L. Modesitt - Arms-Commander

Two glasses after sunrise on sixday, Saryn’s detachment was headed due west, ten kays out of Henspa, under a high haze that turned the morning sky a silvery greenish blue. Early in the morning as it was, the day promised to be the hottest that Saryn had yet experienced in Candar…or anywhere else, for that matter, and it wasn’t even near the height of summer. She hadn’t even bothered with her riding jacket and certainly wasn’t looking forward to the heat of the days to come, not at all.

Inside her tunic was a letter introducing Saryn to Jennyleu’s niece Haelora, which Essin had handed her just before she had mounted to leave the inn. That introduction Saryn intended to pursue. An innkeeper in Lornth had to know things that the regents would not, and even from what little Saryn had heard about the land of Lornth, it was clear she’d need every bit of information she could find or dig up.

She shifted her weight in the saddle and looked along the road before the column of guards, riding two abreast. The lands to the west of Henspa-and the river-consisted of low, rolling hills that looked to get flatter the farther they were from the river. While some of the land was pasture, and there were a few orchards and woodlots, most was cultivated. For what ever reason, the road on the west of the river did not follow the watercourse at all but headed away from it for almost fifteen kays, then turned north at the town of Ornath and continued onward for another twenty kays before rejoining the river some fifteen kays to the northwest of Duevek.

Saryn squinted to make out what was causing the dust in the road a good two kays west of the outriders. As she watched, she could see, headed toward the Westwind riders, a large high-sided and roofed wagon, the kind merchants and traders often used, its wheels churning up dust. Less than half a kay from the outriders, the driver turned his team and wagon onto a side road southward and whipped the pair of drays into something like a fast trot.

“Poor fool,” observed Hryessa from where she rode beside Saryn. “He’s only hurting his drays. If we wanted to catch him, there’d be nothing he could do.”

“Are we that fearsome? Forty-odd women, two wagons, and ten spare mounts?”

“Forty-odd armed women, ser, from a place that has slaughtered thousands of their men.”

“We may have to trade on that fear,” prophesied Saryn.

“What does the Lady Zeldyan want from us? Beyond your counsel?” An amused and knowing smile crossed the captain’s lips.

“You know as well as I. She wants us to preserve Lornth for her son to rule, though she has not said that in so many words.” In any words, in fact, but what else could she desire?

Hryessa turned her head toward Saryn. “Is that possible?”

“We’ll find out, and before too long.”

“What if it is not possible?”

“Then we will do what we can to protect Westwind.” What exactly that might be, Saryn had no idea, except that, given the holders of Lornth, it would be neither easy nor bloodless.

Saryn and her detachment passed few carts and wagons on the ride through Ornath and back to the river, making camp on sixday night at what passed for a way station near the ruins of what might once have been a town. After an early start on sevenday, two glasses’ ride brought them to a flat stretch between two hills and a kaystone proclaiming that Haselbridge lay but three kays ahead.

Saryn could sense riders nearby and was not surprised to see a group appear on the low rise perhaps half a kay ahead, just off the left shoulder of the packed-clay road where it crested the next hill. She could sense no others, but all that meant was that there were none within a kay. “Riders ahead,” she said quietly but firmly to Hryessa.

“Ready arms,” said Hryessa, turning in the saddle. “Pass it back on the quiet.”

“Ready arms…Ready arms…” the murmured command whispered back through the guards.

As the Westwind detachment neared the crest of the road, Saryn could see that the waiting riders were drawn up almost in formation. On the right side of the road was a scrubby section of pasture that sloped steeply down to the river, still running almost to the top of its banks with the late runoff from the Westhorns.

“Hail, Angels!” The call was loud, cheerful, and sardonic, and came from an angular man attired in a rich maroon waistcoat over a thin but fine linen shirt. He was mounted on a gray stallion, slightly forward of the other eight riders.

“Hail!” returned Saryn, studying the caller. He looked to be a young lord or heir, whose wavy brown hair was longer than that of most armsmen, crafters, or tradesmen, and his entire being radiated arrogance.

“Where might you be headed?”

“To Lornth.” Saryn reined up short of a position that would have brought her opposite the lord-holder or lordling. Behind her, Hryessa brought the guards to a halt. “And you?”

“We were out for a ride.” He bowed in the saddle. “Keistyn, of Hasel. Welcome to my lands.” The cheerful words still carried a sardonic and demeaning overtone.

Saryn inclined her head, if but slightly. “I have not had the honor of meeting you before, but please understand that we are only passing through with no ill intended to anyone in Lornth.”

“That is most reassuring,” replied the lead rider, “for many have feared the blades of the angels of the heights.” He paused. “I do not believe you introduced yourself, Angel.”

“Saryn, Arms-Commander of Westwind.” Saryn studied the eight armsmen behind Keistyn. All carried in shoulder harnesses the long and massive blades favored by most men-at-arms in Lornth, and all wore red tunics trimmed in black. Three looked young and fresh-faced, and two were clearly hardened veterans of some sort. The remaining three were excessively beefy, with a certain cruelty behind round faces, the kind of cruelty that seemed to come from self-indulgent and overweight males, Saryn reflected.

“And what might a fearsome arms-commander be doing here in the lowlands? I had heard that the angels had asked a favor, and when the regent had granted it, you had returned to your heights, never to trouble Lornth again.”

“We have not come to trouble Lornth,” Saryn replied pleasantly, “but to respond to a request of the regents. Because the regents, unlike the Gallosians, who paid most dearly for their faithlessness, have kept their word and faith, when the regents asked us to return to meet with them, we were pleased to accede to their request.”

“I had not heard of the faithlessness of the Gallosians, but being people of little honor, could you have expected otherwise of them?” A short bark of laughter followed.

“Until someone proves otherwise, we accept their word,” Saryn said. “They proved otherwise, and the Prefect’s son, Arthanos, and his army of nine thousand are no more.” She smiled politely at Keistyn.

“Nine thousand…I beg your pardon, Angel, but that seems…unlikely.” A skeptical smile followed Keistyn’s words.

Saryn shrugged. “Unlikely as it may seem to you, that is what happened. Sooner or later, you will hear, and there will doubtless be those who will not believe.” She paused. “But that is what happened. You should recall that, twice, Lords of Lornth attacked the Roof of the World, and both perished. The second time armsmen from all across Lornth perished as well. You might also recall that a single mage who left Westwind brought down the great empire of Cyador. Doubting is all well and good, Lord Keistyn, but it is also dangerous to doubt what has already occurred, especially when thousands have already died because they, in turn, doubted.”

“Oh…I do doubt. I doubt anything that I have not been able to verify myself, or through those I trust to be most truthful.”