the Duke managed to see everything. He appeared in one barracks when the recruits were just getting up, and in another while they were sanding the floor. He walked through the mess hall during meals, and even ate there twice. The recruits could hardly choke down their food. He ate as if he liked it, and talked easily to his squires. They all knew by then that the young men in mail were his squires, and one of them a nephew of Count Vladiorhynsich of Kostandan. He was there when Vona’s unit made a brilliant reverse in square and threw Kefer’s unit off balance, and still there when Stammel’s unit managed the same thing, not quite so well, against both the others.
“I wonder if he ever sleeps,” muttered Arne to Paks in the jacks, the one place they were almost sure he wouldn’t be.
“I don’t know. He was on the wall last night when we came on. Gave the watchword, just like Captain Valichi, but I nearly fell off the parapet.”
“And this morning he was waiting in the courtyard when we came out. I wish I knew what he was thinking —”
“I don’t.” Paks had, in fact, been wondering what the Duke had done to Stephi, but she was afraid to ask anyone. Surely Stammel knew, from the men who had come, but—“If I knew,” she said in answer to Arne’s quizzical look, “I’d be even more frightened of him.”
“It’s not like he’s
“Barra and Natzlin think they’re getting it,” said Paks. Arne snorted.
“After the way Vona’s pulled them off two days ago? They’ll have to do something big to make that up.”
“Ours wasn’t so sharp,” Paks reminded her.
“Against both of ’em. Kefer’s was only one-on-one. I hope—”
“We’ll make it,” said Paks, suddenly full of confidence. “We’re much better with spears, and we’ve got four of the best swords—”
That week was, in fact, one long round of contests. Those few dimwitted enough not to catch on to that by themselves were forcibly enlightened by their companions. Mock combat the last day was hardly mock: collarbones and fingers, one or more in each unit, snapped under the blows of wooden swords. When the entire recruit cohort gathered in formation in the courtyard, there were no smiles. For the first time, they were being addressed by the Duke himself, formally.
Paks, in her usual position at the front of the formation, ignored the bruise that had three of her fingers swelled up like blue sausages. It had definitely been worth risking them broken to break the front line of Vona’s square. Especially since they weren’t broken; the surgeon said they’d bend in a few days. She watched for the Duke. One of his squires came through the Duke’s Gate and nodded to Captain Valichi. The trumpeters blew a fanfare; Paks’s skin rose up in chillbumps. The Duke strode briskly through the gate, cloak swirling. He spoke to Valichi, nodded, then moved to Vona’s unit, on the far side of the courtyard. Paks suppressed a groan. Had they lost to Vona’s? But the Duke made no announcement. Perhaps he was just inspecting, as he had twice before. She dared not glance over to see. Her hand began to throb more insistently; the pain edged up her arm. She listened to the rasp of the Duke’s boots across the court. It seemed a very long time before the sound came closer. Now he was at Kefer’s unit. She could hear that he was, indeed, passing along the ranks. She could even hear the rumble of his voice as he spoke to this recruit or that.
Then he was in front of them, greeting Stammel, and giving a quick glance along the front rank. Paks wondered if he would speak to each of them. She reminded herself of Stammel’s instructions: “Say ’yes, my lord,’ or ’no, my lord,’ instead of just ’sir’ as you would for the captain.” The Duke came closer, with Stammel now a pace behind him. Paks could feel her neck getting hot. She tried to stare through him to the mess hall windows, but he was tall; it was hard to avoid meeting those gray eyes.
“Fingers broken?” he asked her.
“No, sir—my lord,” said Paks, stumbling over the honorific and blushing even more.
“Good.” The Duke moved on, and Paks heard nothing for some time but the blood drumming in her ears. After Stammel had told them, and she had reminded herself, she’d still said it wrong. When she could hear again, the Duke was already on his way to the front of the formation.
“When you were recruited,” he said to them all, “you agreed to stay with this Company for two years beyond your training, and to fight at the orders of your commander. Back then you didn’t know your commander. Now you do. All of you have qualified to join my Company, and that means you follow me—obey
Captain Valichi stepped forward to lead them in the oath of service. “We swear to you our hands, our blades, our blood, our breath—the service of the hands, and the service of the heart. May the gods witness our oath of loyalty and be swift to punish the oathbreaker.”
“And I to you,” said the Duke, “pledge hands and blade and blood and breath. My honor is your honor, before all enemies and trials, in all dangers high and low. The gods witness my oath to you, and yours to me.” He looked back and forth at the recruits, and nodded.
“Well, now, companions—” Paks stiffened, surprised by the change in his voice and address. “You’ll soon be on your way to battle. As always, one unit must be first on the road. ’Tis no easy chore to choose among you. Tir knows what I’ll do if the Company grows to four cohorts. But the choice is made, and that’s for Stammel’s unit—” Paks suddenly felt that she could soar high in the air on the breath she drew. She locked her jaw on a yell of triumph. Someone behind her was less careful. To her surprise the Duke grinned. “One yell won’t hurt,” he said. “Cheer your sergeant, if you will.”
And “Stammel!” they yelled, and the walls rang with it.
The Duke rode out the next morning, with a late snowstorm behind him. He had hardly disappeared into the swirling veils before the recruits were hard at work again—this time in preparation for the march south. First they were measured for their uniforms, having changed shape since they arrived. With the maroon tunics went taller boots and longer socks, a long maroon cloak with a hood, and—most exciting—armor. Instead of bandas, they would wear boiled-leather corselets (“Until you can buy something better, if you want it,” remarked Devlin.) There were greaves for their legs, and wide bands to protect their wrists. And bronze helmets on top of all.
“Make up your minds,” said Stammel, “how you’re going to wear your hair. If it’s long, I’d say keep it inside the helmet, hot as it is, or some enemy will grab it and throw you. It’ll make a cushion.” Paks found a way of winding her braid that was comfortable and secure. But the helmet was heavier than she’d expected. So was everything else.
“You’ll get used to it,” said Stammel. “After you’ve marched all the way to Valdaire in it, you won’t even notice.”
It seemed hardly any time at all since the Duke’s visit when two of the captains arrived from the south to escort them. A last few days for inspection and packing the mule train that would carry their necessary supplies— and then it was the last night in the barracks. Paks found it almost as hard to sleep as she had the first one.
Chapter Eight
As Paks passed under the gate tower and out into the cold gray light of a late-winter dawn, she felt how changed she was from the girl who had left home those months before. She had not told anyone when her nineteenth birthday came, but she felt the extra year like a wall between her and the past. No one would take her for a farmer’s daughter, not with the sword at her side and the skill to use it, not in the uniform of Duke Phelan’s Company. Beside and behind her, eighty pairs of almost-new boots beat the same crisp rhythm on the hard-frozen
