Duncan, Dave - Tales of King's Blades 3 - Sky of Swords

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SKY OF SWORDS

A Tale of the King's Blades

Dave Duncan

Volume IV of Four Volumes

Pages i-ii and 605-796

Published by:

EOS

10 East 53rd Street

New York, New York

Further reproduction or distribution in

other than a specialized format

is prohibited.

Produced in braille

for the Library of Congress,

National Library Service for the Blind

and Physically Handicapped,

by Braille International, Inc., 2002.

by Dave Duncan

SKY OF SWORDS

It is not true that calamities come only in

threes. They often come in sixes or nines.

ANON.

After that, the day could get no worse, but it

certainly did not improve, at least not until

close to midnight, when Malinda was able to cuddle

into Dog's embrace and weep all over his

fuzzy chest. The wonder was probably that her

Council had not just resigned en masse and left

her to her fate. Why appoint a Council and then

make crazy decisions like that without consulting it?

"So why did you?" Dog growled.

The Queen sniffled in very unregal fashion.

"I was being kind! Neville had done nothing

wrong. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Dominic

tried to tell me and I shouted at him! I

didn't see that Neville had inherited his father's

claim and would be just as dangerous or even worse,

because he was born in wedlock, which will carry weight

with the snootier nobles. Even if he would have a

baton sinister on his arms, plenty of them do.

He can turn Granville into a martyour."

"He swore allegiance?"

"He can always claim he did it under

duress."

"I'll kill him for you. Where is he?"

"We don't know! I sent him to Constable

Valdor, who says he never showed up--but he

may be lying, playing on both teams. Grand

Inquisitor says the Dark Chamber has a

sniffer spell it could use to track him if we

had a suitable key--meaning something closely

identified with him, that he'd owned for a long time.

Which we don't. He's almost certainly far away

by now. ... Oh, Dog, I feel such a

fool!"

Her father would never have made that mistake.

Ambrose would have let Neville molder in a

dungeon for years, just in case. If she ever

did get to sleep tonight she was going to have nightmares

of her own head on a spike alongside

Granville's.

Nobody had been so disrespectful as to call

the Queen an idiot, but the Duke and Chancellor

together then took over the proceedings and

abandoned any pretense of being mere advisors.

They arranged everyone in chairs around the table and

kept the meeting going until sundown.

The Council agreed that nothing could be done about

Neville unless and until he showed up, and

nothing should be done about the holdout garrisons at

present. The Council summoned Parliament for the

fifth day of Tenthmoon. The Council decided

it needed more members and discussed names; Malinda

humbly agreed to appoint the half dozen

selected. The Council even found some money,

or Master Kinwinkle did, when he pointed out that

a tax known as "relief" must be paid whenever a

vassal of the crown died. The Treasury and the

College of Heralds, he said, had been working

all summer, calculating the relief due for the

nobles who had died in the Wetshore Massacre,

and most of it had not yet been collected. With

ill grace, the Dowager Duchess confirmed that the

De Mayes relief was still owing; Baron

Dechaise was ordered to raise ready cash

by mortgaging these prospects.

The Council even had the audacity to start

discussing possible royal husbands. Then

Malinda slammed her fist on the table and shouted

that when she wanted advice on that matter she would

ask for it. The Chancellor frowned at her as if

she were still only nine years old and changed the

subject, but the implication remained that the sooner

they found a man to take the stupid girl in hand the

better.

"So what can you do?" Dog growled.

"Just this." She kissed him. He needed no more

encouragement than that, having managed to lie still in

uneventful embrace while she recounted her

woes. The resulting frenzy drove her

worries away, for a while.

They returned later, when she had her breath

back. "It isn't fair. A man makes

mistakes and he needs experience. A woman

makes them and she needs a husband!"

"You've got a man already." The turmoil had

left them turned over so that Dog's head lay

on her breast.

"And a wonderful one, the only man in the

kingdom who isn't seeking preferment." The

Council meeting had been followed by a long

audience and even longer dinner, honoring the

nobility flocking to court to pay its

respects to the new Queen. "They all want

appointments or settlements or their daughters

made maids of honor or grants of this or that.

You don't expect me to dress you up in

jewels and make you a marquis ... do you?" The

thought of the Council's reaction made her mind

boggle.

Dog just snorted.

"You never ask me for anything," she whispered.

