202 - Entrusting you with a great deal

“No offense taken,” I said. “At least I’m not impinging on their sovereignty now.” If the Haians had ship protection without even knowing it, that was hardly interfering. I had told Breicia and Krena both my worry that Kurkas would try again, so they might even have arranged it already. Keep twenty ships, even scattered, within a half-day’s run of Haiu Menshir, have Niah scouting a full day’s run all around it... why hadn’t I thought of it when I’d been there? But if I could think of it, so could they.

“If I were to consider this mad stunt,” said Segiddis, “how many troops would you be asking of me?” She got up from the chair to pace. She’s considering it, I thought.

“Well... I will confess something. I was in Arko and had no intelligence except from the Pages, so I thought you were conquered. I have to redo all my calculations, now. Could you spare... two thousand? And a disproportionate number of elite?” It wasn’t many, but I knew that Hyerne can be very effective against Arkans, just for the fact of being women warriors; it scares them. Their famous habit of dangling the testicles of slain enemies from their spears as trophies would help.

“That isn’t so many… but Kranaj, that old bitch, is always breathing down our necks on our islands. If you get the Enchians into alliance...”

“My dear friend, that old bitch, is my next stop,” I said.

“That would take their attention from us, and even ally us with them through you… what other friends of yours are you going to visit with this insane scheme?”

“After Kranaj, Astalaz, and then Ivahn in Brahvniki,” I said.

“Astalaz, you are going to talk into this? But he is a man of his word, from all I have heard.”

“I have heard no different,” I said. “Why should that prevent him allying with us?” It was not us yet, but saying the words brings it closer.

She peered at me, her eyes hardening a little. “Of course, you thought we were conquered, too—Chevaga, I know you can’t run spies from the Mezem, but you should at least brush up once you’re out of chains. He and Kurkas signed a peace treaty.”

I froze inside, willing myself not to let it show. I felt as if I’d had my feet cut out from under me. “When was that?” I said, keeping my voice steady.

“About three moons ago.” When I was in the House of Integrity, too mind-riven to be told, I thought. And no one thought to tell me since… of course those with me had been sequestered themselves; they might not know. Breicia and Niku had probably thought I knew. “A ten-year pact. I think it was out of fear on the Lakans’ part more than anything else.”

My skin crawled. Astalaz didn’t know Kurkas, had never met Kurkas; I could see his big dark honest eyes, a little frightened, thinking, ‘I will trust this; I have no choice, really, but I should give the man a chance at any rate.’ I had an awful thought: did that treaty include extraditions? I might not even be safe setting foot in Tardengk.

“You read the Pages,” I said. “Was that treaty mentioned in it? I’ve had no way to get back issues.”

“No, as a matter of fact,” she said. “That’s interesting, isn’t it?”

“It means Kurkas’s intent is to break it,” I said. “You see that over and over again in Arkan history. Why else conceal such an agreement? Here is another thing; I asked Kurkas for five copies of my safe conduct into Arko, which he provided me, and I sent three of them to… well, the same friends I’ve mentioned, Kranaj, Ivahn and Astalaz. Undeniable proof that Kurkas’s highest and most officially-sworn oath is no good.”

“It’s hard to talk a man out of his fear, Chevaga,” she said.

“I’ve done it over and over again in war,” I said, and couldn’t resist but add, “women, too. It’s a pact made to be broken; it keeps Astalaz off the Diradic tongue so that the Arkans can throw all their strength against us. Then the Lakans’ turn will be next. That’s how they do it. I studied how they do it.”

“If I agree to this lunacy, how am I and my people repaid? Your ships... would you have enough to support my sea-slashers to re-take the villages still held by Arko?” The sea-slasher, I knew, was a small fast Hyerne ship.

“I would think so,” I said. “How many villages and how many ships are we talking?”

“Five villages in a close cluster of islands nearest Kreyen. I would think a dozen ships would do, until they are free. I would release them, then.”

“That’s fair,” I said. It was actually more than would be necessary with ships and wings working as one, it seemed to me, but I remembered they wouldn’t be able to fly openly.

“Still, that shouldn’t take long, and you are asking me to send mine to a war that will protracted,” she said. “There should be some other consideration in it for us. You mentioned territories before.”

“I give you my word it will be something,” I said. “Let me see what I work out with the others, and then we’ll make equitable divisions.” I could sell none of them any of Yeola-e, of course; that meant fighting on land outside our borders, though those laws have been blurred in the past when alliances came into play. I already had the privateers contemplating doing it, on Ro with the A-niah.

