A Suitable Bodyguard, page 3
He didn’t have much, personally, and could hardly approach the treasury for it now. But hopefully this would do for one attempted session of judgments and a few visits at waystations.
He paused before grabbing his quiver and arrows, only ever used in the practice yard, but since he didn’t have any other sort of skill with weaponry, he felt as if he should have something to make Tahlen less annoyed with him.
Then he pulled his hood up and left the room to head for the kitchens.
Zelli took paths that would keep him away from any guards and any questions they might have. He was so focused on that, in fact, that it didn’t occur to him why Tahlen would have suggested the kitchens for a meeting place until he got there and found some of the fires going and Tahlen’s sister working in front of them.
It was too late, or early, even for the bakers to be at work, which meant Tahlen had woken her and likely told her all. Love for Tahlen had probably kept her from going to Zelli’s grandmother with the knowledge, but the glance she shot Zelli when he stopped in front of one of the fires was all cold fury.
Esrin looked like she’d dressed quickly and in the dark, but Zelli did not comment on her sleep pants, though they were a pretty green. Her hair was a lighter brown than her brother’s, her skin much paler since she rarely seemed to leave the kitchens or even the fortress. Zelli didn’t know her age but suspected she was older than Tahlen from how she fussed over him, which was something he had seen some siblings do.
She wore a sheathed knife at her belt that was not used for cooking. Zelli had witnessed her using it in the sparring ring once or twice. He thought she’d wanted him to see her do it, although he couldn’t have said why she’d care enough to.
Maybe it was that Zelli was a beat-of-four and she didn’t like members of the old noble families. Esrin had never had much warmth for Zelli no matter how nice he tried to be, but in the past few months, her glares had grown so fierce that Zelli had started to avoid the kitchens altogether.
She said not a word to him now. After her frosty glare, she had returned to her task, which seemed to be preparing and packing up rolls and hand pies. Zelli watched her furtively, debating speaking to thank her or leaving her to her furious silence, but when she was done, she stalked over him and shoved several bundles into his hands, forcing him to drop his bow and quiver.
Esrin scoffed out loud to see them or for the noisy clatter they made on the floor when her every movement was quiet. Her gaze stayed on the packages, which she rearranged when they started to slip.
“You will make sure he eats, both on your travels and when you stop. He must rest too, do you understand?” She didn’t wait for Zelli to nod, although he did, forcefully. “Those pies are his favorites. They’re for him, not you, Mizel of the Tialttyrin. For you, there’s bread and cheese, as well as a few apples.”
“I thought Tahlen liked apples,” Zelli remarked foolishly, and blinked when Esrin raised her head—then lowered it—to meet his eyes.
She opened her mouth, but closed it and looked behind Zelli to someone coming in. It must have been Tahlen, but oddly, Esrin’s expression didn’t change. She still looked like she wanted an excuse to use her knife.
Zelli twisted around to make sure it was Tahlen, and released a small puff of air to find Tahlen in traveling clothes and armor, his hair once more in a braid. He had not chosen heavy armor or any of the more ornate guard equipment available to them, although his light, summer cloak would have the Tialttyrin rowan tree and grape vine embroidered in the center of the back.
His quilted doublet beneath his mail was dark and unassuming, and any shirts beneath that were not visible. He had arm guards, leg guards as well, which Zelli was willing to bet added warmth… but thought Tahlen should have chosen the winter cloak with the fur at the hood, just in case the weather turned.
He had not come armed into the kitchen, except for the practical knife tucked into his belt.
Zelli quickly looked up from Tahlen’s waist and realized his arms were still full of food. He cleared his throat and turned to try to figure out how to get some of it in his pack.
“Not surprised to see me?” he asked Tahlen.
Esrin made a sound in her throat.
“No,” Tahlen answered over the sound of his sister’s annoyance. “You’re not one to go back on your word. Is that your bow?” Tahlen’s voice went stern again. “Leave it.”
