David Niemitz
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Faerie Knight 145
🕑 Added 2025-01-18 12:00:08 +0000 UTC145 - The Battle of Basilea III: Where is a Lie
When a man knows that he’s about to die, that’s when you see who he truly is.
The Life and Times of Legionary Titus Nasica
☀
5th Day of High Summer’s Moon, AC 297
“Can you see her?” Queen Niviène asked, with the same even and patient tone she used whenever she was teaching Trist. After she’d shown him a glimpse of Avitus’ past, he’d asked her why it was her guiding him, and not Auberon.
“My husband does not have the patience to teach,” she’d said, with a smile. “Which is odd, because when his schemes require it, he can be quiet as a whisper for centuries, waiting for the right moment. I suspect it is the fault of his own arrogance. In any event, be grateful you have me instead of him.”
Today, it was back to Trist’s training. Niviène still considered it too much of a risk for Trist to look in on his wife, and he’d been cautioned not to get anywhere near Masheth, who would be watching over Sir Bors. As a result, for his practice, he had chosen Enid De Lancey, who he had not seen since the night he and the other Exarchs had assaulted the Cathedral of Saint Camiel. Time had a tendency to slip away, in the faerie realm at the heart of the Ardenwood, but reaching out to observe others had helped him to keep a sense of the date out in the wider world, and it had been just over two weeks since Enid left them in Lutetia.
“Aye,” Trist responded to the faerie queen’s question, at last. He found reaching out in this way to be easier when the person he sought was someone he was close to. While Enid had helped them break out of the cages in Cheverny, and he’d met her once as a young man, he could not say that they truly knew each other well, which only made this trial more difficult.
The pool, the greenery around them, and the bed of moss on which Trist sat all faded into the distance as his attention latched onto a different place, far away. To his surprise, it was a place that he was familiar with, though the last time he had seen it, the moon had been high above the sea. Now, only a white ring where the sun should have been illuminated the small fishing village of Havre de Paix. Enid was sitting at the front of a wagon carrying many barrels, perched next to Dame Margaret’s father, Roger Bowman. They had come to a halt along the Etalan road that stretched south along the coast of the Circum Mar, from Lutetia all the way down to where it finally banked west and entered Rocher de la Garde. The wagon had been stopped by armored guards wearing the golden wheat sheaf on a field of green that was the heraldry of the Baron du Champs d’Or.
“-going to be a battle here in a few days,” the guard, who was at least a decade older than Trist, was saying when sounds finally came clearly. “This shit-hole is the last place you want your daughter to be when the rebels come through.”
“It does reek of fish, doesn’t it,” Bowman observed, with an exaggerated sniff. “You say we have a few days, though? Because I have sixteen barrels of good ale to sell, and soldiers like to drink. I can be in and out in a day, then head back north to Lutetia with my coin.”
“Soldiers also like a pretty girl, and after the march here, the boys won’t be very picky,” the guard emphasized. “Look, old man-”
“Bowman,” Margaret’s father corrected him, while Enid remained silent, her eyes lowered. “Roger Bowman. Earned the name at Falais, might as well use it.”
The guard seemed to relax. “An old soldier like us, eh? The name is James, of Gué de Galets,” he introduced himself. “Alright, Bowman. Most people have already fled the town, but its true enough the boys will be thirsty. There’s only a single inn to be found in this entire village, at the sign of the white gull. Go there and ask for a man named Boucher, he’s the quarter-master. Tell him I sent you, and he’ll give you a good price. And then get yourself and your daughter back north before you find yourself in trouble.”
“My thanks,” Bowman said, snapped the reins, and started the wagon moving forward again. Once they were out of earshot of the guards, rolling into the outer edges of Havre de Paix, Enid finally spoke up.
“They’re never going to let us continue south,” she pointed out. “If we try to go that way, they’ll know which side we’re on.”
“True enough,” Margaret’s father said. “I’d hoped the king would have taken the town before we got this far, but I also knew at some point we’d need to cross enemy lines. I have an idea. We’re going to sell not only the ale, but also the wagon and the horses. Then, we’re going to buy a boat.”
“A boat?” Enid’s eyebrows shot up. Trist could see that they were rolling past the church where he’d left the orphans, moons ago, and he could also pick out a faded wooden sign with a white bird painted on it just down the street, where one of the white lanes of crushed shells crossed the Etalan road.
“Aye, anything with oars that floats,” Bowman explained. “We go just before dawn, and row south along the coast until we see the king’s army. Now, let’s get to selling this ale.”
“Enid,” Trist murmured, and the young woman jumped in the seat of the wagon, looking around. “Enid, you are hearing true. This is Trist speaking. Do not speak, but nod if you hear me and understand.”
Trembling, Enid nodded, her lips pressed so tightly together they nearly turned white.
