The Seasons of Salt

Chapter Eleven

Brynn Dowse stamped his feet briskly, trying to clear the worst of the mud off of them. The whole damn campsite was a slough now. One of the lesser grievances of war, mayhap, but one which lingered. He could not walk from one end of the campsite to the other without getting stuck four, maybe five, times. Endlessly frustrating, and hardly dignified. It was enough to make a grown man weep.

The siege had been lingering for a few weeks now and the air had grown fetid. The stench of it was almost thick enough to cut and lingered unpleasantly on his tongue every time he breathed. He ought to have grown used to it, by now, but somehow the odour only worsened with time, catching him afresh with its putrid aroma.

He sighed. There had been a few skirmishes, and, before Glengower had worked his silver-tongued magic upon them, the Fen’s Men had had to rally against the King’s Company hard to keep the causeway closed, but it had grown quiet of late. He did not know if this was a temporary lull or a more permanent decline, but he ought to be grateful for it.

It was hard to be grateful for the mud and the stench and the slough though. He hated sieges. Give him a good field battle any day. More likelihood of death, of course, but less waiting. Less tension. Just the singing of the sword and the blood and, once you’d survived it, the relief of still tasting the air.

He could well imagine what Sendre would say though if she could hear his thoughts, could picture her pursed lips and chiding expression all too clearly in his mind. You have children to return to, Brynn. I would have thought you’d be grateful for a bit of boredom. Fae’s breath, that woman. He pitied the fools who only saw the prim and courtly Large Lady with her impeccable manners and poise. He sometimes thought if more women were warriors, battles would be over a lot sooner. He could well imagine Sendre behind the war table, organising troops with the same merciless efficiency with which she raised her children.

Brynn Dowse smiled to himself.

 With the Fae’s blessing, they’d be back to their own houses soon enough though. The thought of his three little plagues hurtling down the pathway towards him sent a small smile lingering beneath his beard. Cerissa, pell-mell, hair loose and flying behind her, Sylas hurtling as though all the demons of the Starfire Isles were after him, Jonnah, a little older, a little slower, trying to keep a little of his dignity as he bounded down the old beloved pathways towards the Da he was still old enough to crash into, bear-hugs and hair tussles – and Sendre, hurrying after them sedately enough to be ladylike, fast enough to betray just how much she had missed him.

This was why men sued for peace, to be home again. To bury themselves in the arms of their wives, and not in some mud-slogged stranger’s soil. He stared at the war map spread wide across the table before him, but he scarcely saw it.

There was a soft swish of leather, and Brynn turned to see his nephew, Emlyn Marstonson, enter the tent, the deep blue of his Fen’s Men uniform immaculately clean despite the mud and mire surrounding them. It set off his blonde hair nicely. Brynn smiled to himself. If only they could persuade Cerissa to care half as much about her appearance as Emlyn did.

 Fae’s Breath, the lad looked like Marston. Looked more and more like Marston every day, it seemed. Havon, the only true-born heir Marston sired, had always been a sickly, scrawny thing, even before the Blood-fever took him. His skin had been as pale as his hair and, though Brynn had never voiced it aloud, he was not surprised to find Havon had not made it to his adult years. Emlyn, blossoming into adulthood on the verge of his fifteenth year now, would have served the dignity of the Dowse name much better, if Marston had only had the foresight to marry the wench he sired Emlyn on. He had Marston’s same hair – the Dowse hair – dirty blonde and thick, and Brynn could never look at it without smiling. Mayhap that was why he was so blessed fond of the kid.

“Well?” He barked gruffly. “What news from the Fen’s Men, lad?”

The poor lad looked tired, no doubt, as the newest recruit, he’d drawn the night’s watch, but there was that same irreverent grin lingering on his face. That was a Dowse trait too. Marston’d be right proud of his boy, if he’d only lived long enough to see him grown. The kid held up half a dozen scraps of paper.

“The corryns have been hovering all morning, Uncle,” he said. “The masters have been busy transcribing and I have been sent to deliver them all to you.”

Féon always hated that he let the lad call him Uncle, but then Féon always hated a lot of things. She’d nearly had apoplexy when Brynn was considering naming Emlyn heir, back when poor Sendre was having all that trouble growing a bairn to term. Four years they’d tried before Jonnah came through, squalling and bloodied and Sendre, who had not believed even until the babe took that first breath that he would be born alive, had wept with joy for days afterwards. Fae’s Breath, he’d almost forgotten how grim those years had been in the soft glow that followed. And Sendre fearing all the time that he’d annul their marriage and try again with someone new, even when he’d told her that he would not. And it was not a fear unfounded.  Féon was not the only one urging him to it, though she certain-sure was the loudest voice.

