‘Ah. I had not considered that.’
‘No more conversation for the moment, tutor. You must partake of this broth — your pallor is far too white for my liking.’
‘Of course, sergeant. Thank you.’
I should have swung harder.
When Arathan awoke again she was gone from his side. His head ached, a throbbing pain behind his forehead that made both eyes hurt as he blinked the sleep away. He listened to people moving about in the camp, heard the snort of Calaras, a heavy sound that seemed to thud into the hard ground and stay there, trembling earth and stones. There was the smell of smoke and cooking. Though the morning sun was warm, still he shivered beneath his blankets.
The events of the day before and of the night past were confused in his mind. He remembered blood, and the crowding round of people. Faces, looking down on him, had the appearance of masks, blank of expression but ready for cruelty. Recalling the blood on his face, he felt a return of the shame that had dogged him since leaving House Dracons.
Yet seeping through such emotions there was ecstasy, and for Feren there was no mask, only darkness filled with warmth and then heat, a spicy realm of quick breaths and soft flesh. He had known nothing like it before; oh, he had been spilling into his sheets for a few years now, and there had been pleasure in reaching such release, but he had imagined this to be a private indulgence, until such time as he was old enough and ready to make a child, although that concept was vague in its details.
Vague no longer. He wondered if her belly would now swell, making her movements ponderous and her moods mercurial — soldiers’ talk among his sparring partners suggested as much. ‘ They become impossible, don’t they? A woman with child has armour in her eyes and triumph in her soul. Abyss help us all.’
He heard the thump of boots drawing closer and turned his head to see Sergeant Raskan arrive.
‘Arathan, you have your wits about you?’
He nodded.
‘It was decided to let you sleep — we shall be riding today, though not as hard as perhaps your father would like. In any case, if you are able, we intend to reach the river this day. Now, a meal awaits you.’
Arathan sat up and looked across to where the Borderswords had their cookfire. He could see only Rint and Feren. Ville and Galak were nowhere in evidence. A quick search of the camp revealed that Sagander too had gone missing. Sudden dread filled him. ‘Sergeant — the tutor — did he die?’ Are they off raising a cairn?
‘No,’ Raskan replied. ‘He is being taken to Abara Delack, where he will remain until our return. They left early this morning.’
Once more, bitter shame flooded through him. Unable to meet Raskan’s gaze, he stood, drawing the blankets round him. The scene spun momentarily and then steadied before his eyes, the pain in his skull fierce enough to make him gasp.
Raskan stepped closer to lend a supporting arm, but Arathan stepped away. ‘I am fine, thank you, sergeant. Where is the latrine trench?’
‘Over there. Beware the pit’s edge — it was hastily dug.’
‘I will,’ Arathan replied, setting off.
His father was tending to Calaras and had not yet looked over, nor did Arathan expect him to. His son had ruined the life of a loyal tutor, a man long in his employ. Sagander’s excitement upon discovering he would be making this journey now returned to Arathan with a bitter sting. It was no wonder Draconus was furious.
The latrine pit was behind some bracken and as he edged round the spiny bushes he halted in his tracks. The pit was shallow and indeed rough.
Sagander’s leg was lying in it like an offering, in a nest of blood-soaked cloths. Others had been here since and their wastes smeared the pallid, lifeless flesh.
Arathan stared at the mangled limb, the bared foot white as snow, motionless as the day’s first flies crawled upon it, the hard, misshapen nails yellow as the petals of the gorse flowers, the deflated tracks of veins and arteries grey beneath the thin skin. At the other end jutted splintered bone, surrounded in hacked flesh. Bruises had spread down around the knee.
Pulling his gaze away, he stepped round the edge of the pit, and continued on through gaps in the bracken for a few more paces.
Of course they would bury it, as the camp was packed up. But scavengers would find it none the less. Foxes, crows, wild dogs. As soon as the wind picked up and carried off the smell of blood and death, long after he and his companions had left, the creatures would draw close, to begin digging.
He listened to his stream splash through spiny twigs and sharp leaves, and he thought back to the last hand that had touched him down there. The stream dwindled quickly. Cursing under his breath, Arathan closed his eyes and concentrated on the pain rocking back and forth inside his skull. Moments later he was able to resume.
As he made his way back to the camp he saw Rint standing nearby, a short-handled spade resting on one shoulder. The huge man nodded, his eyes thinning as he studied Arathan for a long moment, before setting off to fill in the latrine pit.
At the cookfire, Feren was scraping food on to a tin plate. Raskan had joined Lord Draconus with the horses. Pulling the blanket tighter Arathan made his way to the woman.
She glanced up, but only briefly, as she handed him the plate.
He wanted to say something, so that she would look at him, meet his eyes, but it was clear, after a moment, that she had no desire to acknowledge him. I wasn’t very good. I did it all wrong. She is disappointed. Embarrassed by me. He carried his plate off a little distance to break his fast.
Raskan strode over, leading Besra. ‘This one today, Arathan.’
‘I understand.’
The sergeant frowned. And then shook his head. ‘I don’t think you do. Hellar is returned to your care. You have found your warhorse, a true destrier. But she needs to walk some on her own, to work out the violence that your touch might well incite all over again. She is to wonder — by your inattention — if she has failed you. Later this day you will go to her and take the saddle, and she will be relieved.
‘Speak to her then, Arathan, words of comfort and satisfaction. She will know their meaning by the breaths upon which those words reach her. To communicate with a horse, think of truth as a river — never fight the current. Ride it into the beast’s heart.’
Uncertain as to the sergeant’s meaning, Arathan nevertheless nodded.
Raskan handed him the reins. ‘Now, give me that empty plate — it is good to see that you are with appetite — and go to your father. He wishes to speak with you.’
He had known that this moment was coming. As he set out, pulling Besra after him, Raskan said, ‘Hold, Arathan…’ and he took the blanket from the boy’s shoulders. ‘I will tie this up.’ He half smiled. ‘You had the look of a peasant.’
A peasant. Yes. About to stand shamefaced before his lord.
‘Mount up,’ said his father when he reached him. ‘To begin this day, you ride at my side, Arathan.’
‘Yes sir.’
He felt weak pulling himself into the saddle, and as he settled his feet into the stirrups a clammy sweat broke out, and he realized that he was not wearing his armour or his helmet. ‘Sir, I am unarmoured-’
‘For now, yes. Rint has your gear. We shall take the lead on the trail. Come.’
The sensation was strange — to be riding at his father’s side — and he felt hopelessly awkward, displaying none of the ease that seemed so much a part of Draconus.
‘Sagander owes you his life,’ his father said.
‘Sir?’
‘Twice, in fact. Though stunned by his blow, you still had the wits to pull Hellar away. Your horse would have crushed the fool’s skull with a single stamp, shattering it like an urthen egg. That was well done. But it is the second time you saved his life of which I will speak.’
‘Sir, I misspoke-’
‘You wondered if you were my weakness, Arathan. There is no dishonour in that question. How could there be? The matter concerns your life, after all. Is it not your right to wonder at your place in the world? Furthermore, it was perceptive — and this encourages me.’