“Why tournaments?” Atres asks.
“Once we’re able to shatter a couple of swords in a tournament or two,” Emlyn grins, “We’ll have everyone beating a path to our door to buy whatever excess we’re able to produce.”
Atres stares at her for a long moment before nodding.
“You believe that you can do this,” Atres responds, “This is something, if you are successful, where I can help you. The king would be very interested in buying whatever you could supply him with for his army. I can ensure that he becomes aware of this when the time comes. King Kashin isn’t afraid to pay, either, if you can show that it’s worth the coin.”
“You recall me telling you that war was an art form among my people?” Emlyn says and waits a moment for Atres to nod, “That applies to war on every level, from individual combat to small groups to entire armies. I bring the hard-earned lessons of my people to my new Temple. We have always fought constantly, over more generations than I can count, to hold our homes. As a result, we honed ourselves, our equipment, and our techniques to a razor’s edge over that time. These lessons are something I can teach to my cohort. We will win in the tournaments. I need to start attending them as a spectator so that I can start to study our opponents. There is only one unknown in this. What remains to be seen is whether I can find the right ores to produce the metals that we know we need. Even the bronze here is terrible. The only metals I’ve seen here that are worth much are the gold and silver, and those aren’t much use for weapons and armor.”
“I’d be happy to take you to the tournaments,” Atres grins, “As part of the King’s Guard, I get invited to most of them. It would be my pleasure to escort you to as many of them as you would care to attend.”
“That would be helpful,” Emlyn nods, “Then I can start making notes on all of them and what we’ll need to do to counter their favored moves as well as how they’re likely to respond to our counters.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone doing that,” Atres shrugs, “just for a tournament.”
“For my plan to be successful, my cohort must be successful,” Emlyn insists, “For my cohort to be successful, we must study our opponents. This is where knowing your enemy, or at least, in this case, your opponent, can be invaluable. They will not know us, at least for a time. This gives us an advantage, but one we will need to spend cautiously.”
“The tournaments you were in as a child,” Atres says, “Did you do this for those?”
“Hah!” Emlyn nods, “Not only could I have told you much about my opponents in each fight, but their entire family. We had a pretty good idea, depending on what House you were from, as to what your fighting style would be before you were ever old enough to step into a ring, since most of that was learned from family. Even if you weren’t from a House I had faced, my parents, my brothers, or someone else in our family probably had. We maintained extensive records on all the other Houses, particularly the other Great Houses. It’s why my younger siblings were also ranking well. Once I figured out how to defeat the ones in my age group, I was able to teach them how to defeat the ones from those Houses that were in their age groups.”
“I see,” Atres says bemused, “And you plan to carry this into the tournaments that you and your cohort enter?”
“I do,” Emlyn nods, “It will take time to build the records and discover how skills are passed here so that we might be able to anticipate an unknown opponent, since I doubt much of it will be along family lines.”
“I can give you some answers about how skills are passed,” Atres shrugs, “but I don’t think it’s going to be nearly as helpful as what you’re describing.”
Gesturing for him to explain, he goes on.
"Trainers here often travel,” Atres says, “Selling their services for a time to many places in a given area before moving on to new locations. Trying to track and trace all that is an impossible job. Just in the last year, we’ve had three new ones for the King’s Guard alone. Add in every manor house, lordling with some men-at-arms, and the bigger groups like the duke’s army or the King’s Guard, and you begin to see the scope of what you’re trying to do.”
“Then it becomes even more imperative that I train my cohort,” Emlyn shrugs, “so that they can handle any opponent that they draw in the lists.”
“As for you,” Emlyn plants a finger in the center of Atres’s chest, “That goes double for you. I’ve got a personal interest in you being able to handle anything that comes your way.”
Atres smirks at her for a moment before grabbing her hand from his chest and kissing it, “As my lady wishes.”
To his amusement, Emlyn blushes again, and he chuckles. “There are those adorable, captivating pink ears again.”
Emlyn drops her head and sighs, before looking up at him from lowered lashes, “You’re not going to make this easy, are you?”
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Laughing delightedly, Atres shakes his head, “No, I most definitely am not. You’ll work for every day of those one thousand and ninety-four days that you make me wait. For now, I’m willing to accept your blushes as payment.”
“What about later?” Emlyn asks suspiciously.
“Oh, lass,” Atres grins, “You might have to let me steal a kiss or two, here and there. I already told you that if you’ll let me steal a kiss or two, I’ll return them.”
Benger snorts with laughter and sighs. “Our rules,” Benger explains to Emlyn, “aren’t nearly as restrictive as the ones you were raised with.”
Benger shakes a finger at Atres, “No more than kissing, though, or my brothers and I will have some things to say about it.”
“I shall be on my almost very best behavior,” Atres says solemnly, “since my very best behavior isn’t very romantic. Trying to win your sister’s affections should involve romance.”
“That it should,” Benger agrees, “within limits.”
On the last day of the fair, Oja catches Atres in the morning, when he comes to see if Emlyn is up yet. “May I have a word with you?”
Surprised, Atres stops short, “Of course.”
“She’s been through quite enough,” Oja says with a frown, “without some womanizer trying to worm his way into her skirts.”
Adopting a more formal tone, Atres bows to Oja, “Madam, I can assure you this is not my intention.”
