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“My thanks,” Sarn said, without bite or lie.
Isadere scowled, showing their teeth. “I want none of your gratitude, Amhara,” they snapped, turning away as if they could not bear to look at such a creature. Isadere faced Corayne instead. They raised their proudly sculpted face, throwing their features in sharp relief against the golden candlelight.
“Sleep through the heat. You leave for the coast at dusk.”
8
The Life of One Man
Erida
Taristan promised to lay victory at her feet, and so he did, every single day.
Erida’s army rolled over everything in its path, the Lion raised at the head of twenty thousand men. The green flag of Galland flapped high in the cooling winds of autumn. The Rose River flowed at their side, holding the eastern flank as her grand army marched south through the countryside.
The Queen was glad to be out in the air, free of the wheelhouse that held her ladies. The massive carriage lumbered at the back of the column, with the baggage train. Though her knights urged her to remain within the safety of its walls, she refused.
Erida was done with cages.
She wore her usual deep green cloak trimmed in gold, so long it covered the flanks of her horse. Beneath, her ceremonial goldenarmor flashed, light enough to be worn for hours without difficulty. It would hardly turn a blade, but Erida would never see the wrong end of a sword.
They left the Castlewood behind, and their line of fortresses. The kingdom of Madrence fell over them in an invisible curtain. They crossed the border in daylight, without opposition. There was only a stone to mark the line, its markings worn smooth by time and weather. The river still flowed; the autumn forest still stood, green and golden, as if the trees themselves welcomed the Lion. The road beneath their horses’ hooves did not change. Dirt was still dirt.
Erida expected to feel different in another kingdom, weaker somehow. Instead, the new land only emboldened her. She was a ruling queen, destined for empire. This would be her first kill, her first conquest.
The fortress city of Rouleine loomed to the south, at the confluence of the Rose and the Alsor. The city walls were strong, but Erida was stronger.
The enemy army massed along the far bank of the Rose, following their progress. They were too weak to meet her army in battle, but they nipped at their edges as a scavenger would at a great herd. It only slowed the Gallish army down, enough for another force to cross the river and dig in, carving trenches and makeshift palisades overnight.
The Lion devoured all of them.
Erida did not know how many Madrentines lay dead. She did not bother to count the corpses of her enemies. And while hundreds of Gallish soldiers were lost, more came to replace them,called up from every corner of her wide kingdom. Conquest was in her blood, and the blood of all Galland. Nobles who resisted her first summons to war rode hard now, bringing their retinues of knights, men-at-arms, and stumbling peasants. All were eager to share in the spoils of war.
And in my glory.
Taristan was beyond her sight, marching at the head of the column, accompanied by a cluster of her own Lionguard. It had been so every day since Lotha, at Erida’s behest. It earned him the respect of nobles too cowardly to ride with the vanguard, but also kept him away from such vipers.
And away from me,Erida thought, unsettled by how his absence bothered her.
It was so much to measure, but Erida had long years of practice at court. She was the Queen of Lions, and her nobles certainly lived up to the name. She felt like she stood in the lions’ den now, a whip in hand. But even the tamer of lions could be overwhelmed, if outnumbered.
For now the lions were sated, fat and happy. Gorging themselves on broken men and barrels of wine. It would be the same tonight, in a siege camp instead of a castle.
Rouleine was small compared to Ascal, a village next to Erida’s great capital. It stood at the crest of the hill, walled by stone and two rivers, leaving only one direction of assault. The city was well made and well placed, good enough to hold the Madrentine border for generations. But no longer. Twenty thousand souls lived behind the walls and in the surrounding farmlands. Erida could match a soldier to each if she wanted to.
The Madrentine villages were empty now, quiet as they rode through. The buildings were but husks, doors and windows hanging open. The peasant soldiers picked through anything left behind, looking for better boots or an onion to gnaw on. Any lingering livestock were driven to the baggage train at the end of the column, to join the army’s own supply herd. But little else remained.
Even from miles away, Erida heard the bells calling the farmers to safety.
“Funny, it’s the bells that will be their ending,” she said aloud.
On the horse next to her, Lady Harrsing cocked her head.
“How so, Your Highness?” she said.
The old woman held a saddle better than ladies half her age. She wore a sky-blue cloak, her silver hair braided away from her face. At court, she wore enough jewels to remind everyone of her wealth. Not so on the road, when jewels would only weigh her down. Bella Harrsing knew better than to peacock herself in the middle of a war march. Not like some of the others, who wore gilded armor or brocade, as if this were a ballroom and not a battlefield.
“The bells call the peasants and commons inside the walls, so the gates can be shut and the city protected,” the Queen said. The bells pealed without any kind of harmony, tolling from many towers. “If they would only leave the gates open, we could march on in without any bloodshed at all.”
