First Test (9 page)

"I won't keep you long," the king promised. "I really just wanted to look at you.

"We survived the Immortals War, as they're calling it. We survived, but at a price. You know as well as I how many knights were lost, how many crippled. Thanks to Lord Wyldon, you older pages and squires were also able to fight, to defend our people. You did well—but I can see there are faces gone from this room who were present last fall. We shall miss those who are gone.

"Our enemies tried to destroy us. They failed—but we are hurt. Inside these walls, I can tell you, we are hurt. Our healing will be the work of years."

No one spoke. No one moved.

"Most importantly," he continued, speaking as he might to his closest friends, "it is the work of your years. Your studies, your bruises, your saddle sores, your nights spent doing mathematics, and history, and mapmaking. Your mastery of the arts of war, and of the laws of the realm."

King Jonathan paused for a moment, his eyes exploring their faces. Looking at him, Kel thought grudgingly, All right, he hasn't been fair, and he hasn't made Lord Wyldon treat me like the boys, but he's right about the work. I'll show them—I'll show him, and Lord Wyldon—that I'm as good for that work as anybody else. Like the emperor's Chosen warriors. I'll be an example. They'll be sorry they ever treated me unjustly.

"Each one of you here is a gem, all the more precious because we lost so many. Combined, you are the treasure of the kingdom. Treat yourselves as such. Work hard, study hard, and know your value. Guard your strength, make it grow. Build your stores of learning. Do it not for yourselves or your teachers or your monarchs. Do it for the kingdom. Do it for us all." He looked them over one last time, nodded briskly, then strode out of the hall. He was gone before any of them remembered to bow.

As unhappy as her thoughts had been, Kel still had to remember to take a breath once the king had left the room. His presence was even stronger than the emperor's had been. She could see how people might fight and die for him, and how he could stir such fierce loyalty in calm and levelheaded men like her own father. Just a look around the room showed her boys who were still caught up and breathless after what he'd said. Even Neal, who seemed so world-weary, looked eager.

When he realized her eyes were on him, he smiled. "Isn't this a great time to be alive?" he asked. "Stormwings and spidrens to fight, beings from legends arrayed at our sides, people in need of protection and us being prepared to do it… Nothing happened in King Roald's time, and everything's happening now. We'll be sung about, our names will be passed on to our descendants."

"It's going to take a lot of work, that's for certain," she replied with a shrug.

Neal propped his chin on one hand and gazed at her. "You aren't a bit romantic, are you?" he asked, amused.

She sat back and stared at him. She was beginning to think that Neal required a keeper. He seemed to have the craziest ideas. "Romance? Isn't that love-stuff?" she asked finally.

"It's more than just love. It's color, and—and fire. You don't want things magnificent and filled with—with grandeur," he said, trying to make her understand. "You know, drama. Importance. Transcendent passion."

"I just want to be a knight," Kel retorted, putting her used tableware on her tray. "Eat your vegetables. They're good for you."

When she returned to her room, Kel found a small package on her desk. She looked it over. It was wrapped in canvas and addressed to her. The writing was ornate yet readable, like the style that market scribes used. The twine and canvas both were cheap quality, available to anyone with a few coppers to spend.

She drew her belt-knife to cut the twine, sawing until the cord parted. Kel put the blade down with a sigh. She would have to sharpen it yet again. It got dull very quickly. She hadn't thought to ask her parents for a new one before she left home.

Opening the canvas wrap, she found a plain wooden box inside. Shaking her head—she didn't like mysteries of any kind—Kel opened the box. Inside she found a sheathed belt-knife. Like the box, the sheath was plain, made of the same kind of black leather that wrapped the hilt. The blade itself was a very different matter: it was steel as fine as anything that came out of the Yamani Islands, so sharp it would slice a hair. Kel knew that because the first thing she did was pluck one from her head and draw it lightly over the edge.

Underneath the knife was a small leather bag with a whetstone. Like the sheath and box, the bag was ordinary. The stone was high-quality goods. It would put on an edge even her old knife would hold.

Inside the bag was a parchment tag. Written on it, in that same common lettering, was "Goddess bless."

