David Zindell - The Diamond Warriors

‘With a laying on of his hand,’ I said to Lord Harsha, ‘he healed a wound to Maram’s chest that even Master Juwain could not heal. In Bemossed gathers all that is best and brightest in men. It is almost certain that he is the Maitreya.’

Lord Harsha sipped his brandy as he looked at me. He said, ‘Once before you believed another was the Maitreya.’

Truly I had: myself. And the lies that I had told myself – and others – had inexorably brought Morjin’s armies down upon my land and had nearly destroyed all that I loved.

‘Once,’ I said to Lord Harsha, ‘I was wrong. This time I am not’

Now Lord Harsha took an even longer pull at his brandy as his single eye fixed upon me. And he said to me, ‘Something has changed in you, Lord Elahad. The way you speak – I cannot doubt that you tell the truth.’

‘Then do not doubt this either: when it is safe, the Maitreya will come forth. The Free Kingdoms must be made ready for him. And our kingdom, before all others, must be set in order. It is why I have returned.’

‘To become king!’ he said as his eye gleamed. ‘I knew it! Valashu Elahad, crowned King of Mesh – well, lad, I can’t tell you how often I’ve wished that day would come!’

Then his face fell into a frown, and the light went out of him. ‘But after what’s happened, how can that day ever come?’

I noticed Joshu Kadar studying me intently, and I asked, ‘Then has another already been made king?’

‘What!’ Lord Harsha said. ‘Have you had no news at all?’

‘No – we entered Mesh in secret, and have spoken to no one.’

‘Likely, it’s good that you haven’t. There are those who would not want you to gain your father’s throne. I can’t think that they would resort to a knife in the back, but as I said, these are bad times.’

‘Bad times, indeed,’ I said, looking down the table at him, ‘if you would even speak of such a thing.’

‘Well, with your father having sired seven sons, I never thought I would live to see such a day: Mesh’s throne empty, and at least three lords vying to claim it.’

I let my hand rest on my sword’s hilt, and I said, ‘Lord Tomavar, certainly’

Lord Harsha nodded his head. ‘He is the greatest contender – and he has become your enemy. He blames you for what happened to his wife.’

I looked down at my sword’s great diamond pommel glimmering in the candlelight, and I thought of how Morjin’s men had carried off the beautiful Vareva – most likely to ravishment and death. How could I blame Lord Tomavar for being stricken to his soul when I already blamed myself?

‘Too many,’ Lord Harsha told me, ‘still believe that you abandoned the castle out of vainglory. And then told the baldest of lies.’

‘But that itself is a lie!’ Joshu Kadar called out. His hand pressed against his chest as if his brandy had stuck in his throat and burned him. ‘Everyone who knows Valashu Elahad knows this! I have spoken of this everywhere! Many of my friends have, as well. Lord Valashu, they say, led us to victory in the Great Battle and should have been made king.’

‘He should have,’ Lord Harsha agreed with a sigh. ‘But on the battlefield, five thousand warriors stood for Lord Valashu, and eight thousand against, and that is that.’

‘That is not that!’ Joshu half-shouted. It must have alarmed him, I sensed, to speak with such vehemence to a lord knight who might become his father-in-law. ‘If the warriors were to stand again, they would acclaim Lord Valashu – I know they would!’

Lord Harsha sighed again, and he poured both Joshu and himself more brandy. And he said, ‘If the warriors were free to gather and stand, it might be so. But we might as well hope that horses had wings so that we could just fly to battle.’

He told us then that Lord Tomavar had made many of the knights and warriors who followed him swear oaths of loyalty in support of his kingship. In order for them to stand for another, he would have to relieve them of their oaths. So it was with Lord Tanu and Lord Avijan, the two other major contenders for Mesh’s throne.

‘Lord Avijan!’ I called out, shaking my head. This young lord resided in his family’s castle near Mount Eluru just to the north of the Valley of the Swans. ‘My father was very fond of him and trusted no man more.’

‘And no man is more trustworthy,’ Lord Harsha said. ‘Of all Mesh’s lords, none has spoken more forcefully in favor of your becoming king. But when you went off with your friends and did not return, he thought you must be dead, as everyone did. He never wanted to put himself forward against Lord Tomavar and Lord Tanu, but we persuaded him that he must’

‘ We , Lord Harsha?’ I said to him.

I felt the blood and brandy heating up his rough, old face as he said, ‘Myself, yes, and Lord Sharad and Sar Jessu – and many others. Almost every warrior around Silvassu and the Valley of the Swans.’

‘Then have you taken oaths to support Lord Avijan?’

Lord Harsha rubbed at his face to hide his shame. ‘We had to. Otherwise we would have come under Lord Tomavar’s boot, or Lord Tanu’s. In any case …’

‘Yes?’

‘In any case, only one can become king, and we all agreed that no one deserves the throne more than Lord Avijan.’

I remained silent as I squeezed the hilt of my sword, and I felt Maram, Master Juwain and Liljana looking at me.

‘No one, of course,’ Lord Harsha went on, ‘except yourself. But we all thought you would never return.’

I gazed at him and said, ‘But I have returned.’

‘That you have, lad,’ he said. ‘And Lord Avijan would release us all from our oaths and be the first to stand for you. But Lord Tomavar commands six thousand warriors, and another four thousand follow Lord Tanu, and they will surely oppose you if you come forth.’

Although Atara, sitting near the middle of the table, kept her face still and stern, I could almost feel her heart beating in time with my own. I wondered if she had foreseen this moment in her scryer’s crystal sphere or what might befall next.

‘Will Lord Tanu and Lord Tomavar,’ I asked Lord Harsha, ‘oppose me so far as to go to war?’

I would rather die, I thought, than see Meshians slay Meshians.

‘Who can say?’ Lord Harsha muttered. ‘These are bad times, very bad. And since the Great Battle, Mesh is weaker, much too weak. New trees we need to stand in the ranks and face our enemies, but we’ll be a whole generation growing them. Our enemies know this. Already, it’s said, the Waashians are looking for a way to attack us. And the Urtuk already have: they invaded through the Eshur pass last fall. They weren’t many, only a thousand, and they might have been just testing our strength – and so Lord Tomavar’s army threw them back easily enough. And then there is Anjo.’

‘Anjo!’ I said. ‘But Anjo has never threatened us.’

‘No, and that is exactly the point: Anjo hasn’t had a real king in two hundred years, and can threaten no one. Her dukes and barons still battle each other bloody. You will not have heard that only two months ago, the Ishkans annexed Adar and Natesh. And King Hadaru still looks for other of Anjo’s domains to bite off. Lord Tanu has vowed that this must never happen to Mesh.’

‘And it must not!’ I told him.

‘No – and so Lord Tanu has said that Mesh must have a new king, and soon, if we don’t want to wind up like Anjo. Lord Tomavar has said the same thing. They have each demanded that the other stand aside, and have made threats.’

‘But if they make war upon each other,’ I said, ‘then they would make Mesh like Anjo!’