outside and got up reluctantly. Outside, the day was fair and warm; it would be hot by noon. She headed for the cooks’ tent.
“There you are.” Stammel came up behind her. “You’ll be glad to know that the troops in the citadel want to surrender.”
Paks pulled her mind back to the present. “Oh. Good.”
“They’re afraid to open the gates, they say. I don’t blame them. They would expect the worst from us.” He waited to say more until no one was near. “Paks—the others are back now. I spoke to Arne and Vik. There’s a lot you didn’t say last night.”
Paks blushed. She was afraid of his next question. Instead of asking, he went on.
“I’m glad you didn’t. The Duke’s a good man; you know that. I’ve known him a long time; I know why he might lose his temper. But you were right, Paks, however angry he was, or may be still: he’s not the kind to torture. Only he wasn’t himself for a bit.” He went on more briskly. “I don’t think the others will talk about it—I had to pull the truth out of Vik with a rope, nearly. He feared I’d be angry with you.”
Paks found herself grinning at Stammel’s tone. When she looked up, his brown eyes were twinkling.
“You’d best watch yourself, though,” he said. “If things keep happening around you, and you keep siding with paladins, it’ll rub off, and we’ll only see you from far away, as you ride past on your fancy charger.” His tone was only half joking.
For an instant the thought made Paks’s heart leap, but she forced the image away. “No,” she said firmly. “I’m staying here, in the Company, with my friends. If the Duke isn’t too angry—” For she remembered the icy glare he’d given her.
“He’s fair; he won’t hold it against you. But Paks, it’s not that bad an idea,” said Stammel more earnestly. “If you have the chance, I’d say take it. You’ve got the fighting skills, and you care about the right and wrong of things. You’d make friends elsewhere—” Paks shook her head. Stammel sighed. “Have you thought,” he asked, “that your two years is up these many months? You’re due a leave—you could go north and see your family—look around —”
Paks was startled. She had forgotten all about the “two years beyond training” in her first contract. “I hadn’t thought,” she said. As she mused on it, the sights and smells of Three Firs came back to her. The baker’s shop, the well, the striped awnings that hung out on market day. And beyond the town the great rolling lift of the moors, and the first sight of the dark slate roof of her father’s house. Tears stung her eyes. “I could—I could take my dowry back—” she said.
“So you could. Your share this campaign should do it. Think about it. The Duke will be granting us all leave unless he takes us back north.”
“And I wouldn’t be leaving the Company.”
“No. Not unless you wanted to.”
“I’ll think about it,” she said, and Stammel nodded and left her.
Siniava’s troops surrendered that day, but not to the Duke: to the combined city militia. Paks did not even see the prisoners; she heard that they’d been taken away toward Vonja. The Duke’s Company entered the citadel only for plunder; they found the only treasure at the inside opening of the secret passage. Several chests of gold, Stammel said, would pay for the entire campaign, leaving aside their share of Cha and Sibili. Paks heard from Arne that Siniava’s bodyguards had all been carrying jewels and gold. “That’s what slowed them down in the fight,” she joked.
“Did you find out who the others were?”
“Yes. The man’s some high rank in the moneylender’s guild. He’s got a bad wound; he may not live. The woman’s his sister or niece or something.” Arne stopped and looked at Paks. “
“I don’t know. I don’t understand.” Paks could hardly convey her confusion. “Something happened, I know that. But—I keep wondering and wondering about it, and nothing comes clear.”
Three days later, as she watched the city militias march north from the bridge, she was still wondering. The High Marshal had talked to her again, and the paladin; the Duke had apparently talked to both of them. Dorrin had told of the incident in Rotengre, and Paks finally admitted that she’d tried to use the medallion to heal Canna. She could have had, if she’d wanted it, hours of instruction about Gird. She didn’t want it.
“I want to stay with you,” she’d told the Duke, while the High Marshal listened. “I joined your company; I gave you my oath. And my friends are here.”
The Duke nodded. “You may stay, Paksenarrion, as long as you’re willing. But I must agree with the High Marshal in this: some force—we need not agree on what—is moving you as well. The time may come when you should leave. I will not hold you to your oath then.”
“My lord—” the paladin had begun, but the Duke interrupted.
“Don’t bully her. If she’s to leave, she’ll leave, in her own time. You’ve seen she’s no fool.”
“That’s not what I meant, my lord.”
“No. I’m sorry.” The Duke had sighed, looking tired. “Paks, think about it. I know it’s not easy—but think. Talk to Arcolin or Dorrin, if you’d like; talk to Stammel. This company is not the only place you can be a fighter.”
But she had been determined. From a sheepfarmer’s daughter in Three Firs to a respected veteran in the Duke’s Company, with friends who would die for her, or she for them—that was enough. Those childhood dreams were only dreams: this place, these friends, were real. It was all she wanted, and all she ever would.
She waved, nonetheless, to Sir Fenith the paladin, as he rode out. Canna’s medallion was safe in her belt- pouch now. She would let it stay there. No more of those strange warnings to deal with, no more mysteries. And if she died, for lack of its warning—she grinned, not worried. Saben’s red horse would bear her to the Afterfields.