Kel had to sit on the bed. Who would send such a fine gift? Anyone in her family would include a proper note. Neal was friendly, but she couldn't see him spending this kind of money on her. She couldn't see anyone doing it.

She thought it over until the first after-supper bell rang: she had classwork, and Neal had invited her to study with him. Fretting over the identity of the gift-giver would not be of much use for now. She removed her old knife and clipped the new one to her belt, smoothing it with careful fingers before she gathered her books. The gift had come the first day of real classes, which told her there was one thing she could be sure of: someone wished her well.

Kel smiled. Someone wanted the probationary page to succeed.

Five weeks after her arrival at the palace, Kel decided to write a letter to her family. It was hard to get started. That morning Peachblossom had stepped on her foot, bruising it even through her heavy riding boot. It seemed to hurt worse as the day wore on, distracting her in her classes and at supper. Only when she had propped the foot on a cushion placed on a stool did the throbbing ease enough to allow her to write.

Dear Papa and Mama,

Thank you for the package with the candied fruit and cakes. I shared with my sponsor, Nealan of Queenscove. He liked the cakes very much.

I can't believe that five whole weeks have gone. I am working hard. The teachers are strict. Master Oakbridge, the master of ceremonies, is teaching Yamani etiquette from Papa's book. I have to show everyone the submissions so much that I get dizzy. My favorite class is mathematics. I think the teacher, Master Ivor, is pleased with my work.

Tell Tilaine there are no banquets until Midwinter Festival so I haven't served the king at table yet. Pages get to practice serving Lord Wyldon and his guests at supper three days in a row. The new pages are last on the schedule so my turn won't come until late this year. I won't get to serve at the high table at Midwinter. Only senior pages get to wait on important people like the king.

I have a horse. He is a strawberry roan gelding named Peachblossom. He is too big for me, but I like him. He will be sold or killed if I do not keep him. He is very clever, and plays all kinds of tricks if I do not keep an eye on him.

Also, might I have some green tea from our stores? It is very expensive here, and I truly need something to drink at night as I do my classwork.

I did not pack enough dresses. We are allowed to wear our own clothes to supper unless there is a feast or something. Might I have some of my other gowns and some more shifts? And could they be let down an inch? I have grown a little.

Kel smiled at the last paragraph, knowing it would surprise her mother. She had always preferred breeches for wear at home, unless they had to don kimonos for an event at the emperor's court. These days, however, Kel wore dresses whenever possible. She was not about to let the pages forget that there was a girl in their midst. Gowns at supper were just one way to remind them.

What else could she tell her family? Kel stared at her letter, drumming her fingers. She decided to leave out that sometimes Prince Roald sat with her and Neal at supper. For one thing, it seemed like bragging. After all, the prince had made it a point to sit at meals with each of the pages at least once during the weeks since her arrival. That he sat with her and Neal the most could simply be due to his curiosity about the Yamanis. Kel suspected that Prince Roald wanted no one to guess that he was fretting about his coming marriage to Princess Chisakami. Instead she wrote:

Does Mama still have her sketchbook from the Islands? Her pictures are better than the ones in books in the palace libraries. Neal wants to know what things look like.

That was true enough. Neal was curious about the Yamanis and how they lived, and if the prince also looked at the sketches, so much the better.

She would not mention the bad things that happened, not the boys' tricks or Peachblossom’s bad habits. That seemed too much like whining to her. Instead she shifted her foot to a better spot on the cushion and wrote on:

There are sparrows who come to me for bread and the seed I get from the stables. They are practically tame, and eat at my windowsill. One of them is a female with a pale spot on her head. I named her Crown. She scolds the others and she is always the first at the food, so I think of her as their queen. The sparrows get up before dawn, and it is nice to hear them chirp while I dress. There is an amazing lizard-bird skeleton that is actually alive in my class on plants and animals. He likes bread too. Lucky for me, Neal said we can ask the cooks for extra food so I am not forever trying to sneak rolls out of the mess hall!

