Work Text:
Lady Knight Keladry of Mindelan woke in a cave. Caves on the northern border were cold and damp, which meant that she was cold and damp. Fifteen hours ago, I was warm, she thought mournfully. Though never self-pitying, seven months on the Scanran border, riding patrol, had worn down even her morale. Seven months on the Scanran border had her morose. Fifteen hours ago I was inside four solid walls, with a roof, and a fire place, and I was warm.
And now you’re in a cave, and you’re cold, and your hands are tied, answered the cheerful, treacherous voice of Domitan of Masbolle. The longer she spent out here, the more clearly she heard him in her head. Those voices are Scanran. Look alive, Lady Knight.
She opened her eyes.
Fifteen hours ago, she’d ridden into Fort Steadfast on the back of a shaggy pony. Her warhorse, Peachblossom, was a strong and powerful mount in battle, but ill suited to the treacherous mountain trails that wreathed the northern border. He stayed in the town of New Hope, the town Keladry had helped build and longed to return to. But her duty was to follow the orders set by the king, and right now, those orders were to patrol the border.
She handed off the reins of her pony to Lerant of Eldorne. Back as Lord Raoul’s de facto squire, he was as good a source of information as she was likely to find. “How did he find me?” she asked, nothing in her voice to betray the racing pace of her heart. She checked in every fortnight to give her reports, but in the days between she was often high up in the mountains, all but unreachable.
“The normal way,” Lerant said. “The Riders and scouts we’ve got out here are good, but when His Lordship needs to find someone quick, no one’s as fast as Daine’s animals.”
Keladry’s heart hammered louder, as if the anxiety that rode her could demand her attention. She kept it down with practiced ease. “Is it the town?” She couldn’t think of another reason her old knight-master would need to find her so desperately.
Lerant gave her a sympathetic look. They both remembered the last time a messenger had come for her in the middle of the night. “He didn’t say. I’m sorry.”
If it was New Hope, Raoul would never have let her find out before she met with him. He knew she’d never make it to her debriefing if she thought her people were in trouble. She summoned the best smile she could for Lerant. “Is he on the walls?” she asked. Lerant nodded. Keladry thanked him, her mouth dry, and set off at a brisk, ground eating stride.
She found Lord Raoul on Steadfast’s northern battlement, a spyglass raised to his eye. Whatever had his attention, it was his wife, Buri, who noticed her. She raised a hand and waved Kel over. “Thanks for coming,” she said, her voice pitched low. Raoul collapsed the spy glass and turned toward her.
“Is it the town, sir?” Her voice came out even, which she was proud of.
Raoul had never gotten the hang of disguising his emotions. She saw surprise there, then confusion, and sheepish understanding. Buri, who was both better at schooling her face and faster than her husband, looked simply bemused. “Nothing like that,” he said. “I’m sorry if I scared you. Why don’t you come back to my office?”
Buri slid off the battlements, sliding an arm around Kel’s shoulders. “Cheer up,” she said. “You’ll like this one.”
They both had awful senses of humor, Kel reflected. That was why they got along so well. She regretted that she’d ever encouraged them.
In Raoul’s office, she’d stood with her hands braced against the map table and studied the markers Raoul had laid out. The northern part of the country was nasty terrain, and no matter how quickly the knights and the King’s Own adapted, they had nothing on the Scanran raiders who’d grown up here.
“I thought,” she said a bit mournfully, “That once we got rid of Maggur, the raids would quiet down.”
“But Maggur taught them all these delightful new tricks with which to amuse us.” Raoul said brightly. “They can’t just pack it in and go home now, what fun would that be?”
“No fun at all,” Buri said. “Why, it’s like he left us a gift, Kel, and you can’t refuse a gift.”
“That would be rude,” Raoul agreed, with a solemn twinkle.
When I get back, Keladry promised herself, I am going to kill them both.
“Be careful, Kel,” he’d said. His normally bright eyes were dim with worry. “We lost seven from the last Rider group we sent that way, and all the scouts. That’s why we’re only sending you. One scout has the best chance of getting in and out without being seen, and you’re the best we have.” She closed her eyes again, and thought about map Raoul had laid out. She’d travelled north-west from Steadfast, skirting the valley that surrounded the Vassa. She’d still been a good three leagues from the hillside where Raoul had marked the raiders, and even then, she was only supposed to scout. Not engage.
I think your map was questionable, my lord, her head-Dom thought wryly. She kept her eyes closed as she organized her thoughts, but only a moment later, a boot connected with her shoulder.
“Are you awake?” A gruff, heavily accented voice, followed by another kick. “He’s awake.”
Well, at least they haven’t figured out I’m a girl. Kel sighed and opened her eyes, finding herself staring at the toe of his boot. Dirty, torn leather, stained with river mud and the Gods only knew what else. She wrinkled up her nose.
