Wind Rider's Oath

Tellian's vassal, not the Baron's-to vastly exceed any orders you might have given him.'

'As always, your reasoning is acute, Chalthar,' Saratic purred. 'See to it. And see to it that Baron Cassan's man, Warshoe, is attached to Sir Fahlthu.' Chalthar looked a question at him, and Saratic shrugged. 'Something about the man worries me, Chalthar. Not enough to offend Baron Cassan by refusing his services, and the gods know he's proved capable enough in everything we've asked of him so far. But if he's a blade that's likely to turn in our hands, I'd rather have him chopping off Fahlthu's fingers than Halnahk's. And having him safely among those 'bribed by Erathian' might not be a very bad thing, either.'

* * *

'There's a messenger from Sir Jahlahan, Milord.'

Baron Tellian looked up from the breakfast campfire beside the Balthar high road at the sound of Tarith Shieldarm's voice.

He and his armsmen were still two days' travel-for those on warhorses, instead of coursers, at least-from Hill Guard. They'd been setting an easy pace, allowing the horses from whom they had demanded so much in their pursuit of Leeana to recover somewhat. Even so, it had not been a pleasant journey, and especially not for Tarith. The burly, dark-haired and dark-eyed armsman had been assigned as Leeana's personal armsman even before she could walk, and when she'd been a baby, she'd held his heart in her two pudgy hands. Nor had she ever released that grip. Of all Tellian's armsmen, Tarith had taken his daughter's loss to the war maids hardest, and he continued to blame himself for it. It was nonsense, and Tellian knew it, but Tarith stubbornly insisted that he should have disobeyed Leeana's direct orders and refused to let her send him away. The fact that she'd constructed a totally plausible errand for him to run seemed lost upon him, and Tellian only hoped time would heal his grief and blunt that draining sense of guilt.

'From Sir Jahlahan?' the baron said after a moment, shaking off his reverie.

'Aye, Milord,' Tarith said, and extended a sealed message pouch.

Tellian took it with a grunt of thanks that partially concealed a pang of anxiety. He'd deliberately avoided sending any messages ahead to Balthar. Despite the relatively moderate pace he'd set, he and his armsmen would reach Hill Guard no more than two days-two and a half, at most-after a messenger from Kalatha could have arrived. He refused to subject Hanatha to a written confirmation that they had lost their daughter forever when the delay to tell her in person, and hold her in his arms as she wept, would be so brief.

But Jahlahan had to know Tellian must be well on his way back to Balthar by now, whether with Leeana, or without her. So what could be so urgent that the seneschal hadn't felt able to wait and report it to him directly?

He gazed down at the message pouch for a moment, then drew a deep breath and broke the seal. He extracted the message inside, opened it, and sat back on his haunches to read it.

But then the report's second sentence wrenched him upright with a jerk and a white-faced oath of disbelief.

He felt all his armsmen staring at him, knew his expression was giving away entirely too much, but he couldn't help it. He read the short, horrifying message all the way through, then made himself reread it to be certain there'd been no mistake.

There hadn't been, and he felt his shoulders slump.

'Milord?' a voice asked. 'Wind Brother?!' it said more sharply, and he shook himself.

'Yes-yes, Hathan,' he said, looking across to meet his wind brother's anxious eyes.

'What is it? Surely not the Baroness-?!'

'No.' Tellian shook his head again, sharply, as if trying to shake his mind back into functioning. 'No, Hanatha is well. It's-'

He looked back down at Jahlahan's message, then crushed it into a ball in a white-knuckled fist.

'It's not anything at Hill Guard or Balthar,' he said hoarsely. 'There was an . . . emergency at Warm Springs. Prince Bahzell has gone to deal with it.'

'I see,' Hathan gazed at him for a moment, and Tellian flicked a thought to Dathgar.

?Brother, ask Gayrhalan to ask Hathan to ask no more questions. Ask him to tell him that I will explain everything shortly.?

?Of course,? his courser replied. ?And may I hope that you'll explain it to me at the same time?? Dathgar continued dryly.

?Of course I will,? Tellian assured him, and felt a familiar sense of comfort from Dathgar's attitude. Although, he reflected more grimly, even Dathgar was going to be horrified by this news.

'All right, Tarith,' he said aloud, turning back to the senior armsman. 'As I'm sure you've already figured out, Sir Jahlahan's note is scarcely good news. All's well at Balthar and Hill Guard, though. The problem lies further north, and as I told Hathan, Prince Bahzell and Lord Brandark have already left Hill Guard to deal with it. However, I am the Lord Warden of the West Riding. It's my responsibility, not Prince Bahzell's, to respond to my lord wardens' requests for help. There's nothing that any of you-' he swept the listening armsmen with his eyes '- could do to help with this . . . particular problem, however. So Hathan and I are going to leave you here and go on ahead.'

'Milord-!' Tarith began an instant, automatic armsman's protest, but Tellian shook his head firmly.

'We're not going to argue about this, old friend,' he said. 'Hathan and I are riding ahead. And I don't want you laming the horses trying to catch up with us, either!' He eyed the armsman sternly. 'There's no way your mounts could keep up with us, so there's no use trying. Is that understood?'

Tarith clearly wanted to continue the argument, and he had all of a life-long retainer's stubbornness to continue it with. But he'd also served the Bowmasters of Balthar since boyhood. He recognized his Baron's seriousness . . . and he knew when it was time not to argue.

'Aye, Milord,' he acknowledged unhappily.

'Thank you,' Tellian said, punching him lightly on one armored shoulder. Then he turned to Hathan.

'Let's ride, Wind Brother,' he said simply.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Thalar Keep, the home of Lord Warden Trisu of Lorham and the ancestral seat of the Pickaxes of Lorham, was a considerably more modest fortress than Hill Guard Castle. Then again, the town of Thalar (calling it a 'city' would have been a gross exaggeration) was far, far smaller than Balthar. Still, the castle, with its two curtain walls and massive, square central keep, was of respectable antiquity. Indeed, it looked to Kaeritha's experienced eye as if the outer walls were at least a couple of centuries younger than the original keep.

There was nothing remotely like finesse about the castle's architecture or construction. It was uncompromisingly angular, laid out with an obvious eye for fields of fire for the archers expected to man its battlements in time of emergency. Whoever had designed it, though-assuming anything like an actual 'design' process had been part of its construction-had clearly been less concerned about what an enemy with capable siege engineers might have done to it. It was dominated by a higher ridge to the east, beyond accurate bow range but well within reach for the sort of ballistae someone like the Empire of the Axe might have deployed. Nor was the castle moated. It was built on what appeared to be an artificial mound, too, rather than bedrock. That raised it above the town proper and gave its parapets a greater command of its surroundings, but the earthen mound would have been highly vulnerable to mining operations.

Of course, she mused as Cloudy carried her up the very slight slope towards Thalar just over a week after she'd reached Kalatha, the people who'd built that castle had probably had their fellow Sothoii, or possibly Horse Stealers, in mind. Neither the cavalry-oriented Sothoii nor the relatively unsophisticated hradani would have been in much of a position to take advantage of the weaknesses evident to Kaeritha. And according to Mayor Yalith, Thalar Keep had withstood serious attack at least three times during the Sothoii's Time of Troubles.