Ordermaster

LXX

The first light of sevenday had barely touched the tallest oak on the hill above the Austran envoy’s residence when Kharl swung up into the saddle of the chestnut gelding, awkwardly because he bore the long truncheon in its slightly oversized scabbard. He wasn’t used to riding that much, especially not wearing a weapon. He wore his black jacket and a gray cotton shirt, good garments, but not necessarily lordly ones. Demyst, Erdyl, and the two guards were already mounted, and all bore sabres, but a sabre would have been worse than useless for Kharl.

“Are you sure you would not rather take the carriage, Lord Kharl?” asked Fundal, standing on the end of the brick walkway from the portico.He looked across the five mounted riders, and the sixth saddled but riderless horse.

“The carriage wouldn’t work. Not all the roads outside of Brysta are that good. We may have to ride where the carriage would not go.”

“Yes, ser.” Fundal looked at the envoy glumly. “You don’t know when you’ll be back, I suppose?”

“Sometime before twoday, when I present my credentials to Lord West. It could be late today, or tomorrow, or oneday.″

“Yes, ser.”

Kharl turned his mount and headed down the brick-paved drive toward the open iron-grilled gate. Demyst pulled his mount alongside Kharl’s. Alynar and Erdyl were directly behind Kharl and the undercaptain, while Cevor brought up the rear, guiding the riderless mount, which also held provisions. The loudest sound as the party rode eastward and down the hill toward South Road was that of hoofs on brick pavement.

There were few souls out and about, although Kharl could see the haze from chimneys and smell cooking oil and smoke.

“How far are we going, ser?” asked Erdyl, from where he rose behind Kharl.

“As far as we need to. No one wants to talk about roads or about what’s happening in the south.”

Erdyl was silent, as were the others. Kharl concentrated on riding and not bouncing in the saddle, although his riding was far better than it had been when he had first been required to ride at Dykaru two seasons earlier. He also kept checking the streets, and roads, and the area through which they rode for signs of chaos. He found none; but he was well aware that, even so early in the day, several uniformed patrollers had been watching them.

As they passed the last dwellings of Brysta on the southeast side of the city and began to ride through the small plots that were neither true holdings nor just gardens, the ground grew somewhat more hilly to the east of the road, low hills that were more like rocky meadows, dotted with woodlots and irregular fields. Then the road swung due south-or mostly so in its winding path-to avoid a long ridge that rose a good fifty cubits above the road and angled to the southeast.

A half kay farther south, the packed-clay track turned back southeast, following the curve of a hill below the rocky ridge. At the end of the lowhill the ground to the east of the hill flattened, and Kharl saw more clearly the barracks he had seen from the carriage earlier and heard about-four new plank-sided buildings-and two long stables. On the flat between the base of the ridge and the stables, Kharl could see at least two companies of mounted patrollers drilling.

“Those are lancer drills,” said Demyst quietly.

“I thought they might be. I saw some mounted patrollers the other day-first time I’ve seen them in Brysta.” Kharl had half expected it, but it was still a surprise.

Just past the barracks, the south road was joined by another, narrower road from the east that cut through a low spot in the ridge farther east of the barracks and stables and ran due west on the south side of the patroller buildings, ending where it met the south road.

As they continued south on the main road that would eventually lead to Surien-if hundreds of kays farther to the southeast-the holdings and cots became far less frequent, and the road itself was often bordered by hedgerows and holder fields. Yet they encountered almost no one, except an occasional cart.

Then, less than two kays south of the barracks, the road abruptly changed from packed clay into a gray stone highway. The paving stones were large, two cubits by one, and the road was a good rod wide, with gravel and pebble shoulders.

“This looks new,” Kharl said. It was new, at least since the time a year before when he had walked southward to Peachill to see Warrl.

“It’s cut off sharp as with a knife. Right here. Doesn’t run all the way into Brysta. That doesn’t make sense,” replied Erdyl.

“They’re probably still building it,” Kharl offered.

“There’s no sign of’em doing any more, but maybe they don’t want folks to know about it yet,” suggested Demyst.

Kharl stood in the stirrups of the chestnut gelding, looking ahead, but the pavement stretched out at least three kays ahead before disappearing over a low rise, cutting through the wide curves of the old road like a crossbow quarrel, in places running through meadows and fields. “We’ll see how far it goes.” He eased his mount forward.

On the west side of the road was a stone wall that ended abruptly near the shoulder of the new road, which cut through an irregular corner of what had been a pasture. The stone wall had not been rebuilt along theshoulder, something Kharl certainly would have done to keep in grazing livestock.

