Kronmir bowed. “I can reach him before the last light if I ride now.”
“Tell Ser Daniel I am behind you. We will not halt or camp if we can reach the old imperial road before dark.” She looked at Giselle, who nodded.
“We can,” she said.
Ser Alison nodded. “Then tell him to cover the crossroads …” She looked at Kronmir’s wax map and then snapped her fingers and her squire unrolled a chart on parchment. “San Bastide is the third town on the pilgrim itinerary,” she said, looking at a scroll. “Between Fortalice and Mitla.”
“That’s San Bastide,” the duchess said. She reached over Ser Alison’s shoulder and pointed with her dagger. “Where the Via Etrusca turns to come here. And the Berona road crosses the river.”
The two women smiled at each other.
“Perfect,” they said in unison.
Ser Alison turned to Kronmir. “Ride back to Daniel and tell him the battlefield is at San Bastide. You know it?”
“No,” Kronmir said. “But I will, and I see where it must be.”
Giselle glanced at him.
“Where we crossed the river, and took our doses,” she said. “You’ll know it.”
Kronmir nodded.
Giselle vouchsafed a smile. “Where’s your friend?”
Kronmir actually had to think. “Ah,” he said with a bow. “I would hope he is on his way to us by now. He was paying a visit to … Mitla.”
The duchess laughed. “Of course he was. Well, that would simplify matters, would it not? You know that the Duke of Mitla has a brother …”
“Who hates him …” Kronmir said.
Giselle laughed. “Perfect,” she said. “He was really a fine neighbour until last year. Now he rapes choir boys and burns people for entertainment.”
“So I understand,” Kronmir said.
Sauce watched the two of them with ill-concealed impatience. “Are you two done?” she said. “You taking my orders forward, or not?”
“I am,” Kronmir said.
“You have it all?” Ser Alison asked. She really didn’t like him, he could tell. Many employers did not.
“San Batiste is the battlefield. Move forward, no contact.” He nodded.
“I didn’t say no contact,” she snapped. “But you are right; I want surprise. He’s got to cross the river?”
“Yes,” Giselle said.
“It really is perfect. Let’s get him. Just before dark tomorrow.” She snapped her fingers to avert ill-luck. “Dammmmn this is fun.”
Kronmir bowed and went for his horse. He defied himself and glanced at the duchess, but Giselle was talking to the captain of the marines.
He changed horses, left his second riding horse in the hands of Ser Milus’s squire, and rode off with his best horse on a lead.
His horse was fresh, and he felt well enough. It was curiously relaxing to have no responsibility beyond that of courier; he had time to think. He thought about how much Ser Alison disliked him, and he had to assume it was her extreme loyalty to the emperor, whom he had, it was true, attempted to kill on several occasions.
He hadn’t thought about Brown in a week; now he was seized with worry. Brown was as close to a friend as he counted; Kronmir had sent him to Mitla without a qualm.
Examining Giselle, he had to assume that, now that she no longer needed him, his friendship was inconvenient. The thought depressed him, but there it was. Or perhaps her new friendship with Ser Alison precluded him. He knew the duchess’s tastes; he didn’t imagine, as some men did, that he’d change them.
He avoided examining himself. It was as if the knight’s belt had unleashed a torrent of emotions, each more irrational than the last.
And why am I not standing at the side of the empress? he wondered. She needs my guidance, and she likes me. Why did I choose to go with Ser Alison?
And then he thought, Of course, she must resent me; she must see me as the emperor’s eye on her.
Of course.
He sighed.
He spent a good deal of the ride examining the problem of the secret rivals as he called it in the code inside his own head. He had access to details and nuances that he merely summarized for the emperor.
There was a fairly reliable report, for example, that people who touched the Patriarch were burned, and that the robes he wore were woven almost entirely from metallic wire and some Ifriquy’an substance that would not burn. There were tidbits; he’d read a dozen reports on the Ifriquy’an fabric, trying to find a commonality.
