Davi tasted dust.
Drums. Drums, like thunder. With ululating cries, the Vallethi swept into the wheat like scythes.
And fell over.
It was impossible. A joke, a prank, a miracle of some mischievous god, all those screaming men suddenly faceplanting into the wheat. Slack-jawed, the farmers of Lomonde watched as dozens, no,hundredsof blue-garbed Imperial soldiers sprang up with a roar of their own. Half of Valleth’s soldiers were just tripping over their fallen brethren.
Someone behind Davi started laughing, high and hysterical.
The drums rolled again, but even that cacophony was lost under the earthshaking catastrophe of the Eagle Knights, the wood-framed wings mounted to their saddles buzzing with the charge. They had to circle around the wheat to avoid trampling their own infantry, and as they swung in a sweeping arc to the south, Davi had an eternity to contemplate all the errors of his life that had led him to this place.
The Imperial knights appeared fromnowhere.
Davi would have sworn they burst from the earth. A sudden surge of horse and men that slammed into the side of the Vallethi army like a dagger, smashing into the Eagle Knights, through them, slicing straight into the meat of the army. Heavily armored knights with lance and sword that leveled the enemy like grass, more knights than Davi could count, and he and the other farmers watched, sinking slowly to their knees with tearsstreaming down their cheeks, and thanked the stars for their deliverance.
Even after it was over, he lingered. Davi had never been one to forget a favor, and he had spotted the man who had led the charge, easily the tallest fellow he had ever seen. It was only when he removed his helmet that Davi realized it was not a man at all. A boy. A prodigiously strong one, to be sure, but there was still a youthful softness in his face, and surely that smooth chin had never yet met a razor.
Later, he learned it was Remin. The son of the traitor Duke Benetot, fosterling of Duke Ereguil, technically not even a knight at all. But none of that mattered. Remin had saved Lomonde. He had saved the life of everyone Davi knew, everyone he loved. That night, when Davi went home to find his mother in the garden and one of his sisters standing nearby with a knife still clutched in her hand, he knew that somehow, he would have to pay that boy back. He would pay him back if it took his whole life.
Admittedly, he had not envisionedthis.
“…twothreefour, one twothree…”The duchess’s lips counted as she stepped, more quick than graceful, her eyebrows pinched with concentration. This was their first actual dance, a combination of the steps they had been working to master for more than a week. Davi found he performed best if he pretended this was some bizarre form of sword practice.
“Turn, turn,” said Leonin, whose remorseless repetition of the steps sometimes made Davi want to hit him. “Catch her hand, and bow…”
Pain stabbed into Davi’s side, and his lips tightened.
“Oh, are you all right?” Ophele withdrew instantly, as if she had done something wrong.
“Fine, fine, my lady. Just moved wrong,” he said, straightening. Remin had cracked him nearly in half the day before. “Beg pardon.”
“We were doing so well,” she said, a little breathless, and moved back into place opposite him. She was so earnest, it made Davi want to pat her head. “The music does help, doesn’t it?”
“It is a high compliment to call this music, my lady,” said Tounot, looking unhappily at his lute. He and Leonin had been charged with schooling the duchess in courtly graces. “My fingers have been more oft on a sword than a string, this last year.”
“It will be winter soon, perhaps there will be more time for peaceful pursuits.” Ophele produced this only a little awkwardly, her eyes flitting toward the floor. Having witnessed most of the duchess’ training, Davi could say honestly that he preferred getting walloped with a sword. The aristocrats of the Empire were famed for their flowery speech, but until now he had never realized it was something theylearned.
“There is a little art there, my lady,” Tounot said, encouraging. “But remember to look up, and speak more loudly. It was difficult to hear.”
She nodded, and then remembered one of their many other admonitions.
“I will,” she said, with a visible effort to be louder. But her eyes still dropped to the floor.
She had asked them to correct her, in the privacy of the solar. But it still made Davi want to find and strangle whoever had made her so anxious, and just as bad, the fashionable society that was forcing her to painfully break these habits and adopt a whole new set of unnatural mannerisms. Davi didn’t see what was wrong with her now. Some people were just shy.
“What you say is interesting, my lady,” he told her, taking her hand to begin their dance again. “Are you planning what you say before you say it?”
“Yes. It sounds nice because there’s alliteration,” she replied, frowning down at their feet. “I always wondered why everyone says Sir Tounot is such a good speaker, and I think it’s because he uses so many devices. Alliteration, simile—”
“And turn,” said Leonin, shooting a glance at Tounot, who looked surprised to find that he had been the subject of such study. “Please stand up straight, my lady, like a string is pulling upward through your spine.”
“—metaphor, consonance…” Ophele straightened, her arm extended as she and Davi paced off a circle with only their fingertips touching. “Only, you can’t use too much alliteration or it just sounds funny. I made a mental model of the perfect sound proportion, because too many close together lose their elegant effect.”
Sheer surprise made all of them burst out laughing, and she looked pleased.
“I thought of that last night,” she said, and then Davi had to lunge to catch her when she tripped over her own feet.
After a time, Tounot took a turn to dance with the lady, giving Davi a chance to nurse his ribs and observe. When Leonin corrected Ophele, he had to own that it was fair; she did slouch, she did look at the floor, and after a few corrections in a row she did start wringing her hands. But it was annoying to have to listen to everyonepickat her all day.
