Moving Targets and Other Tales of Valdemar

Elyn stared at the wagon, hoping it was a hallucination. It wasn’t.

It was a traders-caravan built to the specifications of a rich man with vague notions of “the romance of the open road.” So it was big, big enough that it took two stout horses to pull it. Expensive leaf springs sandwiched between wishbone axles peeked from behind carved, bent-wood coachwork. It was luxuriously appointed within. And without.

It was yellow. Bright yellow. And there were flowers painted on it, scrolling around the windows and door. The roof was red.

Elyn groaned silently. Heralds were supposed to try to be inconspicuous. Hard enough when you were wearing a white uniform that screamed: “I’m the Herald! Shoot me first!” But with this? They’d look like a lot of traveling actors. Or clowns. Would people even believe they were Heralds and not just entertainers dressed up as Heralds?

“We could have it repainted,” said Trainee Laurel helpfully, gleefully gesturing at the wagon and then standing with one hand on her hip. “In fact, we probably should. White, with a blue roof. And with the crest of Valdemar on the side. The people would love that!”

Elyn had to admit that she was probably right about that last part. Laurel was a pretty thing with abundant red hair, kind hearted, with a formidable Gift that was from some place in the Empathy family. She could make anyone like her and want to do what she wanted. Fortunately, she had a strong code of ethics. Unfortunately, she tended to think the best of everyone . They’d quickly learned not to allow her any say in judgments after she pleaded in favor of a violent murderer, who had been caught literally red-handed, by saying that his mother didn’t think he’d do that kind of thing.

Repaint it white. As if that will make us less of a moving target? At least no enemy would ever take this wagon seriously. “We don’t have time,” Elyn said, truthfully. “It would have to be sanded down to the bare wood. Otherwise, everything else will bleed right through.”

“Blue. Dark blue. Solid dark blue, no decorations. I already have the paint, and I rounded up the workmen,” Trainee Alma said as she trotted up with two of the palace carpenters in tow, each of them carrying two buckets of dark blue paint. “I calculated it very carefully. One coat will do it. Night Blue cut one- to-three with Sky Blue has a drying index of six candlemarks, with a twelve-candlemark cure, and has an unprimed saturation well within limits. There will be plenty of time for it to dry before we leave tomorrow.” She waved a clipboard of papers and punctuated her statement with a firm nod that proclaimed that questioning her figures was inadvisable under pain of explanation. Boyish, bookish Alma had been an Artificer-in-training before she had been Chosen; she made up for Laurel’s lack of practicality and then some. Strong-willed, rock-steady, and blindingly intelligent, she was always searching for the most ordinary explanation for the extraordinary. She also had no discernable Gift. Elyn sometimes wondered if that was because Alma herself had not yet mathematically proven she had one.

“Aww. Do we have to paint it?” Trainee Arville asked plaintively. “I think it’s nice.” He was the tallest young man Elyn had ever seen, but you would never know it, because he was always slouching. He always looked a little unkempt. Not dirty, but untidy. Except when in his Whites, he could only be found in faded earth-tone field-laborer clothes, none of which seemed to be his size even if they were. Elyn knew he didn’t do it out of carelessness or because he was slovenly. It was as if everything he put on immediately had a mind of its own, and that mind was half-asleep.

His Gift was as powerful as Laurel’s and as odd. It was a rare Gift and extremely difficult to train for. Luck. He could trip and fall and come up not only unhurt, but clutching something useful, important, or occasionally even valuable. He was almost never hit during fighting practice, not because he was good but because his opponents always made inexplicable mistakes. Small children and animals adored him.

“Yes, Arville, we do,” Alma said firmly. “Otherwise no one will take us seriously.”

