Crown of Renewal(9)

Back in the stronghold, Selfer met Burek. “I have a word for you, Captain, now that the courier is off.”

“Yes, sir?”

“I have another letter from the new Count Andressat, to be handed to you once the pass is open, he said in his note to me. He says he is your father.”

Burek nodded. “He told me that when I was coming back from Cortes Andres.”

“He may want you to come there—to stay, I mean. I would, if I were … he has to recognize your ability.”

“This Company is my home—”

“Forever? I doubt that. But read your letter and see what he says.”

Selfer went into his office. He liked Burek—his good sense, his steady personality, his courage—and hated the thought of losing him. This close to the new campaign season, he would wait until Arcolin arrived and let him hire a new captain if Burek left.

The list of soldiers due punishment for various misdeeds lay precisely in the middle of his desk. One of his least favorite duties and one that grew more common as winter waned. No matter how they trained, in this season troops grew bored and stale, tired of winter quarters, bored by Valdaire. The list lengthened every tenday until the recruit cohort arrived, and this year was made worse by unseasonably warm, sunny weather and the increasingly bad stench near the bridges in the city.

He sighed, looking at today’s list: two repeat offenders, both for drunkenness. One for brawling with a Golden Company soldier; as a first-time offender, still a worse offense than simple drunkenness. A first-term had wandered away from a work detail and come back late … a girl, of course, was his excuse. Another had been found asleep in the storeroom he’d been assigned to clean. Then there were the problems found at inspection: uniforms and weapons not cared for, missing items, and so on. He jotted down the punishment by each name, then called in the senior sergeant for each cohort and had them assemble their troops in the main courtyard, with the miscreants to one side, in a separate formation.

After the regular daily inspection of the rest, Selfer called each of those on the list forward with the sergeant for that cohort. One by one he assigned punishments, and when it was done, he went back to his office to file the list. Burek was waiting.

“He does want me to come back,” Burek said, his expression sober. “I am his oldest son by several years, and I have more experience, he says.”

“Does that mean he’s naming you his heir?”

“He offers that. I wish you’d met him. He’s a good man, I think.”

“Who let you grow up without his name,” Selfer said, and then disliked the edge in his own tone. “I’m sorry,” he said then. “It’s not fair when I haven’t met him. And I suppose he was young.”

“Yes. And he makes no excuses for how it happened. What he says is that since his father died, he must stay in Cortes Andres most of the time, as the Count. He has three brothers to help, but in the present threat he thinks it is not enough.”

“He’s hiring Golden Company again this year, isn’t he?” Selfer noticed he was tapping his fingers and quit.

“Yes. But he still wants me … When we rode together, when he escorted me back to the border, we found we liked each other. More than blood relation; Filis did not like me, or I him, for that matter.”

“So … you want to go?” Selfer forced back what he wanted to say about Andressat’s family, about how hard it would be for Burek, how resentful the new count’s other sons would be.

“I said I would stay here. Yet—he is my father by blood. Yet again—the man who raised me, the only father I knew—is also a good man. If I went back—he would be someone I gave orders to. It could not be the same.” Burek met Selfer’s gaze. “And I am needed here, as well. I know that. I owe Lord Arcolin a lot, and you and I are friends. I feel a responsibility for the troops. I know them, and they know me—”

“You said you would stay here until you were needed there … maybe you will know when you feel the need there more than the need here. But you must tell Lord Arcolin when he comes.”

“Of course.”

“And for my part, Burek, I hope you stay. We do not want another Harnik.”

“Gods, no!”

“And you may have noticed we’re getting more misbehavior now. We need to get them out of the city and then back in time for Lord Arcolin and the recruits. A five-day march will do no harm and show up anything we need to work on.”

“Agreed. And if it rains or we get a late snow, all the better to cool the hotheads among them.”

By the third day of the march, Selfer had a long list of what must be done when they got back to Valdaire. They were more than a day from the city, in the rough outbounds that belonged to Foss Council, working their way along the foothills of the Dwarfmounts, where rotten snow lay in shaded hollows. No rain had come; the sky was summer-blue, and the wind from the south blew warm.