He glanced at the cot immediately ahead and to his right. Despite the cool of the early morning, the shutters were closed when they should have been open. So was the door to the small barn to the south of the cot. He could sense no one in the buildings or nearby. Had they protested the loss of their land to the road?

Kharl shook his head, imagining what Egen would have done to anyone who protested. He was just glad that Dowsyl’s orchards were well back from the old main road, and he hoped that they were also well back from the new road.

For the next two kays, they were the sole travelers on the gray stone high road. Perhaps half a glass passed before Kharl saw riders coming from the south, wearing the traditional blue-and-burgundy uniforms and moving in formation.

“Looks like lancers, ser,” said Demyst. “What do you want us to do?”

“Let’s stop here and wait for them. I’d like to see what they have in mind.” Kharl didn′t have any illusions. The only question in his mind was exactly what sort of trouble the lancers posed. He reined up, then turned in the saddle. “Close up. As close as you can get.”

“Ser?” asked Erdyl.

“You heard him,” hissed Demyst.

The others moved in.

Kharl watched carefully as the lancers rode toward them, double file, in good order. The half squad of lancers reined up less than two rods away. All the riders carried not only sabres, but rifles in saddle cases-Hamorian rifles from their order-feel, Kharl sensed. Their undercaptain reined up to one side.

Kharl eased the chestnut forward.

“Hold it right there, fellow!” snapped the undercaptain.

“I didn’t want you to have to yell.” Kharl reined up slowly, so that he was almost a rod closer to the officer.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” announced the undercaptain. “The south road is closed.”

“There were no signs or barriers,” Kharl replied politely. “Might I ask why?″

“That’s ser, to you, fellow, and no, you can’t ask why.″

“No one in Brysta said that the road south was closed,” Kharl said, his eyes and senses on the ten lancers, all of whom had their hands on their rifles, clearly waiting for a command. He’d wondered about riding south, but, since no one had been able to tell him anything, he’d felt that waiting would not be wise. Now he was seeing why. He almost smiled at the thought. He’d never liked waiting.

“Well, it is, and the question is whether you fellows will hand over your golds and head back peaceably, or whether you end up in the quarries.”

“I thought the justicers or Lord West decided that,” Kharl said, even as he extended an order-probe to the rifle the undercaptain was pulling from its case. He began to untwist the order-locks in the iron.

″The lancers decide here, and I’ve decided-″

Kharl untwisted the last of the order-ties, then flung up a shield around his group.

Crrummmpttt! The blinding white glare and heat of chaos flared over the undercaptain and the ten suddenly hapless lancers.

Despite the shield, Kharl felt as though he had been thrust inside a furnace, then shaken. He just grabbed the rim of the saddle with his free hand and braced himself, trying to stay in the saddle as the chestnut jerked sideways. He managed to hold both his mount and the order shield until the tumult and chaos had dispersed.

Even so, a good tenth of a glass passed before Kharl’s eyes stopped watering, and he could see clearly. Except for an irregular patch of darkened gray stone in the center of the new road, and a number of fine cracks in the paving stones, there was no sign of the eleven lancers, except ashes as fine as mist drifting in the light breeze.

“Light-demons … burned’em to less’n ash …”

“Mean bastards … woulda shot us dead on the spot …”

Kharl had no doubts of that, or that the undercaptain had been ordered to act just that way.

“Now what?” asked Demyst.

“We keep riding. We still don′t know why they don′t want anyone here.” And Kharl wanted to get to Warrl before things got worse-if they hadn’t already.

“ … no sign of’em … nothing but a blackened patch on the road …” murmured Erdyl.

Neither guard answered his comments.

Kharl eased the chestnut forward at an easy walk. He had to keep blottinghis forehead. They covered another two kays before he began to cool off. When he began to feel light-headed, he took out some cheese and bread from the provisions in his saddlebag, an awkward task for him because he still wasn′t that good a rider. He ate slowly and drank almost half the water in his bottle.

The light-headedness departed, and as they continued southward, Kharl used his order-senses to study the road and the holdings. Occasionally, there were traces of chaos-wizardry, seemingly in places where stony outcrops or rises had been removed or lowered, but most of the road had been built without wizardry. Along the way, there was only a scattering of empty dwellings, and those were where the road had been built across the land belonging to that cottage or hut-at least from what Kharl could tell.

Still, no one anywhere close to the highway ventured out as they passed. Twice, a more distant peasant holder scurried into his hut when he saw the five riders.

The second time, Demyst cleared his throat. “Doesn’t look like they like riders, ser.”

“After the way those lancers tried to kill us, I’m sure that they don’t.”