Zelli jerked his head up. “Why? I can hit the target every time.” Esrin picked the bow and quiver off the floor and carried them away as if that was that. Zelli stared at her, then at Tahlen again. “I don’t want to be useless.”
“A target of straw is not a person,” Esrin said from the other side of the kitchens.
Tahlen kept his eyes on Zelli. “You would have to be at a distance to be of use with your bow, and have a cool head when you chose to kill someone. I don’t wish that for you.”
Zelli bit his lip instead of letting out his initial responses. He weighed pressing the issue and Tahlen’s possible replies. But it was mostly Tahlen’s phrasing that kept him from protesting. It was probably what had kept Esrin from objecting as well. Wishes were not to be taken lightly. And… and Zelli had not considered killing anyone, though he should have.
He settled on, “Am I supposed to do nothing if you are endangered?” only to glance nervously to Esrin, but she was back to packing up food as though intending to feed them for days.
“You’ve taken no oath to protect me.” Tahlen held up a hand as if to prevent Zelli immediately offering such an oath. Zelli closed his mouth. “If we’re smart, and careful, and lucky, it shouldn’t come to that. As you said, there are no reports of anything and we will only be gone a few days. We are also not attracting attention with a large retinue. And, well, you are of the fae.”
If Zelli revealed himself as being even partly of the fae, anyone wise would not bother him. Unfortunately, people were not always wise. Zelli proved that with his next words.
“If my appearance is so disturbing, then surely you don’t need to come with me,” he heard himself say, sour as old wine. He didn’t even mean it. He wanted Tahlen with him. But he was tired of being odd and avoided.
Tahlen was stiff. “I am aware you didn’t plan on my presence. But once The Tialttyrin discovers your absence, it will soothe her to know I’m with you.”
“For Grandmother,” Zelli muttered, mostly to himself, then jumped when Esrin dumped several more bundles of food into his arms.
“I will protect you,” Tahlen said as if in answer to Zelli’s whining. Zelli looked up and regretted it with how warm he grew. He always knew what he was doing until Tahlen was near.
Frazzled, confused, faintly embarrassed and uncertain as to why, he grumbled. “I can’t fit all this food in my pack.”
“I’ve put another on Lemon Blossom.” That Tahlen had already been to the stables and prepared Zelli’s favorite horse made Zelli grumble again, not unhappily. “I found no mail in your size within the guards’ spare equipment. When we get back, I’ll ask for some to be made.”
“I’ll make a note in the household ledger,” Zelli answered with surprise, “if you think I should have it.”
“Lolo,” Esrin called to her brother from the opposite side of the kitchen. Tahlen left Zelli to go to her. Zelli truly had no more room for all the food, but attempted to find some rather than appear to be listening to the brother and sister across the room. He didn’t know why Esrin sometimes called Tahlen by that nickname and could never ask. But if he happened to overhear….
“You don’t have to do this,” Esrin whispered, low and upset, as if she had already said it but had to try again. Tahlen must sometimes be like stone even with her. “Let him make his own choices or bring someone else.”
“Who?” Tahlen asked softly. He didn’t say that there was no one else willing to do it or that no one else was nearly as capable as he was, but Esrin must have understood all the same, because she crossed her arms. “I have to,” Tahlen added when she didn’t speak, his voice even softer. “Even if I didn’t, I am sworn to protect them with my body and my life.”
“They will be up in these hills, behind mighty walls,” Esrin argued. “Where they do little good, but at least don’t get in the way.”
Tahlen shook his head. “And he will be out there alone, doing what they should be doing.”
If Esrin didn’t dislike Zelli so much, Zelli would have shared a smile with her for her aggrieved sigh. Tahlen had a powerful effect on certainty with everyone.
Esrin muttered something else which Zelli did not hear, then lightly shoved her brother out through another door. She stared after him, though, hands clasped tight behind her.
