Codex Alera 01 - Furies Of Calderon Part 2

"Traitor," Amara said, dropping the word lightly. "Traitor," Amara said, dropping the word lightly. Fidelias flinched. His grimace darkened to a scowl. Fidelias flinched. His grimace darkened to a scowl. Odiana looked back and forth at the sudden silence and then offered, in a helpful tone, "Shall I fetch the branding irons, then?" Odiana looked back and forth at the sudden silence and then offered, in a helpful tone, "Shall I fetch the branding irons, then?"

Fidelias turned to them and said, "I think we've been ham-handed enough, for the moment." He focused his eyes on Aldrick and said, "Give me a few moments alone to talk to her. Maybe I can get her to see common sense."

Aldrick regarded Fidelias with a steady gaze and then shrugged. "Very well," he said. "Love, would you?"

Odiana stepped around Aldrick's stool, eyes focused intently upon Fidelias. "Do you intend to a.s.sist her in any way or to attempt to prevent us from discovering what we wish to know?"

Fidelias's mouth quirked up at the corner, and he focused on the water witch. "Yes, I do. No, I don't. The sky is green. I am seventeen years old. My real name is Gundred." The woman's eyes widened, and Fidelias tilted his head to one side. "You can't tell if I'm lying, 'love'? I'm not some child. I've been deceiving crafters stronger than you since before you were born." His gaze flicked past Odiana to Aldrick. "It's in my best interest to get her to talk. In for a sheep, in for a gargant."

The swordsman smiled, a sudden show of white teeth. "Not going to offer me your word of honor?"

The Cursor's lip curled. "Would it matter if I did?"

"I'd have killed you had you tried," Aldrick said. "A quarter hour. No more." He rose, taking Odiana gently by one arm, and led her out of the tent. The water witch shot a glare at both Fidelias and Amara and then left.

Fidelias waited until they were gone, then turned to Amara and simply looked at her, saying nothing.

"Why?" she asked him. "Patriserus. Why would you do this to him?"

He stared at her, expression not changing. "I have served as a Cursor for forty years. I have no wife. No family. No home. I have given my life to protecting and defending the Crown. Carrying its messages. Discovering its enemies' secrets." He shook his head. "And I have watched it fall. For the past fifteen years, the house of Gaius has been dying. Everyone knows it. What I have done has only prolonged what is inevitable."

"He is a good First Lord. He is just. And as fair as anyone could want."

"This isn't about what's right right, girl. It's about reality. And the reality is that Gaius's fairness and justice has made him a great many powerful enemies. The southern High Lords chafe at the taxes he lays upon them to maintain the s.h.i.+eldwall and the s.h.i.+eld Legion."

"They always have," Amara interjected. "It doesn't change that the taxes are necessary. The s.h.i.+eldwall protects them as well. Should the icemen come down from the north, they would perish with the rest of us."

"They do not see it that way," Fidelias said. "And they are willing to do something about it. The House of Gaius is weakened. He has no heir. He has named no successor. So they strike."

Amara spat, "Attica. Who else?"

"You don't need to know." Fidelias crouched down in front of her. "Amara. Think about this. Ever since the Princeps was killed, it has been in motion. The house of Gaius died along with Septimus. The royal line was never very fertile-and the death of his only child has been taken as a sign by many. His time is past."

"That doesn't make it right right."

Fidelias snarled, "Get it out of your head head, child." He spat on the ground, face twisted in fury. "The blood I've shed in the Crown's service. The men I've killed. Is that any more right right? Are their deaths vindicated because I serve this First Lord or that one? I've killed. I've done worse, in the name of protecting the Crown. Gaius will will fall. Nothing can stop that now." fall. Nothing can stop that now."

"And you have cast yourself in the role of... what, Fidelias? The slive that rushes in to poison the wounded buck? The crow that soars down to peck at the eyes of helpless men not yet dead?"

He looked at her, eyes flat, and gave her a smile empty of mirth or joy or meaning. "It's easy to be righteous when you are young. I could continue to serve the Crown. Perhaps prolong the inevitable. But how many more would die? How many more would suffer? And it would change nothing but the timing. Children, like you, would come in my place-and have to make the decisions I am making."