″Don′t see why they were acting like brigands …″

“So that anyone who escaped would add to the stories about brigands dressed as lancers.” Kharl wondered exactly what Egen was hiding.

Another glass passed. They saw no one else on the new highway, and the gray stone pavement still stretched before them, arrowing southward. They continued riding, and Kharl kept looking, trying to sense the lancers he knew had to be somewhere ahead. Yet he sensed nothing but the remnants of older chaos.

Just before midmorning, on the east side of the road, Kharl saw the burned remnants of a cot that looked familiar. He thought it might have been the one where he had persuaded the elderly woman who lived there to feed him.

“The well here should be good,” he said to the others, riding though the open side gate.

Demyst glanced at Kharl.

“There’s no one here.” The mage reined up short of the well.

“Eerie,” murmured Erdyl. “There’s no one in these cots real close to the road, none of them. This is the first one that’s burned, though. What happened, do you think?”

“They didn’t want to give up their land, or part of it, to Lord West’sroad.” Kharl dismounted and tied the gelding to the dead limb of a tree that had been charred by the fire and stood leafless between the burned cot and the well. He walked to the well. A bucket and rope still remained.

After drawing the water, he let his order-senses check it, but he could detect no chaos-natural or wizardly-in the water. “It’s good.”

“Mounts could use water. So could I,” said Demyst.

After watering their horses and letting them rest for a half glass or so, Kharl and the others remounted. As he rode on, Kharl’s stomach grew tighter and tighter. While there were no more burned cots, and only a handful of empty cots and pastures, with untended fields that lay fallow, they saw no more holders outside. At times, Kharl could see others in the distance, and carts and wagons on back lanes, but none on the gray stone highway.

A good glass before noon, Kharl could see, off to the west of the new gray stone road, a curving section of the old road-and the kaystone that announced Peachill.

“We’ll cross to the older track now.” He turned the chestnut and let his mount pick his way over the uneven ground until they reached the original road. Even the ruts were old and worn down by rain and weather. Merayni and Dowsyl’s orchards were off a lane on the west side of the road, short of the hamlet itself. The small hutlike cottage where he had asked directions was also a heap of charcoal, burned at least a season before.

As he guided the chestnut westward along the narrower lane, his eyes looked for the other cots and dwellings. He could see none, only another heap of burned ruins. His stomach clenched even more tightly.

“Ser …?”

“I need to see someone-if they’re here. If they’re not …” He forced a shrug.

“Doesn’t look like they left anyone here,” ventured Demyst. “Must have done something.”

Kharl could only hope that the destruction remained near the old road, as he rode westward on the lane. Dowsyl’s orchard and house were a good two kays from the road, with the dwelling and storage barns set amid the orchard, between the pearapples and the peach trees.

Less than a quarter kay farther westward, he came to another burned-out cot and barn. He swallowed, moistening his lips.

“ … worried, I think …”

“ … be worried, too … no one on the roads, empty cots, burned cots …”

Kharl glanced down the lane, toward the rolling hills to the west, hills covered with the full summer green of broadleaf trees, mixed with the darker green of the pines and firs. Ahead, to his right was the old stone wall that marked the beginning of Dowsyl’s lands and orchards. The pearapples and the peaches were in full leaf, and he could see the gold of the peaches amid the green. His guts twisted as he rode closer. He could not see the thatched roof of the house above the stone wall, nor the roof of the barn in the space between pearapples and peaches. Dreading what he knew was beyond the wall, he eased the chestnut through the gateless opening in the stone wall.

At the other scenes of destruction, where the houses had been burned or just left deserted, there had been no indication of what had happened to the holders. At Dowsyl’s, that was not so. In the garden to the south of the charred ruins, six clear graves had been dug-and filled-heaped high with extra loam so as to leave no doubt that they were graves.

For a long time, Kharl just sat in the saddle and looked. He could sense that they were indeed graves, with the faintness of old death. The graves were not new. They could have been dug within eightdays of when he had last visited Warrl. Within eightdays. Eightdays … and Kharl had not even known. Had not sensed it, even.

Egen had traced Warrl somehow, and because he could not touch Kharl, he had killed them all-Merayni and Dowsyl and their three children … and Warrl. Warrl. Kharl’s youngest.

He did not know how much time had passed before he finally turned the chestnut and headed back out eastward on the lane, back through the ruins of Peachill.

“Ser?” asked Demyst, gently. “You knew them?”

“My consort’s sister and her consort, their children.” He did not want to mention Warrl. “He was a good man. An honest man.” He knew he could not say a word about Warrl, not and hold himself together.