They’d taken her sword and shield. She saw both in the dim, smoky light of the cave. They were propped up against the far wall of the cave, too far for her to reach. And useless, with her arms tied, anyway. The wire wound around the hilt of her sword glittered mockingly, invitingly. It was a distraction she couldn't aford to think about. Instead, she took stock of what she still had, how she was positioned, the ropes holding her wrists together.
“Good bounty on Knight-boys,” the Scanran who’d kicked her said. “Ten gold crowns.” He crouched down, bringing his face to hers. His breath stank like fish, and her nose wrinkled up despite herself. She said nothing. Did he want her to beg for ransom?
Apparently, since another man moved up beside him. “We give him back, he’ll turn around and come right back out here. We’re better off killing him.”
Yes, they were definitely looking to hear her beg. She sighed.
“You won’t kill me,” she said. She used her legs to push herself more-or-less upright, half sitting and half leaning. Wrists tied, and when she yanked on them, she found she’d been tethered. Even with her legs free, she couldn’t stand. She adjusted herself, until she was kneeling. “You held over Grimglass last week, didn’t you? And Hollow’s Point three days before that?” The men gaped at her. “You didn’t take much food from either. Not enough to last you much longer. And you can’t trade the goods you took for gold, not on this side of the border. If you want to eat this week, you either have to leave me here and cross the Vassa, or you’re going to have to march me to a fort and ransom me.” Her wrists fell between her ankles. She was still wearing the low, soft-bottomed boots she’d hiked out in, perfect for scaling the rocky foothills along this part of the border. Because they hadn’t searched her, they hadn’t found the knife she kept in her boot cuff.
“Of course,” she continued, moving slowly, “I’m guessing you don’t want to get within a stone’s throw of a fort, do you? The places you’ve been raiding from the last few weeks, they can’t rightly be called towns.” Her eyes scanned the cave. “It’s just the three of you, isn’t it? We wondered why you’d started wasting your time on such piddly targets. Did you get separated from your brothers on accident, or did they turn on you? That’s why you haven’t gone back over the river. You’re stuck here.”
She knew she’d hit on the right answer by the way they refused to look at her. “You still have a choice,” she told them. “You won’t get anything by killing me, and you can’t hope to walk away from Steadfast or Giantkiller unpursued. But you could let me go, and earn yourself some goodwill with the King.”
“Or we could kill you,” the second one who’d spoken repeated. “And then we’d be free of you. We wouldn’t have to worry about your people tracking us down.”
“My people already tracked you down,” she said, with a patience she wasn’t feeling. She moved achingly slowly, sliding the knife from her booth one hairs breadth at a time. “How do you think I found you?” By accident, but they didn’t need to know that.
The first said something in Scanran that she couldn’t follow, and the first who’d spoken snapped back. It was grating to hear them bickering in a language she couldn’t understand, but it gave her the cover she needed. She kept her knife sharp, and they’d pulled the ropes that bound her taut. Amateurs. A little slack and they’d be harder to cut. She’d have to make a thanks-offering that they were so inept, once she got out of here.
By the time they noticed she was free, she was already on her feet. There were three of them, but Kel had spent years wading into fist fights with boys who were bigger and older than her. These men -- boys, really, she noted with regret -- were half-starved and scrawny. Border life wasn’t kind to anyone, even if you weren’t out on your own.
It had never been a fair fight, and if they hadn’t jumped her before, they never would have caught her in the first place. Her fist connected with a nose, her heel with a knee cap, and she brought her knife down hilt-first on the head of the third. In a trice, she had them each subdued and tied properly.
“I wish you’d let me go,” she said, as she tested the knots on the last of them. “Now I’ve got to do something with you. It’s not like I can drag you back to Steadfast on my own.” She found her scabbard and buckled it back on shouldering her shield and tucking her sword back into its sheath. Properly armed, she crossed her arms over her chest and glowered at them. “I’ll have to go back for help,” she said. “And I hope you’re comfortable, because if you freed my pony, it’s going to take me twice as long.”
She was beginning to think the third only spoke Scanran, because he only glowered at her. The second -- the one who’d advocated killing her, before -- looked as if he was sorely regretting having missed the chance. And the first, the chattiest, gaped outright. “You’re a girl!” he sputtered.
“Gods all bless,” she muttered, and walked out of the cave. There was, as she suspected, no sign of her pony. Kel spared a moment to hope the dear, sturdy beast was safe, and considered her option. There was a road about a furlough south, but the rest of the raiders were still out there somewhere. If they were any better than the three they’d cast out, she’d bet they had scouts of their own, looking for prey or possible ambush. She didn’t want to be spotted.