“All right,” she said, sitting down again, and taking up the stick of office, so that I knew she was about to speak her decision. “I will send one thousand, and seventy-five elite, with my daughter Kelaepo commanding them, and Peyepallo commanding the regulars. And if you win back Vae Arahi, I will send another thousand. But I have several conditions. First: that you make alliances with Kranaj of Tor Ench and Astalaz of Laka as well.”

“That’s fair enough,” I said into the pause she left, and took a silent deep breath. A drop of sweat came loose from between my shoulder-blades and rolled down my back.

“Second…” She put down the stick and stood up again, frowning. Something told me to stand up also, so I did. “I have heard stories from you, and about you. You’ve proved to me that you reason like a woman. But... I guess when it comes down to it, we Hyerne can be very set in our ways, as much as other people. If we do this... I am entrusting you with a great deal. So many of my sisters’ lives, as well as our name as a fighting nation. And... I don’t mean to offend, but it goes against the grain to so trust a man with such responsibility.”

“So you want to test me somehow,” I said. “Name the test.”

“Show me your womanly strength, and spar me.”

No wonder I’d somehow known to get up. Reason like a woman... womanly strength... I swallowed my retort. I am here: I speak in their language. “Where, and how?” I said. “Name the weapons, if any.” As challenged, I could say it was my right to choose the weapons; but I wanted to show her I could use any. Kaninjer, I hope you’ll forgive me.

“Just straight sword... true steel… and right here will do. Tirothuli, move the chairs and then go.” The music cut off as if the harp-strings were suddenly red-hot, and he scurried forward to do it. As he was going, he gave me a look that seemed a mix of jealousy and pity.

I was getting another dispensation, I saw, to wield a weapon despite my gender defect. “My sword’s on my ship,” I said. “Are we having it fetched, or would you lend me one?”

She barked some orders, and a guard brought a pair of straight Hyerne longswords and a shorter draped tunic in the same teal, staring from me to her Queen and back again, but saying nothing. Segiddis changed without even a thought. That deep-bronzed muscular beauty reminded me of Niku, with a pang. Segiddis seemed almost impatient to do this; I wondered if it was the way she always did things, or whether she was more eager because it was me. Though it had long sleeves, I kept my shirt on, to hide the bandage. She invited me to choose one sword. It was no Chirel, but it was good enough, straight and balanced closer to the hilt than I was used to.

I had never fought, or sparred, a Hyerne in my life, and so had no idea of their style, but then I’d faced any number of warriors from all over the world in the Mezem. This would be easier than the negotiation.

We’d barely crossed swords when she stepped back and said “Wait. You’re favouring your shield-arm... why?”

I allowed a laugh. “I hoped I’d be able not to show it. You’re too sharp-eyed for me. In that battle against the twenty-one Arkan ships, I took a wound.”

“Ah. Well then…” She tucked her left arm behind herself, the hand in her belt so she could not use it. “Fair’s fair.” Since it did not matter now, I took off my shirt. Just like the women on the street, she didn’t hide her appreciative once-over in the slightest. From her, somehow, it didn’t grate. We closed again.

She was very good, anyone’s elite of elite, but not my match. I could get in three kill-strokes for her every one. I knew very well, though, not to do anything that could be taken as humiliation, but only excellence.

Would it bother her to be bested by a man anyway, and that translate into anger? I knew how it was with Arkans: show them an inferior who is somehow superior, and what they want to do most is kill them. I mean only to reassure you that you are deciding rightly to ally with me, I told her in my mind, so only that spirit would come off me, as I stopped the sword with the point a hair from her guts again. She moved as if she was enjoying it, but I saw no trace of a smile.

We were soon both pouring sweat; of course I’d got the head start in that. How long would we go? I decided not to stop until she called a halt, to prove my endurance even wounded. “Enough!” she finally said, stepping back. Then a smile spread across her face. “I haven’t been tested like that since my last Throne Games.” I knew, though only generally, what that meant: a Hyerne Queen can be challenged by any other Hyerne (by which is meant Hyerne woman) for the throne, through a set of contests both physical and of wits; a vote of the people, by which I mean the women, of Thenai settles it. “Chevaga, I can see why you won fifty fights in the Mezem, and have the name you do.”

“And you are more inclined to trust me as an ally, I hope,” I said.

“Yes,” she said, with both pleasure and a touch of concession, as much as I could ever imagine from her. She called for the guard, who came to take the swords. “I can see also…” She was suddenly closer to me. “How beautiful you are.” Her arms were around my waist and her tongue between my lips almost before I knew.

That utterly casual and unquestioned assumption, that she could, even with a man who had just proved he could take her, caught me so off-guard I did nothing to stop her. By the time I thought of the words, “I come from a place where all people are equal, and we ask,” it was too late to say them, my mouth hotly full.

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