“Lord West’s men, you think?”

Kharl just nodded, although he had no doubt that it was Egen’s doing. His throat was dry. He wanted to swallow, but he couldn’t. Beneath the grief, rage seethed, and his jaw kept tightening.

How could anyone be so viciously cruel? For Kharl, it was beyond explanation. Four children, helpless, and one of them had been Warrl, who had only gone to Merayni’s to be safe.

The mage shook his head. Merayni hadn’t been Kharl’s favorite, but she’d done what she had thought best-and it had led to her death. Kharl had tried to rescue Sanyle and keep Jenevra from Egen, and for that Egen had killed Charee, and tried to have Kharl flogged heavily enough that he would not survive. That had driven Arthal to sea on the Fleuryl-and to his death. Then Egen had used overtariffing and Tyrbel’s murder to drive away Warrl and send Kharl into hiding and eventually into flight from Brysta. Beyond that, Egen had burned every cot in Peachill.

And that hadn’t been enough-all that because Kharl had stopped Egen from abusing one girl and rescued one of his victims?

Thoughts kept swirling through Kharl’s head. Egen … always Egen. Bastard was too generous a term for Ostcrag’s son. So was pissprick … or anything else Kharl could think of.

The other thing that bothered him was that, at least for a time, Jeka had not been harmed. Kharl frowned, then nodded. Egen had never known that Kharl had hidden with Jeka. That had to be the only reason. When Kharl had walked to Peachill to see Warrl, he had not gone as a beggar, but as himself. Had that pride doomed Warrl?

And why hadn’t Egen done the same to Sanyle? Or had she fled to someone who could protect her? Kharl wondered if he’d ever know, but he just hoped that she had gotten safely to Vizyn. She had certainly known that it was not safe for her to stay in Brysta. Kharl shifted his weight in the saddle.

No one said a word on the ride back toward the gray stone highway.

As they neared the burned-out hut beside the old road, Demyst cleared his throat. “Ah … we headed back, ser?” asked Demyst.

“Not yet. We’ll keep heading south. We know what they’re doing. We don’t know why.” Especially now, Kharl had to know. What was Egen doing that required such cruelty, not just to Kharl, but to the holders he’d driven from their homes?

Not until they were a good kay south of Peachill did Kharl call another rest halt, once more at an abandoned-but not burned-cot-and one where they were shielded by a short hedgerow and not visible from the new highway. They ate and watered and fed the mounts, then rested for almost a glass.

No one said much to Kharl, respecting his silence and grief.

Finally, he cleared his throat. “We need to get riding.”

“Ser,” ventured Erdyl, “what are we seeking?”

Kharl laughed harshly. “If I knew that, we wouldn′t have to be here. Lord West-or his sons-don′t want travelers here. They’ve built a new stone road, but no one is using it, and they don’t seem to want anyone using it. There aren′t any armsmen in Brysta. They’ve been replaced by patrollers in new uniforms. There are no ships in the harbor except those from Hamor, and no one seems to know what’s on them. The Hamorian envoy avoided telling me that. The Sarronnese envoy doesn’t know. We can’t even find most of the other envoys or their secretaries. Those secretaries that Erdyl’s talked to don’t know any more than we do. Or they aren’t saying.” He shrugged. “So we’ll keep riding for a while.”

“Yes, ser. I didn’t mean …″

“I know,” Kharl replied. “It seems stupid, but there has to be some reason for all this, and we weren’t finding out in Brysta.” He climbed into the saddle and turned the chestnut back toward the gray stone road. He did not turn in the saddle to look back. He could not have done that and maintained any composure.

They rode more than another glass, another five to seven kays, from what Kharl judged before he sensed another set of lancers riding northward toward them from beyond the low hill crest ahead. He glanced around before speaking. “Off the road, over by those trees. There are more lancers coming.”

The five others followed, gathering around Kharl beneath an ancient black oak. “Before they get here, I’m going to put a sight shield around us. You won’t be able to see, but they won’t see us, either.”

“No more fire?” murmured Cevor.

“No. Not this time.” Kharl didn’t want too many lancers disappearing. Also, doing too much of the order-release magery took a heavy toll on him. “Just be quiet. They won’t be able to see us, but they can hear us.”

Once he had raised the sight shield, Kharl could hear more than a few swallows and someone’s fast and nervous breathing. He just hoped none of his group would do something stupid.

The second patrol was close to forty lancers-two full mounted squads. The riders were moving at a trot, and were out of sight before long. Kharl waited until he was certain before releasing the sight shield.

