Sword of the Bright Lady Read online

  “I wanted to thank you, Pater,” he stammered out.

  Christopher tried to think of something appropriate to say. “It was no more than she deserved.”

  “Dereth says when I come back from the war, he’ll make me a smith. Then Dynae and I can get married,” the boy offered for his approval.

  “That sounds good.” Christopher was not sure what else he was supposed to say. Then he thought of something. “When are you going to be drafted?”

  “Next winter, Pater,” the boy said mournfully. “And I’m afraid—I mean, I’m worried that I might never see Dynae again. Begging your pardon, Goodman,” he said to Karl, “but I don’t think I can measure up to you.”

  “It is not character you need, but luck,” Karl said.

  “Don’t worry, lad,” Svengusta said. “No one is expected to measure up to Karl. A single term is all we are asking, not two.”

  “Two?” Christopher said. “You were drafted twice?”

  “The second time I volunteered,” Karl said. “Afterwards, Saint Krellyan made me a civil servant, to prevent a third term. As Quarter-Master of the draft, I now send others to die in my place.”

  “Two terms, and you still don’t have any rank?” That did not bode well for Christopher’s plan of advancement.

  “He was offered promotion,” Svengusta said. “He turned it down.”

  “I have my reasons,” Karl said. “They are not worth your time.”

  Christopher scratched his chin to cover over the awkward pause in the conversation. “Well,” he said to the boy, “then you and I are to be comrades-in-arms. I’ll be part of that draft, and I swear I’ll do what I can to make sure you come back.”

  “Truth, Pater?” the boy asked with astonishment. “They drafted you? But you’re old!”

  Svengusta cackled at Christopher and shooed the boy off. “Go on to bed, son,” he said. “He’ll be here for the rest of the year for you to gawk at, but your chores won’t do themselves on the morrow.”

  In the chapel, getting ready for sleep, Helga’s doe eyes were like beacons. Karl sat on her bed and smiled at her while she stripped off his boots. Christopher and Svengusta retired to their own room, where they had to remove their boots by themselves. Disturbed by the quiet sounds in the next room, Christopher cast his arm over his bed, but there was nothing to hold.

  7.

  PUBLIC RELATIONS

  The next several days passed swiftly, if not painlessly. Spooked by the duel and the upcoming draft, Christopher had become obsessed with sword practice. Karl was always willing and sparred with daunting relentlessness even after a hard day’s ride. The regime left little time for self-reflection. What time there was, Christopher spent considering how out of shape he was compared to these people. Unending hard labor was a personal trainer no gym could hope to match. He was a bit relieved when Karl eventually decided that he should be heading back to town. Christopher decided to go along to see what he could buy. The village didn’t even have a forge of its own.

  “I will escort you for the day and keep you out of harm’s way. But you no longer need me here in the village.” Karl had conceded that Christopher now understood the basics of riding and just required practice. For his part, Karl already had learned half of what Christopher, the kendo black belt, could teach about swordsmanship. The other half he’d started out knowing.

  Dawn had hardly happened by the time they were out of the village. Karl delayed for nothing so trivial as a hot breakfast. But the clear road gave Christopher a chance to talk. Not having to duck tree branches or dodge fences made conversation possible.

  “Thank you for the fencing lessons,” he said to Karl. “I’ve found them incredibly helpful.”

  Karl’s shoulder twitched, which would have been a shrug on any less tightly wound man.

  “Seriously,” Christopher said, “I’m better than I ever was. I can’t believe how much difference a week of practice has made.”

  “It is not practice,” Karl said. “It is the rank.”

  Christopher paused, looking for the right words. Finally he gave up and said, “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Skill at arms is one of the privileges of rank,” Karl explained, “and it gets worse. You want to know what it’s like to be fifth rank? I’ll close my eyes next time we spar. Then you’ll know what a fifth rank feels when facing common men.”

