SASHA AWOKE TO THE DISORIENTATION of a comfortable bed and blankets. She looked across the little room and found Sofy's bed empty. Daylight streamed through the window and, with it, the sounds of camp from the lower slopes—whinnying horses and soldiers at early muster. Somewhere distant, she fancied she could hear the yells and grunts of morning drill as soldiers trained upon an available patch of ground. Beyond that, drumming from the Udalyn wall. Sometimes it seemed that they'd never stop. Surely they'd be getting tired, after two days and nights without pause.
She blinked at the ceiling, massaging her aching shoulder, and trying to clear her head from sleep. It was the third morning after the victories of Ymoth and the Yumynis Plain. The previous evening, the king himself had arrived at the head of an army of nearly six thousand. Torvaal, at least, was taking no chances. The banners last evening had suggested that Koenyg was with him, and probably Damon as well, but the light had been poor and the royal messenger had not bothered to clarify. She was to meet with the king this morning. The very thought was enough to make her wish she could roll over and go back to sleep.
The little room had a stone-paved floor covered by a thick rug. The beds were of simple wooden frame. The room, and the entire cottage, had a simple dignity that appealed to her.
From beyond the window, she could hear Sofy humming a tune in the garden. The splash of water from a pail. An inaudible question from one of the guards…although Sasha could guess. A cheerful reply, and the splash of more water being gathered, then poured. Sasha smiled. Sofy would give the entire guard contingent green thumbs soon enough. Kessligh would approve.
Sasha stretched aching limbs, careful of her shoulder, and then began to dress in clean clothes she'd washed the day before, and dried before the fire that night. She'd washed herself too, in the warm water, and what a luxury that had been. Once dressed, she straightened out the bed and made a spirit sign to the house spirit for watching over her and her sister while they slept …not that she truly believed in such things, but because she suspected the Udalyn who owned this house might, and it was considered bad luck to leave such things neglected for any period.
Stepping into the main room, she found that the interior guard had already started a fire in the central pit and was boiling some water.
“Hello!” said the guard with a bright smile. “Would you like some tea?” Sasha blinked. It was Andreyis.
“I'd love some,” she replied with a sleepy grin, trying to brush her hair back into place with both hands as she walked over. “How did you grab this duty?”
Andreyis grinned even more broadly, and looked smug. “The honour is being given to all those of outstanding service. The men chose me to represent Baerlyn.” And he shrugged, stirring the tea with a wooden spoon. “I know they're just being nice. And I don't think any of them really fancied the morning shift.”
Sasha considered him as she blinked sleep from her eyes. Was it her imagination, or did he wear the sword at his hip with greater confidence now? And had he even filled out a little within his jacket?
Andreyis poured the tea—it was strong, as he knew she liked it. They talked of the men and the horses. It had been another delight to discover that of her beloved horses, only one had been left behind at Ymoth, and that only for a strained hind leg.
Teriyan had embraced her upon first seeing her after the battles, and had called her a “bloody genius,” professing that he'd expected half of them to wind up dead even if things went well. “If you hadn't seen straight through that snotty little bastard, we'd have met them on even terms and lost five times as many men! You saved an incredible number of men, Sasha! We're all damn proud of you, and Kessligh will be too when he hears of it!” Which had made Sasha feel at least a little better, about Dobyn and Tesseryl in particular…but not enough.
Halfway through tea, the front door opened and Sofy entered, carrying an empty bucket that held gardening tools, her hands smeared in rich, black dirt. “Good morning!” she said brightly, depositing the bucket on the table.
“Highness,” said Andreyis, and bowed.
“Oh, stop that!” Sofy reprimanded with a slap at his arm. “Sasha, I've already told him that he's like an old friend, but he keeps bowing.”
“It is my honour and privilege,” said Andreyis, with a faintly mischievous confidence.
“I wish you'd bow like that to me occasionally,” Sasha offered past her cup.
“Not bloody likely,” Andreyis retorted with a grin. Sasha and Sofy laughed.