Zelli took his chance. “Do you have any tarts or sweet cakes?”
He stopped abruptly in his approach when Esrin rounded on him. “I just gave you enough to feed a…”
“No, no.” Zelli did his best to gesture placatingly. “I meant, something special. I’m going to leave an offering by the gates to ask the fae to assure his safety.” He didn’t know why that would make Esrin freeze, but he was glad she did. Zelli lowered his voice though Tahlen was gone. “There is no convincing him not to come, but I didn’t mean to drag him into it, and… I don’t want him harmed. It’s a big favor to ask of them, so the offering must be something good. I have nothing they could want, but they do like sweets.”
Esrin stared at him without blinking, then pulled the knife at her belt so quickly Zelli jumped. In one motion, she tugged a lock of hair loose from her braid and sliced it off. She held the lock of pale brown hair out and Zelli shifted the food bundles once again to get one hand free. She set the lock in his palm and gave him a look that for once was not furious. “Don’t tell him.”
Zelli nodded. “I won’t.”
Esrin cleared her throat before turning away. “Then get going. The sooner gone, the sooner back. And be careful.”
She said that for Tahlen’s sake, but Zelli nodded again though she couldn’t see him, then left to make his way to the stables.
Lemon Blossom was happy to see Zelli, happier still to sniff at the food that Tahlen took from Zelli the moment Zelli was close enough. Starfall, Tahlen’s horse, had also been readied, with a short staff strapped to the saddle alongside the bags that must have held Tahlen’s things and where he stashed the extra bundles of food.
Tahlen had armed himself in the meantime as well. Zelli did not comment on the sword across his back or his own lack of one. He went to get the mounting block for himself only to stop when Tahlen knelt down to offer his help before Zelli could take more than a step.
Tahlen had taken no oath to do that. But the stables at night were no place to argue about it, especially since they were trying not to attract attention. Once seated on Lemon Blossom, Zelli nodded his thanks and held his tongue while Tahlen checked things one final time, then mounted Starfall.
Dark Starfall nearly blended into the night. Lemon Blossom, glossy and bright, would not. But Zelli let Tahlen take the lead as they went out of the stables and began the ride out of the hold, first through the large gate at the entrance and past the heavy stone walls draped with falls of nasturtium, a plant the fae favored, then down the winding paths through the homes and buildings of the village. The torches that lined the road to the land below the fortress and some of the lanes in the village were still burning, and would continue to for a few hours yet.
The air grew colder, although it did not carry the chill of true autumn. Most in the village were sleeping. Only one or two buildings showed signs of lights within. The fires in the guard towers on either side of the smaller gate that closed off the village from the fields around them were visible some distance away, even through the fog.
Tahlen turned once, glancing to Zelli, but when Zelli only stared back, he rode on. He did not even stop when those in one of the towers called to him, although he did answer when they asked what he was doing at that hour.
“We’ve a long way to travel,” Tahlen told them, unreadable as ever. Ivey and Forna’s commiserating jokes ended abruptly when they noticed Zelli behind Tahlen.
“Zelli.” Their greeting to him was more cautious. Zelli gave them both a friendly, if anxious, nod, and rode on as if he expected the gate to open for him. Uncle Rou often said the only people to demand explanations from a beat-of-four were other beat-of-fours.
Whether or not Uncle Rou was right, the gears for the gate mechanisms turned and the doors opened enough for Tahlen and then Zelli to ride through. Tahlen called out something else to Forna that made him laugh, but Zelli’s attention was fixed on the rowan trees in front of each guard tower.
In daylight, the ribbons and trinkets hanging from their branches would glitter and flutter. With little wind and no light, the trees seemed unnaturally still. Zelli left the road to reach one of them, aware of the doors of the gate shutting behind them and Tahlen and probably the other guards in both towers watching him approach the tree.
Some places had statues, or niches in their walls for people to place offerings to the fae. The fae in the other world could be anywhere in this one, though humans did not often see them. But places for offerings were marked and it was felt that the fae were present there.
