Cyador’s Heirs

XXVII

When he returns to the palace, Lerial simply tells his mother and his aunt, and Undercaptain Woelyt, that he is supposed to continue the training begun by Majer Altyrn by learning more about arms at Lancer headquarters. While Emerya hides a faint smile, she says nothing. His mother merely says, “Doing what your father arranged is for the best.”

Undercaptain Woelyt nods approvingly, especially after Lerial tells him that Captain Chaen is in charge of his sparring and training. “Good man. Strong as an ox with a blade. You hold your own against him, and no one will beat you down just on strength.”

On sevenday, Lerial spars first against Chaen-with blunted blades and padded armor, and then against Veraan, a young undercaptain, “young” meaning likely only a few years older than Lerial himself. Lerial discovers that what Altyrn and Chaen had earlier observed is indeed true because it is quickly clear that Lerial is far better than the young officer. He also understands Chaen’s reasoning about the two pairings. The first is to show the other officers that Lerial is good enough to go against the senior captain, and the second is to show the junior officers that Lerial is already above them … and that his working with more experienced officers is not a result of favoritism, but skill.

While he does not spar on eightday, he is at Lancer headquarters before seventh glass on oneday, twoday, threeday, and fourday, and he spends more than a glass in padded armor working against various officers. Then he returns to the palace and studies the handful of tactics books from his father’s small study, as well as the maps of the areas around the lands held by his father. He does write as gracious a letter as he can to Majer Altyrn, thanking him for his hospitality and all the instruction provided, and arranges for it to be dispatched.

In his sparring, one thing does not change immediately. For the first few moments, even for a fraction of a glass, of each session with an officer with whom Lerial has not sparred, he feels awkward and has to be especially alert and careful, although by the end of his session on fourday morning, he is beginning to feel as though the awkwardness and uneasiness is not lasting as long as it once did.

Because his presence at Lancer headquarters rests on both his position and a certain sufferance by Majer Phortyn, Lerial makes a continuing effort to be polite and deferential to all the Lancer officers, without being obsequious or fawning. He does make a practice of taking a second set of greens with him to headquarters and washing up in the officers’ quarters after his sessions, because he is invariably soaked and smelly when he finishes.

On fourday, this is especially necessary, because he has promised to meet Emerya at the Hall of Healing after he has finished his sessions at Lancer headquarters and to spend the day at the Hall.

He is just finishing donning clean and dry greens when Lauxyn, one of the older undercaptains, appears. He is the only undercaptain, besides Veraan, whom Chaen has allowed to spar with Lerial, perhaps because Lauxyn is clearly more experienced, and most likely a former squad leader recently promoted to undercaptain because of his skills.

“Might I ask why you work so hard, ser?”

Sensing honest curiosity, rather than scheming or some other chaos, Lerial decides to answer, if cautiously. “I don’t ever wish to be a burden on any Lancers.” He grins ruefully. “At least not any burden that I can possibly avoid. Being as good as I can with a blade and learning as much as I can might just help.”

“They say the Duke is good with a blade.”

“He is. That’s another reason.”

Lauxyn nods politely. “How long will you be doing this? Do you know?”

“At least until my father returns from the north. After that, he’ll decide. He wanted me to improve my training in his absence.” That is somewhere between a guess and a fabrication, but it is certainly not impossible, given his father’s expectations.

“You could ride some patrols now.”

“I hope I’ve learned enough for that, but that’s for my father and Majer Phortyn to decide.”

Lauxyn offers a brief smile. “You should be ready when they decide.” He slips away, leaving Lerial alone in the small chamber.

After Lauxyn leaves, Lerial straps on his sabre, then dons his unmarked Lancer visor cap and stuffs his damp training greens into the kit bag, before making his way to the stable and his waiting escort, again headed by Jhubyl, who alternates with Fhanyd, the other junior squad leader in the company assigned to the palace.

In moments, the five riders are outside the headquarters’ gates and following the river boulevard north toward the Hall of Healing.

“You’re sure you don’t mind riding around with me?” asks Lerial.

“No, ser. It beats the duties at the Palace. Besides, that’s part of what we’re there for. It’s more interesting than checking guard posts … or making sure the younger rankers aren’t messing with the kitchen girls … on duty, that is.”

As they ride through the River Square-almost due east of the palace-Lerial glances at the river piers … and frowns. There is not a single flatboat tied up there. And the only sailing craft are two used by the Lancers on their patrols. He cannot remember a time when he has seen the piers so empty.

Because the harvests were so poor in the south? Or could the Heldyans have blocked the river at Amaershyn? Or just coincidence?

