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Gloria put her hands over her ears, trying to block out the clash of steel from the courtyard below. She needed to concentrate on the stack of letters in front of her.
Sir Duncan,
I cannot begin to tell you how much I enjoyed the most recent issue of the Quarterly. The feature on the “Five Most Common Problems With the Sword Grip” was just the sort of thing my young squire, Smedley, needs to read. Many thanks.
“You’re welcome,” muttered Gloria.
I marvel at you, my good sir. How can you produce so many articles and still have time to gather such exhaustive statistics on all the tournaments in the Trahernian lands?
“He has his daughter do it,” said Gloria.
With a sigh, she looked at a different stack of papers on a table near the window, trapped under a blunted old battle axe head that she used as a paperweight. Those were the results from the Haydon Squires and Under-20 Tourney, and she wanted to get them compiled and recorded before lunch. But first she had to answer her father’s fan mail.
The next letter might have cheered her up, since it was a complaint. But it claimed “Sir Duncan” had gotten his math wrong in the article on the draw weight of Sahasran laminate bows. And since Gloria was the real author of the article, she knew damn well the math was right. Even so, she spent ten minutes redoing all her figures so she could write, “I believe it is you, sir, who are mistaken,” in good conscience.
Below in the courtyard, the clanging of steel on steel grew louder, and then louder again. And above it all, there was her father’s voice, calling out, “Yes, yes, your lordship. Precisely right! Be aggressive. There’s no substitute for aggression.”
“Except skill,” thought Gloria. “Or practice. Or a good defense.”
Setting her pen aside, she stood and walked over to the big leaded glass window, which she had cracked enough to let in some fresh air. Outside, a stiff breeze sent bright orange and red leaves swirling around the courtyard. In the center, under the big maple, her father stood with his hands clasped behind his back and his head thrust forward, jaw set, glasses perched low on his nose. She thought of this as his “coaching posture.”
In front of him, a young boy in a blue quilted tunic hacked with all his strength at a suit of empty armor hanging on a wooden post. The boy’s dark hair was plastered to his head with sweat, but he was smiling. He was Jeffrey Sigor, younger son of the Duke of Newshire, and Gloria knew her father was inordinately proud that his grace was paying for these private lessons.
She was about to return to the letters, possibly after finding some tufts of cotton to stuff in her ears, when a bell rang below, and Betty, the chief housemaid, came up to say a visitor had arrived in the livery of the duke. Gloria tried (and failed) to wipe the ink smudges from her fingers, and then hurried down the back stairs after Betty.
Her father, informed of the visitor by one of the footmen, was already in the back parlor, standing at a mirror and trying to make his graying, windswept hair lay flat again. She took the brush from his hands and did it herself, while he polished his spectacles on a handkerchief.
“A messenger from the duke,” he whispered excitedly over his shoulder. “I wonder if he wants Lord Jeffrey to be my permanent squire.”
“Do you really think you’d have time for that, Father?”
“Time?” He frowned. “Of course I’d have time. You can start taking on more of my duties.”
She bit her lip and thought, “Start taking them on? Start? Really, Father?”
Apparently thinking his hair looked good enough, he pushed away her hand and the brush and led the way down the passage, through the armor-lined great hall, and into the little blue front parlor.
To Gloria’s surprise—and her father’s, too—the visitor was no mere servant or messenger boy. He was Lord Brandon Dryhten, first squire to the Duke of Newshire. More importantly, he was the eldest son and heir of the Duke of Leornian, even though, like Lord Jeffrey, he hadn’t been formally knighted yet.
“Sir Duncan,” said Lord Brandon, dropping into a low, elegant bow. “My master, his grace the duke, sends his greetings.”
Gloria’s father bowed as low as he still could manage. “Lord Brandon, please convey my most profound good wishes to his grace, your master. And may I say what an absolute delight it is to have so promising a young squire as yourself flatter my humble abode with your presence.”
“Um...thank you, sir.” Lord Brandon looked around the room, no doubt taking in all the gilded furniture and the ornate presentation weapons from half a dozen monarchs and the dozens of tournament trophies.
