Page 39 of Valdemar

Kordas stared at the candle burning on the otherwise empty hearth—mind not blank, but not exactly thinking either. The whole set of magical shenanigans after the coronation still had him convinced that he was missing something, somehow. But what was it?

And damn, I never did hear Jonaton state his theory.

As he had for years now, while his people established their home here, Kordas was just fine at directing everything on a baronial scale. Roads were laid, resources storehoused, and by their sixth year, even wine was made. The flying monsters, the Red Forest, the water spiders—they were more existential than he could plan defenses for. They already lived here—to them, the Valdemarans were invaders—so they had inherent advantage. The Tayledras were brilliant, but also preoccupied—they were allies, but helping Valdemar was not their priority at all. More and more, the feeling that whatever the Valdemarans made would attract trouble only grew. Even founding Haven on a Vale site gave him pause, because making Valdemar prosperous also used his people’s labor to create a tastier prize to simply take. Spitters and Poomers were in short supply, and while ballistae and perimeter traps were built to stop a horde, that was just it—there was no guarantee than an invader would be a “horde” at all. Like the beetles, or the blight—arrows and coldshot wouldn’t defend against such things, and those threats hadn’t even been sent to weaken Valdemar.

That I know of.

Even the Tayledras held a policy that it was better to be agile and educated, and to improvise what was needed, than to create a fortress prepared for anything. It didn’t help Kordas’s worry that his people didn’t have enough resources to be ready for every possible thing, and aside from being able to put holes, craters, and cuts in things, they were riding too much on luck. He knew damned well, however, that if he thought too hard about the situation, whatever it was that was prodding the back of his mind would flee like a frightened trout. What he needed was to “not think” about it—just set his mind to rest and let things churn until the wary fact or idea or whatever it was finally showed itself. Fresh air could help.

Isla stirred a little in the seat beside him, closed her book, and set it aside. “I’m going to bed,” she said. “But I know that look. I’ve seen a lot of it over our years. Don’t worry about waking me.”

He kissed her. “You are the best of wives. I think I’ll go out for a walk.”

“Take a watchdog,” she replied, as she passed through the door to the bedroom.

He knew very well she meant a guard, but instead of beckoning one of the pair at the door to the royal quarters to follow him, he conjured up his own “watchdog,” an enhanced version of a mage-light that would constantly seek things larger than a house cat approaching the mage, and spotlight them. It was an extravagance, but tonight he didn’t want anything or anyone intruding. Intruding on what? I don’t know yet. I just know I don’t want any interruptions.

The Palace was much quieter than the old Ducal manor had ever been at this hour—much less the Imperial Palace, which had been buzzing whatever the hour. People were, unsurprisingly, in bed. Even the nobly born worked in Valdemar, and worked hard, and at this point, they were used to it—some even cheerful about it. But that meant that everyone was in bed early. Entertainment after dinner never lasted more than a mark. If anyone wanted more entertainment than that, they could amuse themselves in their quarters. So the corridors were empty, mage-lights were dim to save people’s night vision, and only the occasional guard posted on night watch was there to see him pass.

His mind would be racing, if there were a race to win, but instead it ran in circles, like a restless horse on a longe-line running ruts in the earth. It felt like there was just too much to be done for him to think through and plan out, so he touched upon one subject after another, dipping into ridiculous amounts of detail. Every night since the coronation had been like this, increasingly so. There was a foreboding in his thoughts about the immediate future, that they simply weren’t ready to withstand whatever came after Valdemar now that it was such a ripe plum. He could devise defenses and strategies for what he knew. But out there was the unknown, and the unknown had kicked the Valdemarans hard more than once when it finally showed itself.

Once outside, he did not regret for a single moment that he’d decided to walk. He could only describe the air as “soft”; it was skin temperature, with barely a hint of breeze, and perfumed by herbs and the faintly sweet aroma of blossoming vegetables and ripening fruit. A full moon shone down on the gardens with little in the way of clouds to obscure it—only very high, thin clouds, which created a halo around the moon and accented the light of the stars. This was the famed “silvery moonlight” praised in song, noted in romantic tales, and inevitable in adolescent poetry. There really was nothing else quite like it, he had to admit. It provided just enough light to taunt out adventurous thoughts and skewed estimates of abilities. It seemed to imbue all that it touched with strange powers worthy of wonder. Moonlight, however, conferred no invulnerability to accidents, and in inclement weather Kordas’s bones often sounded off about his foolhardy youth spent learning hard lessons like that.

After all that’s happened, I’d say I’ve had all the fun I can stand. I’ll see Valdemar through to my last breath, but I wouldn’t mind it if others had all the adventures for a while. I feel like I’ll be restless if my future is just smiling, waving, and handling administrative issues, but I think I’d like to find out. I won’t be around forever. Valdemar is—I hate to use the word “stable”—but the worst part seems to be over.

Some wise soul had laid out the paths between the planting beds with white border stones so there was no danger of blundering into the turnips, and that was all that saved Kordas from stomping through carefully tended crops. His blunder snapped him from ever-deepening immersion in his thoughts. His mind was preoccupied by matters higher than mere walking. He was in a good state of mind, equal in intelligence and emotion at the moment, and that—and maybe the moonlight—encouraged wild thoughts of the future.