  Healing, magic, and now skill? The benefits of tael seemed insurmountable. No ordinary man could hope to best someone with that kind of advantage. The only thing they could do against a foe like that would be to overwhelm him with numbers, at terrible cost.

  “Are there fifth ranks in the war, then?”

  “Yes, and worse,” Karl said without emotion. “Let me explain the nature of war. The power of great rank is such that whoever strikes first usually wins. Thus, a battle is a game of hide-and-seek between ranks. The commoners are cast onto the field like sounding stones, to reveal the position of the enemy powers. They do this by dying. To see a crowd of men clashing together with steel means nothing; to see bodies exploding in pieces signifies the presence of rank.”

  Trying to overwhelm super-swordsmen with mass formations wouldn’t work any better than cavalry charges had against machine guns. “What about bows?” Christopher asked. “Can’t you just get a bunch of archers to shoot the high ranks to death from a safe distance?”

  “Bows are unpopular. Slay a foe at range, and someone else might take his head and his tael before you can claim it.

  “Also, bows are expensive,” Karl added, sourly. “The Saint will spend thirty gold to equip each boy called to the draft. A crossbow costs thirty-five.”

  Christopher was alarmed to realize how much his horse and sword would stand out. “What do they get, then?”

  Karl barked what might have been a laugh. “That’s the business I’ve been avoiding. Traditionally, each boy is given a spear, a shield, a helm, and a studded tunic.” Noticing Christopher’s questioning look, he explained. “Studded is leather armor with metal discs sewn in, to give the pretension of a chance to turn a sharp blade.”

  “Traditionally?”

  “Studs are expensive. The armorers charge Krellyan twenty gold for each suit. Replacing it with plain leather would save fifteen gold per boy. With the money saved, Krellyan could send another priest out with the draftees. An extra healer is going to save a lot more lives than that stupid, useless armor.”

  “So, why not send them out with leather?” Christopher asked. It seemed like an innocent question.

  “What? You would send our boys naked to the war?” Karl snarled. “The people wouldn’t stand for it. They think the armor helps. They think it protects the boys. You can’t tell them it only protects their own pride, to pretend that they are not sacrificing their sons without hope. To suggest such a thing would be unthinkable. Only an immensely popular man could change our vaunted tradition, and he wouldn’t be very popular afterward.”

  A sad realization crept into Christopher’s mind. “So what Krellyan needs is a war hero. A man so concerned with the safety of his fellow soldiers that he’d sacrifice his popularity. But of course, he has to have lots of experience on the battlefield, so people believe he knows what he’s talking about. He has to have the personal bravery to have done what he’s asking others to do. And of course he has to be a commoner if he’s going to take something away from the commoners. Where do you suppose he could find such a man?”

  They rode in silence for a while.

  “Krellyan is a hard master,” Christopher said softly. No wonder Karl took no notice of his popularity. He expected it to be a temporary condition.

  Karl snorted. “Not as hard as I would be. I’d send them out with nothing but slings and spears. The rest of it’s useless, anyway. Don’t you see,” Karl said with a deep and inexhaustible bitterness, “they’re right. Commoners really are as useless as stones. If they bunch up in pike squares, one spell kills them all. If they spread out with bows, the knigh
ts mow them down like blades of grass. All they can do is die, preferably loudly, and hope someone important noticed.”

  Christopher could not share Karl’s defeatism. Hobilar’s enhanced vitality had only stopped a few blows from a stick; it would count for nothing in the teeth of a cannon. Gunpowder here would have the same effect on the nobility as it had on Earth.

  “When are you going to give the armorers the bad news?” Christopher asked, wanting to know how long he had to convince them to spend it on something new.

  “As late as possible, so they can’t do anything about it. When I finally give out the contracts for the leather, too late for the studding to be done, I’ll be pilloried in every town as incompetent, dishonorable, and insensitive to boot. Then Krellyan will pacify them by sending out a third priest.”

