Robin Hobb - The Complete Soldier Son Trilogy - Shaman’s Crossing, Forest Mage, Renegade’s Magic

‘Is it true?’ I asked.

‘I wouldn’t lie about it!’ Trist declared angrily.

‘No, I don’t mean that . Is it true that we get the bad posts and don’t move up as fast?’ Suddenly, the disparity was personal to me. Carsina awaited me only if I showed her father I could win rank quickly.

‘Well, of course it is, for most of us. I even heard that when Roddy Newel’s family tried to buy him a captain’s commission, the regiment declined to have him. There’s a lot of political stuff like that, Nevare. I guess you don’t hear about it much, out on the frontier. But those of us who grew up in Old Thares know.’ He leaned closer to me. ‘Haven’t you noticed? Our corporal is old nobility. So are all the cadet officers. They never put us with our own kind, or let us have officers from amongst the second- and third-year New Nobles. All the second-years and third-years in Carneston House are old nobility. Next year, when we’re second-years, do you think we’ll be here again, or in one of the nice, new houses? No. They’ll put us across the grounds in Sharpton Hall. It used to be a tannery, and still stinks of it. It’s where all the second- and third-year New Nobles’ sons are housed.’

‘How do they fit them all?’ Gord asked wonderingly.

‘All?’ Trist said snidely. ‘Listen up, Gord. Rory told us about culling at the beginning of the year. What do you think it’s about? It’s about having more Old Nobles’ sons go on as officers than New Nobles’ sons. Come the end of the year, a lot of us won’t be here any more. It was bad enough when Colonel Rebin was in charge. I’ve heard that Colonel Stiet would be just as happy to find ways to clear all of us out.’

‘But that’s not fair! He can’t exclude us or kick us out of the Academy just because we aren’t from Old Noble stock.’ Spink was shocked and angry.

Trist stood up, tall and lean, and stretched casually. ‘You keep saying that, Spink, lad. But the fact is, fair or not, he can do it. So you’d best find ways to make it less likely it will happen to you. That’s what my father advised me before I left. Make the right friends. Show the right attitude. And don’t make trouble. Or be seen with trouble-makers. A little free advice: Going about whining “that’s not fair” isn’t going to endear you to Colonel Stiet.’ He rolled his shoulders and I heard his spine crack.

‘I’m off to bed, children,’ he informed us archly. I liked Trist, but his superior manner at that moment grated on me. ‘I have to be up early, you know.’

‘So do we all,’ Rory observed cheerlessly.

We dispersed from our hearth into the chill of the bunkrooms. I said my prayers and got into my bed but could not fall asleep. Spink seemed to share my insomnia for he whispered into the quiet, ‘What happens to us if we get sent home from Academy?’

I was surprised he didn’t know. ‘You’re a soldier son. You enlist as a common soldier and do the best you can from there.’

‘Or, if you’re lucky, some rich relative buys you a commission and you go off as an officer anyway,’ Nate added into Spink’s despairing silence.

‘I don’t have any rich relatives. At least, I don’t have any who like me.’

‘Me, neither,’ Kort observed. ‘So perhaps we’d better sleep tonight and study hard tomorrow. I don’t like the idea of marching for the rest of my life.’

We all fell asleep to that thought, but I think I lay awake longer than the rest of them. Spink’s family had no money to buy him a commission if he were culled from the Academy. My father did, perhaps. But would he? He had never intended that I should overhear his doubts of my ability to be a leader and hence an officer. But once I knew that he had them, it had made my golden future shine a little less brilliantly. In the back of my mind, I had been consoling myself that graduating from the Academy virtually guaranteed I would be at least a lieutenant, and both my father and Sergeant Duril had said that even the most idiotic lieutenant could usually make captain, by attrition if by no other means. But what if I were culled? Would my father judge me, after that failure, worth the cost of a good commission? The positions in the best regiments were very dear, and even in the less desirable ones, they were not cheap. Would he think I was worthy of that expense or would he consider it good money thrown after bad, and leave me to enlist as a common soldier? Ever since I had been old enough to realize I was a second son and meant by the good god to be a soldier, I had thought my future assured. On my eighteenth birthday, I had thought I grasped it in my hands. Now, I perceived that golden future could be lost, and not even through my fault, but purely by the politics of the day. Prior to the Academy, I had given little thought to the prejudice I might encounter as the second son of a New Noble. During my training with Sergeant Duril it had seemed a thing I could easily overcome by dint of solid effort and good intentions.

I hovered at the edge of sleep. I think I dozed. Then I felt a sudden sting of outrage. I sat up in the dark. As if from a distance, I heard myself speak. ‘A true warrior would not put up with continued humiliations. A true warrior would find a way to strike back.’

Spink shifted in his bed. ‘Nevare’s talking in his sleep again,’ he complained to the quiet room.

‘Shut up, Nevare,’ Kort and Natred said in weary chorus. I lay back in my bunk and let sleep take me.

The few weeks of initiation that remained seemed an eternity to me. The pranks grew rougher. One night, we were all rousted out of bed in our nightshirts and forced outside in a cold, driving rain and told to stand at attention. Sergeant Rufet had been lured from his desk for that one; he found us when he was doing one of his regular rounds of the building, and angrily ordered us back to bed. I could no longer, as Rory did, shake such humiliations off as a challenge to toughen me. I now saw them as a small place where the Old Nobles’ sons could unveil how they truly felt about us. When they taunted me or forced me to behave foolishly or wasted my time with unnecessary tasks, it now burned in my soul. It created a little well of anger in me, one that they fed, drop by drop. I had always been a good-natured fellow, able to take a joke, able to forgive even the roughest of practical jokes. Those six weeks taught me why some men carry grudges.

I began, foolishly perhaps, to take small vengeances. When I blacked the second-years’ boots, I took care to get blacking on the laces so they’d dirty their hands. They caught me at that, of course, and angrily warned me to be more careful the next time. I blacked the boots meticulously, but pushed a thumbful of pine-tar up into the treads of several random boots. They tracked the sticky mess all over their floors the next morning as they left their dormitory, and reaped the punishment for a sticky floor at the noon inspection. That, they blamed on each other, and had demerits of their own to march off. That pleased me. Far better to make their misfortunes seem accidental.

A few nights later, I rose from my bed after I judged the others were asleep. I walked silently through the study room, but just as I reached the door, Rory spoke.

‘Where you going, Nevare?’

He and Nate had been sitting in the dark, talking quietly. I hadn’t noticed them.

‘Out. Just for a minute.’

‘What you got there? More tree gum?’

When I made no reply, Rory gave a snort of laughter. ‘I saw you gatherin’ it the other day. Pretty smooth, Nevare. Actually, pretty sticky. And I wouldn’t a thought it of you. What are ya doing now?’

I was torn between reluctance and a certain amount of pride in my cleverness. I came back to the hearth, blew briefly on the coals to wake a feeble flame, and then showed them what I held in my hand.