Ha. He’d almost forgotten that. How easy the mind mellowed. It was easier to remember Féon how she’d been when they were little, scampering around Bridgenford together, swimming, and picnics, and Fae-days. Easier to forgive the winter-ice that came from her lips these days when he remembered their childhood. Marston, Polric, Brynn, Féon and – Well. It was a long time ago now. Many rushing waters had passed under the bridge. He’d been thinking recently that she had turned into a sour-mouthed wretch of stern opinions out there in Aridshire, but mayhap he was just remembering it wrong. Mayhap she had always been that way. Certain-sure, for all that she was blood, Brynn was finding her a trial these days. He remembered to write to her dutifully often, and he took the little plagues up to see their cousins every other year as a brother ought to, but the people that they once were had changed. He had been weighed down with the responsibilities of a house and a Lordship he was never supposed to own, and she – well. It could not be helped, mayhap. But what was it to her what the kid called him, anyway? He was only a boy, and the Fae knew that Emlyn did not have any other living relatives to claim him. How much did it cost to give him a little kindness?

Féon’d not even seen the lad since she’d married over to the Rowleys over on the mountain edged desolates of Aridshire – must be, what, nearly a ten-year back now? Back when the last dragon war had been put to bed at last. And now they were fighting another one. Mayhap war never really ended. Mayhap it only slept like winter bulbs beneath the sod and when the flowers and leaves on it withered, the bulb of it waited to sprout out again next spring.

By all the rivers, that war had lingered. It had taken his own Da, it had taken Marston – it had – No. He pushed that thought away hard. But they had been fighting it for years. Nine, ten of them, from his youth to the early years of his manhood, until he thought that it would never end, that they would never know owt but war across the counties once more, until some bright spark on the Floating City had found a way to permanently body-bind the dragons, and the tide of war had turned. And life had started to regain a little normality. People wed and sired sons, and celebrated Fae-days and Féon had taken that last trundling journey down to Aridshire alone to meet her new husband, with only one of her mother’s sons left to give her away.

Mayhap that was why she’d turned so sour. He’d be sore too, if he had to leave the rolling green beauty of Bridgenford for the harsh sun-soaked rocks of the Rowley acres and the perpetual shadow of the Dragon caves above. He’d not have made her go through with it himself, but their father, Gerin Dowse, had sworn her away and it’s a hard thing to go back on a dead man’s last wish. Féon had thought it her duty, and mayhap she was right to.

Emlyn coughed a little, and Brynn realised the kid was still holding up the letters for him to take as he drowned deep in his own thoughts. Brynn snatched them with a small glower at the boy, who just grinned. He knew his uncle too well to be cowed by his fake ferocity now.

“I have not got time to read all of them now,” he snapped, throwing them down on the table behind him. “Tell me what they say. Or have you forgotten all the learning we paid for you to have? At great expense, I might add, Marstonson.”

“The queen and her two children were taken hostage last night by Oric Helmas and his men.”

Brynn Dowse blinked in surprise.

“Helmas? I thought he was loyal to the Ferrises?”

Emlyn just shrugged. “So did they, apparently. But his lands have been scalded by the upheaval, and his common-folk are starving and look like to riot. He’s ready for peace at all costs now. He does not want this war stretching on into winter.”

Brynn frowned.

“I thought you would be pleased, Uncle! It will bring the end of the war round so much sooner.”

Brynn just grunted again.

“And the king?” he asked instead. “What has happened to Royce Hagwhore?”

“He’s holed up in the keep the last we had heard, with the few remnants of his men he holds still, but the outer walls have already fallen and they have no resources to withstand a siege. As long as we can stop reinforcements from traversing the Golden Causeway, the war is ours.”

“Confidence kills, boy.”

“Armies kill, Uncle. And ours is intact, whilst the king’s is beaten and disarrayed.”

“Aye? Until the dragons fly. How many dragons do you think it takes to decimate an army? I saw the damage they wrought in the last fae-damned war. You were barely a bump in your mother’s morning frock then, minnow. Do not preach war tactics to me.”

But Emlyn’s smile just grew.

“The Rowleys have the dragon prince hostage,” he said. “Their note arrived this morning.” He nodded at one of the scraps discarded on the table with an almost wry smugness.

Brynn looked up sharply.

“Alive?”

“Aye, alive, but body-bound. Permanently, by the way they write, but I do not know if you want to credit it.”

 Brynn scratched fingers through his scrubby beard thoughtfully.

