War Maid's Choice-ARC Read online

  “I’d imagine it has something to do with, oh, I don’t know...the fact that you understand ‘something like this’ better than any of the rest of us?”

  Leeana snorted, but she had to concede that Garlahna had probably put her finger on it. There weren’t many—in fact, she admitted, there weren’t any—other war maids with her perspective on the internal workings of the aristocracy and its obligations under the Kingdom’s laws and traditions. That made her the logical person to “informally” discuss minor points of contention with Trisu before they turned into formal complaints. Once it reached the complaint stage, someone older and more senior would be sent to handle the matter, but Mayor Yalith had gotten into the habit of using Leeana to keep things from ever getting to that point. Of course, there was the minor fact that the mayor couldn’t possibly have found an envoy who would have been more offensive to Trisu’s prejudices. Which, Leeana had suspected a time or two, might well be another reason she kept getting selected for these little visits.

  I do wish the mayor could find another way to tweak Trisu’s nose, she thought moodily, her arm moving rhythmically while she continued to rub Boots down. Not that I don’t sympathize with her. And not that she isn’t making a valid point, for that matter. War maids aren’t supposed to cater to the prejudices of our male “betters,” and sending someone Trisu has to be polite to despite himself is one way to underscore that for him. Unfortunately, understanding what she’s doing doesn’t make it any more pleasant to be her clue stick.

  “I’ll talk to him about it tomorrow,” she said out loud.

  “Try not to do it until after breakfast,” Garlahna advised. “That’s the most important meal of the day, you know. I’d hate for you to lose your appetite that early.”

  * * *

  “Welcome, Arm Shahana,” Trisu Pickaxe said as Warblade personally ushered Shahana into his spartan, whitewashed office high in Thalar Keep’s central tower.

  “Thank you, Milord,” she replied. As much as she and Trisu grated on one another’s nerves, he was always punctiliously polite whenever they met. And he was apparently the only man in all of Lorham who could remember the proper form of address for one of Lillinara’s champions.

  “May I offer you refreshment?” Trisu continued, waving one hand at the small side table, where a bottle of Dwarvenhame whiskey and two crystal glasses kept company with a moisture-beaded pitcher of beer and a much larger beer stein. At least he’d learned that much about her, she thought.

  “That would be most welcome, Milord,” she replied with a slight smile, and he personally and expertly poured beer into the stein and handed it to her. She sipped with unfeigned pleasure, since Trisu had one of the better brewmasters she’d ever encountered.

  “This is good, Milord,” she acknowledged.

  “I’m pleased you like it,” he replied with a genuine smile. Then he waved her into the chair facing his desk and waited until she sat before seating himself once more. “May I ask to what I owe the pleasure of your visit?”

  “Nothing earth shattering...this time, Milord.” Shahana smiled thinly. “The Voice knew I had business in Kalatha, and she asked me to stop by and visit you while I was in the vicinity. She wanted me to extend her respects, and to tell you Quaysar expects a very good harvest this year, if the weather holds fair. She hopes to be able to make good on the taxes you so graciously deferred last fall.”

  “It’s good of her to take the trouble to inform me of that,” Trisu replied.

  He took a sip from his own glass of whiskey, and Shahana wondered if it was to erase the taste of that courteous response from his mouth. Then she scolded herself. No, he didn’t like the war maids, and he would have been far happier if Quaysar had lain in someone else’s wardenship, but she’d never heard an overtly discourteous word out of him. Bluntness that verged on rudeness, sometimes, for he was a plainspoken, almost painfully honest man who took a certain pride in being that way, but never deliberate discourtesy.

  “Please inform the Voice that there’s no urgency in making up last year’s shortfall,” he continued after a moment. “Bad harvests can happen to anyone, but it looks like a good harvest for almost everyone this year if, as you say, the weather holds. That’s what I’m hearing from my bailiffs, at any rate, which means we’re anticipating a strong income stream, and I realize the Temple has yet to fully recover.” He smiled thinly. “Given the way events almost worked out, I fully understand that her treasury is still under considerable pressure.”