What else could she say? They didn't have to know that only Neal and the prince would talk to her, or that yesterday she had been doused in a bath of muddy water when she stepped out of her room. Thanks to that she had been very late to breakfast, causing the boys to growl as she came in. For her lateness, Wyldon had given her a week of mucking out the stables from the first bell after supper until the second bell. She would just finish her letter with the cheerful bit about the sparrows.

Once she had finished, she turned to get her sealing wax and seal from her desk drawer. Her bruised foot slipped from its pillow to bang on the floor. She yelped.

Someone knocked on her door. "Kel, open up. It's me, Neal."

"Drat," she muttered, and went to let him in.

As he stepped into the room, he saw her lucky cats. "Why are those things waving?"

She smiled. "The legend is that a cat waving to the first emperor drew him out of the path of an enemy arrow. The Yamanis make hundreds of them. They're supposed to bring luck."

"Good thing you have so many, then," remarked Neal, picking one up and examining it.

Kel made a face at him. "Very funny." She hobbled over and put the cat back where it belonged.

"I thought you were limping in the mess," he said. "Have a seat and let me take a look."

"The door stays open," she warned him.

"Yes, yes, yes. Why are you holed up in here?" he demanded. "Come study with Roald and me."

"I will," she said, wincing as she lowered herself onto her bed. "I just had to finish a letter home. I wanted to thank them for the cakes and things."

Neal grabbed her footstool and sat by the bed. Gently he lifted her swollen foot onto his knees. "And you say Peachblossom wasn't trying to hurt you?" he said. Her foot was one large bruise.

"He wasn't," Kel retorted. "If he'd been trying, he'd have broken it. I really think he's starting to like—ow!"

"There's no reason why you should have this kind of pain," muttered Neal, inspecting her toes. "It figures. You aren't at all ticklish."

"Very funny," she retorted, eying him nervously. "What are you going to do?"

"Fix it," he said. "Foot bruises take forever to heal without help."

"I don't know," Kel protested, carefully drawing her foot away. "The Yamanis say it's better to live with pain. You have to let it roll away like water off a stone. That way it doesn't have any power over you."

"They sound like wonderful, cheerful people," commented Neal. "Any other useful warrior stoic arguments?"

Kel shook her head. "What would Lord Wyldon say if he knew? He told us knights work through pain all the time. He does it himself, you can see it hurts him to use that arm." Wyldon had shed his sling a week after the start of classes, and used his right arm now in weapons practice and riding. "Sometimes there's no healer around, or others need a healer more than you."

"Well, you're neither a stone nor a Yamani nor the Stump, in case you haven't noticed," Neal said tartly. "And it's foolish to stint on healing in a palace full of mages. Don't argue anymore." His voice was firm but his hands gentle as he drew her leg back onto his knees.

Kel thought of her Yamani teachers, who were taught as children to sit unmoving in icy rains for as much as an entire day. She was being weak, letting Neal do this. She ought to refuse the help, but she couldn't. Her foot hurt too much.

Neal rested her foot on his hands and bowed his head. A soft light of such a deep green as to be nearly black shimmered between his palms and Kel's flesh. She felt it as coolness that sank under her skin, and sighed. The pounding in her foot began to soften until it had ceased. Her toes shrank back to their normal size as she watched.

"I can't believe you gave up learning to be a healer," Kel said when Neal released her foot. "I can't believe you're happier as a page. An old page, at that!"

Neal made a face. "I can name three who were older when they started."

"Please don't," Kel said hurriedly. Once Neal started to give lists of things, even a three-person list, he would not be content until he also mentioned what books he'd learned their names from, who wrote them, and who disagreed with the writers of the original books. It was far easier not to let him get started. She said, "And don't tell me you did all this to be one of the oldest first-year pages in the realm."

Neal sighed, surveying his long-fingered hands. "On the Great Roll of Knights in the Hall of Crowns, twelve Queenscove knights are listed—only the Naxens have more. In The Scroll of Salute, King Jonathan the First wrote that four houses were the shield of Tortall: Legann, Naxen, ha Minch, and Queenscove. My brothers thought knighthood was the greatest service they could give."