He drifted toward Danilo, who was at least a familiar face. “What happens now?”
“I guess we wait for someone to tell us. I didn’t mean to attract attention and get you in trouble, Lord Regis.”
“You too, Dani?” That formal Lord Regis seemed a symbol of the distance they were all keeping. He managed to laugh. “Didn’t you just hear Lew Alton remind me very forcibly that nobody would call me Lord Regis down here?”
Dani gave him a quick, spontaneous grin. “Right.” He looked around the barracks room. It was bleak, cold and comfortless. A dozen hard, narrow camp-beds were ranged in two rows along the wall. All but one had been made up. Danilo gestured to the only one still unchosen and said, “Most of us were down here last night and picked beds. I guess that one will have to be yours. It’s next to mine, anyhow.”
Regis shrugged. “They haven’t left me much choice.” It was, of course, the least desirable location, in a corner under a high window, which would probably be drafty. Well, it couldn’t be worse than the student dormitory at Nevarsin. Or colder.
The third-year cadet said, “Men, you can have the rest of the morning to make up your beds and put away your clothing. No food in barracks at any time; anything left lying on the floor will be confiscated.” He glanced around at the boys waiting quietly for his orders. He said, “Uniforms will be given out tomorrow. MacAnndra—”
Damon said, “Sir?”
“Get a haircut from the barber; you’re not at a dancing class. Hair below the collarbone is officially out of uniform. Your mother may have loved those curls, but the officers won’t.”
Damon turned as red as an apple and ducked his head.
Regis examined the bed, which was made of rough planking, with a straw mattress covered with coarse, clean ticking. Folded at the foot were a couple of thick dark gray blankets. They looked scratchy. The other lads were making up the beds with their own sheets. Regis began making a mental list of the things he should fetch from his grandfather’s rooms. It began with bed linens and a pillow. At the head of each bed was a narrow wooden shelf on which each cadet had already placed his personal possessions. At the foot of the bed was a rough wooden box, each lid scarred with knife-marks, intertwined initials and hacked or lightly burned-in crests, the marks of generations of restless boys. It struck Regis that years ago his father must have been a cadet in this very room, on a hard bed like this, his possessions reduced, whatever his rank or riches, to what he could keep on a narrow shelf a hand-span wide. Danilo was arranging on his shelf a plain wooden comb, a hairbrush, a battered cup and plate and a small box carved with silver, from which he reverently took the small cristoforostatue of the Bearer of Burdens, carrying his weight of the world’s sorrows.
Below the shelf were pegs for his sword and dagger. Danilo’s looked very old. Heirlooms in his family?
All of them were there because their forefathers had been, Regis thought with the old resentment. He swore he would never walk the trail carved out for a Hastur heir, yet here he was.
The cadet officer was walking along the room, making some kind of final check. At the far end of the room was an open space with a couple of heavy benches and a much-scarred wooden table. There was an open fireplace, but no fire was burning at present. The windows were high and narrow, unglazed, covered with slatted wood shutters, which could be closed in the worst weather at the price of shutting out most of the light. The cadet officer said, “Each of you will be sent for some time today and tested by an arms-master.” He saw Regis sitting on the end of his bed and walked down the row of beds to him.
“You came in late. Did anyone give you a copy of the arms-manual?”
“No, sir.”
The officer gave him a battered booklet. “I heard you were educated at Nevarsin; I suppose you can read. Any questions?”
“I didn’t—my grandfather didn’t—no one sent my things down. May I send for them?”
The older lad said, not unkindly, “There’s no one to fetch and carry for you down here, cadet. Tomorrow after dinner you’ll have some off-duty time and you can go and fetch what you need for yourself. Meanwhile, you’ll just have to make out with the clothes on your back.” He looked Regis over, and Regis imagined a veiled sneer at the elaborate garments he had put on to present himself to his grandfather this morning. “You’re the nameless wonder, aren’t you? Remembered your name yet?”
“Cadet Hastur, sir,” Regis said, his face burning again, and the officer nodded, said, “Very good, cadet,” and went away.
And that was obviously why they did it, Regis thought. Probably nobody ever forgot twice.
Danilo, who had been listening, said, “Didn’t anyone tell you to bring down everything you’d need the night before? That’s why Lord Alton sent me down early.”
“No, no one told me.” He wished he had thought to ask Lew, while they could speak together as friends and not as cadet and commander, what he would need in barracks.
Danilo said diffidently, “Those are your best clothes, aren’t they? I could lend you an ordinary shirt to put on; you’re about my size.”
“Thank you, Dani. I’d be grateful. This outfit isn’t very suitable, is it?”
Danilo was kneeling in front of his wooden chest, brought out a clean but very shabby linen shirt, much patched around the elbows. Regis pulled off the dyed-leather tunic and the fine frilled shirt under it and slid into the patched one. It was a little large. Danilo apologized. “It’s big for me too. It used to belong to Lew—Captain Alton, I mean. Lord Kennard gave me some of his outgrown clothes, so that I’d have a decent outfit for the cadets. He gave me a good horse too. He’s been very kind to me.”
Regis laughed. “I used to wear Lew’s outgrown clothes the years I was there. I kept growing out of mine, and with the fire-watch called every few days, no one had time to make me any new ones or send to town.” He laced up the cords at the neck. Danilo said, “It’s hard to imagine you wearing outgrown clothes.”
“I didn’t mind wearing Lew’s. I hated wearing my sister’s outgrown nightgowns, though. Her governess taught her needlework by having her cut them down to size for me. Whenever she was cross about it, she used to pinch or prick me with her pins while she was trying them on. She’s never liked sewing.” He thought of his sister as he had last seen her, heavy-footed, swollen in pregnancy. Poor Javanne. She was caught too, with nothing ahead of her except bearing children for the house of Hastur. “Regis, is something wrong?”
Regis was startled at Danilo’s look of concern, “Not really. I was thinking of my sister, wondering if her child had been born.”
Danilo said gently, “I’m sure they’d have sent word if anything was wrong. The old saying is that good news crawls on its belly; bad news has wings.”
Damon MacAnndra came toward them. “Have you been tested yet by the arms-master?”
“No,” said Dani, “they didn’t get to me yesterday. What happens?”
Damon shrugged. “The arms-master hands you a standard Guardsmen sword and asks you to demonstrate the basic positions for defense. If you don’t know which end of it to take hold by, he puts you down for beginners’ lessons and you get to practice about three hours a day. In your off-duty time, of course. If you know the basics, he or one of his assistants will test you. When I went up last night, Lord Dyan was there watching. I tell you, I sweated blood! I made a damn fool of myself, my foot slipped and he put me down for lessons every other day. Who could do anything with that one staring at you?”
“Yes,” Julian said from the cot beyond, where he was trying to get a spot of rust off his knife. “My brother told me he likes to sit and watch the cadets training. He seems to enjoy seeing them get rattled and do stupid things. He’s a mean one.”