L. Modesitt - Scion of Cyador

“Can you tell me which third?” Lorn feels another chill-the kind that provides no real cooling, but the mental coldness of a chaos-glass trained upon him. He ignores it.

“Ah…no ser.”

“Do you want to condemn those men to die in the first skirmish they have with barbarian raiders?”

“No, ser.” Helkyt’s tone is resigned. “Just being that it is so hot…”

“The barbarians don’t fight much when it’s cool and comfortable, as I recall.” Lorn pauses and blots his steaming forehead. “There’s something else. Have you noticed the way the lancers act when they accompany Neabyl and Comyr and the new enumerator…Gyhl, that’s it…on board vessels?”

Helkyt frowns.

“They’re acting like lancers again. They’re trained, and ready, and their carriage shows it. That makes the enumerators’ tasks easier. It also tells the Hamorians and the other barbarians that Cyador is not to be a target.”

“That be true, ser,” the senior squad leader admits. “Neabyl be far cheerier these days, and even his consort came to see him.”

Lorn suspects that has more to do with Flutak’s disappearance than with the greater professionalism of the port-detachment lancers. “There are other reasons, as well.”

Helkyt’s eyebrows lift.

“The barbarian attacks have continued to increase, and we may be called upon. Or,” Lorn smiles wryly, “I may find that my next duty will be there with some of these very same lancers.”

Helkyt winces.

“You do your duty here, Helkyt, and after such a record of faithful service and a long career, I would doubt you will be transferred before you can claim your pension.” Lorn blots his forehead again, aware that whoever used the chaos-glass has let the image lapse. Who could it be? It does not feel like Tyrsal, or his father, but Lorn has no sense of who the unknown magus might be.

“No offense, ser, but I’d be hoping your words be true.” The senior squad leader laughs uneasily.

“They are not certain, but I’d wager that way.” Lorn eases the chestnut toward Tashqyt’s squad, lifting the huge padded hand-and-a-half blade that he will once again use one-on-one against the younger lancers to accustom them to fighting the long swords of the barbarians. “The one-on-one drills!”

Ignoring the sigh from Helkyt, Lorn hopes he can turn each of the recruits into at least a semblance of a lancer before too long. He has already sent a messenger to Commander Repyl, moving up the inspection date for the District Guards by two eightdays, and that means he and most of the Mirror Lancers will be leaving Biehl within three days.

From what he sees and has seen in his chaos-glass, he has less time than anyone else in Biehl knows, and his fate rests in large part on his judgments of what he has observed in his chaos-glass. Yet for all that his fate and the fates of many others rest on his calculations and observations, what he sees cannot be reported to anyone.

Lorn looks up briefly and out the window of his first-floor administration-building study. The post-dawn air is still and warm, without too strong a breeze. He hopes the dry weather will hold, at least for a few days. Then he turns back to the papers before him. He is yet writing out the last of his scrolls, orders, and rough copies of maps when he hears Helkyt enter the outer study.

“Helkyt?”

“Yes, ser.” The senior squad leader shakes his head as he steps into Lorn’s study and sees the various stacks of papers. “You ever be sleeping, ser?”

“Not so much as I’d like, but that’s not for trying.” The overcaptain gestures to the chair across the table desk.

Helkyt sits down, almost gingerly.

“I’m going to impose some duties on you. I wish it could be otherwise, but you’re the only one with the experience.”

The senior squad leader’s eyebrows lift.

“Tomorrow is when we go to inspect the District Guards, as you may recall.”

“Yes, ser.”

“I will be taking all the Mirror Lancers except for a halfscore of senior lancers, and the halfscore of the most recent trainees.”

“Ser?” Helkyt shifts his weight in the chair, uneasily.

“I have heard from some traders that there may be some barbarian raiders riding into the lands west of Ehyla. I thought that we might check that out while putting the District Guards through maneuvers.”

“Best you take all the firelances, then, ser. Those we can do without-more so than you, if there be barbarians coming into Cyador.”

“I appreciate your thought. I hope I am mistaken, but one never knows.” Lorn shrugs. “My sources are usually good, but barbarians aren’t always predictable, except in that they like to attack the lancers and people of Cyador.”

“Ser…beggin’ yer pardon, but in more ’n two seasons, I’ve yet to see you mistaken, and though I be no wagering man, were I one, I’d wager on what you know.” He pauses. “And you be wanting me to keep things as you have?”

“That’s right.” Lorn leans forward. “We’re before harvest, and there shouldn’t be too many ships porting, either to buy or sell, except for clay and china, and most traders won’t come in just for that.”

“The olive-grower Baryat’s son-he been behaving himself?”

“So far as I can tell. But if he has any problems, they won’t be with you.” Lorn laughs ruefully. “We might get some orders transferring lancers to Assyadt or something,” Lorn muses, “but don’t transfer anyone until I get back. Or until it’s clear I won’t be back.”

“Don’t be talking that way, ser.”

“I don’t plan it that way, but I’d be a poor overcaptain if I didn’t plan for the worst.” Lorn points to the corner of the desk. “Those are the training plans for the next season, and some other papers that might be helpful.”

“Yes, ser.”

Lorn continues to brief Helkyt until nearly midmorning. He could have waited until later in the day, but he wants Helkyt to have some time to consider what he has told the senior squad leader so that if the older man has any questions, Lorn will still be in Biehl to answer them.

Again, behind closed shutters, in the late afternoon, Lorn studies the image in the glass. A long column of riders follows a narrow and dusty road-barely that-eastward through a long valley. Their destination is a narrow track through the most rugged and least hospitable section of the Grass Hills. At one time, from the look of the track, the way may have been more traveled, but its abandoned state and ruggedness are not likely to stop the barbarians.

Lorn shakes his head. As he has already determined, the destination has to be one of the towns west of the Grass Hills in Cyador, for there are no other Jeranyi towns west of the barbarian column. At their pace, they will enter the lands of Cyador in less than three days, perhaps four.

The Mirror Lancers leave to inspect the District Guards at Ehyla in the morning, and he has done what he can. His lancers know that they are headed out on maneuvers, and a possible scouting effort. Some of the older ones nodded knowingly. Several had already cached extra food, and the cooks have lodged a complaint with Helkyt.

Lorn smiles at that thought.

He lets the image fade, then calls up another image-this one of a trader in blue. Despite the lateness of the day, she remains in the large room he has come to recognize as her trading office. His lips curl as he recalls her lecture on the difference between studies and offices.

He lets that image fade quickly, for he does not wish to disturb her, although she glances up, her eyes narrowing, just before the image fades. As he sets the glass aside, Lorn wonders again what secrets lie in her ancestry-for she has sensed a chaos-glass searching when he was with her-and only those with abilities of the Magi’i can do such.