Exile's Valor

He pondered that for a moment, trying to think of all of the times Selenay could be vulnerable. Not when holding Court, not at Council meetings. Probably not in the gardens or in her own quarters, or at meals or entertainments—unless the harpists suddenly produced arrows and used their instruments as bows.

Not very likely.

But before the arrival of the Prince, Selenay had occasionally donned the working Whites of a common Herald, and gone off for a long ride, down to the Home Farms, outside the walls of Haven, usually accompanied only by Talamir and sometimes not even him. And then, if ever—

:You know, I believe I am going to start attending the Hurlee practices,: he said slowly. :I believe I will begin working with the Hurlee players. She might object to an escort; she won’t object to a crowd of cheerful youngsters nattering about sport. In fact, she might even enjoy their company. But it will not take much to turn them from gamesmen to melee-experts.:

:Hurlee is cursed like a melee already,: Kantor observed.

:And that is the point,: Alberich replied. :Furthermore, unless she is really craving privacy, Selenay won’t think anything of a Hurlee team riding along with her. They’re only Trainees, not Guards.:

:So she won’t object?:

He smiled. :I believe she will welcome them.: Then he sobered. :The hard part will be in training them to be weapons at her side, without any of them realizing that is what I am doing.:

:If anyone can,: Kantor said firmly, :you can.:

He sighed, and hoped his Companion was right.

20

A harsh, cold wind blew across the Hurlee ground, rattling the last of the sere, brown leaves still clinging to the trees. A helm and neck-brace weren’t much help in protecting from the cold; the wind ripped gleefully down the Weaponsmaster’s collar and the sudden chill brought back memories of long patrols in the lonely hills of Karse in weather worse than this, when he would wake cold, patrol until he and his men were warm only where their bodies were in contact with their horses’ hides, then gather around smoking fires where you warmed little bits of yourself, while the rest stayed achingly cold. Now—well, he had come from a warm salle, and he would be going back to it; this was just minor discomfort, inconsequential.

Alberich gravely surveyed the twelve best Hurlee players in the Collegium now gathered before him; in their turn they gazed fearlessly back at him. They were all superior athletes, all either in their last or next-to-last years, and all were old enough to give Alberich respect untempered with fear. They were past that half-fearful, half- awestruck stage, past thinking him an unreasonable taskmaster. They knew him now, knew what he was about, knew why he did what he did with them. There were those that were this lot’s yearmates that still had not grasped those truths; that was why he had picked his candidates so carefully.

And if they suspected what he was about with them now was going to be something more than turning them into vicious Hurlee players—well, he reckoned they only thought to the moment when they were to get their Whites, and assumed that he was fitting them better to be Heralds in some of the more dangerous sectors. And it was true enough that this training would serve that end, so they were not entirely wrong.

The real purpose was a secret held by him, Talamir, Kantor and Rolan—and the Companions of these dozen young Grays. After careful consultation with Kantor, he and Talamir had elected to include the Companions, but not the Trainees, because of the risk that someone would let something slip. No secret was ever safer, and he and Kantor felt that to get the best result, he needed the informed cooperation of the Companions. Other than that, no one else had been told. Not even Myste knew, though of course, he would tell her eventually for the sake of the Chronicles. Just not now; later when the danger was past, and his fears were proved false—or true.

The twelve sat shivering in their saddles, waiting for him to speak. They wore more than the usual Hurlee protections; shin, knee, and calf-guards, kidney-belts, elbow-guards, arm-guards, neck-braces. And they were finding, as he already knew, that none of these protections helped against the teeth of the wind.

There were no observers today. No one wanted to sit in the cold, in the open, with no shelter on a day like this. Not even to watch the best Hurlee players in Haven. It seemed an especial irony that rather than being overcast, the sun shone down among swiftly-moving scuds of cloud in a mostly-blue sky. It gave no help against the cold.

“Two teams of six for now,” he said, and pointed. “Harrow. You sit out, throw in the ball, referee. I will play this third and the next.”

When Hurlee had first been turned into a game and not a form of exercise, it had started with as many