nearby.
Soft' looked amused. 'Best that you tighten your belt, Heir of Tyree. I'd hate to see a young man lose his pants before such an admiring crowd.' She gave Sasha and Damon each a kiss on the cheek and departed in a swirl of skirts. A pair of Royal Guardsmen followed and the crowd parted before them.
'Am I mistaken,' Jaryd said uncertainly, 'or was the princess flirting with me just now?'
'A princess of Lenayin does not flirt,' said Damon. 'Everyone knows that.'
'I've heard it said that a princess of Lenayin does not fart, either,' Sasha said cheerfully, pulling on her heavy gloves. 'But I happen to know differently.'
'Master Jaryd!' came a new, angry voice. Damon turned to find Pyter Pelyn pushing past the jostle of horses. 'This is Danyth's replacement?' He pointed his lagand hook at Sasha.
'You have a problem with that?' Jaryd asked.
'You insult me, and you insult my family's honour! I'll not ride with this…'
'Half the Falcon Guard know what truly happened to your cousin!' Jaryd retorted. 'If you'd ask them, you'd discover the truth, but no, you insist on preferring my father's lies because it suits your purposes!'
'My father also says that Sashandra Lenayin killed cousin Reynan!' Pyter snarled. 'Do you call him a liar too?'
'Your father was not there! Neither was mine. I killed your cousin, Pyter. I killed him with my own blade as he attempted to kill Sashandra from behind like a coward! Sergeant Garys was there, he can vouch it true!'
He pointed to the sergeant, a short, thick-built man with a bushy beard and tattoos on his forehead. Sergeant Garys looked at the ground. 'Aye,' he said reluctantly. 'On my honour, you killed him, Master Jaryd. And it was well done.'
'It's a conspiracy!' Pyter fumed. There were friends at his back, nowfellow nobles all. The Falcon Guardsmen, Damon noted, gathered more to Jaryd's side. 'Family Nyvar have never liked Family Pelyn, you fear us a threat to the great lordship!'
'I'd have more fear of a sick goat,' said Jaryd.
'Enough!' Damon shouted, stepping between them. 'This is the grandest tournament of the year! Tyree's honour is at stake. The team is chosen and we shall compete! This bickering achieves nothing.'
Pyter glared at him, as if weighing the consequences of an insult to a prince's face. Then he spat and stalked back to his horse, his friends following.
Damon turned on Jaryd. 'What's got into you today?' he demanded. 'Are you determined to start a fight? We're at more risk now from those fools on the field than we are from the Banneryd.'
Jaryd snorted and turned back to his horse, unanswering. 'No matter, Your Highness,' said Sergeant Garys, watching Pyter's departure with a dark stare, 'we'll watch that one for you. He'll not cause any accidents without befalling one himself, I'll promise that.' Several guardsmen growled agreement. The Falcon Guard were mostly not nobility. Even the Verenthanes among them were not overly fond of the likes of Pyter Pelyn. They had, however, appeared to come to a liking for Jaryd Nyvar.
Damon turned to Sasha. She appeared not at all perturbed by the argument, stretching her arms behind her back, gloved fingers interlaced. 'It's going to get rough out there,' Damon ventured.
'Good,' said Sasha.
'Look, matters would be vastly improved if you just declined to take part…
'Give in to those lying thieves, you mean?'
All the rationalisations, all the possible defences for Tyree's nobility flew through Damon's mind. But it was all manure and he knew it. 'Yes,' he said instead, with mounting exasperation. 'Give in, Sasha. Just this once.'
'No,' said Sasha. 'That's where it starts.'
'Where what starts?'
'If you don't know that,' Sasha snorted, 'then you're the biggest fool here.' And she also attended to her horse.
Taneryn scored a winning goal and paraded around the field in ferocious, fist-waving celebration. Then a herald on a white horse galloped onto the field and announced the next two sides. Damon put heels to his horse and the Team of Tyree galloped onto the field. Banneryd came out opposite, fourteen big men on big horses, holding a perfect line. Cavalry men of the Banneryd Black Storm, as grim-faced and strong-muscled a selection of Lenay soldiery as one was ever likely to see. At their head rode Captain Tyrblanc, with a big square beard and a close-shaved scalp. He rode with a hand on one hip, straight-backed in the saddle despite his wide girth, and with barely a glance at his opposition.
Only as they drew closer did Damon recognise the man who rode second, with a Banneryd black-and-blue shirt and saddlecloth. It was Koenyg, as broad and strong as any of the cavalry, astride his favourite chestnut stallion.
The adjudicator waited astride his white horse with a ballskin dangling from his hook. He dropped it as the two teams lined up opposite each other, and Jaryd and the Banneryd captain dismounted to inspect it. The ball was a folded bundle of skins wrapped with twine and leather strips, about the size of a man's chest. Jaryd dug his hook into the folds and lifted, then tried the same with a hook through the outer straps and twine. Tyrblanc did the same, and both seemed satisfied. They clasped forearm to forearm, but if words were exchanged between them, Damon could not hear. Tyrblanc was the larger, and by far the more ferocious-looking, but skill in lopping heads was not necessarily the same as skill in hauling the ball.
The teams then lined up abreast, facing the scaffold seating. Archbishop Dalryn stood in his robes before the royal box and proclaimed the gods' blessing upon proceedings. As that line-up dispersed, the Tyree Goeren-yai performed a chant in a tongue Damon did not recognise. The captains returned to the centre circle with several others, and the rest found their starting positions across the field.
Damon found himself starting next to Koenyg. His big brother smiled at him, the dark, knowing smile that only an older brother could manage, foreboding of future torments and humiliations.
'I'd thought you were busy?' Damon suggested, as their horses jostled and snorted, eager to be underway.
'Not too busy to teach my little brother a lesson or two in horsemanship,' Prince Koenyg replied. Damon sat taller than Koenyg in the saddle, yet he knew better than to take comfort in that. Koenyg was all muscle and determination. He was Commander of Armies now, Kessligh's old title, besides his usual responsibilities as the heir-defence of the realm primary amongst them. The king made broad decisions, but where force and strategy were in question, it was up to Koenyg to turn those decisions into action. Such responsibilities were the apprenticeship that would prepare an heir for the task of kingship. There were those, however, who suggested that the king had delegated too much.
'What's she doing here?' Koenyg asked, nodding to Sasha on the far side of the field.
'Her name's Sasha,' Damon said sourly. 'You might recall her-little terror in a dress, always yelling?'
Koenyg gave him a whack across the stomach with the back of his hook, none too gently either. 'This will be trouble for Family Nyvar,' he remarked.
Damon refrained from hitting him back. It was perhaps not a great idea to hit the heir in front of more than one thousand people. 'You don't sound surprised.'
Koenyg gave him a sideways look as his horse danced and tried to rear. Koenyg knew everything that went on within palace walls, and many things beyond, that look said. If Jaryd had had a fight with his father, the heir of Lenayin would know.
Koenyg smiled. 'You should have declared Krayliss in breach at Halleryn,' he said offhandedly. 'If you'd killed him there, we wouldn't have this trouble here.'
'It would have cost lives,' Damon retorted.
'It may now cost more lives. You've heard Lord Kumaryn tried to arrest Sasha in Baerlyn?'
'I heard.'
'The great lords are relatively powerless, Damon, all save the northern three, and perhaps Krayliss. Their power comes from having their people united beneath their leadership. The others like Kumaryn are largely ignored by their own people. They insist the king needs them, but in truth it's the north we need. The north is strong, we must keep them on our side.'
'At the cost of justice?' Damon retorted.