The commonality had been reported four days ago, when Brown reported that the Duke of Mitla burned people he touched, and wore clothes woven for him in Ifriquy’a, and had done so for over a year.
And Kronmir had begun to piece together a theory about the Odine that held water, but for which there was little evidence. That the Necromancer was the “Rebel Odine.”
Old rebels. Rebels from the last opening of the gates, when the dragons were triumphant. The rebel Odine must have been allies of the dragons. The will was imprisoned; might still be imprisoned, capable of acting only through intermediaries. Until it was released. Thus, it would have only allies, not not-dead. Perhaps the Patriarch and the Duke of Mitla.
Kronmir tasted his theory, testing it the way a man might suck at a bad tooth. He was almost certain that he had detected a real flaw in the way that Odine matured; that as they took other creatures into their thoughts, the thoughts themselves matured. Perhaps the Odine functioned like democracies, and in time, the will ceased to be a unified entity and began to divide and divide again …
Perhaps not.
How many of them will appear on the day the gates open, Kronmir wondered.
The sun was no longer visible and he had pulled his hood out of his pack when he found the ruined temple. There were two Venike rangers there; they passed him forward to a long ridge overlooking the Mitla road, where he found a hand of the green banda eating a hasty supper.
They sent him south; one offered to guide him, and he declined. He crossed two ridges as darkness fell, and he cursed when his horse almost fell in a deep hole. He was tired, both of his mounts were done, and the woods and hills of northern Etrusca were vast.
The moon rose, and Kronmir dismounted, had a mouthful of wine, and listened. It didn’t help. He rode south again, and tried angling east.
The moonlight increased. He was about five leagues east of the ruined temple; he knew the imperial road was in the shadowed valley at his feet. He just couldn’t find the green banda. He felt foolish for declining a guide.
There was nothing else for it. He would have to ride all the way back to the post, and ask for a guide. The message had to be delivered.
He considered riding openly along the road. On the face of it, it appeared reckless, but he had to assume that Favour would scoop up any courier or rider on the road, and his main fear was being shot down in the moonlight instead of taken.
But this part of his night, at least, went well. Before midnight, two green-clad men appeared out of the darkness; Wha’hae recognized him.
“How in fuck are you comin’ fra’ the south?” the man asked.
“I don’t know myself,” Kronmir admitted.
But five minutes later, by lantern light and a small mage light, Kronmir was showing Favour where San Batiste was.
“The boys and girls will be tired,” Favour said. “She’ll want to make camp right here; on this ridge, or behind it.” He nodded, his face monstrous in the lantern light. “Want to scout the battlefield or set the camp?” he asked Kronmir.
Kronmir had been tired, but the younger man’s enthusiasm was infectious. “Battlefield, if you don’t mind.”
“Off you go. Take this lot; Wha’hae may smell like a farmyard, but he’s a good scout.”
Kronmir found himself in command of a dozen scouts without a scrap of uniform among them. In fact, except for some weapons, every one of them might pass for a pilgrim or a minor merchant. They all spoke Etruscan except Wha’hae, who
barely spoke at all.
They grumbled, but they mounted, and they rode down the last ridge, well strung out, and then they were in a river valley, which Kronmir knew more by sound than by sight. It was very dark; the moon was too new to provide much beyond a pale and confusing glow. Off to the north there was another long ridge; to the south stretched the beginning of the richest agricultural plain in the old world.
The comet was clear in the sky above, burning white, a pointing finger that seemed aimed at the bridge. As the comet rose off the horizon, it provided more light than the moon.
“We’ll want people on that ridge,” Kronmir said. “In case …”
Wha’hae grinned in the comet light. “In case it all goes to shite?” he asked softly. “Aye. The ridge; Enri, you take Cranmer and Cromwell and More; ride the ridge end to end, flash me, and then get some sleep.”
The four men grunted and rode off.
“I want to see the bridge,” Kronmir said. “I’m going to guess there’s a ford.”
Indeed the river, whose name he didn’t even know, wandered along the flat valley bottom and seemed shallow in the moonlight. But from the height of the high-arched imperial bridge, it looked considerably wider.