  “Thank you, Milord.”

  It was a bit difficult for Shahana to get the words out in a normal tone as Trisu reminded her of how close the Quaysar temple of Lillinara had come to total disaster. He was right about the strain the temple’s treasury had been under ever since, although that pressure was finally beginning to ease, thank the Goddess! But the last several years have been hard ones in the wake of Shīgū’s devastating attack.

  And the real reason you’re pissed off by Trisu’s “understanding tone” isn’t just because he was right all along when he claimed there was something seriously wrong in Quaysar, either. It’s because Dame Kaeritha got the call to straighten that entire mess out instead of you, isn’t it?

  She didn’t much like admitting that. In fact, she was self-honest enough to know she spent as much of her time as she could not admitting it. That, unfortunately, didn’t make it untrue.

  No, it doesn’t. But, dammit, we should have seen what was happening, and the Mother should have sent one of Her arms to deal with it!

  The thought flashed through her mind, and she raised her stein, taking another long swallow of the clean, rich tasting beer to hide her expression while she dealt with it.

  The truth was that Lillinara’s arms wouldn’t have been remotely as well equipped as Dame Kaeritha had been to deal with the assault on the Quaysar temple, and Shahana knew it. Arms of the Mother, like Shahana herself, were trained warriors, but Shahana wasn’t remotely Kaeritha Seldansdaughter’s equal in that respect. Partly that was because of the difference in the deities they served, of course; Tomanāk was the god of war, after all! His champions were primarily warriors, but that function was secondary for most arms.

  Most arms, as Shahana herself had, heard Lillinara’s voice early in life and began as arms of the Maiden—students, scholars, and explorers taking their first steps on the road of life, studying and learning in order to prepare themselves for greater responsibilities in the course of time. The majority of them eventually became arms of the Mother, although not all ever made that transition. The ones who didn’t tended to become the Church’s librarians, researchers, and scribes or sometimes envoys, but they certainly weren’t Lillinara’s mailed fist. Arms of the Maiden had some training under arms, yet it was minimal, just enough to let them look after themselves in an emergency, because they were supposed to be concentrating on other things.

  Arms of the Mother were fully engaged with life. They were trained warriors, but their primary function was to nourish. Many of them, too, remained scholars, serving as teachers and educators. Others, like Shahana, were skilled healers and midwives or surgeons in addition to their weapons training. As warriors, they were guardians and protectors, the custodians of the precious fire of life Lillinara shared with her mother Kontifrio. More than one arm of the Mother had died defending that flame, but they were defenders, not the spearheads of justice Tomanāk’s champions so often were.

  And then there were the arms of the Crone. Not all arms of the Mother made that transition, and Shahana sometimes wondered if she had the moral fortitude to make it herself. Arms of the Mother defended life; arms of the Crone were focused on the proper ending of life. The healers among them served the hospices which offered care and support for the elderly, the dying. Where those slipping into Isvaria’s shadows were given the dignity and comfort they deserved. It took a special bravery to open one’s heart to those who must inevitably fade, to embrace the natural tide and ease the final flicker of the flame arms of t
he Mother protected so fiercely, and Shahana wasn’t at all certain she had that much courage.

  But arms of the Crone weren’t just healers. They, too, were warriors, yet their function was not to defend life, but to avenge it. An arm of the Mother would seek, far more often than not, to capture a criminal and deliver him to justice, whatever his offense; when Lillinara dispatched an arm of the Crone, it was to slay, not to capture.