Many had seemed to expect Sofy to trade pants and jacket for her dress and resume princessly ways once some semblance of civilisation had been restored. Certainly any number of young soldiers remained ready and eager to wait upon her every need. And yet Sofy remained in the clothes she'd ridden in, alternating between those and some others she'd borrowed from the cottage, seeming to belong to a boy of younger years. When asked, she'd simply smiled and said, “There will be plenty of time for dresses later, I'm sure.”
Much of the past two days, she'd spent watering and tending to the gardens, accumulating dirt stains on clothes and face, and becoming sweaty in the warm midday sun. Sasha was sure that “happy” hardly described Sofy's mood. But it was equally plain that whatever unhappiness there was, the gardening was a part of the cure.
Sasha went outside to sit on the wooden bench before the lower garden and survey the scene as she ate some breakfast. Sunlight fell upon the valley's far slope, although this, the eastern side, remained in shadow. Snowcaps upon the further mountains gleamed in the light, and the terraced fields, cottages, orchards and trails along the valley's western side shone in serene, golden detail.
Across the valley floor below camped her army…if one could call it a camp. There were no tents, of course, although men were sharing empty accommodation on rotating shifts. There were many, many hundreds of horses across the green fields to either side of the Yumynis, and many thousands more back to the south. They were more than seven thousand, now, and more had continued to appear up until the king's arrival last evening. Even now, she could see perhaps three hundred horse to either side of the river, formed and ready, in case of action. At night, that number doubled, and shifts were constantly rotated. But the moon had been full and the Hadryn had not risked such overwhelming odds.
Further north, the Hadryn camp appeared strangely orderly by contrast, white tents lined in neat rows across the fields. Black banners flew, and catapults stood at intervals along the line, their long arms drooping as the morning shadow crept across the valley floor. Men could be seen exercising and drilling, others moving about the tents, tending to fires and breakfast. Horses grazed on the grass, and opposing formations of infantry and cavalry remained also on permanent watch—their numbers roughly similar to what opposed them. A thousand remaining cavalry, it had been estimated, and another two thousand infantry. Not nearly enough to break through the force that had trapped them.
Beyond the Hadryn, where the grassy fields turned to rising rock, and the valley sides began to draw together in steep, precipitous sides, a stone wall spanned the valley from side to side, its ends buried into near-vertical cliff. Blue and gold banners hung along the wall, the colours of the Udalyn, and warriors could be seen moving upon the battlements. There was a large single wooden gate on this side of the river, a smaller one upon the far side. Most amazingly of all, the Yumynis River spewed through a narrow cleft in that rock, a roaring spray of white foam. The Udalyn had moved the river, a long time ago. The wall's foundations spanned a dry, rocky depression where the river had evidently once flowed. They must have carved this steep, narrow cut themselves, diverted the waters into it, then built the wall over it. The scale of it amazed her.
Several Udalyn warriors had climbed across the steep cliffs and around the wall by moonlight to tell those who could understand their broken Taasti that there were caves at the valley's end. Thousands of people were hiding there, having left their land before the advancing Hadryn wave, driving most of their livestock before them. Food for people and animals was constantly stockpiled in those caves, and the Udalyn were a long way from hungry yet.
The wall was another matter, cracked and crumbling beneath the constant pounding of Hadryn artillery. In several places, the wall had collapsed entirely. The Hadryn had made four breaches, the Udalyn said, and then tried an attack. Even with four separate points of attack, their men had taken heavy casualties from arrowfire as they'd scrambled up the unstable mounds of stone, and had then met ferocious resistance at the top. The Hadryn had dismantled houses and fence walls in their thirst for ammunition, and many of their catapults had required repair. From her seat, Sasha could see new, developing breaches in the wall, where the sheer face was crumbling and leaning, and artillery stones were piled high at the base. Another two days, perhaps, and there would have been seven breaches. The Hadryn had been making more ladders too, using wood from the forests around Ymoth.
