Alex Lidell - The Cadet of Tildor

By early evening, the late summer breeze played across the Academy courtyard, tousling the flag of Tildor and the cadets’ uniforms. White marble buildings, like soldiers, lined the two sides of the lush lawn. A peaked shadow from the temple at the east end of the yard stretched toward the library in the west, slicing into the students’ formation.

As a senior, Renee stood in the front and felt, rather than saw, the whole complement of the school gather in ordered rows behind her. The Crown’s welcome address would hold little content beyond a call to attentive studies, but his visit was a tradition. Most officers and officials pledged to serve Tildor; the fighters and magistrates who graduated the Academy pledged loyalty to the Crown . Personally. And when that day came, the young new Servants of the Crown would all have met their liege. The Academy took pride in that.

Trumpets called the courtyard to attention, dipped and rose again as King Lysian III strode out from behind the temple mound. His footsteps kept time with the Hymn of Tildor, which filled the air, the last step and note ending exactly at the erected dais.

He was five paces in front of Renee.

Lysian was young. Renee blinked at the absurdity of her surprise. Of course he was young, he was nineteen, just a few years older than she. For a moment, standing so close, he was an attractive blond boy whose large blue eyes, so like Sasha’s, reflected the apprehension and excitement brewing within Renee’s own chest. But then he spoke, and the boy in his eyes disappeared behind the steel voice of the Crown.

“My champions.” King Lysian’s gaze swept them. “For years I’ve stood at my father’s side as he offered you words of encouragement and challenged you to great deeds. Tradition tells me to do the same.” He swallowed. “But I must set aside the luxury of tradition. Tildor is sick.”

The eyes of an advisor standing by the dais widened as the king put down his notes and drew a breath.

“A decade ago, we fought off a Devmani invasion. The Servants and others rallied to my father’s call, buying our victory with their blood. Many fell. Too many.” He paused and Renee could see his jaw tighten before he drew breath to speak again. “After our victory, too few swords remained to protect Tildor from its own disease. Now Vipers steal men and children from the streets and cut women’s throats for pleasure and boast. The Family robs the purses of our merchants and nobles while fattening its own with sale of veesi leaf. Today, I wager that there is not one of you who stands before me who has not lost a friend to the violence of a Viper, or coin to the corruption the Family spreads.”

Renee’s fist clenched, fingernails digging into her scarred palm.

Lysian raised his chin. “My armies guard our borders, and my soldiers strain to keep our roads safe for commerce. Some of you will join and lead those troops. But it is the disease of crime on which my reign opens. I will fight it. And you are the champions who will fight beside me.” He paused. “Please, study. Please, train. The Crown needs your Service.”

Trumpets hurried to catch up with the king, who had turned and left without waiting on applause.

The crowd of cadets twitched, necks straining to watch the royal departure and catch the eyes of nearby friends. “What did you make of his words?” one cadet whispered to another while instructors ascended the dais to read schedules of classes and exams.

“What did you make of his words?” the question came around again.

I pray I’m here long enough to give my pledge, thought Renee, and closed her eyes, wondering how she would survive the coming year.

Servant Commander Korish Savoy tilted his face to relish the pouring rain. It streamed down his cheeks and neck, washing away dust, sweat, and blood. The horse beneath him pawed the mud and whinnied into the damp morning air. Savoy petted the stallion’s quivering shoulder before nudging him under the shelter of the sprawling trees.

“A victory worthy of minstrels’ songs, would ye not say, sir?” Cory, a young sergeant, trotted up on his bay, his grin untroubled by the bandage binding his brow.

Savoy leveled him with his eyes. “If I hear it, I’ll know whom to hold responsible.” The latest string of victories was boosting the Seventh’s confidence to dangerous levels. Pride was one thing. Invincibility was another. “Anything useful to report?”

The boy’s grin, of course, didn’t falter. “Aye, sir. Half the bandits had Viper tattoos, plus several thousand gold crowns’ worth of veesi leaf between them. Someone’s head will fall for this.”

Savoy nodded. The Vipers’ Madam was not known for mercy—rumor held that she had executed her son’s father for producing an offspring who fell short of her standards. Whichever Viper lord was in charge of the operation the Seventh had just uprooted was unlikely to survive the week. And neither would the lord’s family.

But seeing Vipers this deep into the countryside, and with veesi to boot, bothered Savoy for other reasons. “Vipers on the Family’s turf?”

Cory scratched his horse’s ear. “Maybe the bastards will kill each other off. I’ll nay cry if they do.”

“Or they use us to do it for them.” Savoy ran a hand through his hair. The information of the hoard’s location came from a birdie, not the Crown’s own scouts, and snitches had their own agendas. “What else?”

Cory pushed his soggy bandage behind his ears and pulled a folded square of parchment from his coat. “Messenger returned from Fort Ellis. I dinna know if they’re more grateful or embarrassed for our help, but they’ll be sending men to collect the prisoners. And a personal message for ye from the capital.”

Savoy rubbed his temple. Good news from Atham was as likely as raccoons talking. “We’ll rest a day here, then move out to drill in the mountains.” He slid a dagger blade under the envelope’s seal. “The boys still have most of their blood inside them?”

“Aye.” Cory frowned, then added with some reluctance, “Mag’s hoping you won’t notice his limp, but that’s all.”

“Should I notice his limp?”

Cory shrugged.

“Fort Ellis has a mage Healer. You and Mag will volunteer to help take the prisoners there.” He held up a hand to ward off protest. “And I will continue thinking that bloody bandages around sergeants’ foreheads are a fashion to attract women.” Letting Cory blush in relative privacy, Savoy unfolded the message.

A wave of nausea gripped him as he read and reread the text. When the words didn’t change, he stared at the neat handwriting, watching the raindrops smudge the ink. Someone played a jest. Savoy had created the Seventh, handpicking and training each man in it. It had to be a jest.

“Sir?”

Savoy schooled his face and voice. “Belay my previous orders, Sergeant. The Seventh will go up to Ellis as a group. And stay there.” He refolded his orders before slipping them inside his jacket.

“How long, sir?” Cory’s voice was carefully flat.

“Until you get other orders.” He looked up to meet the young sergeant’s wide eyes and hardened his own. “I’ve been reassigned.”

Four days later, Savoy guided his mount past Atham’s city walls, into an ambush of scurrying pedestrians and bellowing merchants. “Fish! Fresh fish!” a woman shouted into his ear. He could taste the rot from the stench alone. The closest fishing pier was a three-day ride west. He managed to get past the fish lady only to have a small girl block his path.

Her bare feet toed the ground inches from his horse’s metal-shod hooves. “Can I pet your horse?”