Archive of Our Own

"Alanna," Raoul said. "You know that's a terrible idea."

"So was pretending to be my twin brother for eight years," Alanna reminded him. "It didn't stop me then."

"I think you're getting less mature as you age," Raoul said. "Which, considering where you started from -- "

Alanna kicked him under the table.

"See what I mean? The bigger person would have risen above."

"The bigger person seems to get pushed around a great deal."

Raoul eyed her over the rim of his glass of water. "You know you can't actually take Keladry as your squire, right?"

"I know," Alanna said. "And you don't need to tell me all the reasons why not, Goddess knows I've heard them enough to last me a lifetime." She stared down into her own glass of water, feeling petulant. "I just want to say something to her. Myles says that she hasn't even had one knight-master express an interest in her. Not even one, not even when she's survived spidrens and bandits and Cavall, for crying out loud. When I was her age I had you all fighting to have me as your squire, and broke all of your hearts when I picked Jonathan -- "

"Funny, that's not how I remember it."

"Then you remember it wrong." Alanna tapped her fingers on the table, brooding. "There are things that I could teach her that most knight masters couldn't. It's a waste that I don't get to."

"Like what?" Raoul asked.

Alanna started. It had been months since anyone had engaged in a conversation with her about Keladry of Mindelan; George, Myles, and most of her friends had reached the point of 'hmm'ing at the right places while their eyes glazed over.

"Well, I could answer her questions," Alanna said. She felt caught off guard. "What about if she has a question about her monthlies, or, or boys, or -- "

Raoul snorted. "And you'd do a fine job talking to her about boys, I'm sure." He moved his foot out of the way before Alanna could kick it. "What did you do, when you had a question like that?"

Alanna shrugged. "Asked Eleni Cooper, usually."

"Well, there you go. She just needs to befriend the Rogue and his mother."

"That's a solid plan." She rolled her eyes.

"Of course!" Raoul's face grew serious. "But it goes to show...you don't have to learn everything from your knight master. And Kel's not you; she's got a mother and sisters she can go to for that sort of thing. What she needs is someone to teach her how to be a knight. And I don't think she's going to be the same kind of knight as you. She needs someone who could teach her about, oh, command, logistics..."

Alanna had watched as Raoul made this speech, her eyes squinted and judgmental. She could tell when Raoul was leading up to something; usually she could sniff it out in seconds. This time only took her a little longer.

"Raoul!" she yelped. "You sneaky mountain of a man, are you trying to steal my squire?"

He scratched the back of his head, not making eye contact. "Not stealing, exactly. I thought you might mind."

"I mind that you waited so long," Alanna told him. She wasn't sure if she wanted to pout or to laugh. "Unless you just decided right now because of my brilliance."

"Flattering yourself again, Lioness." Raoul chanced looking up at her, so Alanna forced a smile. It wasn't as hard as it might have been. If she couldn't take Kel, Raoul was the next best choice. "I've been thinking about it since the spidren hunt."

Alanna dropped the smile for a scowl. "You made me wait for THREE YEARS?"

"Waiting builds character. Think of it as a lesson in patience."

"If I haven't learned patience yet, I never will," Alanna muttered.

"Stranger things have happened. Though not by much." Raoul paused a second. "You're sure you don't mind?"

"If you ask me again, I'm challenging you to a duel."

Raoul held his hands up in surrender.

Alanna sighed. "And so, my knowledge goes to waste."

"I'm sure we could scare up someone for you to take under your wing, if you want to teach that badly."

"I don't, exactly." Alanna started to drum her fingers again, and stopped. "But it's like healing. I remember Maude telling me, if you don't use the gifts the gods give you..." She shook her head. "Gods want their gifts to be used."

"I leave that sort of thing to you. I'm just as happy not having the gods paying me any mind."

Alanna shook her head again, catching sight of another old friend entering the room. "Baird," she called out, and he changed course to join them. "Come take me out of myself, Raoul's got me brooding."

"I'm not sure I'm the man for the job," Baird said, seating himself next to Raoul. "Or not at the moment. I think my son is trying to get a jump on his inheritance by driving me to an early grave."

"Oh?" Alanna raised an eyebrow.

"Well, it's that or he's doing it without trying, which might be worse."

"Cunning and ruthless is preferable to careless and well-meaning?" Raoul asked him.

