The Duel Part One

The loss today was too raw for Malady to bear. She hadn’t yet dressed for her Return, and the thought of all those sympathetic words made her want to curl up on her cold, empty bed. Snow lay heavily upon the statues in her small garden; perhaps she should cancel.

  If so, she needed to send runners without delay; she left a letter half-written at her desk, drew a houserobe about herself, and tucking her powdershot into the robe’s knotted cord, left her chamber in search of Housemaster Havis.

It was a shame to cancel. The servants had put in a grand effort buffing the oak-panelled walls, and Bartholt’s brass telescope--her only ornament of any value--had been set out on an end-table in the hall, the lenses arrayed before it. Though she owned but a little silverware, it too was polished to a high sheen, and her reflection was uninspiring. Maybe not such a shame after all.

    She found Havis in the kitchen. He was shouting commands at two servants she didn’t recognise. Bartholt would have known their names. One sliced root vegetables, the other plucked a goose. Havis busied himself beneath the oven, stacking the logs to the channel the heat. On hearing the servants stop moving, he looked up.

    “Come on! The lady needs your service, not salutes! Ralliss, keep the feathers. After roasting you can put them back on.” He dusted sooty hands on his apron and gave a tight bow. “Milady! Most excellent to see you. Your attire is presently in the receiving room, Jemiah returned with your requested alterations and will help you dress as soon as it pleases you. I hope I don’t step beyond bounds to suggest that the sooner it pleases you, the better prepared we’ll be for your guests.” He hung the apron up; beneath it, his uniform was impeccable.

    “We’re cancelling. I need runners sending out. The weather’s awful. I wouldn’t make my men march in it and I won’t make my guests.” She looked at the kitchen table gradually filling up with pastries and soft breads. “And Havis, I’m not a lady. Malady’s just fine to call me, or Marshal if you absolutely must use a title.”

    He puffed out his chest, and he had somehow polished his buttons brighter even than usual. “Your title is Freesoul Malady Endiss d’Med, Light’s Marshal by appointment. But in this house, with myself in your service… you aren’t my commander. I shan’t call you Marshal. You are the lady of the house, and it is my duty to address you as such.”

    “Runners, Havis.”

    He approached, and reached a hand out. “May I?”

    She allowed him to lay a gentle hand on her elbow and steer her from kitchen to Receiving Room. Jemiah left with a hurried curtsey.

    Perfection. The settees had been arranged close enough that no one would feel cause to raise their voice, and with space sufficient for private asides. Havis’s work. There was now no time to change the coverings. Additionally, there was no need, as she was cancelling.

    Havis released her arm with the same grace with which he’d taken hold of it and moved to a respectful distance. Folding his hands behind his back, he met her eyes.

    “With the fullest of respect, there’ll be no more talk of cancellation. The staff have enough pressures. And you, Milady, have been locked away for far too long.”

    “The weather, Havis!”

    “I’ve known you long enough to know your excuses.”

    “But,” she said, and bit her lip, and couldn’t stop the tears sliding out. She sank onto black brocade cushions; hugged her knees. Outside, howling wind rattled the latches of the high windows.

    Havis ran his thumb behind the ornamental clock on the mantlepiece of the room’s large fireplace, and once satisfied, turned back to her.

“There’s no length of time you can wait that will make this any easier.”

Bartholt. Her last memory was in the spring. A sideways smile, musket slung at his shoulder, leaning on the haft of his gleaming halberd. They hadn’t let her look. Folded cloth on a box before the Loremasters set flame to him. He would have lain a soft and gentle palm on her shoulder, and told her that when she was ready he would listen if needed. She had drawn from his strength many times. But also he had drawn from hers; she pushed him to excel and ran the drills with him until in the time it took other soldiers to loose two shots, he could fire thrice.

Him, a soldier of the frontier; her, a defender of the city. Medressea still needed defending.

She unfolded her arms and rose. A breath out through the nose from the very bottom of her lungs expelled the paralysis. An echo of her battlefield practice; it felt good to make ready.

“Jemiah!” She pitched her voice to carry through the wall. The servantress reentered, curtseying. “Havis, I’ll have the room.”

Nothing so gauche as a smile, but the light in his eyes was the light of victory.