"What do you want?"

He took a while to answer. "To be your man

always. To have you as my woman." He nuzzled her

breast.

She stroked the massive muscles of his arm.

"All the Guard knows you're my lover, so I

don't suppose it will stay a secret much

longer."

"What the Guard knows Ironhall knows.

Heard you're going there to harvest more Blades."

"That's a state secret. Nobody's

supposed to know that, except Audley and

Dominic and Chancellor Burningstar."

"Probably just someone's lucky guess, then.

Makes sense. I heard Grand Master has a

dozen ripe ones for you to pick."

"So did I," she said, annoyed. "Why can't

men keep secrets? I expect you're the

subject of political classes. You

suppose they're holding you up to the juniors as

Royal Gigolo, an example of rewards

available to the diligent student. You want that?"

"No."

He moved his tongue and lips to her other

breast, making it even harder to concentrate on other

matters. They were experienced lovers now, knowing every

pore of each other's bodies, every secret whim,

every unspoken thought--and also every evasion.

"You haven't told me what else you want.

Crave a boon, Trusty and Well-Beloved

Subject. Anything."

"Send me back to Sixthmoon of 350

to tell my pa not to kill my ma by making me."

She shivered and stroked his hair. There was no

arguing with him on this. No such enchantment existed

or could exist, she was certain, for it would create

an impossible paradox. He wanted to cancel out

his own existence, but if he did not exist he could

not do that, so he would exist after all and could do it, and

so on, round and round forever. Conjuration could do many

things, but that was not one of them.

"Then you will never meet me and become my

man."

He did not answer. He could not accept that his

desires were contradictory, let alone

impossible. Crushed by guilt for deeds that were not his

fault, Dog was not always entirely rational.

"Listen, love," she said. "As queen, I can

give you a letter to Grand Wizard ordering him to find

you the spell you want or make it up. If he

says it's impossible, will you believe him?"

Dog stopped his foreplay. "I won't understand

his talk. Can I take Winter with me?"

"Yes, love, you can take Winter with you."

They lay in close and sticky silence for a

while, then she said, "Aren't you going to finish what

you were doing?"

"You go ahead," Dog said. "I'll catch

up."

On the twelfth day of her reign, Queen

Malinda rode off to Ironhall, escorted by the

entire Royal Guard. Her purpose was not

only to raise the strength of the Guard by adding a

dozen recruits; she had also summoned a

general assembly of the Order. She left

by moonlight and did not travel the most direct

road--precautions her father had taken during the

Monster War, and which seemed only sensible now,

when a dozen garrisons scattered around the coasts

had either declared for King Neville or refused

to declare allegiance at all.

Circumstances had changed since her first

visit to Starkmoor. The presumptuous

princess had become queen, overturning a

revolution while losing only a single Blade.

The entire school was assembled at the main door

to cheer her arrival, and Grand Master had become

a model of cooperation. Hammered by the Old

Blades and forged in the fires of necessity, he

declared, a dozen sharp and shining youngsters were ready

to serve Her Majesty; indeed he would now

venture beyond his written reports and release

fourteen. Starting with Prime and Second, they were

summoned in groups and asked in turn if they were

willing to serve. Each declared his readiness and

knelt to kiss the royal hand. With a couple of

exceptions, they all looked absurdly young, but

of course she did not say that; she reminded them

instead that they were special, because they were the first to be

bound by a reigning queen in almost a

hundred years. She did not mention that they might

be the last Blades ever bound, if Parliament

proved as antagonistic as she expected.

The following day she had no trouble finding food

for thought during the hours of meditation that must precede

a binding. On her first visit she had spoken with the

candidates out of boredom, this time she did so

to take her mind off her troubles. Hunter and

Crenshaw she recognized, but there were another

dozen names to memorize: Lindore with the smile,

Vere the tall one, Mathew the freckled one,

Loring the gorgeous, Terrible the fidget ...

all eager, all scared. They all had their

sword names ready: Avenger, Glitter,

Lady, Gadfly, and so on.

Several times Sir Lothaire, the Master of

Rituals, came around in his fussy,

absentminded fashion. Uncertain how to address

his sovereign when she was sitting on the floor

leaning back against the side of a raised hearth, he

tried to bow while kneeling, which was not a success.