"Perhaps not. I had thought, now that he's a squire, we'd stop having these same arguments about his leaving university. I've stopped goading him about it. So he comes into the infirmary and goads himself into having an argument about it."

Alanna bit her lip. She didn't think her friend would appreciate her laughing just now. "And which side does he take in these arguments?"

"Both," Baird said gloomily. "It's the university training. But when I point out that he might still drop out and resume his healer's training, he refuses."

"He could do both, surely," Alanna said, and felt something wrench inside her.

"If you are sure of that, that makes one of us." Baird sighed. "I remember you, in the Tusaine War. All that talent and no knowing how to use it...and now that's to be Neal. One of the gods' little jokes, I suppose."

"No," Alanna said. "That's not the joke."

She shot her eyes over toward Raoul, who made a face of pure innocence.

"Such a shame when knowledge goes to waste," Raoul said. "What was that, about the gods wanting their gifts to be used?"

"This isn't what I meant," Alanna snapped.

Baird raised an eyebrow at her, but only a little. He'd had years to get used to the Lioness's little fits of pique. "Something the matter?"

"Yes," Alanna said, and then frowned. This wasn't the voice of the Goddess in her ear, or a vision in a fire, but there was a feeling of certainty about the whole thing all the same. It annoyed her immensely. If it had just been her, she might have been tempted to ignore it, but with two old friends staring her down, she had to rise to the challenge. "Baird, your son is going to be my squire."

Baird blinked at her. "That's...surprising," he said, words coming to him slowly. "I'd think he would have come into infirmary making a scene with any news as exciting as that."

"Oh, he doesn't know yet."

Raoul's smile was too broad for the hand he tried to hide it with.

-

The first thing Neal thought when he walked into his father's study and saw the king standing next to Baird was, I didn't know it was possible to be in this much trouble.

When he saw the Lioness, his brain gave up trying to think of rational explanations. The king and his champion had put aside four years of discord to be in the same room as him. There could not possibly be a rational explanation. The only answer was that he was as mad as everyone said. Perhaps the last four years hadn't happened at all; perhaps he'd only imagined them, as he was clearly imagining this scene.

He bowed and greeted his father's guests purely by reflex. Oakbridge and the Stump had beat some habits so deeply into him that he could no more snub the king than he could fly.

If the last four years had all been his mad ravings, did that mean that his imagination had invented the Stump? Neal didn't realize that his imagination hated him so much.

"Please, have a seat," Baird said to Neal, who stayed on his feet, distracted, until the king and the Lioness had sat down. Even his contrary mind couldn't have created the Stump, which meant he wasn't mad. Perhaps he'd been possessed by a demon, like the tales the Bazhir told of the inhabitants of the Black City. The King and his Champion were here as mages, then, to deal with the dark evil powers that had taken up residence in his soul. Though, if he were possessed, surely he would remember something more interesting and evil happening to him in the last few days than Peachblossom biting a whole in his tunic.

His father had said something while he'd been following this flight of fancy, but listening to one thing while thinking of another was the first and most useful skill Neal had picked up at university, so he hardly missed Baird's saying, "We wanted to discuss the matter of your education."

Neal scowled at his father. If he'd taken even a moment's deliberate thought, he'd have decided against making such an expression in front of the king, but Baird's repeated attempts to meddle in his decision-making precluded such consideration. "You've dragged in someone else to make your arguments for you?"

Baird remained calm, which was always the most infuriating reaction. Neal was sure that was why he did it. "Aren't you the one who says that a scholar consults with experts when he needs to?"

"It's a dirty trick, using a man's words against him," Neal said, and promptly bit his tongue. A bit of frankness in front of the Lioness was probably fine, since if a tenth of what people said about her was true then she was the frankest person in the kingdom. But Neal had no great works or even a shield to excuse rudeness in the presence of his monarch. He circled back around to the idea that he was insane; that would explain a lot.

"Let's try this," the Lioness spoke up. "Is it training as a healer you object to, or just having to quit your knight's training?"

"I resent interference in my decisions, my lady," Neal said promptly.

She frowned at him, which was formidable but not, after four years of the Stump, enough to send him quaking in his boots. "You didn't answer the question."

