Sharon Shinn - Reader And Raelynx

“I told him to,” Justin said, sounding pleased with himself, that he had given advice, and it had been accepted, and it had turned out so well-unless you considered getting a blade through the belly a bad thing. He came a step closer and bent over a little. “You fought well,” he said to Kelti. “At least two others are alive today because of you.”

Kelti looked straight back at him, trusting the other soldier to tell him a hard truth. “Am I going to die?”

“Might,” Justin said. “It’s a bad wound. But we have some mystic healers here who can bring a man back from death’s doorstep.”

“I don’t mind dying,” Kelti said. “If it’s for something that matters.”

“It is for the noblest cause imaginable,” Amalie told him, stroking his cheek. She had not seemed so sure just an hour ago, but to reassure this young man, she had managed to summon true conviction. “To keep the kingdom safe and whole. To keep cruel men and women from gaining the power to kill and destroy at will.”

“I never did anything that mattered before,” Kelti said.

“And when you are recovered, will you still want to be a soldier in the royal army?” Amalie said. “Or have you seen enough of fighting?”

His dark eyes were shining with fervor-or possibly fever, Cammon wasn’t sure. “As long as you have need of me, I will fight for you,” he said.

“Then heal quickly, and come see me when you are whole again,” Amalie said. “I have need of a few more Riders. I would invite you to be one of them.”

Cammon heard Justin’s quick intake of breath, but when he looked over, Justin was grinning. This must be how it was done; suddenly, the monarch just knew. And if that wasn’t a kind of magic, Cammon had never seen a spell cast in his life.

“Majesty, I will be well in a few days. I’m sure of it.”

She smiled and came to her feet. “Look for me then, Kelti. I’ll be waiting.”

It was late, and tomorrow would be another punishing day. “Amalie, you have to go back to your own tent now,” Cammon said, leading her outside. She didn’t even protest; she was too exhausted.

Justin followed them, still grinning. “Good to see that you’re planning to quickly fill up the ranks of Riders again, Majesty,” he said.

She gave him a searching look. “Did I choose wisely? Will you be willing to ride alongside him?”

“He proved his courage today. His fighting skills need some improvement, but training is something we can give him.” Justin glanced at Cammon. “When we met him, he struck me as a man desperate to find a cause to give his whole heart to.”

Cammon nodded. “I agree.”

Justin continued, “And you’ve just offered him that cause. I believe he would be loyal to you to the death.”

She sighed. “Which I hope does not come tomorrow.”

Justin shook his head. “He won’t even need magic now. Someone has faith in him. A boy like that, faith’ll keep him alive for a long time.”

“You speak from experience, of course,” Cammon said in a polite voice.

Justin laughed. “I absolutely do.”

Justin stayed behind to coax Ellynor to take a rest, but Cammon and Amalie returned to her pavilion. “You’ll feel very tired when I give you back your pendant,” he warned. “You’ve been pulling magic from me, and it’s buoyed you up, but I think you’re going to feel pretty bad when I hand it back. So promise me you’ll just go to bed and worry about war again in the morning.”

“I promise,” she said, and held out her hand.

He laid the gold necklace in her palm, and she actually staggered. The glow that had seemed to sustain her flickered out. She dropped to the bed as if her legs suddenly could not support her.

“Ohhhh,” she breathed, “I didn’t think it would be quite so severe.”

“Just take off your dress and your shoes,” he said. “And I’ll pull up the blanket. Go straight to sleep.”

But she forced her eyes open. She hated anyone to think she might be weak. “What about you?” she asked.

He had slept in the tent with her since it was first erected. No one had commented on the arrangement. He actually thought Tayse might even be pleased about it-not because Tayse had any romantic notions about young love, but because Tayse considered Cammon a very good sort of weapon. “Yes, of course I will go to sleep, too,” he said.

She shook her head. “No. If I’ve been stealing your magic, are you exhausted too?”

He sat beside her and began unlacing her shoes, since she seemed incapable of performing that task for herself. “You haven’t been stealing it. I’ve given it to you. A present.”

“But has that gift left you drained and weak?”

He pushed her to her side so he could undo the buttons at the back of her dress. He figured it wouldn’t be long before she was demanding to wear men’s trousers, as Senneth did. A dress was clearly out of place on a battlefield. “No. I’m tired because this has been a dreadful day and I have not been able to shut out all the cries of pain and calls for help. But it didn’t make me especially weary to share my magic with you.”

He tugged the skirts of the dress up and had to half lift her to get it off over her head. “Why not?” she asked sleepily, lying back on the pillow.

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Because I have a lot of power, I guess. I’ve never yet used it all up. Maybe that will happen someday-maybe it will happen during this war. But it didn’t happen today.”

“Good,” she said, and closed her eyes. “I’ll take some more of it tomorrow.”

THEsecond day of war was much like the first one. Brutal, arduous, tense, and exhausting. As before, Cammon and Amalie stayed well to the back, Amalie fretful and Cammon struggling to sort out the noises and emotions besieging him. He managed a little better this day. He was able to focus, as Jerril had taught him, only on the voices he wanted to hear while he shut out all the others. The various leaders of the defending army were beginning to realize what an asset he was, and this day messages came swiftly from the mystics attending Romar, Colton, Kiernan, and the captains of the other troops.

“We’re able to shift forces to any line exactly when we need them,” Romar said that night as they held another brief conference in Amalie’s tent. “Our numbers are smaller, but we’re able to deploy better. It’s almost an even trade-off.”

“I’d still like to see another thousand men ride up wearing Danalustrous red,” Kiernan said.

Senneth shook her head. “I don’t think that will happen. Malcolm seemed very certain he would not join the war.”

“Then we plan a strategy around the troops we have,” Tayse answered.

No one said that there weren’t enough troops, but Cammon could tell everyone was thinking it. They had lost more soldiers today; they were slowly being whittled down. Cammon saw Romar speculatively regarding his niece, and he could read the regent’s thought: How soon must we send her across the border to safety? Not that there was certain to be any safety for Amalie, even in the Lirrenlands.

That night, again, Amalie spent an hour outside the infirmary tents, moving between fallen soldiers, offering thanks and encouragement. Cammon could see two shapes inside the pavilions, shadows moving against the low interior light. One he guessed was Ellynor. The other he knew to be Valri, for he had sensed her there the entire day, moving among the wounded and the dying. She moved with a grim purposefulness, almost all of her attention on the sober task before her, but a small part of her-a tiny, hopeful, selfish part-was engaged in a celebration of joy. Cammon smiled to feel it. The reunion with Ellynor’s cousin must have proceeded rather well, he thought. He glanced around, in case he spotted the fellow lurking in the shadows, waiting for Valri to retire for the night.