It went well until the final arrival. First, thankfully, were the Lord and Lady Basingford, Vashtan and Estelle--an elderly couple--her sponsors to the Academy. If not for them she wouldn’t be a marshal. Close on their heels, Freesoul Jereth d’Med, formerly Light’s Marshal, who’d taught her musket and halberd. She flashed him a warm smile, she’d missed his cantankerous wit. Briefly reaching the now with these three prepared her for the arrival of her empty-headed but articulate cousin Freesoul Celestine d’Med, a widely-known socialite, and she didn’t feel as apprehensive as she thought she’d be about the arrival of her commander, Lord Dashelle Armaforth Lenemici d’Med, Light’s High Marshal by appointment; and his son, Laes.

    All settled in after their snowy coats had been taken, and warm wine pressed into their hands by Havis, who announced each in turn, and made the traditional housemaster’s request that they ‘await the pleasure of the lady’s grace’. She’d always found it a bit flowery but now she was grateful; there was time in her chambers to comfortably sit the powdershot in the alteration to her dress. Despite her ruffed skirt and the cut of her neckline--which though it could by no means be called daring, nonetheless exposed more skin than she had shown in eight months--she felt calm.

The time came after the general chit-chat to discuss the first matter that might be called serious, when from her front door came an unexpected tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap.

    She actually took a step towards the door before Havis smoothly passed in front of her. “I’ll see to this, milady. Probably just the morrow’s bread; Aver Bakerson often delivers before the roads become difficult.”

    The figure visible as Havis wrestled open the ice-rimed door was not the cheerful hairy-armed baker, but a tall and broad-shouldered male--once evidently of powerful build, gone deeply to seed--leaning heavily on a reinforced cane carved from a single piece of now-outlawed bloodwood. Unmistakable. Heavy jowls beneath small hard eyes, forehead creased in perpetual scowl, but not the good-natured irascibleness of Jereth’s; the scowl indicated that its bearer found all he saw to be considerably less than satisfactory.

    His name was Brandal Derryg and she would never dignify him with the titles that even now Havis begrudgingly fulfilled his obligation to announce. Baron Brandal Iriniad Fossault Derryg d’Med, Imperator by blood. Him too, she had last seen in the spring.

    To the warming of her heart, High Marshal Dashelle came immediately to her defence. “This is irregular, Brandal. I was privy to the invitations. Yours was not among them.”

    She found herself speaking. “Peace, Dashelle, I’m sure the Imperator-Baron was merely walking. Far be it from me to refuse the shelter of my home to a free soul of the Light.”

    How she kept the rage from her voice she didn’t know. Her sorrow hid as white hot anger coursed through every nerve. The powershot could be in her hands in an instant; she could empty his head over her front step. Or backhand him with her lace glove and commence a duel she could win without effort; justice would be done in the eyes of all persons present. But not the law: that was not how matters were handled in Medressea any more. The forms must be obeyed.

    “On the contrary. I knew of Malady’s Return. Her preparations are extremely impressive... as is her proper use of title, Freeman Dashelle.”

Brandal had this way of lingering on the weighty parts of his words and imparting more than their rightful force. It was hard to remember, looking at him, that he’d once been a skilled leader. A hero.

His words left Malady cold. The status of Imperator-Barons versus the holder of the much newer title of High Marshal was an issue sore to the point of violence. In theory, Dashelle could order Brandal to raise levies and outfit militias should war arise, but on home soil, in times of peace, the only persons traditionally above Imperator-Barons were the Emperor himself, and the Light of Creation. If he didn’t want to bring down the censure of his peers, he was reduced to two options: accord Brandal his title and suffer the omission of his own - or demand satisfaction. Her cousin would undoubtedly retell the story of tonight across all of Medressea’s fashionable parlours. Option one would brand him a coward, option two was for him as it was for her: of questionable legality, despite the Light’s silence on the issue.

She spoke up before he could make this decision. “A gathering such as this need not stand on ceremony, Brandal. Now we’re all introduced I’m sure we’ve comfort enough in our positions that it will be only the smallest of matters to dispense with Title within these walls. Why, consider it a part of your invitation to join us, from the lady of the house.”

There. She’d landed a blow. His eyes tightened, but there was little he could do with Celestine’s tale-hungry eyes watching all: accept and join, or refuse and leave. For a man used to being above, to be equal was a loss.

He bowed his head in feigned grace. “As you wish, milady.”

There was no getting rid of him. If a marshal publicly disrespected an Imperator-Baron, there’d be hell to pay. Both sides would have to disavow her. And if the first thing she did after coming out of mourning was compel to duel the man responsible for Bartholt’s death, her entire career would be called into question. Never mind that he had called on her. So she set her heart to endure, and smiled, and made him welcome.