The Devotion of Delflenor Read online

  The Devotion of Delflenor

  R. Cooper

  Copyright © 2021 R. Cooper

  ISBN: 9781005909963

  Cover art by The Illustrated Page Book Design

  All rights reserved

  Content tags:

  Drinking, sex, mention of past battles/injuries, violence, blood

  Table of Contents

  a fool’s errand

  starting out from the same place

  into the Wood

  soft places

  under the stars

  in this meantime

  practice

  the origin of shrines

  the ruin

  questions asked and a story told

  meaning

  a door bright with sunrise

  Champion of the Champion

  a shield is also a weapon

  more than a dagger

  for her

  out of the Wood

  promise met

  the stone in the stream

  the gift of the Three

  Delflenor of Ainle

  One

  a fool’s errand

  DELF PUT a hand to Ona’s back and waited until the little squire gritted mer teeth and nodded before she continued bandaging the wound across Ona’s shoulder and collarbone. The injury was stitched together and far enough along in healing to not require the care of a proper healer, but Delf still frowned over the darkened flesh and did her best not to cause more pain than necessary as she redid the dressing.

  Despite Delf’s care, Ona hissed an oath at the Liege of Pain. Delf smiled sympathetically but did not stop until the work was done.

  The scarring would fade in time, although it would leave a slash through the elaborate pattern Onavir had only just had hammered into mer skin last year, confirming Ona as ame, a soul neither man nor woman nor any of the choices between, with added flourishes all down mer arm that also said Ona hoped to be a true knight someday, a champion of the high circle, like mer hero. Not everyone liked additional decorations or to make statements on their bodies beyond the usual, but knights had a fondness for such things. Perhaps because most of them had precious few belongings of their own, and no homes to decorate, so they fancied up their bodies instead.

  Ona was no knight, not yet. A begley, as untested squires were often known, had no place in battle and should not receive injuries like this one. But things were not as they used to be, and Ona had acquitted merself well, or so Delf had heard. A true squire at last.

  Delf, only recently returned from escorting some priests through territory loosely claimed by both the cheve of Resk and the cheve of Mri, did not know all the details of the incident, or need to. It said enough that a begley had been pulled into the fight, and that several of the champions of the high circle were nursing serious injuries of their own.

  Delf hid her grimace behind a drink of wine, draining her cup before pouring more in her own as well as Ona’s. Ona added crushed herb pain powder to mer goblet and smiled, with strain but sweetly, at Delf for the help. There might have been hope in that sunny smile as well, but Delf pretended not to see it as she leaned back against the wall and kept her wine close.

  Onavir eventually joined some of the other squires in their place near the fire at one end of the hall, a step down from the stone dais directly before the hearth, referred to the high circle. It was no coincidence that this put the squires near the knights recuperating in a place of honor in front of the fire’s warmth. The squires would not go any closer. Only the most distinguished Knights of the Seat, in active service or long past it, sat there.

  Delf was far from the fire, near enough to one shuttered window to get prickling skin from a small draft. It was early in the year to feel so cold at night. The harvest was not yet fully in. This meant a long winter, another sign that the Wise had forsaken Ainle. At least, that was what more and more people whispered.

  Delf propped one foot on a stool just in reach of her long legs, leaving the wall at her back, and slouched down as low as she could and still drink. Her pose might have looked inviting to some, body loose, surcoat hanging crookedly and bunched between her open thighs, but any of her friends would know better. Certain aspects of Delf’s appearance concerned her on a daily basis—the thickness of her eyebrows, her piercings, her chest—but she had never been inclined to more complex hairstyles favored by the likes of Ran or Jareth, and she rarely bothered with niceties like posture when in the presence of friends and family here in the barracks.

  The feasting hall of the barracks was crowded this evening. Many knights had returned to the Seat, as both the sacred shrine and the village around it were called, to wait on their mending bodies. And yet, even with the crowd, their numbers were not what they once were. The Knights of the Seat had lived in these barracks for generations, unique among the warriors of Ainle for serving the Seat, the stone in the stream, and not a cheve. Although, of course, everyone in Ainle was bound to the chevetein, if one had been chosen.

  Outside the shuttered window was a view of a courtyard and another hall. Above that, visible over the rooftop, was the crown of a hill and an arrangement of buildings that made a small settlement. At the base of the hill, almost tucked away from view, was a small shrine with a stream running beneath it—the Seat itself. Delf and the others were pledged to it. To the chevetein who no longer existed, and the Wise, and the Three among the Wise in particular.

  Delf sneered, just a bit, into her wine, but tipped her cup to the Three all the same before she drained it and leaned over to pour herself more. A wave of dark hair fell into her face. She left it there.

  Those of the high circle in the hall tonight had every right to partake as freely as Delf did, but though they clutched goblets or clay mugs, the brightness in their eyes was doubtlessly pain, and if they dulled it, it was with herbs alone. They had made a good show of strength and had not lost a member of their party, the Three be praised. Perhaps restless, ambitious cheves would cease their bullshit for a time and grant tired knights a rest.

  Or perhaps they could return to the old ways, and offer individual combat to settle questions instead of endless, bloody skirmishes.

