“I am not a child!”
“You’re what, twelve years old now?”
“We would never approve,” Mari’s mother said.
“Why not?” Kath pointed a soldier standing nearby, holding the reins of her mount. “She can’t be much older than me! Her parents must have been all right with it!”
Mari looked toward the soldier and recognized her. “Private Bete.”
Bete nodded, then gave a impassive glance at Kath. “My parents died about five years ago at the hands of bandits, when I was a year younger than you. They were trying to get to Trefik in hopes of finding a healer for my two little brothers, who had the fever that went through that year. My brothers died of the fever not long after the bodies of my parents were found. I joined Lady Mari’s army to put an end to the bandits, and the warlords, and to defeat the Great Guilds that out of greed and uncaring left Tiae to suffer.”
“Oh,” Kath said in a small voice. “I’m…sorry.”
Private Bete relaxed enough to smile slightly at Kath. “The daughter has given me a new future, as she will give this world a new future.”
“Mage Alain!” a woman’s voice rang out coldly.
Alain looked that way immediately. Through gaps in the people between, he could see Mage Asha standing near a young man. The two cavalry soldiers accompanying Asha had already drawn their sabers as they confronted the man. “What is he?” Alain called, his own voice nearly as emotionless as Asha’s.
“Not a thief,” Asha replied. “A spy.”
Alain began leading his horse toward the confrontation as the people nearest Asha and the accused spy drew away, leaving his path clear. But before Alain could ask any further questions, he heard Mari’s father talking loudly. “That’s absurd! We know this man! He’s helped us out along the way!”
Alain waited for Mari to deal with her father. He walked up to the young man and studied him.
“Wait, Father, please,” Mari said. A moment later, she was alongside Alain and eyeing the accused spy. “Who are you working for? The Empire?”
The man, looking alarmed in a very innocent way, shook his head.
“Not the Empire,” Asha confirmed. “But something was left unsaid.”
“The Mechanics Guild?” Mari asked.
Another shake of the head.
“He lies. It is the Mechanics Guild,” Asha said.
“I see this as well,” Alain agreed.
“I—I’m not—" the young man began.
Mari shook her head at him. “You can’t fool Mages. Bind his hands,” she directed one of the soldiers. “So, you’ve helped my family on the way down here, huh? Have you been tailing them ever since they left Caer Lyn? Ingratiating yourself with them? Does he have any weapons?” she asked another soldier who was searching the man.
“Just a knife, Lady. Nothing odd about that.”
“What are you doing, Mari?” her father demanded, coming up behind her. “What is that woman doing? Stop that! Stop it now!”
The soldier who was binding the spy’s hands behind him raised one eyebrow toward Mari’s father but did not pause in his task.
Mari looked at her father. “Please do not countermand my orders to my soldiers, or attempt to give them orders yourself. Major,” she added as Consela arrived, pointing to the spy, “ensure that this man stays with us when we resume our march. We’ll have a long talk with him tonight and find out what his orders were.”
“Yes, Lady. We’ll tether him to one of the wagons.”
“Thank you, Mage Asha,” Mari added.
Asha nodded once in reply, her bland expression unchanged. “This Mage will continue her task.” She turned and walked slowly toward a small group of commons who eyed her fearfully.
Alain looked toward the nearest officer, a captain. “Assign more escorts to Mage Asha so they can assure the people here that she is no threat to the innocent.”
“It will be done, Sir Mage.”
Mari’s father had finally found his voice again. “You are arresting a man on the word of a Mage?”
“On the word of one of my Mages,” Mari said, her voice sharpening in that way which Alain knew meant someone was getting perilously close to making her really angry.
Whatever her father might have replied was cut short by Mari’s mother, who said one word. “Marc.” She leaned close to him and spoke in a low voice. No one else could hear what was said, but Alain could read the emotions in her and Mari’s father.
Apparently, one did not have to be a Mage to see those emotions. Alain saw every other person turning away or pretending not to be aware of the drama.
“Fall in!” The shouted command set everyone in motion back toward the road.
Mari, her mouth set in a thin, hard line, beckoned to Alain. “Let’s go.”
“Kath,” he murmured, keeping his voice so low that only Mari could hear it.
She flinched, nodded thanks to him for the reminder, and turned back to look at her little sister. “Did you want to walk and ride with me?”
Kath cast a measuring glance at their mother and father, then shook her head. “I’d better keep an eye on them, Mari,” she said in what Kath probably thought was a whisper but carried to those nearby.
Mari smiled. “You’re a good daughter.” Something about those words, though, erased Mari’s smile almost instantly. She nodded to Alain again and they walked to rejoin the cavalry on the road, everyone else moving along with them.
* * * *
The afternoon was far advanced when the soldiers and refugees reached the village where they intended to stop for the night. A couple of wells and a stream cutting through the village—spanned by a miraculously surviving bridge—offered water for the thirsty horses as well as the soldiers, but everyone knew the only food available would be what they had brought.