  Christopher suddenly understood why he was being told all this. The depth of Krellyan’s opportunism was made clear. “I’m the third priest, aren’t I?”

  Karl gave him a grin that challenged the snowy fields for the title of “wintry.” “You’re sharper than a slice of bread, Pater. When the complaints have reached their limit, the Saint will placate the people with your head, and you will be the darling of the hour.”

  “And you’ll be Karl the screw-up instead of Karl the brave,” Christopher said.

  “If you save one boy’s life,” Karl grated, “I’ll count the trade fairly done.”

  Christopher was hoping to save a lot of lives. He had no idea who the enemy was, but if the war had lasted all of Cardinal Faren’s life, then the two sides must be evenly matched. Christopher was pretty sure he could tilt the balance.

  On the other hand, tradition was a strong force, as evidenced by the machinations the Saint and Karl were going through to change the simplest of arrangements. Christopher would need vast quantities of genius, diplomacy, and money to revolutionize this society in under a year. What he had was a recipe for gunpowder from a TV show, the ability to insult people without speaking their language, and the change in his pockets.

  He hadn’t had a chance to take stock of his resources yet. There always seemed to be something more important to do, like avoid being stabbed to death. Here, on the placid ride to town on the gentle back of the broad, strong horse, he dug under his borrowed, tattered cloak and priestly robes to see what he had brought with him.

  The answer was not much. Two quarters and a key. The shiny quarters were only nickel cladding over copper. Passing them off as silver pieces would be an act of counterfeiting, and he had committed enough crimes already.

  His truck key was aluminum, which might be worth something, if they knew what aluminum was. He seemed to recall it was valuable in Napoleon’s day, but he didn’t know if medieval smiths even knew of its existence.

  “Who would be interested in curiosities from other worlds?”

  Karl’s face darkened.

  “No one sane.”

  Popularizing technology might be harder than he thought.

  “That is to say,” Karl continued, “only a wizard, and you would be foolish to deal with them at all. I would suggest selling it to the first magician you see, at whatever price he offers, and forgetting about it. Talk of other worlds can only lead to trouble.”

  “Why is that?” Christopher asked.

  “Because only monsters live in the outer planes, and not by choice. They are banished there, by the powers of the gods, constantly plotting and scheming to trick some poor mortal into opening a pathway here so they may slaughter and plunder.”

  Saint Krellyan seemed to have been proven right. Chatting about the ancestral home of Man was not likely to win him any friends or influence.

  “It’s just something I picked up in my travels,” Christopher said. “But if you think it’s dangerous, then a wizard might think it’s valuable.”

  “You are a priest of the White now,” Karl said. “You cannot misrepresent the facts, even by omission. Do not spoil your affiliation before you have discharged your duties to the army.”

  Christopher wanted to ask what he meant, but that would likely lead to Karl asking him why he didn’t already know, and that might lead to questions Christopher didn’t want to answer, especially if he couldn’t dissemble. Questions like where he and the strange metal had come from in the first place.

  “Fair enough,” he said.

  Karl pursed his lips, as if he had said too much already. Christopher felt a twinge of sympathy. It was clearly not normal for the young commoner to spend so much time explaining basic facts to an older, ranked priest. It must disturb his view of the world.

  But then, Christopher had his own disquiets. Wracking poverty on an alien world was only one of them. His thumb went to his last asset, idly spinning it on his finger. A plain gold wedding band. It was the only physical link he had to his wife and the life he had left behind.

  A life in disarray by now. How long had he been here? By now they would have found his truck abandoned at the river, his dogs waiting patiently by its side. The police would be unsympathetic; only another husband run off in the middle of the night. She would not believe that. She would wait for him, as she had for all the long years before they met. As he had waited, unaware of what he was waiting for until it burst on him like a surprise party in a darkened room, and afterwards all was chaos and joy.