"Oh, I'd love to train as a healer," Neal said. "And then I'll begin my career as a juggler, and a poet, and a farrier, while I'm at it. You know, most people would consider trying for a shield to be enough punishment for one lifetime."

"I can see there's no need for you to study with the Players, as dramatic as you are," the Lioness retorted.

"Squire Nealan," the king said, and Neal started. He had forgotten that the king was in the room. "I understand that you want to do your duty by the kingdom. But the kingdom needs healers as well as warriors. We lost too many healers in the Immortals War."

"We also lost knights, sire."

"So do both," the Lioness said, with a shrug.

"Yes, of course, my lady, it's as simple as breathing. I'll just find someone who can teach me to be both a knight and a healer -- "

"I can teach you both," the Lioness snapped. "Assuming you can be taught anything, which I'm beginning to doubt."

A terrible understanding dawned on Neal, and he looked to his father with horror.

"Lady Alanna and I think it would be best if she were your knight master," Baird said.

For a minute Neal was stunned -- absolutely stunned -- that Baird could have pulled something like this off. Then his surprise wore off. Of course Baird would go to such lengths; the only person who wanted Neal to be a healer more than Neal did was Baird. Well, Baird and Kel --

Kel.

"Absolutely not," Neal said.

"Neal," his father said, but the Lioness cut him off.

"You need to learn how to be a healer," she said. "Not instead of becoming a knight, but because you're becoming a knight. You'll take lives, fighting. You need to learn to balance that. Ignoring your Gift is a mistake you'll regret."

Neal's throat burned. He tried to shut out what the Lioness had said as though it were the sort of garbage Joren's group spouted. He couldn't let himself listen, or he'd be convinced.

"I'll muddle through somehow, my lady," he said. "Don't trouble yourself over my mistakes when you're the one who's talking to the wrong squire."

"Neal," his father chastised him.

It would hardly be the first time his father had chastised him. But he held his tongue anyway, more because there were so many different thoughts in his head clamoring to be said that he couldn't pick one. He found himself speechless for the first time since -- he wasn't sure. Since Kel had lectured him about chivalry, maybe, ten years old and a head shorter than him and full of righteous indignation.

He could picture her clearly like that, just like he could picture her now and how she'd look if Neal came and told her he was going to squire for the Lioness, her face Yamani blank to hide the pain from her best friend stabbing her in the back.

"You should be talking to Kel," he said finally.

The Lioness grimaced. "Kel's getting an offer -- a good offer. She'll be taken care of," she said. "You, on the other hand, are still trouble."

"More trouble with every passing day," Neal said. "And if even I, in my troublesome manner can see that you ought to be Kel's knight master, than it ought to make you think."

"Yes, the thought hadn't occurred to me on my own," the Lioness snapped.

"It isn't a good idea," Baird added quietly. "People who don't want to accept a second lady knight will say that she didn't earn her shield."

Neal had a retort lined up for that, but the king threw him off, standing and prompting the rest of them to scramble to their feet.

"Consider Alanna's offer carefully, Squire Nealan," he said. Was Neal imagining it or did that sound like a warning? Perhaps everything sounded like a warning coming from a king. Only a fool would upset a king. Good thing you're not a fool, Neal heard a mocking little voice in his head say. "I trust you will make a wise decision."

He took his leave of them, the Lioness following him out with a pinched look on her face.

Neal turned to his father, wordless.

"I did not intend to set the king on you," Baird said. "But I agree with what he said. Just -- think carefully, please. You have a remarkable mind, when you choose to use it."

Neal scowled at him and left.

He had to talk to Kel.

-

"For the record," a voice said from Alanna's doorway. She turned and saw -- who else? -- Baird's son. Neal, she supposed. She should get used to his name. "I object to this as a fundamental miscalculation on the part of all concerned and protest most strongly to every part of this."

"Are you finished?"

"No," he said, and added half-heartedly, "my lady. I want it known that I'm only going along with this because Kel is clearly as mad as the rest of you and says she's going with Lord Raoul. I still think this is a mistake. But what is education, if not letting your teachers show you how to make their mistakes instead of your own?"

Alanna felt the beginnings of a headache setting in. She had thought, discussing the matter with Baird while Raoul looked on and tried not to laugh, that getting Neal to agree would be the hard part.

It was just sinking in that she was going to spend the next four years dealing with the consequences of that agreement.