“Can I offer you refreshment? Coffee? Tea? Fortified wine, perhaps? Glazed almond cakes?” Turning, Gloria’s father snapped his fingers practically in her face. “Gloria, see to some refreshments for—”
“No, thank you, Sir Duncan,” said Lord Brandon. “I am here to ask a favor of you for his grace, and once I have your answer, I should return as quickly as possible.”
“Very well, my lord.” Gloria’s father puffed out his chest. “What humble service can I do your esteemed master?”
“The duke has been approached by an Immani promoter named Pascal Courtois Clementus, who—”
“Oh, I know him,” said Gloria’s father. “Gloria, he’s the one who did that big naval tournament at the Proedrian Straits two years ago.”
“Yes, Father. I remember.”
“As I say,” Lord Brandon continued, “Mr. Clementus has approached the duke with the idea for a Grand Trahernian Tournament. It would be nearly a year long, and it would take place in at least four or five different cities, with all sorts of different events. The goal would be to crown a single Trahernian champion—the greatest knight in the world.”
“Ah, and naturally his grace wants to consult with me as to the arrangements for this tournament.” Gloria’s father beamed. This was far more prestigious than taking the duke’s second son as a squire.
“Yes, sir,” said Lord Brandon. “In fact, he wishes to engage you for the entire length of the tournament as a special consultant. All the events will be scored according to the Weekes Scoring System, naturally.”
“Naturally.” Gloria’s father snapped his fingers again. “Gloria, cancel all my appointments! I will return to the palace this instant with young Lord Brandon.”
“You were supposed to meet Harris Evans at The Broken Lance for lunch.”
Her father scowled. “Harris? Oh, you can meet him for me.”
Ten minutes later, once Gloria’s father had changed into a much more expensive and ornately-embroidered silk tunic, he and Lord Brandon left for the palace, and Gloria was left to undertake her father’s social obligations for him. Not that this was the first time she’d been obliged to do so, of course. And she didn’t mind seeing Harris Evans. In fact, it promised to be the highlight of her day.
The weather was perfect for autumn—cool and sunny. Gloria put on her best green wool riding dress and walked from her father’s house on Cuthbertstryde, near the river, down to The Broken Lance on East Marrethstryde. The tavern was one of her father’s favorites, as it stood across the square from the Prince Piers II Memorial Amphitheater, and it catered to athletes and their admirers. Harris was waiting at a corner booth in the back. He didn’t seem at all surprised to see her, rather than her father. He had known them both a very long time, after all.
A well-weathered older man with a neat gray beard and a permanently cocked eyebrow, Harris greeted Gloria in his usual fashion. “Have a drink,” he said. “This round is on you.”
She laughed and fetched two mugs of spiced mead. Harris was always easy to keep happy.
“I finished the article on the development of the Annenstruker saddle,” he said when she returned. He pushed some papers across the table. “Do you think anyone actually reads this crap?”
“Judging by the correspondence I get, yes, they do,” she said, slipping the article into a worn leather bag she had brought, just in case.
Gloria wrote easily half the articles in Weekes’ Quarterly, her father’s famous tournament newsletter. Of the remainder, Harris wrote at least two thirds. He was an agent, matching up knights with noblemen who wanted to sponsor them in tournaments, and the commissions he earned in doing this made him wealthy. But he never looked quite so happy as when Gloria paid him for an article.
She counted a pile of silver shillings into his palm. He giggled a little, shook them in his hand, and then put them away in his purse. “Now, my dear girl,” he said, “guess who I’ve seen in town. And guess who is meeting right now with the duke, according to my sources.”
“Is it Pascal Courtois Clementus?” she asked.
His face fell. “How in the Void did you know that?”
She explained about Lord Brandon’s visit to her father’s house, and how her father had rushed off to “advise” the duke on the tournament.
