Adrian Tchaikovsky - Heirs of the Blade

‘Your duty was to obey your Prince-Major, and no more. You do not owe fealty to the Monarch, but to me, and it is I who judge how best you should serve. For example, this girl…’ He nodded at Tynisa. ‘She is under my protection. She has rendered a rare service to me, and I am in her debt. Thus I absolve her of all acts committed in this, my principality.’

Elass gaped at him, aghast. ‘But my son-’

‘Has benefited from just such leniency on many an occasion, under your own justice. He chose to live by that sword. If you will maintain an arbitrary rule, learn to be ruled arbitrarily in turn.’ He held her incandescent gaze for some time, with no further sound but the echo of his voice in every ear. At last he turned those keen eyes on the brigand chief. ‘Dal Arche, you fought in the war, I’d guess.’

The brigand chief nodded curtly, his expression not inviting further questioning, and Felipe went on, ‘Your home is under the black and gold now, perhaps? Or maybe you’re no longer the same man that called such a place home. I hear much of you from my agents, and some from your own men.’ He nodded at Avaris. ‘But Salme Elass is correct in one thing: Rhael cannot be allowed to slide back into anarchy. I had hoped Siriell would tame it, but alas… Now I shall be cruel to you, Dal Arche, more so than you might expect. You would have your followers live beyond today?’

Again that terse nod.

‘Then you must do something for me, O leader of outlaws. You must swear fealty to me, body and mind, abject and without condition. For I will have you made Prince of Rhael.’

Somewhere nearby Salme Elass let out a screech of protest, but in that moment Tynisa was wholly taken up with the greying brigand’s face, and the battle there between hate for the aristocracy and fear for his fellows. She saw his hand twitch twice on the bowstring, making as if to pull it taut, but somehow he held himself back.

‘It’s that, is it? Is that the choice I get?’ he grated.

Felipe smiled bleakly. ‘Do you like my Mercers? I wonder what they represent to you. Do they populate your nightmares, these the Monarch’s most skilled servants, thief-takers and bringers of justice? And would it surprise you to know that the greatest duty of the Mercers is to keep watch on the nobility and punish those lords and ladies who use for selfish ends the power the Monarch grants? As I say, they are few, and the times are wicked, but they are enemies of more than just brigands. Your answer, Dal Arche?’

‘You’re a madman,’ Dal told him.

‘I’d not be the first prince-major to be so,’ Felipe replied implacably, and then demanded again, ‘Your answer.’

Tynisa genuinely believed the brigand was going to refuse, his loathing of the nobility stronger even than his love of his friends, but then his shoulders sagged. ‘Let it be so, though it’s a mad world.’ He looked more like a man condemned to death than a candidate for the nobility.

The movement, when it came, was so swift that Tynisa nearly missed it, and she was caught by a weird sense that she had been here before: only then she had been the victim, and another’s blade had stood in the way. Salme Elass had taken more than she could bear, and Tynisa would never know whether it had been the loss of her son or of her ambitions that snapped her.

Her blade whistled up towards Felipe Shah, who had not even drawn his own. The world seemed to stand still.

Tynisa found that her own blade was already moving to intervene, but the angle was wrong to simply flick the woman’s blow aside. To beat it away from herself would only be to speed it on its way. Instead she snaked her narrow sword between Felipe and the blow and put all the strength she could into her parry, so that Elass’s sword swung round at her, narrowly missing her torn face as she fell backwards. Elass was screaming, blade raised to impale her, heedless of rank and station, and Tynisa lifted her own weapon with trembling arms, knowing she was not strong enough even to roll aside.

The arrow struck Salme Elass in the jaw and drove in halfway to the fletchings, snapping the princess’s head sideways at an unnatural angle, a brief, bloody choking sound the only exclamation she could muster. The sword fell from her fingers, end over end, on to the snowy ground, then she collapsed.

Dal Arche lowered his bow, his hand automatically reaching for his quiver, but finding no more arrows there. If he was satisfied that he had, at least, been permitted one last act of rebellion, his face showed none of it. Indeed there was a tense silence that overcame everyone there, each face frozen as they waited for the prince’s response. The only true mourner of Salme Elass, judging from his expression, was Felipe Shah himself.

‘Another dynasty ended, then,’ he murmured, so that only Tynisa could hear him. ‘Another prince to find.’

His private thoughts seemed to exercise a magical power over the watchers for, although Felipe’s head remained bowed, all other eyes were drawn to Lowre Cean.

‘No, no.’ The old man shook his head. ‘Not that. Not again. Don’t ask me, Shah.’

‘There must be someone, or Elas Mar will become a new Rhael within a year. Find me an alternative. Give me their name, their pedigree. I must work with the tools that I have, Cean. You must rule from Leose, or what have we gained, out of all this?’

The slump of Lowre Cean’s shoulders indicated a despondency every bit as profound as Dal Arche’s.

‘Gather up, all of you,’ Felipe Shah called out, his voice again reaching all ears. ‘Followers of the Salmae, know that at the end your mistress betrayed her Monarch and her prince. You serve the Lowrae now, and may that bring you more honour than your service to the Salmae.’ The words were merely formal, for Tynisa knew well that Cean was the last of the Lowre bloodline, just as Elass had been the end of hers.

The motley collection of followers that Elass had kept with her formed an awkward group, sullen and uncertain, whilst their former enemies drifted together into a distinct band with Dal Arche – Prince Dal – at their head. Tynisa took the chance to sit up painfully, grateful when Che reached out to help her.

‘This is the will of the Monarch,’ Felipe Shah stated ‘declared through me, her Prince-Major. I hereby invest Lowre Cean as Prince of Leose, and Dal Arche as Prince of Rhael, and I charge them both to keep a better order in their new domains than has been the case there before now. Let us have peace and prosperity, as much as this late age allows it.’ He broke off, looking beyond the gathered groups, and Tynisa followed his gaze. Another rider was coming, and she recognized the same youth who had served Lowre Cean as messenger.

‘Marcade, what news?’ Lowre called out, for the young man’s expression was pale and terrible, and he gripped a scroll in a hand that shook when he proffered it to the old man.

Lowre read the contents grimly, and passed it wordlessly to Felipe. Watching him, Tynisa saw something go out of the Prince-Major, some briefly kindled flame of hope. When at last he spoke, his gaze found hers.

‘My agents report… The Empire has brought its armies to Myna. The war has started again. They are coming for us,’ his sombre gaze passed from Tynisa to Che. ‘Or for you.’

Capitas: some months before

Since the business with the Mosquito-kinden, the great and the good of Capitas had begun to look forward to the Empress Seda’s welcoming of new ambassadors. Whether she charmed or whether she punished them, she was equally entertaining, as good as a visit to the fighting pits. This, she knew, was how the court felt. Returned from Khanaphes and on her own throne again, she gauged the mood around her, noting with amusement the swelled numbers of courtiers eager to see her latest reception.