The Saphire Rose by David Eddings

It was when they reached a hilltop several miles from Chyrellos that the Preceptors turned back. The advice and the cautions had all been given, and so there was little to do but clasp hands and to wish each other well.

Sparhawk and his friends rather soberly watched as their leaders rode back to the Holy City.

.Well,’ Tynian said, ‘now that we’re alone –

“Let’s talk for a few moments first,’ Sparhawk said. He raised his voice. cDomi,’ he called, “would you join us for a moment, please?’

Kring rode up the hill, an inquiring look on his face.

“Now then,’ Sparhawk began, ‘Martel seems to think that Azash will want us to get through without any difficulty, but Martel might be wrong. Azash has many servants, and He may very well loose them on us. He wants Bhelliom, not any satisfaction He might get from a personal confrontation. Kring, I think you’d better put out scouts. Let’s not be taken by surprise.’

“I will, friend Sparhawk,’ the Domi promised.

‘If we should happen to encounter any of the servants of Azash, I want all of you to fall back and let me deal with them. I’ve got Bhelliom, and that should be all the advantage I’ll need. Kalten raised the point that we might just overtake Martel. If we do, try to take Martel and Annias alive. The Church wants them to stand trial. I doubt that Arissa or Lycheas will offer much resistance, so take them as well.’

‘And Adus?’ Kalten asked eagerly.

“Adus can barely talk, so he wouldn’t be of much value in any trial. You can have him – as a personal gift from me. ‘

They had gone perhaps another mile when they found Stragen sitting under a tree. “I thought perhaps you’d got lost,’ the slender thief drawled, rising to his feet.

‘Do I sense a volunteer here?’ Tynian suggested.

‘Hardly, old boy,’ Stragen said. ‘“I’ve never had occasion to visit Zemoch, and I think I want to keep it that way.

Actually, I’m here as the queen’s messenger, and her ~personal envoy. I’ll ride along with you as far as the Zemoch border, if I may, and then I’ll return to Cimmura to give her my report.’

“Aren’t you spending a great deal of time away from your own business?’ Kurik asked him.

“My business in Emsat sort of runs itself. Tel’s looking out for my interests there. I need a vacation anyway.’ He patted at his doublet in various places. ‘Oh yes, here it is.’

He drew out a folded sheet of parchment. “A letter for you from your bride, Sparhawk,’ he said, handing it over.

‘It’s the first of several I’m supposed to give you when the situation dictates.’

Sparhawk moved Faran away from the others and broke the seal on Ehlana’s note.

‘Beloved,’ it read. ‘You’ve been gone for only a few hours, and I already miss you desperately. Stragen is carrying other messages for you – messages which I hope will inspire you when things aren’t going well. They will also convey to you my unbending love and faith in you.

I love you, my Sparhawk. Ehlana.

‘How did you get ahead of us?’ Kalten was asking when Sparhawk rejoined them.

‘You’re wearing armour, Sir Kalten,’ Stragen replied, ‘and I’m not. You’d be amazed at how fast a horse can run when he’s not burdened with all that excess iron.

‘Well?’ Ulath asked Sparhawk, ‘do we send him back to Chyrellos?’

Sparhawk shook his head. “He’s acting under orders from the queen. There’s an implicit command to me involved in that as well. He comes along.

“Remind me never to become a royal champion,’ the Genidian Knight said. ‘It seems to involve all sorts of politics and complications.’

The weather turned cloudy as they rode northeastwards along the Kadach road, although it did not rain as it had the last time they had been there. The southeastern border country of Lamorkand was more Pelosian in character than it was Lamork, and there were few castles atop the surrounding hills. Because of its proximity to Chyrellos, however, the landscape was dotted with monasteries and cloisters, and the sound of bells echoed mournfully across the fields.

“The clouds are moving in the wrong direction,’ Kurik said as they were saddling their horses on the second morning out from Chyrellos. ‘An east wind in mid-autumn is very bad news. I’m afraid we’re in for a hard winter, and that’s not going to be pleasant for the troops campaiping on the plains of central Lamorkand. ‘

They mounted and rode on towards the northeast.

About mid-morning, Kring and Stragen rode forward to join Sparhawk at the head of the column. ‘Friend Stragen here has been telling me some things about that Tamul woman, Mirtai,’ Kring said. “Did you ever get the chance to talk to her about me?”

“I sort of broke the ice on the subject,’ Sparhawk said.