Amara let her voice resonate with contempt. "Thank you, so much, for protecting protecting me." me."

Fidelias's eyes flashed. "Make this easy on yourself, Amara. Tell us what we want to know."

"Go to the crows."

Fidelias said, without anger, "I've broken men and women stronger than you. Don't think that because you're my student, I won't do it to you." He knelt down to look her in the eyes. "Amara. I'm the same man you've known. We've shared so much together. Please." His hand reached for her grime-covered one. She didn't fight his grasp. "Think about this. You could throw in with us. We could help make Alera bright and peaceful again."

She returned his gaze, steady. Then said, very quietly, "I'm already doing that, patriserus patriserus. I thought you were, too."

His eyes hardened like ice, brittle, distant, and he stood up. Amara lurched forward, clutching at his boot. "Fidelias," she said, pleading. "Please. It isn't too late. We could escape, now. Bring word back to the Crown and end this threat. You don't have to turn away. Not from Gaius. And..." She swallowed and blinked back tears. "And not from me."

There was a pained silence.

"The die is cast," Fidelias said, finally. "I'm sorry you couldn't be shown reason." He turned, jerking his leg from her grasp, and walked out of the tent.

Amara stared after him for a moment, then looked down, to where she had palmed the knife Fidelias always kept in his boot, the one he didn't think she knew about. She shot a glance up to the tent, and as soon as the flap fell, she started attacking the dirt that pinned her. She heard voices talking outside, too quietly to be understood, and she dug furiously.

Dirt flew. She broke it up with the knife and then frantically dug it away with her hands, shoving it away, making as little noise as she possibly could-but even so, her gasps for breath grew louder, bit by bit, as she dug.

Finally, she was able to move, just a little, to shove enough loose earth forward to wriggle. She reached out an arm and dug the knife into the ground as hard as she could and used it as a piton to pull herself forward, up. A sense of elation rushed through her as she strained and wriggled and finally started snaking her way free of the confining earth. Her ears sang with a rush of blood and excitement.

"Aldrick," snapped the water witch, from outside the tent. "The girl girl!"

Amara stumbled to her feet and looked around wildly. She lurched across the tent to grasp the hilt of a sword laying across a table, a light gladius little longer than her own forearm, and spun, her body still clumsy from its imprisonment, just as a dark shape filled the entry flap to the tent. She lunged out at it, muscles snapping together to drive the point of the sword in a vicious stroke at the heart of the figure in the doorway-Aldrick.

Steel glittered. Her blade met another and was swept aside. She felt her point bite flesh, but not much or deeply. She knew she had missed.

Amara threw herself to one side, as Aldrick's blade rose in a swift counter, and was unable to escape a cut that flashed a sudden, hot agony across her upper left arm. The girl rolled beneath a table and came up on the far side from Aldrick.

The big man came into the tent and stalked her, pausing across the table. "Nice lunge," he commented. "You pinked me. No one's done that since Araris Valerian." He smiled then, that wolfish show of teeth. "But you aren't Araris Valerian."

Amara never even saw Aldrick's blade move. There was a hissing hum, and then the table fell into two separate pieces. The man started toward her, through them.

Amara threw the gladius at him and saw his sword rise up to parry it aside. She dove for the back of the tent, now holding only the little knife, and with a quick move slashed a hole in the canvas. She slipped through it and heard herself whimpering in fear as she began to run.

She flashed a glance behind her as Aldrick's sword opened the back side of the tent in a pair of strokes and he came through after her. "Guards!" the swordsman bellowed. "Close the gate!"

Amara saw the gate start to swing shut, and she slipped to one side, ran down a row of white tents, gathering up her skirts in one hand, cursing that she hadn't seen fit to disguise herself as a boy so that she could have worn breeches. She looked behind her. Aldrick still pursued, but she had left him behind, like a doe outstripping a big slive, and she flashed a fierce smile at him.

Caked dirt fell off of her as she ran for the nearest wall, and she prayed that she could get enough of it off of her to call to Cirrus. A stepladder rose up to the wall's defensive platform in front of her, and she took it in three long strides, barely touching it with her hand.

One of the legionares legionares, a guard on the wall, turned toward her and blinked in shock at her. Amara made a ridge of her hand, let out a shout, and drove her hand into the man's throat, never slowing. He tumbled over backward, gagging and choking, and she ran past him, to the wall, and looked over.