And once, after a fatuous query about her

preference in wine for the banquet, he said brightly,

"Sir Dog is performing satisfactorily?"

Anything the Guard knew, Ironhall knew.

Malinda turned to him in shock. Did he not

realize she could have his head for that remark? His

eyes were hidden by the reflection of firelight on

his glasses, but the inane grin on his mouth seemed

innocent enough. Giving him the benefit of the doubt,

she decided that the school bookworm was unaware

of the gossip. The onlookers were not--fourteen young

faces around the octogram struggling very hard not

to leer. Her cheeks were probably as red as the

coals in the grates.

"Of course. He wields a mighty

sword," she said.

Vere and Terrible developed coughing fits,

confirming her suspicions.

Lothaire was still not flying with the flock. "Ah.

I am pleased to hear that. It is wonderful how the

binding solves problems, sometimes." There must have

been some other purpose behind his question. Here it came

--"I was just talking with Sir Jongleur ...

old classmates ... both here and later at the

College. He mentioned that Sir Dog came

to see him, posing a problem in conjuration.

Apparently--"

"Sir Jongleur is here?" She had given

Dog the letter to Grand Wizard, but he had

not taken Winter with him when he went to the

College--probably because he still could not bring

himself to reveal his secret past to a friend. Grand

Wizard had referred the question to another conjurer.

Dog had refused to say much about their discussion,

meaning he had not understood a word of it.

"He's come for the assembly. Lots of

knights--"

"Go and fetch him," the Queen said. "Now!"

As Lothaire scrambled to his feet and

scurried away, she glanced around the circle.

Twenty-eight eyes avoided hers. She was almost

as angry at herself for being embarrassed as she was

with the conjurers for discussing Dog's private

problems. She rose in silence and headed for the

stair.

The door led out to a grassy space between the

gym and the perimeter wall at the northeast corner

of the complex, not overlooked by anyone. She was standing

there, studying cloud shadows on the sunlit tors,

when Lothaire came hurrying back with another

sword-bearing knight. He was in his forties, with a

belly and jowls, which were unusual on any member

of the Order. His beard was streaked with gray and

hung halfway down his chest, but he bowed

nimbly enough. Lothaire fidgeted, uncertain

whether to go or stay.

Malinda ignored him, concentrating on the

conjurer. "Last week we sent Sir Dog

to see Grand Wizard. He told us later that he

had been sent to you."

Jongleur chuckled lightly. "Blades in the

raw unnerve the old gaffer, so he always refers

them to me. Sir Dog is a deeply troubled young

man, as I am sure Her Majesty is

aware."

Her Majesty was mainly aware of hunger and

worries and shortness of temper. "Then why do you

breach professional ethics by discussing his case with

an outsider?"

His eyes narrowed. "I am sure Sir

Lothaire will be discreet."

"Why should he be, when you are not?

Furthermore, the letter Dog brought bore our

seal. That made it crown business. You have

violated your oath of allegiance."

He fell on his knees and bowed his head. He

said nothing, which was his wisest option. Malinda

looked at Master of Rituals, who promptly

dropped beside his friend. She let them shiver

for a moment before she spoke.

"Taking the inquiry on that basis, what

answer did you give our messenger?"

"What he wanted would not have worked, Your

Grace," Jongleur told her shoes. "It would

violate the laws of conjury." He was almost as

pompous as the Duke of Brinton.

"What laws of conjury?"

"Well, to start with, Damiano's Axiom and the

Prohibitions of Veriano, my lady."

"I am aware of Damiano's Axiom:

"Action prescribed without available resolution

will dissipate the assemblage." Alberino

Veriano's Prohibitions are merely a list of

things that he considered conjuration could not achieve, many

of which have been accomplished since his day. Be more

specific." Malinda had put her mother's

library to use during the summer, seeking either a

solution to Dog's problem or proof that it had

none. She had found neither.

The men looked up in surprise. Sunlight

flashed on Master of Ritual's spectacles;

Jongleur tugged nervously at his beard.

"Your Majesty shames me. ... The

principle of superposition."

"Continue."

He gulped, worried now. "To assemble

elementals and command them to perform an

impossibility is extremely dangerous,

leading to uncontrolled release of spiritual power.

It is impossible for one thing to be in two

places at once, which rules out traveling in time

--even conjury will not let you go back and strangle

yourself. Nor can you exist when you do not exist, that being

another forbidden outcome. Sir Dog's desire

to visit his childhood cannot be satisfied by any

means known to modern spiritualism."

