Arñe, doing her job as corporal, made sure they kept the grange clean and fetched whatever anyone needed—“We must not be a burden on the grange,” she said, perhaps more often than necessary. In truth, they weren’t busy enough, and soldiers needed to be kept busy. They polished everything that could be polished, to the point where Stammel heard the yeoman-marshal complain that he had nothing to do. Arñe arranged what drill she could but lacked space, since this city grange had no barton, and the street outside was busy dawn to dusk, noisy with the sound of smiths at work. Stammel could distinguish the solid whang-whang of the ironsmiths from the lighter tink-tink-tink of whitesmiths.
Some hands of days after he’d wakened, Stammel laid a hand on Bald Seli’s shoulder and came into the grange on a drill night for the first time. The big room was full of strangers, all talking, it seemed; it smelled of sweaty people and stale breath. Seli eased him onto a stool near the entrance.
“Go on,” Stammel said, when his people came to greet him. “All of you—go drill with them.”
Marshal Harak opened the drill with a prayer, then set his yeoman to doing basic exercises. He didn’t introduce the Phelani; by that Stammel knew they had been there long enough to become familiar to the locals. By the grunts and groans, Stammel could guess which exercises Harak assigned, though the names were different; his muscles twitched a little as he imagined doing those stretches and bends. After a few minutes, Harak told them to fetch hauks. Someone dropped one; it rattled on the floor. Someone else laughed; Harak growled at them in the same tone Stammel himself used.
Then came the tap-tap of the simple beginning exercises, with Arñe—Harak must have asked her—counting the time. In his mind he could see it; his body remembered every move. Someone—there, across the room, fourth row, near the front—was off-beat, constantly late. Arñe said nothing; she must be waiting for Harak to comment.
As she speeded the count, the slow one continued to lag, off the beat. Stammel opened his mouth and shut it again. It was not his place to correct another man’s unit. He hoped it wasn’t one of his people. Finally Harak said, “Gan, you’re behind. Pick it up.”
“Sorry,” a man said. Right location, Stammel thought, pleased with the accuracy of his hearing. “My arm’s sore, Marshal.”
“You think an enemy will slow down because it’s sore?” Harak asked.
“No, but … I’ll do better.”
But once more the tap of this man’s hauk was slower than the others, and slowing down. Stammel itched to correct him and before he quite realized it, he stood. The count stopped.
“Are you all right, Stammel? Do you need something?”
“I need a hauk,” he said. “It’s time I started training again.” As he expected, there were mutters of But he’s blind here and there in the room.
But from the Marshal, only silence. Then, “Of course, Sergeant. They’re on the wall to your right. Five strides across the entrance, ten to the corner, turn left and about ten strides—”
That was a challenge—he might have sent someone to be a guide—but also recognition. Stammel put his hand on the wall and set off into the dark; the wall disappeared—the entrance. Five strides … and the wall reappeared, solid stone he was glad to bump his fingers on. Ten—he felt the wall ahead before he reached it, a looming presence he did not know how he perceived. But it made turning the corner easier. In three strides he was abreast of some of the yeomen; he could feel the heat of them, and smell them, and hear their breathing. Another five strides, and two … and under his hand was a rack, mostly empty, but—as he felt his way along it—the well-worn handle of a hauk. He hefted it, then found another. They felt heavy, but he told himself that would be good, after his long illness. He heard a soft sigh that seemed to come from everyone in the room.
“Best come forward,” the Marshal said. Stammel stretched out one arm, so the hauk brushed the wall, and went toward the Marshal’s voice until the Marshal said, “Far enough. You’re even with the front rank, two strides from the platform. Gan—move over and make room. Keder, help the sergeant line up.”
“That’s me,” a voice said, from behind and to his left. “Take three steps sideways left, that’ll put you about right, and I can help if you need.”
But Stammel had been opening and closing ranks since he was a recruit; his body knew how to move sideways and his three steps, Keder told him softly, put him exactly right.
“You may resume,” the Marshal said, and Arñe’s voice, much closer now, started a slower count than it had. He lifted the hauks and beat time with the others. Beside him, Gan lagged a little, then caught up. Stammel supposed the Marshal’s eye was on him. Perhaps he considered having a blind man at the head of the line was a good example. As Arñe picked up the speed, Stammel concentrated on correct form, on precise timing. Up, across, forward, back, together in front, together behind … he began to wish he too had done the stretches and bends. A muscle in his back twinged; he ignored it. It was a healthy twinge.
On six, they should be tapping hauks with the person beside them—but Gan was never there when he was. He himself was on count, he was sure.
“Gan—you missed your tap!” the Marshal said.
“I don’t want to hurt him,” Gan said.
“Don’t worry,” Stammel said. “I’m not easily hurt.” There was a moment of silence, and then the Marshal again.
“Gan, if you don’t keep time, I’ll bring you up here and drill you myself.”
That got a muffled chuckle from the others; apparently it was a familiar threat. The next time Arñe called six, Stammel’s hauk tapped another on his left. His tap was strong, the other’s weak, and the hapless Gan dropped his hauk. “Keep going,” the Marshal said. “Gan—recover on three …”
Stammel’s arms ached; the palms of his hands stung. He ignored that, too. Nothing was as bad as the fire, and it had been years of training, he was sure, that gave him the endurance to survive. He would not quit until he fell over.
The Marshal had other ideas. When the group moved into line-against-line, and Stammel turned about to face the man behind, the Marshal stopped him. “Sergeant, your captain put your health in my care. You have done enough for a first drill. Rest now.”
In truth, he was trembling, but he hated it, quitting in front of the yeomen. He took it as an order, instead of his own will. “Yes, Marshal,” he said, and without a reminder found his way back to the rack to put his hauks away, and—left hand on the wall this time—made it back down the grange, across the terrifying space where he had no wall to guide him, and found the stool he’d been sitting on by barking his shin on it.
He had at least started. He would come back somehow, some way, however long it took. Though what he could do as a blind man—a blind soldier—he could not imagine.
34
Camwyn, the prince’s younger brother, mounted his horse, first in the procession, and led his friends to the training ground. Today, it would be mounted drill without weapons—not nearly as exciting as knocking the heads off straw-stuffed figures—but at least his brother the prince let him out of the palace. Eight Royal Guards rode with them, in case of attack, and the Royal Guard senior riding instructor, carrying a bundle of flagged sticks to mark points on the field.
Camwyn had missed all the excitement when Verrakai attacked his brother; it was all over by the time the palace guards came to warn him … and arrest Egan Verrakai, Duke Verrakai’s grandson, until that moment one of his own friends. Now Egan was imprisoned, under Order of Attainder, and Mikeli would not relent.
The training field opened out before them as they came through the gates. Camwyn felt like spurring his mount into a gallop, but he had promised Mikeli he’d obey.