Ten feet down to the ground level, and then another seven or eight feet of ditch lay beneath her. A crippling fall, if she didn't land correctly.

"Shoot!" someone shouted, and an arrow hissed toward her. Amara threw herself to the side, grasped the top of the wall with one hand, and vaulted it, throwing herself out into empty s.p.a.ce.

"Cirrus!" she called-and felt the stirring of wind around her, finally. Her fury pressed up against her, turned her body to a proper angle, and rushed down beneath her, so that she landed on a cloud of wind and blowing dust rather than on the hard ground of the ditch.

Amara gained her feet again and ran without looking back, stretching, covering the ground in leaps and bounds. She ran to the north and the east, away from the practice fields, away from the stream, away from where they had left the gargant and its supplies. The trees had been cut to make the walls of the encampment, and she had to run across nearly two hundred strides of broken stumps. Arrows fell around her, and one struck through a hanging fold of her skirts, nearly tripping her. She ran on, with the wind always at her back, Cirrus an invisible presence there.

Amara reached the shelter of the trees and paused, breathing hard, looking back over her shoulder.

The gates of the camp swung open, and two dozen men on horses, long spears gleaming, rode out and turned as a column, straight toward her. Aldrick rode at their head, dwarfing the riders nearest him.

Amara turned and ran on through the trees as fast as she could. The branches sighed and moaned around her, leaves whispering, shadows moving and changing ominously around her. The furies of this forest were not friendly to her-which made sense, given the presence of at least one powerful wood-crafter. She would never be able to hide from them in this forest, when the trees themselves would report her position.

"Cirrus," Amara gasped. "Up!"

The wind gathered beneath her and pushed her up off the ground-but branches wove together above her, moving as swiftly as human hands joining together and presented her with a solid screen. Amara let out a cry and crashed against that living ceiling, then tumbled back to the ground. Cirrus softened her fall with an apologetic whisper against her ear.

Amara looked left and right, but the trees were joining branches everywhere-and the forest was growing darker as the roof of leaf and bough closed overhead. The beating of hooves came through the trees.

Amara struggled back to her feet, the cut on her arm pounding painfully. Then she started running again, as the hors.e.m.e.n closed in, behind her.

She couldn't have guessed how far she ran. Later, she only remembered the threatening shadows of the trees and a burning fire in her lungs and her limbs that even Cirrus's aid couldn't ease. Terror changed to simple excitement, and that transformed, by degrees, to a sort of exhausted lack of concern.

She ran until she suddenly found herself looking back-and into the eyes of a mounted legionare legionare, not twenty feet away. The man shouted and cast his spear at her. She stumbled out of the path of the weapon and away from the horseman, into a sudden flood of suns.h.i.+ne. She looked ahead of her and found the ground sloping down for no more than three or four strides, and then ending in a sheer cliff that dropped off so abruptly that she could not see how far down it went or what was at the bottom.

The legionare legionare drew his sword in a rasp of steel and called to his horse. The animal responded as an extension of the man's body and pounded toward her. drew his sword in a rasp of steel and called to his horse. The animal responded as an extension of the man's body and pounded toward her.

Amara turned without hesitation and threw herself off of the cliff.

She spread her arms and screamed, "Cirrus! Up!" The wind gathered beneath her in a rush, as her fury flew to obey, and she felt a sudden, fierce exultation as, with a screaming whistle of gale winds, she shot up, up into the autumn skies, her wake kicking up dust devils along the ridge that cast dirt up in the face of the unfortunate legionare legionare and set his horse to rearing and kicking in confusion. and set his horse to rearing and kicking in confusion.

She flew on, up and away from the camp and paused after a time to look behind her. The cliff she'd leapt from looked like a toy from there, several miles behind her and one below. "Cirrus," she murmured, and held her hands before her. The fury gusted and swirled a part of itself into that s.p.a.ce, quivering like the waves rising from a hot stone.