"And did you explain that to him in words he could

understand, or did you amuse yourself by confusing him with

technical jargon and overblown vocabulary?"

Jongleur hung his head. "I did not understand

that he was acting on Your Majesty's behalf."

"Well you do now. You will go and find him at

once and explain the problem in detail, until

he is completely satisfied. Do you understand?

Furthermore, since my request was directed

to Grand Wizard, I shall expect a written

reply from him to be delivered to my secretary,

Master Kinwinkle, before I return

to Grandon. Otherwise you may see the

inside of the Bastion." She turned her glare on

Lothaire. "And you, Master, will remember that

Sir Dog's past is none of your business.

Nor his future, either."

She stalked back into the Forge, leaving them on

their knees. The whispering there stopped abruptly

when she entered.

Now she had something else to worry about. She

should not have lost her temper! Dog was her weak

point. Enemies could strike at her through him.

She did not have time to work up a good fret over this,

though, before Audley came trotting down the steps

and presented her with a dispatch just in from Chancellor

Burningstar.

The ports of Horselea and Tharburgh had

declared for Fitzambrose. Neville himself had

been reported in Pompifarth, claiming royal

honors and issuing a summons for Parliament

to meet there, instead of in Grandon.

Members of Your Grace's Council, the

letter concluded, respectfully recommend that

Your Grace consider declaring Pompifarth to be in

a state of insurrection and in breach of the Queen's

Peace; and that Your Grace may wish to charge the

Black Riders with freeing its loyal

inhabitants from the traitors who have deflected

them from their true allegiance and to bring all

contumacious subjects under the royal mercy; but

the Council will of course loyally wait upon Your

Grace's instructions. The Council, in

short, was not going to start a civil war without the

Queen's command but was protecting itself in case things

got worse before she returned.

The Queen was in no mood to start a war,

civil or uncivil, but as she rammed swords

through fourteen young hearts that night, she found herself

wishing that one of them belonged to Neville

Fitzambrose. That one, she would cheerfully chop

in slices.

She still had to preside over the general

assembly before she could leave Ironhall and

race back to the capital. Knights and some

private Blades had been flocking in ever

since she arrived; and on the morning after the binding

the Loyal and Ancient Order of the Queen's

Blades assembled for the first time since 361, when

Sir Saxon had been elected Grand Master.

Master of Archives, that professional

pedant, muttered that there was no record of a

general meeting of the Queen's Blades, not ever.

Now there was, for the Head of the Order, seated below

the broken sword of Durendal, was Queen

Malinda the First, bejeweled and wearing a crown.

More than six hundred men had gathered in the

hall. The entire Royal Guard was present,

still in the old blue liveries, alas, because the

Queen could not afford to outfit them with new.

Snake and his Old Blades were there in force, as

were knights so ancient that they could remember

Ambrose II and would insist on doing so if

given the slightest encouragement. Every private

Blade in the land had begged and bullied his ward

to attend, and many had consented. These non-Blades

were shunted off to a safe, quiet corner to dispose

of a butt of fine wine from the royal cellar, but

no other strangers were present.

The ceremony was brief and matter-of-fact,

yet many an eye blinked tears. Grand Master

read out a blood-chilling list of additions to the

Litany, including a "Sir Wolfbiter,

slain in a far country" and ending with Sir Abel.

But the main business of the meeting concerned the three

Blades who had been crippled at Wetshore:

Sir Bellamy had lost a leg, Sir

Glanvil the use of an arm, and Sir Dorret

had been both blinded and horribly mutilated

by a kick from a horse. For half a year they had

lived in torment, driven by their bindings to defend

their ward and balked by physical inability.

The conjuration to release them could hardly have been

simpler, yet only the sovereign could perform it,

and Amby had not been capable. Each in turn

knelt before the Queen with bared shoulders, and she

dubbed him knight, touching his flesh with the sword that

had bound him. Right after that, as Snake cheerfully

remarked, they could go off and get roaring drunk for the

first time in their lives.

Commander Audley floated in bliss, ever at

the Queen's side, being Leader before the entire

Order, the youngest ever recorded. No other man

had ever gone from Prime to Leader in just half a

year, either. Much drollery was being lobbed around just

behind his ears, on the lines of

"do-you-suppose-his-fencing-will-improve-when-his

comballs-drop," but he could pretend not to hear that.