That meant back the way she’d come, which would take her longer. Determinedly, she set off, and wondered what had become of her sparrows. She hadn’t seen a one since she’d been knocked unconscious.
It was a long, slow hour through the forest. The ground that her pony had managed so surefooted seemed to slide and shift beneath her feet. It was sheer luck that stopped her from tumbling down into the ravine, more than once. “I am a knight,” Kel said out loud, using her knife to clear a prickly bush that had sprung up in her path. “I protect people, and I serve the honor of the realm. I am not a gardener.”
In the breaths between grumbles, she noticed that the forest had gone eerily silent, and she froze.
She saw the first bandit come out of the woods, and heard the snap of twigs that let her know another was behind her. At least it wasn’t the same group she’d left tied up in the cave back there. That was gratifying. Kel sighed, and shifted her grip on her knife, pitching her voice to carry.
“I left three of your friends in a cave back there,” she said. “An hour’s hike back. I’m cold, I’m cranky, and if it’s all the same to you, I’d prefer we both turn around and pretend we never saw each other.”
The Scanran facing her was taller than any of the men in the caves had been. Better fed, too. He held his hands wide, showing the knife sheaths that stretched to his elbows, and the bulging muscles of his shoulders. “I’m afraid that will not work for us, Lady Knight. Not if you’ve come this close to our camp.”
Kel sighed, shading her eyes against the sun. “Is that why you killed the scouts from the Ninth rider group? You thought they’d found your camp?”
The bandit shrugged again. “If we hadn’t killed them then, we would only have had to face them in battle now. It’s the same for you.”
A sparrow flitted through the trees, alighting on the branch above her head. Kel took her eyes off the bandit to watch it, and then looked back to him. “Maybe so,” she said, “But that’s better than trying to fight me now. You see, I’m in a very bad mood.”
She wondered if he were just a raider, or if he’d fought in Maggur’s army. He gave a bark of laughter at her joke that made her think maybe he’d seen war before. “We will risk it,” he said, and she felt the men at her back move.
There were at least ten of them, about, and they were stronger and better trained than the three she’d overpowered in the cave. She didn’t think much of her odds, so she turned and ran. One moved into her path, and she raised her sword to block him. The stroke was clumsy, but it knocked him back enough that she was able to get by. Another, she laid out when she slammed her shield into his face. If they had archers, I’d be dead already. Small blessings, she thought. As she passed under the tree with the sparrow, the tiny bird took flight, winging ahead of her. She did her best to follow it, down the steep southern bluff to the road below.
There were two squads of First Company waiting. They parted like they’d been expecting her. The bandits, close behind her, slid to an almost comical halt. Instead of one unhorsed knight, they’d come upon twenty men of the King’s Own, with what was left of the Ninth Rider Group behind them. Safely behind the lines, Kel turned to watch as the bandits were rolled up, quick as you please. As battles went, it couldn’t have been prettier. “Too bad we didn’t plan it this way,” Buri remarked, coming up beside her and handing her the reins to her own shaggy pony.
“No one would know that if you didn’t tell them." Kel said dryly, accepting the lead. There were four more sparrows perched on the beast; two on the saddle pad, two huddled down between his ears. The pony, used to it by now, tolerated them.
She turned and saw Raoul coming toward her. His sword was drawn, but it hadn’t even been bloodied in the skirmish -- if it could be called that. “Well, Lady Knight,” he said. He was grinning his Very Bad Man grin. “What do you think of scouting?”
“I think in the future I’ll leave it to scouts,” she said. “You're late, my Lord."
"You know my flair for the dramatic," he responded, his grin growing wider. Kel couldn't help but return it.
"How did you find me?" she asked.
"I stared and stared at that map, and something just wasn't right," Roul said. "When I figured out that they'd split into two groups, I realized you were headed right into the mouth of them. When we caught up to your pony, I knew we were on the right trail. And your sparrows helped, of course."
“Good work,” Kel told the birds. “I’ll make sure you get extra seed when we get back to camp.” To Raoul and Buri, she added, "There's three more in a cave a few leagues back that way. It's rough ground; you'll need the Riders to get in there. These warhorses can't do it."
Buri grinned. "We'll manage," she said. "Another one for the ballads. What are you going to do now?"
"I’ll be glad to get back to doing what I’m supposed to do," Kel said.
Buri and Raoul exchanged glances. “She always says that,” Buri said. “Do you think she has any idea?”
“Not the slightest,” Raoul caroled out.
Kel heaved an exaggerated sigh. “She is standing right here. And she wants a hot bath and a real meal before she has to go back on that blasted mountain.”
Still laughing, Raoul held down a hand and hauled her up onto his warhorse. “I think that can be arranged,” he said. “Come on, Protector of the Small. You have work to do.”