The Chaos Balance

LV

Thrap!

In the gray light of predawn, Nylan lowered the widebladed razor he was using to shave and glanced over his shoulder toward the bedchamber, catching sight of Weryl. The boy stood and held on to the brass-bound chest, rocking his weight back and forth as though he wanted to take a step.

“Ah dah dah ah…”

A slight breeze stirred the room, bearing the odor of damp grass and the slight fragrance of some unknown flower-both sharp in the air cleaned by the night’s thunderstorms. A small puddle of water lay beneath the open window.

Thrap!

“Can you get that?” he asked.

“I’m throwing something on, master of the bath chamber,” snapped Ayrlyn.

“Sorry. Do you want me…”

“I’ll get it.”

At the sound of the door opening, Nylan lifted the crude razor to finish shaving, concentrating on not slashing himself. He finished as quickly as he could and washed hastily, trying to ignore the cock with the off-key crowing that seemed perched on the wall directly below their open window.

“Zeldyan sent these up with breakfast,” Ayrlyn said as Nylan stumbled from the washroom. She held up trousers, shirt, and tunic, all in dark gray. “There’s a set for me as well. They seem to be to our measurements.”

The smith shook his head. “Why now?”

“So we couldn’t exactly refuse. It also reflects on the regents, I suspect, if we’re poorly clothed.” Ayrlyn offered a tight smile. “I’m sure we’ll pay for the garments.”

“You would put it that way.” Nylan lifted the trousers and slipped them on.

“They do fit nicely,” Ayrlyn observed. “I like them on you.”

Nylan flushed.

By the time they were dressed, had wolfed down the eggs and cheese and slabs of something Nylan hoped was ham, and had all their gear in the appropriate bags, the edge of the sun was peering over the eastern horizon, casting a flat glare into the room.

“Huruc did say dawn,” Ayrlyn said.

“We’re a little behind.” Nylan hoisted saddlebags into his arms, trying not to get them caught on either his shoulder harness or the hilt of the blade in his waist scabbard.

“Not so that it would matter. In case you haven’t noticed, this isn’t the most punctual of cultures.” Ayrlyn reclaimed Weryl from his exercises with the trunk.

“No exact timepieces,” observed Nylan, struggling toward the door, then waiting for the other two.

“It’s hard to make anything exact in a low-tech culture.”

As Ayrlyn opened the heavy door, Sylenia rushed down the stones of the corridor toward them. On her back was a thin pack, but she also wore new grays, trimmed with purple, unlike those of Ayrlyn and Nylan.

“Oh, sers, let me take Weryl.”

“Be my guest,” said Ayrlyn.

“You look so handsome this morning,” the nursemaid cooed at the boy. “One day all the girls will think so.”

“Not too soon,” said Nylan.

“You don’t want to stop lugging him around?” asked Ayrlyn as they started down the steps to the courtyard door.

“That would be nice, but I’ve noticed that the older children get, the more problems they have.”

“Since you’ve never had children before, that has to come from your own upbringing.” The flame-haired angel shook her head. “I pity your poor parents.”

Horses and their riders milled around in the shadows of the courtyard as the three adults and Weryl made their way toward the stables. Nylan dodged a fresh horse dropping, slipped slightly on the damp paving stones, and jarred Ayrlyn’s arm. “Sorry.”

“Walking is hazardous to your health here,” she said wryly.

“Just about everything is.”

Merthek was waiting just inside the stable door, with the four horses lined up. “I have your mounts saddled, sers, but I didn’t know about the seat.” His head went to the leather-covered framework by his feet.

Nylan shifted the bags in his arms. “I’ll attach it to my saddle, but it works better after the saddlebags are in place-one set anyway. The others will go on the gray.” Nylan had drilled holes in all three saddles-his, Ayrlyn’s, and Sylenia’s-so that Weryl’s seat could be moved from one mount to the other, as necessary. Weryl faced backward, seeing where they had been.

After setting Weryl in the seat, and fastening him in place with the wide leather strap, Nylan stepped back and asked Ayrlyn, “How does he look?”

“Happier than when he was in the carrypak.”

“I think I’ll be happier, too.”

“You mean you don’t want to fight off bandits with your son strapped to your chest?”

Sylenia, wearing her new long-sleeved gray shirt, glanced from Nylan to Ayrlyn, and then to the array of armsmen mounted in the open space of the courtyard to the north of Huruc.

Nylan swung into his saddle, then checked the shoulder harness, before looking to Ayrlyn and Sylenia. As he did, the purple-cloaked Huruc rode slowly across the damp stones of the courtyard.

“Are you ready, angels?” asked the burly armsman.

“We’re ready,” answered Nylan.

Huruc guided his mount across the paving stones, each step clicking and echoing from the keep walls. “If you do not mind, we should ride at the head of the column.”

Nylan flicked the dark brown mare’s reins, urging her after Huruc. Ayrlyn eased the chestnut beside Nylan, and Sylenia, seated easily in her saddle, followed.

“…get that nag moving, Nuorr!”

“…in line…know where you belong! Keep it that way.”

Nylan looked back over his shoulder at the still-shadowed walls, whitish-pink and splotched with irregular patches of moisture from the night’s rain. Neither Gethen nor Zeldyan had appeared.

Again, Nylan noted, there were four guards in gray and purple at the gate to the keep. While the four stood stiffly as the column moved past, none looked up. Slowly, slowly, the column clopped out the open gate and turned southward, away from the river, back along the road that had brought Nylan and Ayrlyn to Lornth, less than a handful of eight-days earlier.