Much as it could be, Lerial has trouble believing it is coincidental. But it could be.

North of the River Square are the factorages of the larger merchanters in Cigoerne. Even they look less busy than he recalls. Is it that he remembers just the busier times? He looks toward Jhubyl. “Are things here quieter than usual?”

“It’d be hard to say, ser, but I can’t say I’ve often seen the river piers so empty.”

“That’s what I thought, but I wondered if it was my imagination.”

“Be mine, too, then, ser.”

“I know the Heldyans blocked the river at Amaershyn some years back. Do you think they could have tried that again?”

“I wouldn’t know, ser. The captain didn’t mention anything this morning, and there wasn’t any watertalk like that at headquarters.”

Still … Lerial wonders.

When they reach the Hall and rein up outside the stable, Jhubyl asks, “You’re sure you don’t want us to stay?”

“Thank you, but I’ll ride back with my aunt and her escorts.”

“Yes, ser.”

Jhubyl and the rankers do wait until Lerial has seen his mount stabled and walks into the Hall of Healing before they turn and ride westward toward the palace.

Lerial makes his way to the first door inside the Hall and enters.

The older woman in pale green, perhaps the same one who had been sitting behind the table-desk the previous time he had been in the Hall, looks up. “Lord Lerial, Lady Emerya requested that you join her in the receiving room.”

“Thank you.” Lerial smiles and turns, making his way along the long corridor to the south end of the building and the receiving room.

He is about to enter the receiving area when Emerya steps out. “Good. You’re here.”

“Why did you want me to come today?” asks Lerial.

“I’d appreciate it if you’d come every day after your sessions with the Lancers. We’re shorthanded here. We had to send the men who are healers north to help your father’s wounded. We’ll see what you can do-or help me do-today. If you can do what I think you can, you can treat lesser wounds by yourself before long.”

“Father’s wounded? And you didn’t tell me?”

“He’s not wounded. He sent word to your mother yesterday. A large group of raiders attacked Penecca. He and his Lancers drove them out. A company of Afritan armsmen attacked. They claimed that Penecca belonged to Duke Atroyan. Your father and his men killed a great many of them, and the rest fled, but many Lancers were wounded. Your father fears that there will be more Afritan attacks.”

“I didn’t think men could be healers.” Lerial knows that’s not strictly so, but he finds he’s slightly irritated, especially at not having been told what has happened in the north.

“That’s not so, and you know it.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about Father?”

“Your mother asked me not to last night.”

“She didn’t say anything this morning.” That’s not exactly fair, Lerial also knows, because he left before his mother had come down for breakfast. But someone should have told you.

“Lerial…”

“Someone should have told me.”

“You’ll have to take that up with your mother.” Emerya looks at Lerial. “We need to get to work. Come with me.”

Lerial follows her from the receiving room back to the entry room, where Emerya insists Lerial leave his sabre, and then to a room with a woman lying on a pallet. She is young, perhaps not even as old as Lerial, and her bulging abdomen and the pain in her face indicates why she is there. The fact that most poor women give birth at home suggests that she is in some sort of danger … or that the unborn child is.

“What can you tell me?” murmurs Emerya.

Lerial does his best to sense the order patterns around the young woman. He swallows.

“That’s what I thought. But what do you sense?”

“The child is weak, and there’s all sorts of chaos around her stomach … her abdomen … like she’s been beaten…”

“She has, but that’s just part of the problem. Can you strengthen the order of the child? Just a tiny bit … too much could kill her.”

“Her?”

“You’ll learn to sense the difference. I need to help the mother.”

“I can do that.”

While Emerya and a midwife help the girl, Lerial stands back slightly and eases tiny flows of order into the child, as directed by Emerya.

More than a glass later, a baby girl rests in the arms of her mother.

Emerya turns to Lerial. “Thank you.”

“You could have done what I did.”

She shakes her head. “Not at the same time. There was chaos all around the birth canal. I had to keep that from her and from the child.”

When they leave that chamber, they find that a woman perhaps ten years younger than Emerya stands out in the corridor. She wears faded brown, and her head scarf is worn and has fallen away from her face and across her shoulders. Her face is damp. With her is a grizzled man.

“You should not be here,” Emerya says quietly to the man. “This part of the Hall is for those who need healing.”

“How is she?” pleads the woman. “My Irnina?”

“She will be well. She has a daughter.”

“A daughter?” growls the man, whose skin is darker than Emerya’s and Lerial’s, but much lighter than that of most Hamorians. “She should not have … she has brought dishonor upon my house!”