Even the most confident Udalyn had admitted that would have been the end. They had been somewhat surprised to be rescued. Like Lord Krayliss, it seemed that they too had lost all faith in the mercy of Verenthane kings. Sasha wondered if despite their isolation, they'd somehow managed to know something others had not.
Sofy joined her on the bench with a cup of water, but no food. “You've eaten?” Sasha asked her about a mouthful.
“It's late,” Sofy said with mild amusement. “You keep missing breakfast.”
Sasha restrained another yawn, and stretched her legs. “I haven't slept this well in years,” she conceded.
“Father will ask about me,” Sofy said then. Gazing out across the Udalyn wall, and the opposing armies. The sound of drums drifted on the golden air. The Udalyn messengers had been disappointed that she refused to countenance wiping out those Hadryn who remained. They'd offered to coordinate an attack, pouring from their gate into the Hadryn's rear as Sasha attacked from the front. From the sound of the drumming, however, it did not seem as if they'd allowed their disappointment to get in the way of a good celebration. “He'll want to ask about the marriage.”
Sasha chewed for a moment as the porridge seemed to lose its taste in her mouth. “What do you want me to say?” she asked.
Sofy sighed, and adjusted her ponytail. It seemed to Sasha that she might have even had it cut a little. Barely seven days ago, such a decision would have been monumental. “Say that I'll do it,” Sofy said quietly. “Say that I'll marry that bastard. If it's what Father and Koenyg have truly decided.”
Sasha said nothing. She wanted to protest. Badly. But then…She placed a hand on Sofy's arm and gazed at her closely. “Are you certain? I have some bargaining power here, Sofy. We have much of the Hadryn army trapped, Father's most loyal supporters. Several of his closest northern lords also. Father and Koenyg will need such men if they wish to join the war in the lowlands.”
Sofy met her gaze, in sombre earnest. “I know,” she replied. “I know you have bargaining power, Sasha. And that's just why you can't waste it on me. I've…I've been doing a lot of thinking. This is just…” and she waved a hand at the view before them. “The things that I've seen in the last few days just make everything look different to what it did before. I mean, when I heard the word ‘marriage’…my head was so full of all the things Alythia has been fretting about, wedding preparations and ceremonies and whether or not she'd like her in-laws.
“But it's so much more than that, isn't it?” She shook her head in disbelief. “Seriously, I can't believe I've been so selfish. All these men who live and die by the decisions people like us make. All of their families, deprived of fathers, brothers and sons. You've led a rebellion, Sasha. You've trapped the Hadryn, but now Father's forces have us trapped. You'll need all your bargaining power to gain clemency for these men, for the sake of their families. You'll need it to ensure the Udalyn are safer in future. Lenayin cannot remain so divided, or all this bloodshed will be just the beginning, won't it?
“You can't put that at risk for me. When I found out Koenyg's plans I thought it was the worst thing in the world that could possibly happen to me. But now, to think that I might be responsible in some way for more of what I saw on those battlefields…” Sofy shook her head, adamantly. “It's the least I can do, Sasha. If I need to marry someone I dislike to help keep Lenayin whole, it shall be a vastly smaller sacrifice than the alternative. I won't be the first to suffer such a fate. I'll survive.”
Sasha held Sofy's hand, tightly. There was no sign of tears in her sister's eyes. It was clear that she had given this much thought, and had arrived at some kind of peace with it. Past the sadness, Sasha felt a pride so intense she thought she might burst. “Koenyg might have changed his mind, Sofy,” she said gently. “Father too. Their plans haven't worked out anything like they'd anticipated.”
Sofy gave a sad smile and shook her head. “You don't know Koenyg or Father as well as I do. These preparations are far advanced. Lenayin would lose face to back out now. In Koenyg's eyes, to lose face is to die. And Father…has not changed his mind on anything since Krystoff died.”
“We can hope,” Sasha offered.
Sofy squeezed her hand tightly. “We can hope,” she agreed.