  Then again, the old duels had commonly ended in death, and not one knight of the high circle would give that a second thought before accepting any challenges.

  Delf glanced to the seats closest to the fire, to the three figures seemingly oblivious to the squires and begleys watching them with veneration. It said much that many of Ainle’s youth still came to the Seat to train with these knights. They did not just come here because of the chaos in their home territories. They also came because of those knights, those three and the others like them, and still pledged themselves to serve the Seat, despite the absence of a chevetein for over a decade, or a sign from the Three that there might be one any time soon.

  Delf considered the trio awash in gold light, short to tall, wide to thin, pale to dark.

  She took another drink. It did not dull her thoughts or slow her heart.

  “That sort of evening?” Tay joked, nudging Delf playfully and taking no offense when Delf shrugged and returned to contemplating her wine.

  Several years older than Delf, Tay was an expert with the staff and the pole-axe the despite the loss of an arm, good company on cold nights, and familiar enough with Delf to know when to be nosy and when to stick to his own business. The decent, honorable sort of knight, who had no doubt gone to the Shrine out of desperation, like so many others in the years following the death of their last chevetein, Brennus. But the Three had not received Tay’s offer, if he had made one.

  Tay was in the same long tunic surcoat and breeches most of the knights wore, though he preferred darker tones that made him s
eem paler. He had marks elsewhere, but the black and blue hammer work on display at his neck was simple and without embellishment; apparently the same since he’d come of age and chosen them. He’d added some finery with a new cloak, but then, he had always liked to be pretty. Anyone was welcome to kneel before the stone of the Shrine and shiver in the cold waters that trickled through the cracks in the floor. But perhaps a tendency toward vanity was not what the Three wanted in a chevetein to maintain the compact between the Wise and this land and all the people in it.

  Brennus had not been vain, not that Delf could recall. But Brennus had been old, nearing ancient, when Delf had lived with them, and perhaps vanity had been abandoned with age. Delf mostly remembered a weary leader with waist-length white hair often worn in a thick braid, who had lines from both overwork and smiles on their face, and faint, faded patterns of dots and scrolls and sharp angles in the hammermarks around their throat; masculine and feminine and something both together. But even those details were difficult to call up.

  It had been too long. Cheves no longer came to the Seat to visit the Shrine. Delf suspected the cheves felt the Wise had abandoned them, and that it was time for them to rule without the direction of the Three. But the cheves would not say so directly, or go any further than avoiding the Seat. Not with what had so far happened to those who had attempted to name themselves chevetein.

  By the fire, Jareth, who blushed at the epithet the Protector, had allowed short, stocky Ranalaut, known as the Fierce, onto her lap, and was trying to continue her conversation despite Ran’s determined efforts to unbind her hair. Jareth eventually stopped him, with one slender hand pressed to the side of his throat and the hammered designs to mark Ranalaut as a man done over two sets of older inkings.

  Ran wore his brown hair long, in elaborate braids and twists twined with ribbons that he could not have done himself tonight, as he had one arm in a sling and a stiffness to his movements that spoke of fractured ribs. Jareth, in contrast, kept her yellow curls pinned tight to her skull, unless, of course, her beloved was feeling affectionate. She could not move to easily dislodge him even had she wanted to; she had pulled the stitches on her thigh loose twice already. One more time, and the healers would likely burn the wound closed so she would not bleed to death.

  Ran contented himself placing a cheeky kiss to the feminine marks around Jareth’s throat, and Jareth turned to the third figure in their little group with a put-upon sigh that Delf did not think she meant.

  The third member of the trio of distinguished knights, the Hope of Ainle, the Tyrant-slayer, sat straight in her seat, but smiled fondly at her friends. She wore a sleeveless surcoat, undecorated, and had only feminine marks at her neck. None anywhere else, not for decoration or to honor a memory. Nothing at all for whimsy or to speak of a family. Some knights went so far as to have spells hammered into their skin for protection, although most knights did not often favor that, these days. The head of the stables had more magic in his skin than most of the people in these barracks.

  The overconfidence of warriors in their muscle and skill, Delf supposed. Or too many people forgetting the old stories where knights had wielded magic—and had it wielded against them.

  For generations upon generations, Ainle’s cheveteins had kept the people safe within their borders, and there had been no need to wander deep into the wilderness of mountain or marsh or forest, where creatures were still said to roam. Ainle had turned its back on crumbled ruins of ancient might and focused on the land, on harvests and ensuring plenty. Magic, aside from a few tricks that eager children liked to learn, was for priests or the odd healer who kept to the old ways. Magic was the subject of stories, and most of the knights around Delf were too occupied with restless cheves and their knights to be concerned with tales of quests or beasts or malicious users of magic.

  Delf had spells like latticework around her thighs and at her ribs, and the symmetrical patterns for yellow gorse at her arms, and marks at her throat done around the originals she had chosen at thirteen, when she had thought outside might suit her more than in-between. Now, her marks proclaimed her mostly feminine, but not altogether. Her surcoat was embroidered at the hem with fiery orange and yellow threads that suited her brown-gold skin—she did not mind a bit of vanity, either. But unlike Tay, Delf was no would-be chevetein. Nor would she ever try to be.

