Crown of Renewal(61)

“It’s not just a sock. It’s a sore heel, a blister, a gods-ratted hole in your skin, and the fever will come into it, and you’ll be lame and someone else dead because of it.” And then, quite unlike Stammel, Paks laughed. “That’s what my sergeant always said. I came into the Company already knowing how to knit, sew a plain seam, and darn socks: it’s not hard if you catch the hole early. I’ll show you later, but now I must see the king.”

“I’m here,” Kieri said. She looked up at him and grinned; he felt his own smile widen. “Paks—how are you?”

“Fine,” she said. He could see a few silver strands in amongst the yellow of her hair now, and the silver circle on her brow still made him uneasy, but she looked healthy. “I was sent,” she said. “And I have word.”

Word. He did not quite shiver. “Arian has had her babes,” he said. “Both healthy. Come and meet them.”

Inside, he led her first to his office. “How long can you stay?”

“I don’t know … longer than one day or two, I think.”

“Sit down,” he said, and nodded to one of his Squires. “Varne, bring refreshments, please.” When the Squire had left, he said, “What word?”

“My lord—sir king—Sergeant Stammel is dead. He had left the Company—”

“Stammel?”

“With a dragon and then asked leave to stay away and live apart, where he was not known, because of his blindness. He made a life there, among villagers on an island, and he died there, defending them.”

“As he would,” Kieri said. “You heard this from—?”

“Captain—Duke Arcolin as he is now. I arrived in time for the burial.”

“Thank you for coming to tell me,” Kieri said. In the years since he had seen Stammel last, he had never been able to imagine him blind—he knew, but his mind refused to see anything but the same steady, tough, capable sergeant, brown eyes clear and keen. Now he thought back to the young Stammel, the Stammel of his recruit cohort. “I can’t … I can’t imagine him dying any other way than that.”

A servant knocked then and brought in a tray with a pitcher and glasses and a plate of pastries. Kieri poured and handed a glass to Paks, then took one himself and a pastry.

“So is that why you come?”

“Not only that.” She looked at him. “I am in search of a Kuakgan; the Marshal-General was attacked by iynisin and suffers wounds that do not heal properly. Marshals and paladins have tried, but it is with her as it was with me. We know of no healing but through a Kuakgan, but there are none in Fintha. Most in Tsaia are bound to their Grove and do not travel far or long. Master Oakhallow will have her, if she will come there, but says he cannot go so far. He has asked some who wander to come to me here—it was the closest way.”

“So it is not our need for a paladin? Glad as I am to see you again, Paks, it’s a relief to know it’s not our problem.”

“No … but you seem especially happy. Is it the children? How old are they?”

“Twins,” Kieri said. “Born today. You will have to see them, but not this moment. I hope Arian’s gone to sleep.” He took another swallow of sib. “Tell me, what does Gird think of the Marshal-General’s injuries?”

“I cannot tell.” Her nose wrinkled. “It’s complicated. When I was a recruit, I had to learn to obey orders I did not understand, but Stammel taught us ways to understand them—the why of things we had to do. Now—I am sometimes given orders, very clear, and sometimes know why and sometimes do not. I know Gird wants me to find a Kuakgan, but it’s not in words. Just … feeling. And at times, I have nothing to do but … be.”

“Hmm. As a king, I am supposed to know why I give the orders I do … I certainly did know, when I was a mercenary captain.”

Paks looked at him, a penetrating look from those gray eyes; he wondered how far in she could see.

“You have changed,” she said. “The seeming younger—that’s the elven blood, of course—but now there’s … it’s almost like … the Lady.”

“You do know she died—”

“I heard,” Paks said. “And how. But—are you then her heir? Is that what I sense?”

“That is a very long story, but in short—yes, in a way that confounds both elves and humans. Not so much of the ability to form an elvenhome as my grandmother—the Lady—had. More than any human should have as far as elves are concerned, but since the choice was the complete loss of it or my lesser version, there are still elves in Lyonya.”