“Good. I have news for you to give King Lionel, when you see him. Tell him that three Exarchs are on their way to him, and they will be coming out of the Ardenwood. He should expect Margaret, Lorengel, and Cynric. They all survived, but Cynric is wounded. They can tell him about what happened in Lutetia when they arrive. Tell him also,” Trist continued, “that General Ismet is marching on Maʿīn with an army. She will not be able to join him any time in the near future, because she has to deal with Valeria there. My wife has arrived in Raetia, but he should not count on her bringing aid; she has been imprisoned there by Prince Conrad, who is in the thrall of the Leviathan. Nod if you remember all of that.”
“I can remember it,” Enid murmured, lowering her face to hide the movement of her lips. “What about you, Trist? Where are you?”
“At the heart of the Arden, learning from a faerie queen,” Trist admitted. “Tell him, as well, that I must keep my oaths and go to Velatessia. I will not be able to help him. If Sir Bors can promise to keep Masheth from lashing out at me, tell them I will try to get in contact again, when I am able.”
“I will,” Enid promised. “Be safe, Trist.”
“And you as well,” he said. “Bowman is a good man. Take care of each other. Farewell.”
Trist allowed his intent to withdraw from Havre de Paix, and from Enid de Lancey. That had gone well, and he did not feel ready to return himself to the pool of the faerie queen just yet. He knew that Niviène was correct, and that it was dangerous for him to look in on Claire, but he had to know whether she was safe. He focused, and the world turned white.
The city was unfamiliar, though he guessed that it must be Basilea, the capital of Raetia, based on where Claire had been when last he’d seen her. A winter storm raged, with hard winds driving snow through the city streets, and gray clouds above.
Claire was huddled behind a broken stone wall, a remnant of a ruined building. Henry was with her, and Yaél as well, and a little white fox. The squire had an arming sword in hand, and Henry had his bow of black Iebara wood, and around the three of them, a battle raged.
A lance of ice shot through Trist’s stomach when he saw what they were fighting. Forneus had clearly discarded his human disguise, and grown again into the massive form of a serpent. Trist would have thought the daemon clumsy on land, after seeing how well it was adapted to the ocean, but that was clearly not the case, because its coils were crushing everything in its path. In fact, as he watched, Dame Etoile screamed, caught between two gargantuan coils that closed in on her.
Trist acted before he had time to think. Where is a lie, first Acrasia and then Queen Niviène had taught him. He pictured two circles, shining in the dark, and himself standing in one. As simple as picking his left foot up, and setting it down in the other circle. He pushed against he knew not what, and the world burned the colors of his core, red and orange and yellow, and then something broke. Perhaps it was the world, perhaps it was himself.
Snow whipped against Trist’s face, but there was no time for that now. He dashed to where Dame Etoile was, caught her up in his arms, and leapt into the air. Carrying a muscular woman in armor would have been difficult enough, but no normal man could have made such a jump with her. As the faeries had been telling him time and again, however, Trist was no longer a normal man.
His muscles burned yellow, as the threads of his boons vibrated through him. Trist hadn’t fought since coming to the Ardenwood, and under the Cathedral of Camiel, he’d been weak from days of captivity, wounded and blind. For the first time since before the siege at Rocher de la Garde, he felt completely rested and healed.
Etoile shrieked in his arms as they flew into the air, and then Trist’s boots scraped against the scaled hide of the monster. He ran along the shifting coil, and it was as easy to keep his balance as to walk a freshly paved road. “Hold on,” he told Etoile, and jumped again, down off the daemon’s body. As soon as he had the two of them safely behind a wall, in an alley, he set the other knight down, and was surprised to see that she carried a sliver of ice, instead of a steel sword.
“What is that?” Trist asked. It reminded him of his own blade, the one Acrasia had bound herself to, and it burned with magic to his eyes.
“A gift from Beira,” Etoile gasped, catching her breath. “Sir Trist, how are you here?”
“I am not,” he said. “Not truly. And I do not know how long I can remain. But it may be just long enough-”
A loud crack rang across the ruined city, and they turned to see the daemon shaking itself off from battering down a wall of ice. There in the street stood Clarisant, and above her rearted the daemon Forneus.
“Go,” Etoile said. “I am fine.”
Trust’s boot dug into the cobblestone of the alley, shattering it, and he was off, faster than any mortal could see him run. Power vibrated in his bones, beat in his heart, and moved in and out of his lungs with every breath. He saw the faerie queen knocked out of the sky, as he ran, and he watched Yaél step between his wife and the leviathan, arming sword raised. The great, reptilian head came down, maw gaping wide, fangs exposed, to consume everyone Trist loved.
He drew his sword and swung in a rising cut, up from his left hip and to the right, ending with his blade extended high. The sword blazed through Forneus’ snout, and the daemon recoiled, its scales burning away beneath the onslaught of his Daemon Bane Boon.
“Trist,” Yaél said, and he risked a single glance behind him to make sure both women were safe. For just a second, Trist caught his wife’s eye, and he could not help but smile to see she was still alive.
“Go somewhere safe,” he told her, “while I kill this thing.” Then, Trist turned back to Forneus and shifted into a High Guard. “Do you remember me, daemon?” he shouted over the storm.
The leviathan answered with a roar, and Trist lunged forward.