It must be true, for offerings had a habit of vanishing in the blink of an eye. Someone could leave a bit of fruit or seed cake out for the fae and stare at it for hours, but the moment they glanced away, the offering would disappear.
Zelli pulled Esrin’s lock of hair from his sleeve and secreted it in the crook of two branches, hopefully where Tahlen could not see.
He kept his voice down. “We ask that you keep him safe, if you can. Thank you.”
It was polite to thank them, whether or not they answered. Getting a response might depend on the mood of whoever listened, or the offering itself. Zelli’s family had always insisted that it was the sentiment attached to the offering that was of interest to the fae. Allegedly, in ancient times, a thimble full of honey had won an Earl a crown, but Zelli suspected there was more to the story than the honey. If it was just a matter of sweets, then a dollop of cream would grant anyone the riches of the wealthiest old family and it clearly did not.
But that might also have been a question of intent, which perhaps the fae could sense. If the fae responded, it would be how they felt the wish should be answered, which was not always how the people asking had expected or hoped for.
Zelli did not question how his family knew this any more than he questioned how fae traits carried through generations without affecting everyone in the same ways.
He looked away and then back to make sure the lock of hair was gone.
“Thank you,” he said again not to be heard by anyone else in this world, and turned Lemon Blossom back toward Tahlen, who had kept his gaze turned politely away.
Together, they rode out into the fog.
Three
Zelli’s nerves settled after several hours of riding through the dark, enough for him to yawn more than once, although he wouldn’t allow himself to drift off. If Tahlen wouldn’t, then he wouldn’t. Of course, at times, he thought Tahlen was asleep, since Tahlen said not a word except to occasionally whisper to Starfall.
They rode slower than they might have because of the thickness of the fog. Zelli watched Tahlen’s unbending figure for a while when peering through the clouds grew dull, then tried to turn his mind to other things. The other things promptly made him anxious again, but he did need to consider what he was going to tell people and also how he would explain himself to Grandmother when he returned. He was hoping his trip would go well enough that Grandmother would not be too angry.
The fog lingered, densest along the river, although they veered away before they could reach the quay where shipments to the capital and other territories came and went. There were places along the river in the holdings of other families that had been destroyed or fought over as the warring went on. That was another problem to eventually contend with; how the winemakers of the valley should export their wines and other goods if the rivers and the countryside were no longer safe. It did no good to grow and make wine if they could not sell it, and the mountains on either side of the valley kept the valley fairly protected but also made transporting large shipments tricky.
Tahlen would no doubt say that Zelli was thinking of things he should not yet, and could not help, in any event.
If the family were stronger, Zelli would not need to worry so much. But he could not make them stronger by force of will. The family would need others to respect them, and if necessary, fear them. They would need guards, and everyone united in obeying The Tialttyrin. And, in addition to the revenue to benefit the valley that renewed wine sales would bring, they needed the rest of the country to remember their reputation.
Reputation meant a lot. The Arlylian had kept themselves out of the conflict because they were a family famously known to not take sides or to act rashly. They might be drawn in, but the day the Arlylian were finally pulled into the chaos would be calamitous.
Zelli did wonder about the consequence of angering such a family, even if he did not voice his musings aloud. The Arlylian had an iris owl on their crest—dignified, yes, but still a bird that would kill other birds, pretty feathers and venomous talons.
Zelli worried about a lot. He couldn’t help it. Some in his family were content to live only in the day-to-day, but Zelli managed the household when Nya couldn’t, and the accounts too, and that meant looking to the future. His grandmother said that was what all wise people ought to do. But Zelli thought it didn’t mean much if the future was not something he was allowed to change. It meant all he could do was worry.
Until this, anyway. If he didn’t fuck it up.
That phrase, one overheard by the sparring ring, would have made his grandmother lift an eyebrow.