Harris was about to answer when the tavernkeeper strode into the center of the common room and called for silence. A knight in the livery of the Duke of Newshire stood next to him, carrying a long scroll with a big blue wax seal. The knight held up his hand, and in a strong, deep voice, proclaimed that the duke was sponsoring a grand tournament, to be held in Keneburg, Sanjay Durga, Nordligsby, Oasestadt, Formacaster, and Rawdon between March and October of the following year.
“There will be archery, jousting, riding, and sword events,” the knight said, “along with two melees. A prize of five hundred Sovereigns will go to the best knight. Three hundred to the second place finisher. And a hundred to the man who comes in third. And a further five hundred will be shared by the best team. Smaller purses for each individual event shall also be awarded for the top three competitors at each location. Feature events shall pay out at one hundred, sixty, and twenty Sovereigns, and lesser events at fifty, thirty, and ten.”
The moment the knight stopped speaking, the whole common room burst out in excited conversation. All the knights asked each other if they were going to enter. All the commoners speculated who might win. A loud and giggly group of women near the hearth started debating who the handsomest unmarried knight in Myrcia was.
“A prize for the best team,” said Harris, nodding. “That’s a good idea. You know who should sponsor a team?”
“The duke? Can he even do that at a tournament he’s sponsoring?”
“No. Not the duke. You, Gloria.”
“Why should I do that?”
“Because you know more about how to fight and win a tourney than anyone else I know. And yes, that’s including your father.”
Gloria stared at him. For years she had listened to her father dispense fatuous, wrongheaded advice to clueless young noblemen. For years, she had quietly formulated her own ideas, but she had never dared share them with anyone but Harris. She knew he was right, but it seemed so monumentally impossible. “How am I going to manage that and keep the newsletter going at the same time?”
Harris winked. “I can take care of the stupid Quarterly. Now go buy me a drink, and let’s discuss who you’d have on this team of yours.”
***
QUIN HAD HEARD OF RELIGIOUS epiphanies—people who had been minding their own business one day before Earstien himself had shone the Light of wisdom in their faces. That was how he felt when the duke’s knight made the announcement.
“A grand tournament,” he thought, sipping his second big pewter mug of ale. “A tournament that everyone in the kingdom will be watching. Especially all the noblemen.”
If a fellow did well enough at this tournament, then surely there would be a nobleman who was willing to make him a member of his retinue. It would be like when Quin was 13, and he had won the Midsummer Boys’ Riding Competition in Lanwit. The Earl of Stansted had been there and had offered to take Quin as his squire on the spot. And now, if he managed to finish in the top three at an event or two, he could start paying back his loans.
“Why have I been wasting my time on the estate for eight years?” he thought, looking with disgust at his dirty fingernails. “I should have been out competing in tournaments. I should have been winning a name for myself.” If he’d done that, then the duke would never have turned him away.
Of course, competing in tournaments cost money. Vast sums of money. Quin winced as he realized there would be a lot of letter-writing in his future. A lot of groveling, obsequious letters trying to convince people that entering a tournament was a sound business decision.
He finished his drink and debated whether he should leave now and catch the afternoon ferry. Then he looked at the big mechanical clock over the bar and, thinking of all those letters in his future, he decided to stay and have one more round.
As he returned from the bar with another frothy pewter mug, he was thinking about who he could beg for more money, and not looking where he was going. Suddenly, out of nowhere, he collided hard with something green and tall and pleasantly yielding. His drink sloshed out, flew through the air, and splattered down the full length of a close-fitting green riding dress.
He looked up to see the owner of that dress, a lovely, pink-cheeked girl with bright hazel eyes that currently burned with fury.
“Watch where you’re going, dipshit,” she said.
To his horror, he realized he knew who she was. Not that they had ever spoken before, but practically every knight in Newshire—maybe in all of Myrcia—knew Gloria Weekes, daughter of the famous master of chivalry, Sir Duncan Weekes.
She hurried away, carrying a mug in each hand and swearing under her breath, as Quin stuttered out an apology. “I’ll, um...pay to have your dress cleaned,” he offered. But she didn’t respond, or even look back at him.