Kordas had a seat upon a garden bench and gazed up at the full moon, speaking directly to it.

“Silvery moon, cast your rays from above. I’ll catch them with thanks, and shine back my love.”He was clearly susceptible to poetry at the moment. Why not poetry, though? “Poetry is the perfect language of specificity for emotions, which otherwise evade characterization.” As my worldly-ways teacher said, “If a subject is complex enough to defy our existing methods of expression, then a new mathematics must be devised to describe it.” I was lucky to know him—a kind soul in a wicked place. Wish he was along right now. “Poetry was made for this; it expresses relatable feelings in shrewdly considered, artfully crafted ways. Composing poetry requires a deep consideration of every element that something could be made up of. For a ruler, the practice of poetry enhances the ability to evaluate whatever presents itself, in a brisk manner, with the faculty of subtle analytic skills in constant practice. These skills are as follows—”

Kordas blinked himself alert with some effort. Apparently, he hadn’t moved a jot, not even breathing. He spoke aloud with a hint of a smile, “That kind of night, is it? The kind of night when anything feels possible, and we’re just lucky to be there for it.”He felt inexplicably embarrassed about letting his thoughts be so intense right now.“When you feel like both a catalyst of, and a witness for, whatever would unfold. Like when we were young—when Love was a fact, heroes got scars, and the power of Want was supreme.”

Also, your mind will spin around in your skull for a while now, thank you. It felt as if he latched onto every fleeting concept in his mind, and then consistently dove too deep pursuing its nature. He needed to snap out of it before it exhausted him. It’s difficult to just stop oneself from thinking. Fear, danger, and horror can do it, but I’ll go too far in thinking about those sorts of things if I start now. Spellcasting discipline can do it, though. Especially ritual spellwork, because there’s an order to when and where to build with each gesture, calling, steadying, simmering, linking, partitioning—no, stop, you’re going too deep again.

A King, alone in a garden, considering his people’s well-being under moonlight. This could not get any more storylike. It’s as if I’m setting the scene, in a book or a play.

Which I might as well be.

And it was a pleasant setting for it, a garden, once wilderness, coaxed into fine yields by the hands of people who, twenty years ago, could never have predicted their fates going this way. Well, maybe some could. There’s always a tale about some folk or other who can tell the future, though I doubt I’ve ever met any. That seems like deities’ purview to me. Imagine if gods could see the future, and know what would be needed by their followers—what would they do with that? Would they make that which was needed? Would they bother to? Do they work to prevent tragedy for their followers—things the followers would never learn about? Do we beg for help not knowing that the Powers we pray to already protect us, and maybe that’s more than we deserve?

Kordas stood slowly from the bench and started walking. These garden paths were laid out for efficiency rather than overt decoration, much like old Valdemar’s manor gardens. With a very little stretch of the imagination, he might have thought himself home.

Not home now,he corrected himself. But he couldn’t help that the word still conjured a manor he no longer lived in, gardens he no longer roamed, pastures that no longer fed his horses. It had been home for most of his life.

Although nobody was there with him physically, Kordas said aloud, for drama’s sake, “And in dreams, I still find myself there.”

I can’t believe I actually thought that would sound good. My poetry’s awful, and I know it. Hah! Nobody harmed, though.

“I should be more careful about my mind wandering, Jonaton would say. It’s too little to be out alone!”

He didn’t pick a path, but his ambling was in a direction just the same. He let that internal pull lead him—out of the gardens, and across the river, giving polite greetings as he passed the guards and other Palace denizens who worked the dark hours. Lythe Shadowdancer was surely awake and working at something at this hour. Preceded by his “watchdog,” Kordas strolled through the night breeze, over the rushing river, and into the hilled, treed field where he and his mages had consulted with each other earlier that day. His horses blew at him with mild alarm until they recognized his scent, before relaxing back into a hip-shot doze. It occurred to him where he was headed, though it hadn’t really been a conscious thought until he was two-thirds there. He eeled his way into that now-familiar grove, careful to avoid night-spun webs, and found himself in the center of a beautiful circle of moonlight. The place looked to outward eyes as enchanted as it was to mage-sight—and brighter.

That moonlight. Nothing else like it.

After a moment, Kordas stretched, and his manic, analytic thinking fell into a more orderly state. For half a minute, he emptied his mind as if preparing for a Great Working. Nightbirds sang, and owls sounded off somewhere deep in the field, punctuated by a couple of Palace dogs howling to that magnificent moon. He walked widdershins around the clearing’s perimeter, resuming his earlier talk aimed at no one. Speaking aloud helped his thinking, because of course it forced concepts into words. And he felt like he was freer to do so alone. Away from a desk, and expectant faces, he could be more honest with himself—and this may as well have been a hermit’s mountaintop for all the solitude he felt. He spoke with what, for him, was simple honesty. He wasn’t selling anything.

“I hadn’t wanted to be a King. Well. Everyone wants to be a King at some point, but what I mean is, I didn’t set out to be a King. I wanted my titles, because I was the best suited to be in charge, and I’d been educated at length in how to use them. I was careful with ambition, unless it aligned with looking after our people better. So, the end result was . . . now I’m a King. With worthy heirs.”