  And that was why neither an arm of the Mother nor an arm of the Crone would have been remotely as well suited to dealing with Shīgū’s attack on Quaysar. However much Shahana might dislike admitting it, that had required a sword with a keener edge than hers. Once Shīgū had replaced the legitimate Voice with her own creature and corrupted the captain of the Quaysar Temple Guard, nothing short of Tomanāk Himself and His champions could have pried her loose again without the utter devastation of the temple. For that matter, even Dame Kaeritha and Bahzell Bahnakson had inevitably left broad swaths of destruction in their wake, and the Temple Guard had been devastated. Well over two thirds of its armsmen and war maids had been corrupted to a greater or a lesser extent—many of them knowingly; others without even realizing what was happening—and the survivors’ morale had been shattered by the realization of how utterly they’d failed to protect the temple they’d been called upon to serve.

  And that was why Shahana had been permanently assigned to Quaysar for the last six and a half years. Rebuilding the temple was a task to which arms of the Mother were far better suited, and she and the current Voice—trained healers, both of them—had carried out that rebuilding with slow but steady progress. It helped that the Voice was a native Sothōii...and that she’d never been a war maid. Trisu, for example, found it much easier to interact with her than he did even now with Mayor Yalith at Kalatha. For that matter, he found it easier to interact with her than he did with Shahana, who’d been born and raised in the Empire of the Axe.

  And he still gets along better with Dame Kaeritha than he does with either of us, Shahana thought moodily. Is that because he’s more comfortable thinking of her as “just” another warrior? Or is it because in the end, she realized he was right and the war maids were wrong about what was happening? Does a part of him think of her as his partisan and not simply as an impartial judge sent by Scale Balancer?

  Of course, she admitted, it was also entirely possible that only a champion of Tomanāk could have been impartial in a case like this one. Lillinara’s arms dealt regularly with prejudice—especially here in the Kingdom of the Sothōii and especially against war maids—and they did have a natural tendency to react defensively first and consider impartiality second.

  So the Gods probably knew what They were doing when they sent Dame Kaeritha and not you, she told herself yet again. Maybe you should just go ahead and accept that They usually know what They’re doing?

  The familiar tartness of that thought restored much of her humor, and she lowered her stein and smiled at Trisu.

  “I’m sure the Voice will appreciate your generosity and understanding,” she said. “We’re making continued progress in rebuilding, and Quaysar is becoming prosperous again, but there’s no point pretending it couldn’t very easily have gone the other way.”

  “I know.”

  Trisu’s gray eyes went cold and distant, looking at something Shahana couldn’t see. They stayed that way for several seconds before he shook himself and refocused on her face.

  “I know,” he repeated. “And the truth is, Arm Shahana, that I blame myself, at least in part.”

  “You do?” Shahana couldn’t quite keep the surprise out of her own voice. As far as she knew, this was the first time Trisu had ever said anything like that. “In fairness, Milord,” she said a bit unwillingly, “yours was the only voice raising the alarm. It’s scarcely your fault that no one listened to you until Dame Kaeritha came along.”

  “You think not?” Trisu sat back in his chair, elbows on chair arms, cradling his glass of whiskey in both hands, and smiled in what certainly looked like faint amusement. “I think perhaps you’re being overly generous, Milady.”

  “In what way?” she asked, trying not to bridle at the honorific he’d chosen.

  “It’s tactful of you and the Voice not to remark upon it, Arm Shahana,” he said, still with that faint smile, “but my own attitude, and that of my family, towards the war maids is scarcely a secret. Indeed, I’ve been known to express myself, ah, somewhat intemperately, I suppose, upon the subject in private conversation from time to time. Nowhere near as intemperately as my Uncle Saeth or my cousin Triahm, perhaps, but still intemperately enough. I won’t pretend I don’t believe many of my...less than flattering opinions where the war maids are concerned are justified, either. Obviously, you and I aren’t going to agree with one another in that regard. However, it’s a lord warden’s responsibility to discharge his duties as impartially as he possibly can, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I’d put myself into a position where I wasn’t able to do that.”

  “As nearly as I can tell, Milord,” Shahana said a bit stiffly, “you did discharge them impartially. It certainly turned out you were the one who was correctly interpreting the situation and the provisions of the Kalatha town charter. Whatever anyone may have thought at the time, you were completely within your legal rights.”

