The War God's Own

properly Prince Bahzell, didn't he?' he asked carefully.

'Aye, I've no doubt himself would be doing just that,' Bahzell replied, and this time resignation had replaced exasperation. 'He's the sense of humor for it, now hasn't he just?'

'But… Are you saying you're not a prince?'

'Oh, well, as to that, I suppose I am,' Bahzell said a bit uncomfortably. 'That's to say, my father's after being Prince of Hurgrum, and I'm after being his son, so-' He shrugged. 'Still and all, my folk are minded to see clan lordship as more important than 'princes,' and there's three brothers betwixt me and any crown, so there's small enough point in putting on airs.'

'Perhaps not from your perspective, Milord,' Charrow said with a hint of dryness. 'Still, for those of us whose sires aren't princes of anything, it seems worth noting. But my point was that even if you've never been formally pledged to the Order, there are secular orders of chivalry. Surely, as a prince, you were knighted by your father, so-'

The master of the Belhadan Order broke off in astonishment as Bahzell began to chuckle. Sir Vaijon was inclined to bristle, but the Horse Stealer's expression made it obvious he was fighting hard not to laugh. Unfortunately, he was failing. Brandark at least managed to turn his laughter into a fit of coughing that looked almost natural, but Bahzell couldn't stop himself, and he pressed one hand to his ribs as his huge, chamber-shaking guffaws broke loose.

It took him only a few seconds to strangle his mirth once more, and he wiped tears from his eyes while he shook his head as penitently as the low ceiling allowed.

'I beg your pardon, Sir Charrow, and I'm hopeful you'll forgive me, for my father would be after fetching my skull a fearful rap for laughing so free. But it wasn't you as I was laughing at so much as the notion of him knighting anyone. It's not the sort of thing hradani are like to spend much time in doing, d'you see.'

'You mean-?' Vaijon was stunned into the indiscretion. He tried to cut it off, but something else seemed to command his tongue as all eyes swung to him, and he heard his own voice blurt out the question. 'You're not even a knight?'

It came out in a half-wail, like a child's protest that something an adult had just said couldn't possibly be true, and a blaze of scarlet swept over his face and burned down his throat. Yet he couldn't tear his eyes from the Horse Stealer, just as he simply could not wrap his mind around the thought of a champion of Tomanak who had never been knighted. Who wasn't even a knight-probationer like Vaijon himself!

'Unless my tongue's taken to saying other than I tell it to, that's the very thing I was just telling you,' Bahzell said after a moment and, for the first time, Vaijon heard an ominous rumble in the deeps of his voice.

'But… but-'

'Peace, Vaijon!' Sir Charrow spoke with a sharpness Vaijon had seldom heard from him, and the flicker of true anger in the older knight's brown eyes did more than anything else to shock Vaijon into silence.

'Forgive me, S- Prince Bahzell,' he said, and bent his golden head in contrition.

'Let it be,' Bahzell said after half a dozen aching heartbeats, and Charrow inhaled deeply.

'I thank you for your patience with us, Milord,' he said gravely. 'As I'm sure you must realize, we of the Order have no experience in how properly to address a hradani champion. And I fear that the God was… less than fully forthcoming when He advised me of your arrival, shall we say?'

'Oh, aye! Himself's a rare one for having his little joke,' Bahzell agreed with a snort, ill humor banished. 'And as for that, I'm thinking there must be a deal he wasn't after telling me either. Not least that there ever was an 'Order of Tomanak ' in the first place! I've no more notion what you do, or how, than a Purple Lord has of charity.'

'He didn't tell you about the Order?' Even Charrow seemed taken aback by that, and Bahzell shrugged. The old knight gazed at him for several seconds, obviously considering what he'd just been told, then shook himself. 'Well! I see we have a great deal to discuss, Milord. First, however, I think it would be well for Vaijon to escort you and Lord Brandark to your quarters and see you settled. After that, if you would be kind enough to join me in the library, I'll try to fill in the blanks He neglected to deal with.'

