Adrian Tchaikovsky - Heirs of the Blade

‘I learn that you performed admirably on the hunt,’ she stated. ‘Most importantly, my champion speaks well of you, and his faintest praise is worth the applause of many.’

She saw no flush of pleasure at the words. The girl accepted the praise as Isendter himself would have, impassively.

‘Alain is not here, or doubtless he would have met you at our gates himself,’ Elass began. Just then, and as she saw Alain’s name spark life from the girl’s expression, a servant entered with a pair of scrolls for his mistress. She laid one down and scanned the contents of the other, apparently forgetting Tynisa’s presence. Another servant was suddenly at her elbow, placing bowls for kadith.

‘I understand that you are Maker Tynise of Collegium,’ the princess continued absently.

Tynisa merely nodded.

‘Alain will not have given you my personal name. The boy never was one for proper introductions. I am Salme Elass – although, of course, you should address me as “my Princess” or “my lady.”’ As she mummed reading the scroll she was watching the girl obliquely.

Of course, revealing one’s name was a privileged concession, but Elass was not sure whether the Lowlander knew that. She saw an understanding somewhere in Tynisa’s eyes, though, that names represented power to the Inapt, and so she would think she was being given some great gift.

Elass followed this indulgence with a smile, transforming her face from stone to flesh. ‘My son will need you, in the near future,’ she said.

Again Elass read that curious reaction: the eagerness of the young woman that became the eagerness of the Weaponsmaster to prove her skill. For a moment, Elass found herself disconcerted by the latter, sensing almost a personal danger here. She is so young, and of such an unusual kinden, that I had forgotten that she must have earned that badge. For a moment she wondered whether using this tool would be wise, but then she dismissed the doubts. So, she is a sharper blade than I had thought. No matter, though, as long as I hold the hilt.

‘We are at war,’ Salme Elass declared flatly.

‘War?’ Tynisa was startled into speech, and that same eagerness for combat waxed like a flame behind her eyes.

‘Ah, you have a tongue, then?’ Salme Elass permitted herself another smile. ‘You will not have heard of this, while in Prince Lowre’s care, for he always seeks to isolate himself, but this province is under attack, and even now Alain has flown off to scout the enemy. This coming spring we will be obliged to fight.’

‘Is it the Empire?’ Tynisa enquired, even though she must surely know how far they were from the Wasps. Unconsciously, her hand curled towards her rapier hilt, and Elass found herself delighted. How I shall use her against Lowre Cean!

‘Not the Wasps, but a considerable danger nonetheless. There is a brigand army assembling at our southern border, challenging our rightful authority. The winter has seen them coming to seek easy prey amongst my people, and for that they must be destroyed. Alain shall be in the vanguard of the assault, and I hope, Tynise, that you shall be alongside him.’

‘Of course.’ The words came without the need for further thought.

Salme Elass nodded, looking down at the scroll again. ‘There is one matter in particular that you can aid us with.’ She paused to ensure Tynisa was listening. ‘I have few swords that I can call upon here at Leose. My people are diminished since the war, and these brigands are many. Therefore I need to call upon my allies, but I fear they may not answer me. There is one, in particular, whose skills would hasten our victory and so save many lives. His mere presence would hearten those loyal to the Monarch, and strike fear into our enemies. He is old, however, and he suffers from a curious condition whereby he seeks to hide from what he was, by losing himself in mundane pursuits unworthy of him.’ She looked up again, and saw that the girl understood.

‘Lowre Cean,’ Tynisa offered, thoughtfully.

‘I will ride to visit him shortly,’ Elass explained, ‘but I am unsure of the welcome I will receive there. However, if there was one of his own household who spoke on my behalf, and had already softened his resolve, then my task would be that much the easier. We need him.’

There was a brief moment’s pause in which Tynisa surely weighed up all that she had experienced of Lowre Cean: an old man bumbling aimlessly from one pointless pastime to the next. But Elass knew that Lowre had acquitted himself admirably on the hunt, at the last moment, when no other would step in, and Tynisa had surely seen that, too.

‘I shall do it,’ the girl confirmed, and Elass carefully restrained her smile from growing any wider.

A tenday later, Salme Elass herself arrived at Lowre’s enclave, a nearly unprecedented occurrence. The old man met her in his main hall that was, for once, cleared of most of his other transient guests. He sat at one end of it and, though wearing only a darned robe, his posture and bearing had transformed him again into Prince-Major Lowre Cean rather than the semi-recluse normally to be seen pottering about the compound.

A little late to try and recapture all that authority, she reflected. Elass sat across the room from him arrayed in her full and formal robes of silk ornamented with gold trim and silver threads. Isendter knelt at her right hand, his head bowed in deference.

‘My lord,’ she said, instilling available humility into her tone, for all that this whole enclave of his was but guesting on her land, ‘you have heard now how the people of Elas Mar are oppressed, how villains are come north from the unclaimed provinces to burn and rob, and prey on the honest folk who live under my protection. I cannot stand idly by at such a time and, my lord prince, I am sure that you cannot either. You fought with my husband against the Empire, and your victories are famed throughout the Commonweal, so I am sure you will take up arms to defend what was his. Having dwelt here in Elas Mar all the years since your own estates were lost, I am sure that you would defend your newfound home. You have been a Mercer in your time, and surely you cannot stand by and see evil done. Therefore I ask you now to attend my war muster at Leose and give us the benefit of your wise counsel, strengthening my few followers with your own. What do you say, my lord prince?’

Lowre Cean looked away from her and pinched at the bridge of his nose. Elass let her eyes flick across to Tynisa, sitting on the sidelines, and found the girl’s attention was fixed firmly on the old man. She has already done her part, the noblewoman decided. Tynisa had obviously hurried back to Lowre’s compound full of righteous purpose, and how could the old man say no to all that? How could he have lessened and lowered himself in the eyes of his new ward, by refusing to go to battle? Elass particularly enjoyed the slightly baffled expression she saw on the girl’s face. There was a war on, and Tynisa plainly could not understand why Lowre Cean would not gladly cast aside the mundane in order to don his armour once again.

The Prince-Major sighed. ‘I am an old man and I have long put aside warlike pursuits. Your husband was a comrade to me, before the war took him away. He was a comrade to my son, before the Wasp-kinden killed him also.’ He was speaking so softly that Elass had to lean in to catch the words. ‘I am no necromancer to know the wishes of the dead, however.’

He paused then, as one of his servants produced kadith, Isendter pouring for his mistress and Lowre’s young messenger performing the same duty for his master.

‘Nor can I allow the happenstance of residence to move me, for all I was invited here in your husband’s fond memory,’ Lowre continued, at last. ‘The Commonweal is wide, even that part of it left to us by the Wasps, and there are no longer so many of us to people it as before. There are other places for a man such as me, if need be.’