Raven's Shadow (Raven #1)(99)

Phoran had good instincts, but he also had some things that would make commanding a group like the one Tier proposed difficult. First of all, he was young. But worse was his reputation. It would make leading the Passerines in anything but drunken debauchery difficult.

Tier had decided that he'd have to do a little training first. He took a judicious sip of his ale. He'd just wait until the next fight broke out - which, if the night ran to form, would be in the next hour or so.

"Came and knocked on our suite this morning," Collarn was saying with palpable excitement. "My father thought they'd come to arrest me for something stupid I'd done. I thought he'd die of shock when they told him that the Emperor had decided that the Keeper of Music needed help and that the masters at the School of Music had recommended me for the position."

Tier smiled at him. "So are you going to take the job?"

Collarn grinned back. "And have to slave around after an old man for years, cleaning, tuning, and refinishing instruments? Absolutely. Do you know the kinds of things that are rabbited away in these rooms?" He gave a vague wave around to indicate the palace. "Neither do I. But I've already gotten to play instruments that are worth more than all my family's holdings combined."

Tier talked with him a bit more, and gradually turned the conversation over to Myrceria. When she had Collarn's attention fully engaged, Tier excused himself and began meandering through the auditorium because the unmistakable sounds of another fight were starting to rumble from somewhere near the stage.

He spoke casually to a few boys as he passed. By the time he made it to the fight, a crowd had gathered around to call encouragement to the combatants. They parted for Tier willingly enough. Once he had a clear view of the action, Tier folded his arms and watched.

The first boy was Toarsen, who was a hotheaded, bitter young man and, like most of his fellows, spoiled by too much money and nothing to do. But he was smart, which Tier liked, and he wasn't a coward.

His opponent was a little bit of a surprise, one of the twenty-year-olds who Tier had pegged as the worst kind of troublemaker, the ones who sat by and let other people do their dirty work. Nehret was not one of the boys who usually found themselves in duels.

Watching them closely, Tier could see signs that both of them had been trained to sword since birth, as many noblemen were, but they were trained as duelists, not as soldiers.

When he'd seen enough, Tier turned to the boy on his right, "May I borrow your sword?"

The boy flushed and fumbled, but handed the weapon over. When Tier asked the boy on his left for his sword also, that young man laughed, drew with a flourish and presented it to Tier on one knee. With a short sword in either hand, Tier walked into the makeshift combat floor.

He watched closely for a moment, staying out of both opponents' immediate line of sight as he tested the swords he held for balance. They were lighter than the one he'd left in Redern and of a slightly different design - made for letting blood rather than killing, he thought.

Finished with his preparations, he darted forward and attacked. Toarsen lost his sword altogether. Nehret kept his blade, but only at the cost of form and balance. He landed ignominiously on his rump.

"If you're going to fight," said Tier. "At least do it right. Nehret, you lose power because your shoulders are stiff - you're making your arms do all the work." Tier turned his back to Nehret, knowing from the past few days of observation just how well the boy would take being criticized and what he would do about it.

"Toarsen," Tier said. "You need to worry less about trying to scratch your opponent, and more about defending yourself. In a real fight you'd have been dead a half dozen times." He turned and caught the blade Nehret had aimed at his back.

"Watch this and see what I mean," continued Tier as if he weren't fending off the angry boy's blows. It wasn't as easy as he made it look. "Nehret is extending too much - ah, see? That attack is what I was talking about earlier. If you'd had your body behind it instead of just your arm it might have accomplished something. Look, he wants to really hurt me, but he's been so trained to go for touches rather than hits that he doesn't stand a chance of hurting me beyond a scratch or two. That's the problem with too much dueling, you don't know what to do in a real fight."

Tier put his left hand behind his back to get that blade out of his way. Then he turned the blade in his right so that when he hit Nehret he didn't take off his arm, just numbed it so the boy lost his sword.

Tier tapped him on the cheek. "By the way," he said, "never go after an opponent when his back is turned unless there is more at stake than your pride." Then he turned his back to Nehret again, knowing that he'd gone a fair way to reducing the amount of influence the boy had upon the other Passerines in the last few minutes. "Toarsen, why don't you try a round against me?"

After the council meeting, Phoran found that he was quite popular. People followed him wherever he went - to his bedchamber if he didn't get the door shut fast enough. Tradition would keep all the Septs at the palace until just before harvest; if they kept this up until then, he'd have the whole lot of them thrown out. Finally, having had enough of the fawning, resentful Septs, Phoran sent for Avar to go riding with him.

He'd been avoiding Avar, since he'd put words to the fears he'd always had. It was poor payment for the Sept's swift support during the council meeting, and Phoran had to do something to change it.