An hour later, Vaijon, divested of his mail and dressed in the simple tunic and hose the brethren normally wore within the chapter house (although his were of the finest silk), guided Bahzell and Brandark into the library. After showing them to the quarters set aside for them, he'd used the intervening time to get his thoughts into some sort of order, and his expression was composed as he ushered them through the stone-walled passages. Internally, however, he remained imperfectly reconciled to the entire concept of a hradani champion. Especially-it pained him to admit it, yet it was true-of a backwoods, uneducated hradani champion whose Axeman came out sounding remarkably like that of the unlettered foresters who served on the Almerhas estates in backward Vonderland. He knew it shouldn't matter to him if it didn't matter to Tomanak , but it did. It truly did, and try as he might, he couldn't quite swallow his resentment that so high an honor should be wasted on such a person… or his disdain for the one on whom it had been squandered.

And then there was Bahzell's companion. Clearly, Brandark was better educated than Bahzell. Indeed, his Axeman could have been that of any well-educated citizen of the Empire of the Axe. It lacked the aristocratic finish with which Vaijon himself spoke, yet it was better than, say, Sir Charrow's. But for all that, Vaijon wasn't at all certain he ought to be leading Brandark along with Bahzell. Sir Charrow had said he had much to explain to Bahzell; it didn't automatically follow that he intended to explain the Order's business to an outsider.

Unfortunately, Bahzell clearly wanted Brandark along, and the smaller hradani equally obviously saw no reason why he shouldn't come. And so, yet again, Vaijon found himself doing something he was positive he ought not to do at the unspoken behest of the totally unsuitable creature Tomanak had seen fit to choose as His champion.

That thought carried him into the library, where Sir Charrow sat beside a crackling coal fire. Despite the large chamber's lofty dimensions, the hot air flowing from furnaces in the cellar through the vents of the hypocaust hidden under the stone floor and buried in the walls went far to drive off the chill. But the fire on the hearth was still welcome, particularly to Sir Charrow. The Belhadan master remained fit enough to hold his own in the field at need, yet there was no denying that he'd slowed with age, and he felt the cold more keenly than once he had.

Now he looked up from the tongs he held in one scarred, sinewy hand, and the fresh coal he'd positioned in the flames crackled wildly as he smiled at his guests.

'Thank you for coming, my lords,' he said. 'Please-be seated.'

The library's walls were lined with high bookshelves, and a second-floor-level balcony ran around them to give access to still more shelf space. As a result, the ceiling was far higher than that of Sir Charrow's study, and it was obvious he'd used the intervening hour to make some preparations of his own. The chair to which he waved Brandark was no different from the one in which he himself sat, although the Bloody Sword filled a seat which made most humans look undersized just about to capacity. But no one in Belhadan had ever built a chair to Bahzell Bahnakson's stature, and so Charrow had ordered a cushioned, high-backed bench brought in to replace the chairs on the other side of the polished table by the library's diamond-paned windows. It was a little low for the Horse Stealer's long legs, but it had been built for several pages to sit abreast while awaiting the summons to duty, so at least it didn't squeeze in on him from the sides.

'We're pleased to be asked,' Bahzell replied as he took his seat, 'but if it's all the same to you, I'm thinking Brandark is as wishful as I that you'd be after leaving aside the 'sirs' and 'my lords.' '

'But I-' Charrow began, then stopped. 'Very well, my friends. If that's truly how you prefer to be addressed, it's certainly not my place to argue with you. Besides-' he chuckled dryly '-traditionally, champions of Tomanak are noted for their… um, determination.'

'You mean rock-headed, stiff-necked, bloody-minded obstinacy, don't you, Sir Charrow?' Brandark asked politely, and the white-haired knight-captain laughed.

'Of course not, Mi- Brandark. It would be most improper for me to say such things about a champion!'

'I see.' Brandark's eyes laughed at Bahzell, and he tilted his ears impudently. 'Fortunately, it's not at all 'improper' for me to describe him accurately.'

'That's as may be, little man,' Bahzell rumbled, 'but just you be thinking about all the nasty accidents as might