Kronmir was looking south, at the plains, which shone in the comet light, because they were covered in golden wheat or the stubble thereof.
He and Wha’hae rode west, looking at the river, and found a broad cattle track that led into the black water.
“How’d you come to being a scout?” Kronmir asked.
“Better than stealing coos,” Wha’hae said. He shrugged. “Looks deep.”
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” Kronmir said and rode his borrowed horse into the water. It came up chest high to the horse, just to the tops of Kronmir’s boots; the bed was sand and gravel under his horse’s hooves. Downstream, toward Genua, there was more gravel; a long gravel island gleamed in the dying light.
Dying. Because clouds were coming in. First long streamers of cloud, and then suddenly the moon was gone, and most of the stars; the big bear lingered, the eye burning through the thin cloud for a long minute before vanishing. But when his horse was clear of the water, the whole sky was obscured, and it was darker.
Off to the north, a flicker of flame winked on the ridge, surprisingly high up.
“Now put it out, you fools,” grumbled Wha’hae, but the fire lasted only for as long as a pious woman would say an “Ave” and it was gone.
“Rain,” Kronmir said. He pulled out his riding hood again and buttoned it with the hood down. He put his hat back on. “It looks to me as if the whole river is fordable from here west.”
“We can’t guess that,” Wha’hae said.
Kronmir liked the man’s intensity. And his professionalism. “Aye,” he said, unconsciously imitating the Hillman’s delivery.
So they rode west again. Sure enough, the river broadened in sandy soil. Big rocks stuck up out of the black water, but it was shallow; a quarter of a league west of the cattle ford, they crossed to the south bank without the water passing their fetlocks.
“Why is there a cattle ford at all?” Kronmir asked.
Wha’hae grunted and his horse let go a long fart.
“You hungry?” Wha’hae asked. “How’d ye come to be a killer, then?”
Kronmir met his eye. “I did it often enough, and it became a habit,” he said.
Kronmir smelled the garlic sausage before it was in his hands, and he wolfed it down.
They rode back along the north bank, and there they had to pick their way across a rocky streambed. Both men had to dismount.
“That’s why the cattle ford is where it is,” Wha’hae said. “No drover wants the like o’ yon. Bad on the coos.”
“Just so,” Kronmir agreed. He ate the rest of his sausage.
“Let’s go look at the Patriarch’s camp,” Kronmir said.
“Fuck, I knew you’d say that,” Wha’hae muttered. “You an’ Favour are kin, I reckon?”
They rode east into the night. Wha’hae sent men away; a messenger to Ser Alison, half a hand to move parallel to them in the darkness.
Twice they stopped to get their bearings, but the light of the comet and the moon served to guide them, and before the moon set, they could see watch fires and campfires.
“Fewkin’ long way to march to get to San Batiste,” Wha’hae said. “We may not fight at all tomorrow.” Then he looked back at the wooded ridge on which the fire had long since been extinguished. “And not so far, neither,” he admitted.
Kronmir was trying to get an idea of the terrain in the darkness when he saw a movement off to the south.
“Run,” he said.
Wha’hae’s head snapped around, and he, too, saw the glint of comet light on armour.
He gave an owl cry, and he was away, galloping furiously on his small horse into the darkness. His two men turned with him, and Kronmir turned his horse and realized, his heart sinking, that they were on fresh horses and he was not.
His horse was done; had come eight leagues or more without rest.
Kronmir went for the woods to the north.
He looked back, and saw that all of the enemy light horse were following him. He was glad for Wha’hae, but very sorry for himself.
An amateur’s error. I am a fool, and I will die very hard.
He sighed.
He rode on, but already his poor mare was flagging, and he wished he was on the horse Giselle had given him. Gilchrist’s spare horse was a third-class nag with no heart, and Kronmir knew he was doomed.
He considered suicide.