Like climbing up the Roof of the World and forgetting that you'd have to climb back down, she thought ruefully.

Maybe she'd be lucky and she'd die in a terrible training accident tomorrow morning.

"I take it you accept my offer, then," she said.

"I accept," Neal said.

"Good." It didn't exactly come out like she meant it, but there was little she could do about it now. She lacked her squire's theatrical flair; she sounded the way she felt. "I'll collect you tomorrow when I'm finished with congress business for the day."

"I shall hardly sleep tonight for excitement, my lady," Neal drawled.

He did have the sense to make a hasty departure. Maybe the next four years would merely been painful, instead of excruciating.

At least the fates had had the courtesy to arrange for the congress to be this summer. Compared to a day of fighting the reins on her own temper while conservatives blathered their usual nonsense about noble's rights and the superiority of tradition, even the prospect of spending the afternoon with her loudmouthed squire sounded like a treat.

She kept an eye on him as they rode into the city. He rode well, though at his age there was no excuse for him not to. He was at ease in their surroundings, being familiar with the city after a lifetime spent at court. Too at ease. He wasn't paying enough attention to the people around them, which Alanna made a note to correct in the near future. Perhaps at Pirate's Swoop. If Aly was to be forever picking pockets, she could at least be set to teaching Neal a lesson about keeping a watchful eye. Or maybe not. Aly didn't need encouraging.

He looked surprised when he realized they were heading for the Lower City, and for one blessed moment Alanna thought he was going to keep his opinions to himself.

It was a short moment.

"My lady has a much broader idea of educational activities than I had expected," Neal said, as they passed a flower girl who, from the looks of her, did not make much of her coin selling flowers.

"If I tell you to speak when spoken to, are you going to pay it any mind?"

"Highly doubtful, my lady."

Honesty was a virtue, supposedly.

They arrived soon enough at the hospital that served those in the Lower City who could not afford a healer. Alanna knew most of the staff that worked there, as she tried to visit whenever she was in Corus. They knew her, too, personally or by reputation, and there were plenty of muffled whispers and wide eyes as she introduced Neal around as "my squire".

"He's only a squire, so don't expect him to be too useful," she told the nurse who examined new patients.

Neal bristled at that, before drawing himself up in his airiest manner, the one Alanna was already beginning to think of as Neal the Player. "Treat me as you would the most simple-minded babe in the woods. I've hardly a thought in my head worth minding," he boasted.

"Goes without saying, a little lad like you," the nurse said cheerfully. She was old enough to be Neal's grandmother and only came up to his armpit. She took him by the elbow and led him toward the ward where patients with minor injuries waited for treatment.

Alanna stuck close to him, rather than offering her services as she normally would, to the patients with the graver injuries. It itched at her, to treat sores and sniffles when there was more urgent work she could be doing, but in this case she owed a duty to Neal, not just to the injured and the ill.

If only her duty to Neal weren't so maddening.

It wasn't even his manner that was getting to her. Once he got to work, the smart comments and sharp retorts eased off, though she caught him biting his tongue several times. It was something of a relief to know that he was capable of holding his tongue. Alanna wondered what it would take for him to show her the same respect he showed the grandmotherly nurse; she hoped she wouldn't have to wait until she was that old. Though she would soon enough have the same head of white hair, if things kept up like this.

Because Neal was frustratingly slow and backward at everything. He struggled to close up the simplest scrapes; he was completely confounded by fleas and lice. After several long minutes lingering over a colicky baby he threw his arms up in disgust and paced to the other side of the ward.

"Well, he's only a noble," the infant's father muttered.

Alanna worked her way over to Neal slowly, stopping here and there to cure colds and ease aches. She hoped he'd have calmed himself out of his dramatic snit.

"Now you see why you need to learn?" she asked.

His eyes flashed with annoyance, and Alanna could have kicked herself. If he hadn't been in a snit before, he was now. "I'm learning ever so many things already," he said, dry as the Great Southern Desert. "For example, my father always used to tell me that it was rude to rub your victory in someone's face once they've already lost. I can see now that must be incorrect. My lady would surely never do anything so petty."

Alanna felt her face redden, and made herself move along.