Amara shaped that air with her hands, bending the light, until she was peering back at the cliff through her spread hands as though she stood no more than a hundred yards away. She saw the hunting party emerge and Aldrick dismount. The legionare legionare who had seen her described her escape, and Aldrick squinted up at the sky, sweeping his eyes left to right. Amara felt a chill as the man's gaze paused, directly upon her. He tilted his head to the man beside him, the wood-crafter Knight from before, and the man simply touched one of the trees. who had seen her described her escape, and Aldrick squinted up at the sky, sweeping his eyes left to right. Amara felt a chill as the man's gaze paused, directly upon her. He tilted his head to the man beside him, the wood-crafter Knight from before, and the man simply touched one of the trees.

Amara swallowed and swept her hands back toward the rebel Legion's camp.

Half a dozen forms rose up over the treetops, which swayed and danced beneath the winds, as though they had been the bushes in a holt-wife's herb garden. They turned, and as one, they sped toward her. Sun glinted off of steel-armor and weapons, she knew.

"Knights Aeris," muttered Amara. She swallowed and let her hands fall. Normally, she would have been confident of her ability to outrun them. But now, wounded, and already exhausted in body and spirit, she was not so sure.

Amara turned and bade Cirrus to bear her north and east-and prayed that the sun would set before her foes caught up to her.

Chapter 3

Tavi slipped out of his room, down the stairs, and through the silence of the last shreds of night before dawn. He entered the cavernous shadows of the great hall, noting a faint glow of light in the kitchens beside the great hall. Old Bitte rarely slept more than a few hours a night, and Tavi heard her moving through the kitchen, preparing it for the coming breakfast meal.

He unbolted the door and left the great hall for Bernard-holt's courtyard. One of the stead-holt's dogs lifted his head from the empty barrel he used as a kennel, and Tavi stooped to scratch the old hound's ears. The dog thumped his tail against the barrel's interior and laid his head back down to sleep. Tavi drew his cloak over his shoulders against the chill of the dying autumn night and opened the postern door to leave the safety of Bernard-holt.

The door opened to reveal his uncle Bernard, leaning casually against the doorway, dressed in leathers and a heavy green cloak for a day in the wilderness beyond the stead-holt's fields. He lifted an apple to his mouth and crunched into it. Bernard was a large man with broad shoulders and the heavy muscles of hard labor. His dark hair, cropped close in a Legion cut, showed a fleck or two of grey, though none such appeared in his close-trimmed beard. He wore a quiver of hunting arrows at his side, riding beside his Legion-issued sword, and he carried the stave to the lightest of his bows unstrung in his hand.

Tavi drew up short, with a flutter of apprehension. Then he spread his hands, silently conceding the victory to Bernard, and then offered his uncle a faint smile. "How did you know?"

Bernard returned the smile, though there was a wary cast to it. "Fade saw you drinking a lot of extra water last night, after you came in so late, and pointed it out to me. It's an old soldier's trick to get up early."

"Oh," Tavi said. "Yes, sir." "Oh," Tavi said. "Yes, sir." "I counted the flocks," Bernard said. "Looks like we might be a few heads short." "I counted the flocks," Bernard said. "Looks like we might be a few heads short." "Yes, sir," Tavi said. He licked his lips nervously. "I'm going to bring them in now." "Yes, sir," Tavi said. He licked his lips nervously. "I'm going to bring them in now." "I was under the impression that you had done so last night. Since you marked down a full count on the tally slate." "I was under the impression that you had done so last night. Since you marked down a full count on the tally slate."

Tavi's cheeks grew warm, and he felt glad for the dimness. "Dodger led his ewes and their lambs out last night, when I was trying to bring the south flock in. I didn't want you to worry."

Bernard shook his head. "Tavi, you know that today is important. The other Stead-holders will be arriving for the truth-find, and I don't need any distractions."

"I'm sorry, Uncle. Why don't you stay here, then? I can find Dodger and bring him back in." "I'm sorry, Uncle. Why don't you stay here, then? I can find Dodger and bring him back in." "I don't like you wandering around the valley alone, Tavi." "I don't like you wandering around the valley alone, Tavi." "I'm going to have to eventually, uncle. Unless you planned on following me around for the rest of my life." "I'm going to have to eventually, uncle. Unless you planned on following me around for the rest of my life." Bernard sighed. "Your aunt would murder me." Bernard sighed. "Your aunt would murder me." Tavi gritted his teeth. "I can do it by myself. I'll be careful and be back before noon." Tavi gritted his teeth. "I can do it by myself. I'll be careful and be back before noon." "That's not really the point. You were supposed to bring them in last night," Bernard said. "What kept you from it?" "That's not really the point. You were supposed to bring them in last night," Bernard said. "What kept you from it?" Tavi swallowed. "Um. I'd promised to do someone a favor. I didn't have time to get them both done before dark." Tavi swallowed. "Um. I'd promised to do someone a favor. I didn't have time to get them both done before dark."