“Why?” asks Lerial politely. “Because she bore a child?”

“Because she is not consorted and the child is a girl. Unwanted boys are worth something.” He turns away and marches toward the south entrance to the Hall.

“But how is my Irnina?” asks the woman.

“Her body will heal from the beating,” replies Emerya. “Her daughter will be healthy.”

“Let her stay here, I beg you, Lady Healer.”

“She can stay for a few days.”

“Thank you…”

Lerial eases back while Emerya talks to the girl’s mother. His eyes turn to follow the older man, but he has already left the Hall.

For the remainder of the day, Lerial does what his aunt directs. He even cleans a workman’s wound and stitches it closed, if under Emerya’s close watch, and helps her set a broken arm.

Slightly past fourth glass, Lerial washes up for the fourth or fifth time since he entered the Hall and then reclaims his sabre, and joins his aunt and her Lancer escorts outside the small stable by the north wall. The sky is clear, but a cool wind blows out of the southeast as they mount up and then ride out through the gates toward the Palace. Lerial rides beside Emerya.

“There weren’t that many people who needed healing today,” he says.

“Some days are like that. Some days the receiving room is filled, and the sick and injured spill out into the Hall and outside the south entry.” Emerya pauses, then asks, “What did you think of the father of that woman who had the little girl?”

Lerial can sense that the question is more than casual. “He didn’t seem to think women are worth much. Especially girls. A lot of Hamorians don’t, it seems … at least from what I’ve heard.”

“Did you like Maeroja?”

Lerial frowns. What does Maeroja have to do with Hamorian men valuing women? He guesses. “She left Heldya because she felt unvalued? Is that why she consorted the majer?”

“Not a bad guess,” says Emerya dryly. “She’s somehow related to the Duke of Heldya, and Maeroja is not her birth name. She’s never said what it was, and I’d guess she never will. She was rowing a small boat across the Swarth River, and several flatboats with Heldyan armsmen were chasing her. Majer Altyrn used the firecannon on the Kerial to destroy two of the boats. That was the last time the cannon was used.…”

There is something more behind those words, but Lerial cannot say what and loses some of what his aunt is saying.

“… turned part of the river to steam. Altyrn and his Lancers rescued her, and he insisted that she change into a Lancer uniform. Then he used a firelance on her clothes and the boat and had it beached on the west side of the Swarth, farther downstream, later that night.”

“Why were they chasing her?”

“One of the Duke’s close friends tried to take advantage of her. She gutted him with his own blade and fled. So did her sister. The mob killed her sister … after … Maeroja hid for days before she found a boat that wasn’t closely watched … but there was a reward for her return.”

“All Hamorians are like that? About women?”

“Most of them. Not all, but most. We didn’t wear head scarves in Cyador, you know? Oh … Cyad wasn’t perfect for women, either. Your grandfather gave in to the demands that women be put in their place. He was the one who insisted on the gilded chains for women who weren’t healers.”

“He was?” This is something that Lerial has not heard.

“Mother-your grandmere-collected all the chains from every woman on the Kerial and had them melted down. The gold helped pay for the lands that are now Cigoerne.”

Lerial is more than a little confused-not about women being less valued, or valued little, but as to why Emerya has brought up the matter.

“You’re wondering why I’m telling you all this?”

“Yes,” he admits.

“Lephi is like your grandfather, and your father. I don’t wish to see Amaira or Ryalah, or their daughters or granddaughters, treated the way women were in the last days of Cyad or in the way the Hamorians treat them.”

“Or the way that man did.”

Emerya nods.

“What do you think I can do?”

“Far more than you think you can right now. I don’t expect anything from you now. I just want you to think about it.”

“I will,” he promises, knowing that he owes her that, and possibly much more.

His aunt does not offer another word on the ride back to the palace.

Once they arrive, Lerial dismounts, then grooms the gelding and sees to his feed and water before leaving the stable. He is headed toward his chambers to wash up before going to the north courtyard for refreshments when Saltaryn steps out of a doorway.

“Lord Lerial.”

“Magus Saltaryn.”

“I understand you have been back in Cigoerne for almost an eightday, and yet I have not seen you.”

“I’ve been busy with arms training at Lancer headquarters … and studying tactics and maps as well.”

Saltaryn looks to say something, then shakes his head. “Perhaps that’s for the best.” He smiles, almost sadly. “Best of fortune, Lord Lerial.”

For all of his acquiescence, Saltaryn does not sound exactly pleased, but Lerial merely says, “Thank you. I appreciate that.”

Saltaryn steps aside, and Lerial continues to his chambers.