“Whew!” Alynar shook his head. “Felt like I was in a cave, ser.”

“Strange,” added Demyst. “I could hear the hoofs, but they just kept riding.”

Kharl turned the chestnut toward the new road, heading southward once more.

Over the next glass or so, east of the gray stone road, a road that had gradually changed its course so that it now pointed south-southeast rather than due south, the hills became more rugged, with occasional gray escarpments. Kharl had the feeling that the same kind of stone had been cut and used for the highway.

By then, it was well into late afternoon, and the holdings were getting more scattered. Kharl frowned as he looked at a hillside to the west at the blackened ruins of what had to have been a mansion or a lord’s dwelling. The cots below it were unharmed, and he could see some figures working the fields. Then he nodded. An unfriendly lord-or one independent of Egen-might well have been a threat. Now, the golds from rents doubtless went to Egen.

For the next kay or so, Kharl began to sense something ahead, but he couldn’t tell exactly what, beyond the general feeling of people and chaos and order-almost like a sizable town. That would not have been surprising, although there were few large towns to the southwest of Brysta, from what Kharl remembered. Most were either on the coast, to the east or north.

Still, the feeling grew.

Then they had to take cover once more, as another patrol appeared from the south and rode northward.

Once the third patrol had passed, Kharl concentrated on what he had been sensing ahead. There were lancers, buildings, and the chaos left from wizardry, and not all that far away. From what he could tell, it was beyond the hillcrest on the east side of the road.

“This way.” Without looking back, he turned the chestnut into the meadow to the left of the gray stone road and headed toward the woods or woodlot that looked to be a kay or so farther to the east, straddling the top of the low ridge. He hoped the woods would provide some cover.

A single holder at the bottom of the hill yelled something, but Kharl ignored him, and the man went back to digging out his irrigation ditch.

It took nearly a half glass for Kharl to reach the woods and guide his mount through the edges until he reached a place where he could look southward over the long and shallow valley that stretched to the southeast from the ridge. The gray stone road split the valley almost evenly. Another two kays to the southeast, between the road and a stream, Kharl could see what looked to be a town, except that the buildings were all long and low structures.

“Looks like barracks,” ventured Demyst. “Rows and rows of’em.”

To the north of the area with the barracks were fenced enclosures filled with horses. Smoke rose from more than a score of chimneys. Farther to the east, beyond the streams, were rows of huts, and beyond them was a raw slash in the stony escarpment and a long and wide pit. Lines of tiny figures snaked in and around the pit.

“That’s the quarry, one of them,” Kharl said.

“Like a town …″ murmured Erdyl.

“More like a fort, with the quarries there.” Demyst frowned. “They don′t need a fort to guard the quarries.”

“The fort’s not for that. It’s to train armsmen.”

“For a war against the Lord South?”

Kharl didn’t want to answer that. Lord South was certainly what Egen wanted people to think, but the fort was far closer to Brysta than to Surien. As he studied the valley, Kharl could sense at least two white wizards, perhaps three. Two of them were strong, perhaps not so strong as the strongest he had faced in Austra, but not to be taken lightly.

After a moment, he turned in the saddle and looked at the undercaptain. “We’ve seen what we need to see. We can head back.”

“Just … head back, ser?” asked Erdyl.

“You want us to charge an entire fort and all those armsmen?” asked Kharl. “Some of them are Hamorian, and the others are Nordlan. We’re not at war.” Not yet, anyway, he thought.

He eased the chestnut back though the woodlot. At the north side, he checked the road and the meadows, but both were clear. The holder still labored on the irrigation ditch. The man did not even look up as Kharl and the others rode back to the gray stone road and turned back north.

As Kharl rode back northward, his eyes and senses concentrating on discovering Egen’s lancers before they spotted his small group, questions twisted through his thoughts. The gray stone road extended at least twenty kays south of Brysta, but how far did it go? One of the histories said that the forces of Fenardre the Great had been able to complete a kay of stone road a day. If Egen′s forces had been working on the road for even half a year, and could do half as much, he might have already completed over a hundred kays. That still left close to a hundred more before the road reached the border of the south quadrant-unless the road-building had been going on in secret much longer. How long had it been going on? Was the refused consorting just an excuse? Were the Hamorians helping Egenwith the road so that they could use it once they took over the South and West Quadrants of Nordla? Couldn’t Egen see what they had in mind? Or did he think he could outwit them? More important, could Kharl do anything? What? How? When?

Kharl rubbed his forehead. For the moment, they needed to get off the road and find somewhere to spend the night. He doubted he would sleep well. He hoped he could sleep some.