“Does Ferris know?”

Emlyn just shrugged.

That did change things, certainly. Unless they’d be willing to sacrifice the dragon heir for another throw of the dice? But dragon spawn were rare. They’d be unlikely to throw it all away and risk their precious fire-eyed bairn.

He looked up to see Emlyn still looking at him.

“Well?”

“There has been…other news. Strange news. I do not know how much you want to credit it, Uncle.” He seemed reluctant to tell it, and Brynn could well guess why. Emlyn had been grown out in the borderlands of Cliffedge until his mother had died and, following Marston’s own death, Brynn had taken him in. He thought himself far too logical to believe in the old ways now.

“Fae happenings?” Brynn guessed shrewdly. Emlyn just shrugged. He would not meet his uncle’s eyes.

“The common-folk say so, but they like to credit everything to the Fae. But they’re not the only ones. There have been…rumours…of small-folk sightings in the Flats. And the Sunset Edge says the…the storm-bringers are…” He ran a hand through his hair, disarraying it a little. “I do not know, Uncle. Just, something has unsettled them all, that’s all I’m saying. Folks are uneasy and they see phantasms everywhere. Ghosts and things. Something’s in the air, that’s all.”

“No news from the Horseplains?”

“No.” Emlyn’s frown increased, and Brynn’s joined it. They ought to have heard something from the Tullivers by now.

“You do not think they’d defect to the hags, do you? The Tullivers, I mean.”

“Ha. You’ve clearly never met Tulliver. He hates those witches with a passion. And anyway, it’d be a little late for it at this point in the war. They’d have done it before we cinched the belt at Holdfast, if they were going to.”

Emlyn murmured a noise under his breath and Brynn swallowed a grin. He clapped one large, calloused hand on his nephew’s shoulder.

“Go and get some sleep, boy,” he said. “You look dead on your feet.”

Emlyn opened his mouth, and then shut it again. Brynn snorted out a laugh.

“Aye,” he told the unspoken question. “I suspect we will be going home right soon. If the dragons are quelled and the king is trapped, the rebellion is all but victorious, I’d say.”

“Except for the urach.”

“Well, we cannot do owt about that now, and they cannot do much on their own. They’ve never taken Bridgenford yet. Too much salt for their blood.”

“We’re not at Bridgenford,” Emlyn pointed out, but Brynn just scowled at him.

“I do not need you to tell me where we are and are not, Marstonson.” And there was a genuine bite of impatience in it, which his nephew picked up on uneasily. He just bobbed his head in a brief bow of apology – his Fen’s Men training obviously sinking in already, Brynn thought darkly.

“There’s a letter for you from home too, Uncle. From Cousin Cerissa. I did not read it,” he added hastily. “I thought it might be personal. I just saw the signature.”

“Did you?” Brynn asked darkly. Emlyn wisely did not say anything. He just bobbed his head again and backed out of the tent.

Brynn rubbed his hand over his face again. Fae’s Breath, this thing was getting dark. Hostages and traitors, sieges and supply cuts. By all the Rivers, give him a good, honest field-fight any day. He rummaged through the papers on the table until he’d found the one with the tell-tale signature. He felt a smile itching at his mouth, his thumb running over the letters the master had transcribed. It was like an ache in his bones, the need to get back home to them. Like a burn, blistering under his skin, that he could not help but rub at.

He tilted the paper towards the light, trying to decipher the scrawl.

Da, it read. I hope you are well. We all miss you and want you home soon. Sylas had the dream again with the White-haired witch. She asked him his name but he didn’t tell it. He is scared. We want you home. I love you very much. Cerissa Auricula Dowse.

He ran his thumb over the words again, committing them to memory and then reluctantly set it to the candle-flame.

He supposed it was his fault. He ought to have told them specifically not to write about the dreams at the same time that he told them not to tell anyone else about them. They were not to know, not really, but it sent angry fear crunching through his stomach. Anybody could have seen this. There was no way of knowing how many had. At least two – the corryn master at Bridgenford could probably be trusted, but here? Out at Holdfast? In this mingling alliance of malcontents? Who knew who had been sold the secrets of the Dowse household?

Mayhap they would write it off as the childish cry for attention of babies, missing their Da, frightened for him, out there on the battlefields and far from home. Mayhap, even if they did believe it, they would write it off as just another nightmare, a phantasm conjured from over-vivid stories of the Wasteland Woods.

Brynn knew better. He’d grown all his life in Bridgenford. He knew what things haunted the children of the rivers. He scowled.

If this White-haired witch thought to take his son from him, she could have another think coming, that was all.