Bernard sighed. "Crows, Tavi. I really thought you had done a lot of growing up this season. That you were learning to handle responsibility."

Tavi felt suddenly sick to his stomach. "You're not going to gift me the sheep, are you?"

Bernard said, "I don't begrudge you getting your fair dues. I was glad-I am am glad to help you get started with your own flock. But I'm not just going to throw them away. If you can't show me that you'll take care of them properly, I can't give them to you." glad to help you get started with your own flock. But I'm not just going to throw them away. If you can't show me that you'll take care of them properly, I can't give them to you."

"It isn't like I'd be keeping them long."

"Perhaps not. It's the principle of the thing, lad. Nothing comes free."

"But Uncle Uncle," Tavi protested. "It's my only only chance to make something of myself." chance to make something of myself."

Bernard grunted. "Then you probably shouldn't have chosen to..." He frowned. "Tavi, what did did you need to do that was more important than the flocks?" you need to do that was more important than the flocks?"

Tavi's face grew warmer yet. "Um." Tavi's face grew warmer yet. "Um." Bernard arched an eyebrow and said, "Oh, I see." Bernard arched an eyebrow and said, "Oh, I see." "See what?" "See what?" "There's a girl." "There's a girl." Tavi knelt and tightened the straps on his boots to hide his scowl and said, "Why would you say that?" Tavi knelt and tightened the straps on his boots to hide his scowl and said, "Why would you say that?" "You're a fifteen-year-old boy, Tavi. There's always a girl." "You're a fifteen-year-old boy, Tavi. There's always a girl." "No, there isn't," Tavi insisted. "No, there isn't," Tavi insisted.

Bernard mused over that for a moment and shrugged. "When you want to talk about it, let me know." He pushed himself off the wall with one shoulder and strung his bow with one leg and the pressure of an arm. "We'll discuss your gifting later. Where do you think we should pick up Dodger's trail?"

Tavi drew his leather sling from his pouch and put a couple of smooth stones into the pocket of his tunic. "Won't Brutus be able to find him?"

Bernard smiled. "I thought you said you could do this on your own."

Tavi frowned at his uncle and scrunched up his nose, thinking. "Cold's coming on, and they know it. They'll want evergreens for shelter and for food. But the gargants were turned out to forage on the southern slope of the valley, and they won't go anywhere near gargants if they can help it." Tavi nodded. "North. Dodger has taken them into the pine hollows over the causeway."

Bernard nodded in approval. "Good. Remember that fury-crafting is no subst.i.tute for intelligence, Tavi."

"And intelligence is no subst.i.tute for a fury," Tavi muttered sourly. He kicked at the ground, scuffing up a small cloud of dust and dried, dead gra.s.ses.

Bernard laid a heavy hand on Tavi's shoulder, squeezed, and then started walking north, down the old lane worn by the pa.s.sage of carts and draft animals and feet. "It's not as bad as you think, Tavi. Furies aren't everything."

"Says the man with two of them," Tavi said, following him. "Aunt Isana says you could challenge for full Citizens.h.i.+p if you wanted to."

Bernard shrugged. "If I wanted to, perhaps. But I didn't come into my furies until I was almost your age."

"But you were a slow bloomer," Tavi said. "I'm way past that. No one's ever ever been my age and furyless." been my age and furyless."

Bernard sighed. "You don't know that, Tavi. Relax, boy. It will come to you in time."

"That's what you've told me since I was ten. If I'd had furies of my own, I could have stopped Dodger and still..." He choked down his anger before he could blurt out the words.

Uncle Bernard glanced back at Tavi, smiling with only his eyes. "Come on, lad. Let's pick up the pace. I need to be back before the other Stead-holders arrive."