  “Oh, I know I was,” he acknowledged with a slightly broader smile, eyes glinting as he recognized how unhappy it made her to acknowledge that point. “But the problem, Milady, is that everyone else knew about my...let’s be courteous and call them prejudices where the war maids were concerned. And because they did, there was an automatic assumption that I wasn’t acting impartially. I put myself in that position by not watching my words more carefully, and I can’t quite free myself of the suspicion that Shīgū chose Lorham and Quaysar specifically because I’d allowed myself to be far more outspoken about my feelings than a responsible lord warden would have done. Those opinions of mine were too broadly known, and without Dame Kaeritha’s intervention, that would have made Shīgū’s lies entirely too plausible.”

  Shahana blinked. She couldn’t help it, because she would never have expected that analysis out of Trisu Pickaxe. It was entirely too insightful to be coming from someone like him.

  Only it just did, didn’t it? she thought. And the fact that you would never have expected it probably says more about you than it does about him, doesn’t it? Damn the man! Now I can’t even congratulate myself for overcoming my prejudices against him better than he overcomes his against me!

  “Milord,” she said, regarding him levelly, “there’s probably something in what you say, but perhaps it cuts both ways. I’ll concede you’ve been a bit more...outspoken than I might have wished upon occasion, but so have the war maids. And, for that matter, the Quaysar Temple has been more confrontational than absolutely necessary from time to time. I think you’re right that it was the tension between all parties, and the fact that that tension was so widely known, that cleared the way for Shīgū’s attempt in the first place. But you weren’t the only source of that tension.”

  “Oh, I never said I was!” Trisu actually chuckled, leaning even further back in his chair. “Milady, it would never do for me to say I was more at fault than the war maids! Just think of the consternation that would cause among my armsmen and anyone else who knows me! Besides, the entire situation would never have arisen if not for the unnatural and perverse lifestyle the war maids have chosen to embrace now would it?”

  Shahana had just raised her stein for another sip of beer. Now she spluttered into it and lowered the stein again to glare at him as he delivered his last sentence in a tone of perfect, matter-of-fact sincerity, as if he’d simply remarked that the sun was likely to rise in the east tomorrow morning. She started to open her mouth, then paused as their gazes met and she saw the amusement sparkling deep in his eyes. She drew a deep breath and shook her head.

  “Milord,” she said tartly, “if you’re not careful, I’m going to deci
de you have a sense of humor after all, and then where will you be?”

  Chapter Eight

  Walsharno asked rather wistfully in the back of Bahzell’s mind.

  “Now isn’t that a dreadful thing to be asking?” Bahzell replied, quietly enough not even another hradani could have overheard him. “And him doing all he can to wile away the leagues and all!”

  The mental voice was considerably more tart this time, and Bahzell chuckled, glancing ahead to where Brandark rode easily in the saddle, strumming his balalaika.

  The musical tastes of individual coursers, he had discovered, varied at least as widely as those of the individual members of the Races of Man, and Walsharno’s ran more to stately measures which relied heavily on woodwinds, viols, and cellos. He was not a fan of balalaika music, and he had even less taste for the dwarves’ latest musical invention. They called it a “banjo,” and Brandark was already showing what Walsharno considered a most unhealthy interest in the infernal new device. If he was going to be honest, Bahzell shared his courser brother’s reservations where Brandark’s new attraction was concerned, but the Bloody Sword’s current selection didn’t bother him anywhere nearly as badly as it obviously bothered Walsharno. At least he wasn’t playing the “Lay of Bahzell Bloody Hand.” That was something, Bahzell reflected. And he wasn’t singing, either, which was even better. In fact, taking everything together, and considering how much worse it could always get, Walsharno shouldn’t be complaining at all.

 

  “Oh, and isn’t that ever so much better? I’m not so sure at all, at all, as how a champion of Tomanāk should be thinking such things.”