P. Hodgell - Honor's Paradox

Jame and the Commandant were left regarding each other. After a moment, Jame tendered him a sober salute which he acknowledged with a slight nod. Then she left the Pit by the opposite door.

It had been a disturbing incident and Jame thought a great deal about it, without reaching any solution. It especially bothered her that she was about to leave Tentir, one way or another, while Bear remained a prisoner within it. Still, what could she do?

In a dream that night, she found herself arguing with her brother.

“Where is honor in all of this?” she demanded of him or rather of his back as he paced, long black coat swishing, hands clasped behind him. “Bear was a great randon before he fell in battle. His condition isn’t his fault.”

“You’ve seen how dangerous he can be,” said Torisen over his shoulder. “We owe our cadets, our people, protection.”

“Of course he’s dangerous,” she answered, exasperated, also beginning in her agitation to pace. “He always has been. With those claws, he’s clearly aligned to That-Which-Destroys. Would you lock away all such Kencyr?”

“Such Kencyr are Shanir.”

“So are those who create and preserve,” said Kindrie, passing them with his white-thatched head bowed in deep thought. “Should they also be cast aside, as I was?”

“I can’t answer for them,” Torisen snapped. “Don’t you see? I can barely answer for myself.”

“And who are you?”

“Highlord of the Kencyrath, guardian of a flawed society.”

“Then let me smash the flaws out of it.”

“What else might you destroy, eh?”

“I won’t know until you trust me to try.”

“Yet there is good,” mused Kindrie. “Honor’s Paradox can break us, or make us stronger while honor itself is our strength. And we are strong, despite everything.”

So they argued back and forth as their paths crossed and recrossed, never quite bringing them face to face.

Jame woke with some unanswerable retort on the tip of her tongue, and lost it to returning consciousness.

Her quarters were dark and quiet except for Jorin’s gentle snore on the pallet beside her.

Where is honor? she thought again.

All this fretting had made her thirsty. As she rose to fetch a cup of water, however, her bare foot brushed something coiled on the floor that hissed in warning.

“Addy?”

She reached down and carefully picked up the swamp adder. Phantom light seeping down the smoke hole gleamed on restless, gilded scales.

“Were you sent to me for protection again?” she asked the snake. “What is Shade up to this time?”

No answer, as usual, except for a flickering black tongue and a mad, orange glare.

She settled Addy a safe distance from Jorin in the warm depression left by her body, dressed, and slipped out of her chambers. One floor down, the cadets slept in their canvas-partitioned quarters. Below, the common hall lay empty and silent. Out onto the boardwalk . . .

Jame shrank back. Against the northern side of New Tentir, the Randir barracks were stealthily astir where a number of cadets waited in the shadow of the arcade’s tin roof. The moon in its last quarter caught Master-Ten Reef’s sharp features as she turned toward a figure darting across the square. Whispers followed, and a hand pointing southward. The waiting Randir streamed out of the shadows like a pack of direhounds running mute on the trail.

Jame followed them out the southern gate. There to her relief they turned east toward the river instead of into the treacherous moraines. Downstream lay a bridge and across it to the south a woodland backed up against the toes of the Snowthorns. If the cadets hadn’t been so intent on their prey, they might have heard her following them for the wood was dark and full of snares for the hasty foot, but no one looked back. When Jame caught up with them, they were crouched behind a rank of bushes under a spreading maple newly leafed out. Jame climbed the tree and edged out onto a bough over their heads. The limb creaked under her weight. One Randir glanced up, but didn’t see her among the broad leaves. The others’ attention was fixed on the glen before them.

Moon and starlight glimmered on two figures there—a hooded man astride a pale horse and a dark, slim girl, one hand on his bridle, earnestly speaking to him. A breeze rustled through the clearing and the rider’s outline seemed to flutter. The mare’s ears pricked toward the bushes. She shook her head and mouthed her bit.

The branch creaked again and slightly gave way.

The Randir drew their bows.

“ ’Ware arrows!” Jame cried, a moment before the bough broke, dumping her and its leafy weight on top of the Randir.

Many were knocked flat. Some, however, let fly. Most of their arrows went wildly astray; others, however, streaked across the glen. The mounted figure seemed to disintegrate into a swirling cloud of jewel-jaws, moon- and shadow-hued. A sword flashed, cutting all but one of the missiles out of the air. The remaining shaft ripped through the hood between head and shoulder, snatching it away from Randiroc’s pale features and white, shaggy hair. He had swung Mirah to cover Shade. The mare danced in place for a moment, then sprang away before the Randir could notch another flight. Whatever happened, Randiroc would not fight the children of his house.

As Jame struggled out of the tangle of limbs, human and arboreal, she thought she saw the Randon Heir still standing there across the clearing. Then he turned and fled. Some Randir fought free to pursue him. They had barely sped away when a second wave of cadets barreled into those still on the ground. Rawneth’s supporters and her opponents fought fiercely, in silence, while Jame wriggled free, only to find herself in the grip of the ten-commander who had put Shade down the well.

“They’re after him,” she gasped.

The commander released her. “Then go.”

Jame ran through the trees toward the sound of fighting, to find the supposed Randir Heir in the hands of his enemies. Jame dropped two cadets with fire-leaping kicks and a third with earth-moving before they realized they were under attack. The other three turned, blades in their hands. Their prey, released, crumpled to the ground.

“This is no business of yours, Knorth,” said Reef.

Jame maneuvered for position, noting their stance and weapons as they spread out to surround her.

“You’ve struck down a fellow randon in unequal combat after an ambush,” she said. “That should concern everyone at the college.”

“Would you tell, then? Go away, little Highborn. Quickly. Before we deal with you as we have with this renegade traitor.”

The one behind her lunged at her back. Jame slid aside in a wind-blowing move, caught the other’s wrist as it shot past, and broke it. The attacker’s momentum sent her stumbling into her mate. Both went down as other Randir began to stagger to their feet. Reef feinted, then slashed, ripping Jame’s jacket as she leaped backward.

Voices called out behind them. Reef backed off, turned, and fled, followed by her companions.

Jame rushed to the fallen “lordan.” Not to her surprise, the latter’s features were in painful flux back to Shade’s. The changer clasped her stomach, trying to hold back a tide of blood. Her hands and the ground beneath her glistened darkly in the moonlight. Jame held her.

“You should be changer enough to close this wound.”

“What does it matter?” Shade spoke through clenched teeth, and gasped as a spasm of pain shook her. “Ah! I would have bound myself to him, but he refused.”

“He didn’t refuse because you’re tainted. I’ve told you: you aren’t.”

“Why, then?”

Trinity, much more of this foolishness and the Randir would bleed to death through sheer stubbornness. Jame scrambled after her wits.