It wasn’t in him. It was too bad, really; what would follow when they caught him would be horrible. Unless he could hide his identity, which was possible, but his sword was fine and he had his knight’s belt on his hips. He undid the latch on the buckle and dropped it in the brush through which his tired horse was cantering heavily.
He began to rid himself of everything he could think of, but they were closing in on him, only a few dozen yards away, and the brilliant moonlight and comet light were too much; he saw a rider pull up when he dropped his purse, and he cursed.
He saw another way.
He wheeled his horse to face them.
She fell.
Kronmir kicked his feet out of the stirrups and got clear. It wasn’t his finest dismount, but he was on his feet in seconds, and the first of his pursuers died when he turned to ride Kronmir down and got Kronmir’s sword through his groin and out his back. Kronmir got the reins of the dead man’s horse and swung into the blood-soaked saddle, took a blow on his back that was turned by the maille under his hood, and he was off, riding west now.
Men came up on either side.
It had been worth a try.
Kronmir turned and cut at the closest, but the man on his right raised a latchet, a small, self-cocking crossbow, and shot his horse. The bolt went into Kronmir’s horse’s rump; Kronmir’s sword deceived his left-hand opponent and cut straight into his skull above his nose, and for the second time in two minutes, Kronmir was leaping from a foundering horse.
His knee struck a rock in the darkness.
In that moment of pain, he knew he was done.
But he couldn’t stop trying, even though his left leg was useless, the pain awful. He fell. He drew his dagger; considered suicide again. Thought of the little ballestrina and the poison, which were, thanks to God, back in his bags at Arles.
He thought of Giselle.
He used the same rock that had apparently shattered his knee to get a purchase, and he rose unsteadily on a rising tide of pain. A rider came out of the darkness. He was moving slowly; he knew Kronmir was down.
Kronmir put his rondel dagger into the man’s horse. It was a stupid thing to do, but the man was not in the right position for Kronmir to kill him and something in his head wasn’t working well. The horse kicked him.
And died.
He assumed his pelvis was broken by the kick, but he crawled to the
rider and put his dagger in the man’s neck.
If I kill enough of them, they will not take me prisoner, he thought.
Or perhaps it was just self-rage at all the mistakes he’d made.
He lay in the dark, wet ground, listening to them search. The pain came in waves. He had thoughts, and once, he put the tip of his own rondel dagger to his own throat.
But it was his way to struggle, and never surrender.
Which was another stupid mistake, of course.
They got him in a wave of pain. One kicked him in the head, and another stood on his dagger hand.
Captured.
Between Arles and San Batiste—Ser Jules Kronmir
Kronmir awoke to find himself in a fine room, a timbered hall with tapestries, not that he had any eye for them. He was lying on a table, about waist high, and his hands were chained over his head. The pain was immense, and his left leg simply would not move.
A man came into his line of sight, blocking out tapestries of unicorns.
“The blessings of all the saints on you,” he said. He had a tonsure, like a monk, but he wore armour. He put his hands on Kronmir’s head and his fingers made the sign of the cross. “What is your name, my son?”
Don’t talk. Say nothing. Once you start, you never stop.
“Is he too badly injured to be questioned?” asked a voice over his shoulder. A sibilant voice. Flat.
The priest jabbed a finger into Kronmir’s shattered pelvis.
Kronmir screamed.
“No,” said the priest. The man giggled nervously.
Amateur, Kronmir thought through the pain.
Kronmir was gone briefly, and then he was awake again. Cold water was being poured on him.
“You know,” the priest said kindly, “nothing will save you. This is all a question of how you die. You are a professional, aren’t you?” he asked kindly.
Say nothing.
Someone he couldn’t see pulled at something that moved his arms and feet. The pain was terrible.
I’m hurt internally. With a little luck, I’ll be dead. Soon.
“You have a wax tablet with some words on it. Can you explain them? Who is Alison? Why no contact? Is that no contact with Alison? Come, sir. You are a knight. Do not die unshriven and go to hell. Tell me what I need to know and I will shrive you, and Carlos here will send you on your way.” The priest was friendly. “Or we can gradually pull you apart.”