  The fate of false cheveteins, of corrupt leaders, was more than just the displeasure of the Three, although that was not what kept Delf away from the Seat. But she wished someone, the right someone, would journey to the Shrine, and soon. Those in the barracks could not go on much longer as they were. Perhaps it was the plan of the Wise for this land to fall. Or perhaps the Wise had no plan. But everyone in this hall believed they did, and they came to the Seat, and swore allegiance, and trained, and gave their blood and sweat, and at times, their lives.

  Too many did that now. And nothing had changed in the years since Brennus had died in their bed except more knights had scars, or did not return from endless, petty skirmishes, and more and more of them turned their gazes to the Tyrant-slayer, who was not much older than Delf. Twenty and a handful of years, most of those spent in conflict.

  The younger knights, the squires, would have no memory of Brennus, and only stories to guide them, something alarming and sorrowful to think about. Delf chose to drink more wine and then mourn her empty cup with nothing left to refill it. Tay must have taken her small cask while Delf had been staring at the fire. Stealthily making a point, as was his usual way.

  Delf kept her back to the wall while considering getting up to fetch more wine at the risk of losing her perfect spot. The wine made her warm. The window kept her cool. Conversations flowed around her, worried and serious or playful and wooing. Delf smiled at those who smiled at her, and shivered even though her skin felt flushed, and hesitated before shaking her head in response to a few unspoken offers of conversation or a night’s diversion.

  She had not been able to be still since yesterday, and she did not think that would change in someone’s bed, even if she was told to do it.

  Ran was now fussing over Jareth, though Jareth did not seem inclined to let him off her lap despite the pain she must be in. Their tally of wounds must be more serious than either of them had let on, and yet they were out here, ensuring they were seen as alive and strong. That showed remarkable knowledge of the image they presented, as the three best of the high circle. It was likely Jareth’s awareness as well as Jareth’s plan for them to display themselves in this way, hoping to inspire confidence. Ran was not a planner. And the third champion—or first, depending on who was asked—was honorable to a fault, but no peacemaker or player of politics.

  Delf’s attention drifted, as it always did, to Prityal the Just, Prityal the Pure. The Hope of Ainle. Tyrant-slayer and collector of numerous glorious epithets.

  She looked exhausted, Delf decided, and not for the first time. Whole and well, compared to the others, but exhausted. Still, Prityal was there, her worthy-of-glorious-epithets profile lit by the fire.

  Prityal knew exactly how many in Ainle did not give up because of her. It had to weigh on her pretty, mighty shoulders. Delf had seen her out at night, more than once, walking with no apparent destination.

  The Tyrant-slayer was great, but not invincible. Delf knew she was not, in a way that chilled Delf no matter how much wine she consumed.

  And yet, Prityal was not the chevetein. Some said she must not have ever visited the Shrine, perhaps deciding, with all her purity of vision, that she was not worthy. It was perhaps a more comforting sentiment than the notion that the Wise must not have accepted even the Champion of Ainle.

  For her part, Delf was privately convinced that Prityal had gone. Prityal the Just would not allow other knights to come to harm when she might have stopped it with one visit to the Seat. She must have gone—and not been accepted, exactly as people feared.

  If the famed hero had not pleased the Three, their land might be doomed.

&
nbsp; Delf licked the last of the bittersweet wine from her lips and wished desperately for more.

  “Need a drink?”

  Delf raised her head to consider Ange, and the goblets Ange had in her large, coppery brown hands, and Ange’s apparent ability to know Delf’s thoughts.

  “So I am not the only one in this mood,” Delf offered, smiling faintly as she put down her empty cup to accept a new one. She had to sit up to do it, and drop her foot to the floor.

  Ange, head shaved despite the autumn chill, had eyes lined with smudged colors, red tonight. She glanced toward her friends and equals in the high circle, but did not move to approach them. Then she returned her attention to Delf. “We could all use a rise in our spirits. All of us,” she added, as if Delf had not understood her meaning. “The nights are only going to grow colder.”

  Delf leaned her head back to flutter her eyes and part her lips. “You know well enough where my bed is,” she answered, only partly serious. Ange was wonderfully strong, and stern when Delf needed her to be. She was also currently taken, even if she was being discreet about her new lover.

  Ange huffed out a small laugh, then glanced away again. When her gaze came back to Delf, it was sly. “I’m too old to be sleeping in the regular barracks hall, much less messing around there. And so are you, and you know it. This is not your place.”

  “This is exactly my place,” Delf argued, but mildly. “Anyway, I do my messing around in other people’s rooms.”

  Ange rolled her eyes. “You tend to drink when you are worried—or rather, when you have a moment to finally stop and then worry. When it’s all over.”

  Delf made a face and put down her cup, which had likely been Ange’s intention in needling her. “I worry no more and no less than anyone else, except for the Hope up there.”

  “Exactly,” Ange said, confusingly, tricking Delf into looking up at her. Ange glanced over toward the fire, then reached out to cup Delf’s chin and gently swipe her thumb across Delf’s mouth.