“I was afraid of that. Some of the things Stragen told me are ~giving me some second thoughts about the whole notion.’

.Oh?’

‘Did you know that she has knives strapped to her knees and elbows?’

“Yes.’

‘I understand that they stick out whenever she bends one of her arms or legs.’

“I think that’s the idea, yes.’

‘Stragen tells me that once’ when she was young, three ruffians set upon her. She bent an’elbow and slashed one across the throat, drove her knee into the second one’s crotch, knocked the third down with her fist and knifed him in the heart. I’m not entirely sure that I want a woman like that for a wife. What did she say? When you told her about me, I mean?’

“She laughed, I’m afraid.’

‘Laughed?’ Kring sounded shocked.

“I sort of gather that you’re not exactly to her taste.’

‘Laughed? At me?’

“I think your decision’s wise, though, friend Kring,’

Sparhawk said. “I don’t think you two would get along very well.’

Kring’s eyes, however, were bulging. ‘“laughed at me, did she?’ he said indignantly. ‘Well, we’ll just see about that!’ and he whirled his horse and rode back to join his men.

‘That might have worked out if you hadn’t told him about the laughing,’ Stragen observed. ‘Now he’ll go out of his way to pursue her. I sort of like him, and I hate to think of what Mirtai’s likely to do to him if he gets too persistent. ‘

“Maybe we can talk him out of it,’ Sparhawk said.

“I wouldn’t really count on it.’

“What are you actually doing here, Stragen?’ Sparhawk asked the blond man. “In the southern kingdoms, I mean?’

Stragen looked off towards a nearby monastery, his eyes distant. ‘Do you want the real truth, Sparhawk? Or would you like to give me a moment or two to fabricate a story for you?’

“Why don’t we start out with the truth? If I don’t like that, then you can make something up.’

Stragen flashed him a quick grin. ‘All right,’ he agreed.

“Up in Thalesia, I’m a counterfeit aristocrat. Down here, I’m the real thing – or very close to it. I associate with kings and queens, the nobility and the higher clergy on a more or less equal footing.’ He raised one hand. ‘I’m not deluding myself, my friend, so don’t become concerned about my sanity. I know what I am – a bastard thief – and I know that my proximity to the gentry down here is only temporary and that it’s based entirely on my usefulness. I’m tolerated, not really accepted. My ego, however, is sizeable.’

‘I noticed that,’ Sparhawk said with a gentle smile.

“Be nice, Sparhawk. Anyway, I’ll accept this temporary and superficial equality – if only for the chance of some civilized conversation. Whores and thieves aren’t really very stimulating companions, you understand, and about all they can really offer in the way of conversation is shop talk. Have you ever heard a group of whores sitting around talking shop?’

‘I can’t say that I have.’

Stragen shuddered. ‘Absolutely awful. You learn things about men – and women – that you really don’t want to know.’

‘This won’t last. You know that, don’t you, Stragen?

The time will come when things will return to normal, and people will start closing their doors to you again.’

‘You’re probably right, but it’s fun to pretend for a little while. And when it’s all over, I’ll have that much more reason to despise you stinking aristocrats.’ Stragen paused. ‘I do sort of like you though, Sparhawk – for the time being, at least.’

As they rode northeastwards, they began to encounter ~groups of armed men. The Lamorks were never very far from full mobilization anyway, and they were able to respond to their king’s call to arms quickly. In a melancholy repetition of the events of some five centuries earlier, men from all the kingdoms of western Eosia streamed towards a battlefield in Lamorkand. Sparhawk and Ulath passed the time conversing in Troll. Sparhawk was not certain when he might have occasion to talk to a Troll, but since he had learned the language, it seemed a shame to let it slip away. They reached Kadach at the end of a gloomy day when the sunset was staining the clouds to the west with an orange glow much like that of a distant forest fire. The wind from the east was stiff, and it carried with it the first faint chill of the oncoming winter. Kadach was a walled town, stiff and grey and rigidly unlovely. In what was to become a custom, Kring bade them goodnight and led his men on through the city and out of the east gate to set up camp in the fields beyond. The Peloi were uncomfortable when confined in cities with such urban frivolities as walls, rooms and roofs. Sparhawk and the rest of his friends found a comfortable inn near the centre of town, bathed, changed clothes and gathered in the common room for a supper of boiled ham and assorted vegetables. Sephrenia, as usual, declined the ham.