The fourth member of the quartet shrugged. “I doubt Father would care if we painted it pink,” Trainee Rod pointed out. Laurel opened her mouth to speak, but when Elyn shot Laurel a look that said don’t even think it, she decided against it. Rod continued. “I doubt he even knows what color it is now. He probably just threw money at a bunch of coach-makers and said, ‘Build me the best traveling van anyone has ever seen.’ What matters is that the horses he sent along are terrific.” Trainee Rod ... or rather, Rod’s father ... was wealthy enough that he could do things like that. Rod should have been spoiled rotten. He wasn’t. Rod’s father should have been livid that he was Chosen, but he wasn’t. Guildmaster Fred-rich of the Goldsmith Guild was so proud of his son that he nearly burst every time he looked at the young man. Then again, that handsome boy, blond and blue-eyed, certainly had a face and body that seemed created to wear a Herald’s Uniform.

And Rod certainly did not have the head to be a Goldsmith, much less a Master, and even less a Guildmaster. His younger brother had seemingly inherited all the real cunning in the family, as Rod had inherited the looks, so when the Big White Talking Horse showed up, it was actually a relief all around.

Not that he was stupid; he just wasn’t nearly intelligent enough to succeed in the business as his father had; he was certainly no match for his brother or Alma when it came to feats of outright logic, and he only had a casual consumer’s understanding of market forces. But he was clever about mechanical things. Most importantly for a Herald, he was absolutely determined to do the right thing and doggedly persistent about seeing that it got done.

As more than one senior Herald had remarked to Elyn, together the four made one perfect Herald. But then again, how many “perfect” Heralds were there?

Most of us just bumble along trying to do the best we can.

She knew perfectly well why the four of them had been assigned to her. Her patience was legendary, and these four needed legendary patience.

“All right Alma, that solution will probably work. Please go ahead and repaint the wagon, gentlemen,” she continued, addressing the workmen. Then she turned to the four ill-assorted soon-to-be-Heralds. “And you lot, get packed, get your new Whites, and get some sleep. We have a long way to go, and I doubt very much that any of you has ever had any experience in driving a wagon.”

They all shrugged sheepishly. She snorted. “Something Rod’s father did not think about. Fortunately, I have. And before this is over, each of you will be an expert in everything from harnessing to fixing a broken wheel singlehandedly in the pouring rain.”

From the shocked looks on their faces, she could tell that all they had considered was that they were going to have a nice, comfortable, warm place to sleep on this circuit, rather than having to camp in the open or find themselves crammed five into a Waystation made for two at most. It had never occurred to them that a wagon and its team were objects that required care and repair, which was one reason why Heralds seldom used them. Usually, when Heralds needed a wagon, they hired one on, driver and all.

The only reason she was even considering using this rolling house was because this circuit was all in farming country. Flat, level land for the most part, plenty of forage for the horses, and good roads. It was something of a choice circuit to get if you liked things to be mostly uneventful. She’d gotten it on this trip precisely because she had four, rather than one or two, to nursemaid through their first year in Whites.

And hopefully, by the time they got to the section of the circuit that bordered on the Pelagir Hills, it would be late enough in autumn that any trouble from there would be tucking itself up to hibernate for the winter.

And if it isn’t inclined to hibernate ... She squared her shoulders and headed for the suite of rooms she shared with them. Well, that is when we find out what these four are made of—and if I did my job.

Elyn pulled at her earlobe a little and stared at the wagon. For once, Alma had miscalculated, it seemed—or else the pigment in that paint wasn’t what she had thought. A single coat of blue paint had indeed been applied evenly and thoroughly over the entire wagon yesterday, with the end result being that the wagon now was blue ... more or less. Not so much a Heraldic blue as a shade resembling water, or a bird’s egg, or the sky under certain conditions. And the vines and flowers had bled through too. It was less garish than it had been, but the effect was still ...

“Oh how pretty!” Laurel enthused. “I was afraid it was going to be dull!”

Alma passed both of them with her bags; she rolled her eyes but said nothing as she stowed her things in the storage boxes built into the side.

Elyn had taught them well enough that they got their gear put away and were in the wagon before a single candlemark had passed. Not without some minor bickering, but there was always minor bickering any time adolescents did anything. Elyn was used to that. The question looming largest in her mind, however, was who to