In the golden light of the late-afternoon sun, the village glowed with a false vision of health and prosperity when the cavalry column first caught sight of it. As they came down the road, which wound between abandoned farm fields overgrown with saplings and weeds, it became increasingly obvious that the village had barely survived the years of anarchy. Past the outer, forsaken farms, those closer in showed the marks of repeated raids. Closer yet it became easy to see that many of the village’s buildings were abandoned, some having been burned or vandalized. The remaining inhabitants, who had gazed with amazement at Mari’s army as it marched to Minut, welcomed the news of Minut’s recovery with disbelief at first, then a cautious and small celebration.
Mari had any rations that could be spared distributed to the villagers. The old town hall had been looted long ago but remained structurally sound, so she and Alain took over one room in order to deal with any decisions that needed to be made before Mari could relax, a constant stream of officers and people of the town or from the refugees going in and out of the improvised office.
Well after full night had fallen, the moment finally came when the last official visitor had come and gone. Mari stretched and yawned, her shadow on the wall wavering in time to the flickers of the oil lamp providing light. “Is there any wine left, Alain?”
He shook the flask, then shook his head. “I can look for more.”
“Maybe you should.” Mari slumped over the small table that the town had provided for her use. She felt worn out from the long day of riding and walking, capped by all of the work needed to keep this part of her army working right. But nagging guilt told her that she shouldn’t yet rest. “I need to talk to my father. You should be here when I do. Or maybe you shouldn’t. I don’t know.”
Alain took a few moments to respond, carefully considering the matter before replying. “Your father showed many emotions when meeting you. He was…confused in his feelings.”
“Confused? You mean he was unhappy?”
“No. I mean he did not know how he felt. That is the best I can describe it.” Alain paused again. “I believe it would be best if you spoke to him without me present. He would be more likely
to settle on his feelings about you if he did not have feelings about me to distract him.”
Mari felt anger stirring and tried to tamp it down. “He has no right to have negative feelings about you.”
“I am a Mage. I have been seen as inhuman and abhorrent, so this is not an unknown thing for me. The experience was always difficult, though, even when I pretended I did not care. But that was in the past. Now the only feelings about me that matter are yours,” Alain said.
Despite everything, his last statement made her happy. “Are you sure you’ll be all right if I speak to my father alone? You won’t feel left out or excluded?”
Alain gave her a trace of a smile. “I will spend the night beside you, will I not? How could I feel left out?”
“You are too good for me, my Mage.” Mari smiled back. “Please ask one of the guards to invite my father here for a talk. Where will you be?”
“Not far. I will be watching, close by if any more assassins appear.”
Mari tried to relax after Alain had left. That was not easy. The room bore the marks of having been ransacked, and now contained only some chairs and the single small table borrowed from various homes. The remnants of their evening meal—hardtack bread, pork jerky, and the last of the cheese—had been set aside. Outside the one small window the darkness of night was relieved only by a few small lights showing from the still-inhabited homes of the village.
One of the guards sounded a brief knock on the door and looked in. “Marc of Caer Lyn, Lady.”
“Send him in.”
Her father walked into the room, his gaze wandering about. He came to a stop a lance length away from where Mari sat and looked around as if the bare walls held great interest, then finally gazed directly at her. “Do you have to wear that, Mari?”
As conversation starters went, it wasn’t good. Mari looked herself over, knowing that her clothes bore the marks of a long day of travel. “Good evening, Father. Please sit down. Do I have to wear what?”
“That…jacket,” her father said, making no move toward any of the chairs.
“My Mechanics jacket?” Mari composed herself, remembering the many grounds her father had for being angry with the Mechanics Guild. “Yes. It’s not a sign of my former Guild, Father. It’s a mark of what I know. Of what I can do. I’m working to make the jacket a sign of knowledge, not a sign of oppression.” She opened it wide to emphasize her point. “Taking it off wouldn’t prove anything, and would make it harder for other Mechanics to believe that I’m on their side against the Guild.”
Her father stared at her. “Is that a weapon?”
“This?” Mari realized that opening her jacket had exposed the pistol in the shoulder holster under her arm. “Yes. It has saved my life quite a few times.”
“You always carry a Mechanic weapon?”
“Always,” Mari said, refusing to accept any feeling of guilt over that. “I’m a target, Father. There were three attempts to kill me in Minut, and two other assassins in that city who were stopped before they got close enough to make a try. Alain, my husband,” she emphasized, “personally stopped two of the attempts.”
Her father looked away. “Why have you made yourself a target?”
“Why does it sound like you’re blaming me for being a target?” Mari rested her elbows on the table. “The Mechanics Guild decided to kill me because they were worried I might some day challenge the leadership of the Senior Mechanics. Are you saying I shouldn’t have tried my best to be a good leader and look out for everyone else? I didn’t choose for the Mages to see me as the woman of the prophecy. I sure as blazes didn’t want it. But they did, and the moment the Mage Guild learned of it, their elders wanted me dead. I’ve been doing the best I can to stay alive and try to fix a broken world. I think I’ve been doing some good things. Why am I only hearing criticism from the father I haven’t seen in so many years?”
Her father grimaced, running one hand through his hair. “It is…difficult. You were stolen from us when you were so young.”
“I never forgot you, or the things you had already taught me,” Mari said.