  And now she would sleep in a cold bed, without even knowing the reason why. The pain of it struck at his heart with the force of an ax. By comparison Hobilar’s many hurts had been mere pinpricks. He doubled over, clutching at the pommel of the saddle in impotent rage. He would suffer a thousand more cuts, cripple a thousand more Hobilars if he had to.

  “Are you unwell?” Karl asked from across the road.

  “My apologies,” Christopher answered. “I was thinking of the difficulties ahead.”

  “Fair enough,” Karl said.

  After they had stabled, watered, fed, and rubbed down their horses—a horse wasn’t like a car you could just park—they went into the church. Karl turned Christopher over to a lanky young man who introduced himself as Pater Stephram.

  “If you wish to draw on your account,” Stephram told him, “you will need to speak to the Vicar Rana. Be warned that while you consider the money to be your own to spend as you like, the Vicar may have other ideas.”

  A troublesome notion. Christopher frowned, and Stephram good-naturedly offered an explanation.

  “Some of us thought to have a celebratory dinner, in honor of the return of the Church of Marcius. When we went to apply for an advance on our salary, the Vicar denied us and set us to double watch-hours as well.”

  “I’m sorry,” Christopher said.

  “You have no need to apologize for that,” the young man said graciously. “Although when the girls caught sight of Hobilar and his maimed arm, they lost their taste for merriment. So the evening would have been futile.”

  By this time they had passed several other white-robed members of the Church, whose average age seemed about half of Christopher’s. This included at least one attractive young woman who captured Stephram’s discreet gaze long enough to interrupt their conversation. The ambience was much like being back in college.

  At least until his fellow priests and priestesses caught sight of his sword. Then their smiles turned uncertain. Christopher was surprised the first few times, because he had forgotten he was wearing the thing. The realization that he was comfortable enough with the sword to forget it made him no happier.

  Stephram abandoned Christopher at the Vicar’s office. Briefly Christopher considered retreating until he could divest himself of the sword, but it was too late. Stephram had opened the door and waved him inside.

  The Vicar was the stout woman he had seen on his first trip to the church. She had been alarmed to see him then; now she seemed positively wary.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, indicating his sword with an open-handed gesture.

  “You need not apologize for that,” she answered. “It is the symbol of your d
evotion. But if you are looking for faults to apologize for, I can give you a definite, if inexhaustive, list.”

  Christopher winced. “I didn’t mean to cripple him.”

  “Again you apologize for the wrong reason. Hobilar must look to Krellyan for succor now, and that may be the only thing that can draw that man into the light.”

  “What should I apologize for?”

  “Dueling in the first place, and winning in the second. Had you lost, Krellyan would have made good your ransom, as he has too much invested in you already. Hobilar would be satisfied instead of enraged, the townsfolk would soon forget the affair instead of gossiping day and night, and the world would roll on undisturbed. Instead you lay your stiff neck in front of the wagon of the world like a log, either to jolt us all or see it crushed.”

  Christopher wanted to apologize again, but he bit his tongue. He was planning on putting a lot more bumps in the road. He changed the subject instead.

  “I was wondering if I could withdraw some money against my salary.”

  “Why would the Church of the Bright Lady pay a priest of Marcius a salary?”

  He found himself gritting his teeth and forced his jaw to relax.

  “How am I to survive, then?”

  “You have funds,” she answered. “At our expense, since we will never recover the money from Hobilar. In any case you need only survive until the end of the year. Then the King will feed and clothe you, although admittedly not in the best style.”

  Christopher had other plans for that money. He stood, fuming silently.

  “Understand,” the Vicar said, “I could feed a peasant family for a decade on what Krellyan has given you for Hobilar’s ransom. Long enough for a boy to grow into a farmer, or a girl to become a wife. If you wish to parade around in horse and armor, you will find no sympathy from me.”

  She stared back at him, defying him to refute her logic.

  But he couldn’t.

  “I understand,” he said. “Still, I need money.” The horse would need to be fed, at the very least.

  “Of course,” she said. “You will not want to live solely off of Svengusta’s charity.”