Oja’s frown deepens, but Atres waves her off, “I’m aware of my reputation and how I came by that reputation. Had I known then what I know now, I would have refused every last one of those women.”
“What, exactly, is that you know now that you didn’t previously?” Oja asks.
“Why, Madam Bevis,” Atres grins, “That there is a Nia in the world, and that she is willing to consider me. I never expected to find anyone like her. I didn’t think a woman like that existed. You should have seen her when we went hunting. She scrambled up that tree like a snowcat. Once up there, she made the most daring leap to the next tree to get a better look at the elk herd she was scouting. Then I watched her set herself and take a lone wolf that thought to drive her from her kill like the wolf was nothing. I’m....”
Atres trails off and scrubs his face with a hand, “I’m absolutely mad about her. She’s told me how young and just how sheltered she is, so I’m willing to wait. I understand what she is; accepting her means accepting the rules she lives by. I’ve already sworn that she’s safe with me. Benger has already lectured me. I suspect that I’ll have more humble pie to eat when I meet the rest of her cohort.”
“Are you sure this isn’t just some passing fancy?” Oja asks, “She’s still grieving for her family. I’d not like to see her hurt again.”
“Nor would I,” Atres shakes his head, “This isn’t some whim. I don’t even have the right words to describe how I feel about her. She told me about wanting to rebuild her House. If that’s what she wants, then I will help her do it when the time comes.”
“I’m surprised,” Oja shrugs, “I thought that would have sent you running.”
“I knew the minute that I made her blush so that her ears were almost purple,” Atres grins, “that it would be a marriage bed or no bed. That there was nothing in between with her.”
“What did you do that made her blush like that?” Oja says with a frown.
“I stated my interest in her plain enough,” Atres replies, still grinning, “and she used her abilities to check my motives, and whatever answer she got back made her blush like that. It wasn’t anything I did or said.”
“Just be careful with her,” Oja says.
“Very careful,” Atres agrees, and Oja waves him off.
Atres goes to find Emlyn and finds her in the clearing doing balance exercises. She’s busy doing calisthenics to loosen up after sleeping on the ground. He steps into the clearing, and she catches his boots crunching on the last of the fall leaves and looks up. Stopping, she looks at him expectantly, with a small smile. He strides over to her and sighs heavily.
“I have to go back today,” Atres grimaces, “I need to dig into this thing with Divaros. Gods! This is harder than I thought it would be. I hate leaving you here. Are you sure I can’t talk you into coming back with me?”
“I thought you had orders to keep an eye on me,” Emlyn grins, “If you leave, how’s that supposed to work?”
“You aren’t making this any easier,” Atres says with a mock growl.
“What should I do to make this easier on you?” Emlyn grins at him, “I could pout and cry like one of those idiot damsels in the storybooks.”
Adopting a swooning pose, Emlyn bats her eyes at him. “Oh, please don’t leave me,” Emlyn whines theatrically, “Whatever shall I do?”
“Oh, you little minx!” Atres mutters.
Prowling toward her, Atres chuckles, “You could come back with me. Don’t give me that nonsense about your Temple being closed. I can arrange a room for you at an inn. If all the inns were to be filled magically, I’d give you my bed and sleep on the floor in the other room.”
“Why is this so important to you? I’ll be back in Harito in a few more days,” Emlyn says, “I can have one of the Temple couriers send word as soon as we’re back.”
“Just promise me that you won’t leave for this Divaros thing until I see you back in Harito,” Atres says, “I don’t know why, but I’ve got a horrible feeling about that.”
“As you wish,” Emlyn shrugs, “I promise that I’ll see you back in Harito before we leave to take that up. Maybe you could come with us? We’ll need some investigators to help us get to the bottom of whatever is going on there.”
Atres gives her a long look before beginning to pace back and forth.
“I hate the whole idea of you being within ten leagues of that,” Atres frowns, “They’re sending you–YOU–right to whatever that thing is, knowing full well that you qualify as the tribute it’s asking for. They may as well plop you on a silver serving platter and offer you up. It’s quite possibly the worst idea I think I’ve ever heard. It’s even worse than the idea Korek had about trying to shave his face with his boot knife on a drunken bet, and that’s saying something. In case you’re wondering, Korek wears that beard to hide the scars from that little misadventure.”
Seeming to come to some decision, he groans, “Gods! I’ll figure out the duty schedule somehow. Yes, I’m coming with you. None of this, not a single shred of it, makes me like the idea any better. You and I both know dragons don’t ask for virgins. An ox, yes, but not that. I’ll be wanting a word with Master Ember about this before we leave.”
Atres stops ranting for a moment as realization washes over him, “This is why I don’t want to leave you here. Damn it, it’s right at my fingertips and I just can’t quite reach it. Arrg! This is one of those times when I wish I had just a bit more dragon in me.”
“Why is that?” Emlyn asks.
“Then I’d know more,” Atres grimaces, “We often know what’s going to happen long before it does. Why do you think there are so many of the dragon-blooded from my clan in the King’s Guard? We anticipate… things. If I were just a bit stronger, I could put it into words, rather than just this incoherent feeling of dread every time I think about you trying to talk with whatever this thing is. Swear to me that you’ll come find me in Harito before you go.”
Would you want to have the Valkis gift? Or just the unusual eye color?