He was not allowed to hear the praise, of which there was

considerably more; the Guard had developed an

affectionate respect for its mascot

commander. He had made no mistakes, and that was a

talent swordsmen valued highly.

Malinda, for her part, could breathe more easily.

As long as she had the power to release Blades,

she was sovereign. They recognized her, their

bindings recognized her, and no one could deny her.

That situation might change very rapidly, though,

and her intention was to leave as soon as possible.

If she went by midday she could reach Bondhill

by sunset and be home before noon tomorrow. She would

find more trouble waiting there, she had no doubt. So

she fretted through the ceremonial meal--which was

barely appetizing, because Ironhall was neither

staffed nor equipped to create banquets--and through

some very windy speeches after it. She cut her own

remarks to a barely decent brevity and departed,

knowing the knights would now indulge in a memorable

orgy of drinking at her expense. Companions were

kept sober by their bindings.

Even in Ironhall she went nowhere without an

escort, and she was dogged upstairs by fourteen young

men who could hardly endure to let her out of their

sight. She went straight to the royal chamber, a

solitary oasis of luxury in Ironhall's

stony austerity, furnished with her father's taste for

overstuffed, overcrowded mishmash. There she found

Dian laying out her riding clothes, but she also

found Winter.

"What are you two getting up to?" she said

cheerfully, then saw that he had more on his mind than

Dian. She dropped the smile. "Spit it out!

And I don't mean your thumbnail."

"Your Grace ... I've been talking

to knights." Winter was rarely so hesitant.

Either he had not finished solving his problem or he

could not convince himself of the answer he had found.

"There are knights from all over Chivial here."

"And?"

"There's something strange going on just west of

here." He pulled his hat off and scratched his

hair. "At Lomouth, Waterby, Ashter ...

all around Westerth, southern Nythia ...

Mayshire."

She waited, knowing that interruptions would only

slow him down. Hunter and Vere were quietly

inspecting the room for hidden assassins, while the

rest of the fourteen had packed up in the doorway

and corridor behind her, reluctant to push past

their sovereign.

"Lots of knights," Winter

mumbled. "Sir Florian from Waterby mentioned

it first, then Sir Warren, who's running a

private fencing school near Buran. ...

They're good men, my lady! So then I started

asking, and hunting out others to ask, and I got

eight or nine certains and a couple of

probablies. ..."

"Tell her!" Dian snapped.

"Please do," Malinda said.

"Hiring swordsmen, Your Grace! And

men-at-arms. And even farmhands. Strong arms and

weak heads, if you know the expression. Several

hundred, at least. I think someone's building a

private army out in the west, here, Your

Grace." He stared nervously at Malinda, like

a child expecting a scolding.

She was training herself to take time to think. So she

took time to think. Her first conclusions remained

unchanged. In troubled times, men of property

naturally wanted protectors, no matter what

the law said about private armies. Half a

dozen bullyboys to guard a mill or dockyard

were of no account. A thousand or two with weapons and

veterans to train them would be something else

entirely. But who could find the money to do that? She

couldn't!

"Is it only hereabouts? Have you asked?"

Winter nodded vigorously. "There's some of it

going on all over, yes. Fitzambrose is

openly hiring in the north. Farmers everywhere are

screaming about a shortage of hands to bring in the

harvest. But, it does seem a lot just west of

here, Your Grace."

What else was bothering him? "Any idea

who's behind it?"

"Mayshire seems to be the center, Your

Grace." Winter drew a deep breath.

"Several people mentioned your cousin, Prince

Courtney." He waited anxiously to see how

Her Majesty liked hearing her heir being accused

of treason.

Until death do us part.

CHIVIAN MARRIAGE CONTRACT

The members of the Council rose when their

sovereign entered--three women and sixteen men

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SKYOFSWORDSATaleoftheKing'sBladesbyDaveDuncanVolumeIVofFourVolumesPagesi-iiand605-796Publishedby:EOS10East53rdStreetNewYork,NewYorkFurtherreproductionordistributioninotherthanaspecializedformatisprohibited.ProducedinbraillefortheLibraryofCongress,NationalLibraryServicefortheBlindandPhysicallyHandica...

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