“You never contacted us.”
Guilt tied a knot in her stomach. “Mother must have explained that to you. I was lied to, and when I realized it I came to see you.”
He nodded sharply. “Those who took you lied to you. You didn’t have good, honest, firm guidance, a father’s guidance, growing up.”
“I think I turned out pretty well regardless,” Mari said. “I know it must be hard to see me all grown up now, but I am. I have some very serious responsibilities. I could use your help and support.”
“How can you claim to be fighting the Great Guilds when you have Mechanics and Mages lording it over the common folk just as in the rest of the world?” her father demanded.
Mari rubbed one hand on her face in exasperation. “Walk around, listen, see how we do things. These Mages and Mechanics do not act like those you’re used to. I insist on that.”
“Mages are inhuman and cannot change—"
“My husband, your son-in-law, is a Mage, and he is an exceptionally fine man!” Mari insisted. “I am not the only one who believes so! He is honored by our soldiers for his actions.”
“Mages can confuse people. I can’t believe that you would do some of the things—”
“Things? What things?”
“I can’t avoid hearing the stories going around,” her father said.
“Stories?” Mari asked. “You mean the rumors about what happened in Dorcastle and the Northern Ramparts, and at Altis?”
“Wishful gossip about a mythical hero arriving to save the day,” her father said disdainfully.
“It’s too bad you see them that way,” Mari said, leaning back in her chair to try to force herself to relax. “They happen to be substantially true.”
Her father paused before speaking again. “I’m talking about the stories specifically linked to you.”
“The stuff from Dorcastle and the Northern Ramparts is specifically linked to me,” Mari said. “Unfortunately, so is what happened at Altis. What other stories?”
“About your behavior! About what you’re doing!” her father burst out.
“What are you…?” Mari’s voice trailed off as she realized what he must mean. “Are you talking about the trash being bandied about by the Mechanics Guild? About me being crazy and incompetent and sleeping around with anybody who's willing? You believe that?” She didn’t feel the outrage she would have expected, but rather a deep sense of disappointment. “You believe that I’m like that?”
“That’s not the point,” her father said brusquely. “Many other people have heard them, and your…known actions lend them credence.”
“Credence?” Mari breathed in and out deeply to regain her calm before saying more. “What about the stories the Empire is spreading about me, Father? The ones about me being Mara the Undying? Do you think those stories have credence, too? Do you want to check my teeth to see how sharp they are, so you can be sure I’m not the Dark One?” Mari smiled in an exaggerated way, pulling back her lips to show her teeth clearly.
“This isn’t funny, young lady!”
“I am well aware of that, Father! And I am not nearly as young as you appear to continue to believe! Give me something specific, and I will refute it.”
“You want something specific? How could you let that little girl join?” her father demanded. “The one who talked to Kath?”
“Private Bete?” Mari shook her head. “Didn’t you hear her? I let her join, I granted her a waiver, because I thought it would offer her the best chance of both surviving and finding something else to live for besides revenge. She had raised herself since her parents were killed, and had been planning to go out to hunt bandits, Father. How long do you think she would have lasted? And what would she have been like when she reached twenty? If she lived that long?”
“But she’s only sixteen!”
“Not inside, Father. I have hundreds o
f orphans like her, some in the army if they’re old enough, but many in the workshops back at Pacta Servanda. They’re learning trades and skills, but most importantly they’re learning that society works by rules and that laws do matter.” Mari sighed in distress. “The first time I saw Bete…she was feral. Thin as a stick and ready to lash out at anyone. It was all she knew. There are too many like her.”
“But making them soldiers at that age, Mari!”
“I’m using the tools I have, Father! Being a soldier is risky but not nearly as dangerous as the lives those boys and girls barely survived before we started restoring order to this land. I am saving their lives by giving them steady jobs and teaching them skills. If I was wrong, if I was harming them, then Princess Sien would be the first to call a halt to it. But this is the least bad option I have, and hopefully it will help turn the victims of anarchy into a generation with the strength to help rebuild Tiae.”
Her father stared at the floor, once more running a hand through his hair. He didn’t say anything for a while, then finally spoke in a halting voice. “I love my daughter. My Mari. But…this Lady Mari. This Mechanic Mari. This…daughter of someone else. I don’t know who they are.”
“They’re all me,” Mari said. “Your daughter. First and foremost. Always.”
“Then leave him.”
“Him?” Mari felt fury bubbling up inside her as she bolted to her feet. “Alain? You’re telling me to leave my husband? The man who has saved my life countless times already and who I love and who loves me with a devotion that outshines the sun? Who would I be if I left Alain?”
“My daughter!”
“No,” Mari said with all of the force she could put into one word. “Your daughter would not do that.”
He fell silent again for a while, then shook his head, still not looking at her. “This was a mistake. I was certain it would be and I have been proven right.”
“I’m sorry that you feel that way,” Mari said, wishing that her father had a Mage’s skill to see how much she meant it. “There are plenty of places in Pacta Servanda where you will not have to—"
“We’ll go back north in the morning. Your mother, Kath, and I. We’ll find a better place for a new home.”