“Well, bugger it all,” he thought, “I suppose I can forget ever having a feature article about me in Weekes’ Quarterly.”
He didn’t bother drinking what little remained of his mead. He left it on the table and exited the tavern, painfully aware that some of the other knights were now pointing and laughing at him.
For most of the ferry ride back across Lake Newlin, he worried about the incident. He wondered if he should write a letter to Miss Weekes and apologize. Or would that make him look pathetic? She had been very angry, and of course she had every right to be. That might have been her favorite dress, for all he knew. It was a nice dress, too, and it fit her well. Very, very well.
Had he known she was so pretty? He had never been so close to her before. Other than looking furious, of course, she had been quite beautiful. Not that the angry expression had diminished her beauty. In some ways, it had enhanced it. Quin had the odd and confusing feeling that a fellow would be very lucky to have a girl like that get angry at him regularly.
The following morning, however, when the ferry landed at Lanwit, he had to put all that out of his mind. His first stop was the nearby boatyard, where his younger brother, Scott, kept an office, and where Quin had left his horse, Lilly.
After their father died, they didn’t have the money to send a second boy out as a squire. So Scott had been apprenticed to a family friend who owned a shipyard. For years, Quin had worried that his brother resented the way things had turned out. Only recently had he realized that Scott thought the exact same thing about him.
When Quin poked his head in the office, Scott was looking over a set of technical drawings for what appeared to be an even larger ferryboat.
“How was Rawdon?” Scott asked. “How did things go with the duke?”
“Cutting straight to the heart of the matter, I see.” Quin fiddled with the clasp of his sword belt. “His grace says I might have a chance to be a militia lieutenant in a year or so.” Before his brother could respond, he hurried on. “However, there’s going to be a grand tournament next year in Myrcia and Sahasra Deva and Annenstruk. All over the place. And the prize for winning will be five hundred Sovereigns! As well as a bunch of smaller purses.”
“You’re going to enter, then?” asked Scott, clearly struggling to keep the skepticism out of his voice, bless him. “You’re going to beat Sir Amund Linwood and Sir Swithin Howard and...oh, who’s that other one you’re always talking about? Sir Xylophone or whoever.”
“Xylander. Sir Nico Xylander. But I don’t have to beat them, per se. I just need to do well enough to catch the eye of some noble. And then I’ll be able to serve in a retinue and get a regular stipend. And that will give us enough money to support the estate and,” he gestured to the blueprints on the desk, “for you to expand your business.”
“I don’t know, Quin,” said Scott. “This sounds a bit risky.”
“A very small risk,” said Quin, hoping that was true. “No more of a risk than expanding into the ferry business, yes?”
“Well, I spent two years studying the ferry business before I decided to enter the market, but I’m sure you thought this through just as carefully.” With a long sigh, Scott pulled out a ledger and writing set. “Fine. How much do you think you’ll need for this...investment? Let’s figure it out.”
They sat down and Scott started doing math, and in a few minutes, both brothers were staring stunned and ashen-faced at a truly preposterous total: forty-five Sovereigns. “I...I can’t believe it’ll cost that much,” said Quin.
“Stands to reason,” said Scott. “You’ll need new gear and weapons. Maybe new armor. Plus the cost of traveling around three countries for seven months. All your food, staying in all those inns. Going to balls and parties, too, so you’ll need new clothes. Finster’s balls, Quin. I haven’t got half this much money in the strongbox right now. And I need that to pay my workers and suppliers.”
“I’ll write to the Earl of Stansted.”
“Good idea, though I doubt it’ll be enough. Earl Fenwick likes you, but I don’t think he likes you quite that much.”
“I’ll borrow the rest from the Procellus Bank,” said Quin.
“I don’t think they’ll give you any more money. You’re still repaying the last loan.” Scott rubbed his temples and then, with a martyred expression, he said, “I suppose I could borrow against the boatyard.”
“No. You’re not going to do that. You don’t even like tournaments.”
Scott patted his shoulder. “It’s fine. It’s important to you, so that makes it important to me, too.”