fought back a scowl as she adjusted her grip on the training sword. She didn’t like to remember how their last fight had ended, but what was she supposed to do, back down from this one?
She lunged with a sweeping strike from the side. Triston stepped back, blocking her advance, then shifted his weight forward. With a flick of his sword, he caught Kura’s blade in a spiral and sent the wooden blade flopping to the ground.
Those all-too-familiar emotions of inadequacy welled up in Kura’s chest, and she muttered a curse under her breath.
“Sorry.” Triston stepped forward to retrieve her fallen sword. He was smothering a grin—apparently all of this was incredibly amusing—but she appreciated his effort to pretend he wasn’t laughing at her. “You practiced a lot on your own, didn’t you? Maybe on a dummy or something?”
That was surprisingly accurate. “What makes you say that?”
Triston held out the training sword’s hilt and Kura begrudgingly took it. “You’re fast, and quick on your feet, too. Most people are going to be done in by that. But you’ve got bad form.” He adjusted his grip. “Come at me again, choose something different.”
Frowning, Kura complied—with as much strength and precision as she could muster. Still, Triston side-stepped her strike, as though he already knew what she was going to do. Mercifully, he stopped short of sweeping the sword from her hand this time.
Kura smothered a sigh, feeling absolutely foolish—both for losing, and for taking that loss so poorly.
“You’ve got a tell,” Triston said. “You’re stomping your lead foot before you make a move. Even the best swordsmen develop quirks like that, although it comes easier when you’re training on something that can’t fight back and call you out on it.”
Kura started to shake her head, so Triston grinned and took a step back, raising his sword. She grimaced, then lashed out with a succession of quick strokes. Although she managed to back Triston toward the wall, he blocked each strike with ease.
With a grunt of frustration, she turned away, clenching her fists. She felt like a child getting so angry over this, but it hadn’t been since she was a child that she’d lost a sword fight so decidedly. “Is this what you’ve come to tell me, that once the real battle comes, I’m dead?”
Triston laughed. “No, of course not. But I can show you a few things. You know, if you want. Bad habits like these are very difficult to undo, but I’m sure we could make some progress.”
She ran those words again in her mind again until she appreciated the weight of them. Was she too good to pass up free lessons from possibly the best swordsman in Avaron? “I…” Pride still made the words difficult to say. “I would appreciate that. Thanks.”
Triston visibly relaxed. “Here.” He retrieved a wooden shield from the weapon’s rack and tossed it to her. “Let’s start you with this. Hopefully it will get you out of what you’re used to doing, and maybe make it easier for some of this to stick.”
Kura fumbled with the shield as she cinched the straps on her left arm. It wasn’t particularly heavy, but its bulk felt awkward in her hand as she stepped back into a fighting stance. And like that, the training began.
It was painful—psychologically far more than physically—but Triston continued to patiently repeat the same few drills with her over and over again. He was a skilled fighter, as if she didn’t know that already, but he was a fine teacher as well: quiet, for the most part, unless he had something to say about her stance or form.
Finally, and long after her shield arm began to ache, he called for a break. Kura let her shield and wooden sword clatter to the ground as she sank to a seat against the far wall. She wasn’t sure how much of this would stick, but she was certainly more confident. Triston returned his training blade to the weapon’s rack, then lowered himself down beside her.
The silence lingered between them, broken only by the sound of Kura struggling to catch her breath.
“For, um,” Triston began, then swallowed. “For whatever it’s worth, I’m sorry.”
Kura looked over at him, but he was inspecting his hands as he picked at his fingernail.
“For everything in the Wynshire, I mean. I’d take it all back if I could.”
Kura let out a long sigh. Gods, she’d hated him so much before, but now—even when she tried—she only found an odd memory of that animosity. “I wouldn’t.” Those words were a shock to hear herself say, but when Triston turned to her, she grinned. “Life in the Wynshire was one step away from hell. I was trying to barter passage out, but it seems a royal escort worked just as well.”