Neal was subdued on their ride back to the palace, and Alanna was fuming too much even to enjoy the silence. Watching him at the hospital had been like watching Raoul struggle to lift a pencil, or listening to Gary read a book by sounding out each word a letter at a time. There was no reason for someone with as strong a Gift as Neal had to be so -- so ungifted.

"I'll collect you in the morning," she told him. "There's a midwife we can visit. She'll be glad enough of some help treating the summer cold that's going around."

Neal bowed at her, too deeply and too long to be genuine. "However shall I contain my excitement, my lady."

She narrowed her eyes at his flirtation with insubordination. That was another thing she was going to have to watch for and correct in the future. One of many things. She fought the urge to rub at her eyes.

"If you have so much energy, we could head to the practice courts," she told him.

Neal straightened up. "I find my excitement miraculously contained," he said, and excused himself.

Alanna decided to have a go at the practice courts after all.

-

Neal did learn a tremendous amount in the next few months.

He learned to dread overheard conversations at pubs and inns, because even a mention of someone's child stubbing their toe would prompt the Lioness to drag him to the injured party, regardless of weather conditions, distance, or terrain to be crossed.

He learned the exact scowl that meant the Lioness was thinking of dunking him in the nearest trough and putting him out of her misery, though he did not learn how to avoid making her scowl like that in the first place. Nor how to defuse her once she was.

He learned that introducing himself as the Lioness's squire was a fantastic way to halt a conversation. Which was for the best, because the only things anyone could ever think to say to that were either terrible ("You need a woman to teach you how to be a knight?") or laughably disconnected from reality ("That sounds marvelous, how lucky for you").

He learned that even the most vexatious of situations was not so bad it couldn't be made worse by simple expedience of having no one to complain to about it.

Kel had told him, repeatedly over the years, that complaining about a situation, particularly one that couldn't be changed, only made it worse. Neal had always privately, and vocally, thought that this was sheer Yamani nonsense. And this situation was only further proof to him.

Normally he would go to Kel with anything and everything that upset him, but -- he could hardly tell her that he was unhappy serving the Lioness, not when it was what she had always wanted for herself. And even if he could, she'd gone haring off with the King's Own without so much as saying goodbye.

And it was no use complaining to anyone else. Anyone who liked Alanna would tell him he was being a fathead. And anyone who didn't like her -- there was no need to give them ammunition.

So it was something of a relief to return to the palace in November, where he could busy himself in the library and the practice courts and the squire's wing, and hide from his knight master before she could hear that a maid had gotten a blister on her foot and make him deal with it.

It was even a relief to hear a too-loud voice call him one day, "What do you know, it's Queenscove!" and turn around and see Cleon of Kennan. "You're alive. I thought for sure the Lioness would have torn you apart by now."

"Shows what you know," Neal told him loftily. "She is obviously saving that as a Midwinter surprise. Unfortunately I plan for my Midwinter gift to her to be my absence."

"But that's what I was hoping for, for Midwinter," Cleon said, and tugged Neal's ear once he was close enough.

"A squire's first duty is to his knight master," Neal said. "Not to lumbering oafs they had the misfortune of meeting as pages."

"Yours is a cheery mood," Cleon observed. "I take it Kel's not around?"

Neal bristled. "What does that mean?"

"Why, only that she has a stabilizing effect on you." Cleon slipped his hands into his pockets, too casual. "You don't think that you survived your fellow pages on your own merits, did you? It's because Kel makes you bearable."

"Then I hardly see that I owe you anything," Neal said. "Such as information about where the Third Company is presently located."

"Touchy." Cleon shrugged. "I thought the Lioness might have beaten you out of that by now."

"Lady Alanna happens to appreciate the value of an opinionated mind." Which was true, in a sense. She didn't much value Neal's opinions, but she agreed with the theoretical concept of people having strong opinions. Or at least, of her own right to have strong opinions.

"Then she must feel that the gods sent you to her," Cleon said. "She couldn't have picked a more opinionated squire if she tried."

"Stop flattering me, my head will swell and then I will have to buy new hats."

"You head can get more swollen than it is at present?"

"Do you want to hear about Kel or not?" Neal demanded, and it was like a switch, Cleon standing up straighter, his eyes practically begging Neal to share.

Right, because Neal was the one who was happier when Kel was around. He managed to refrain from rolling his eyes as he caught Cleon up on Kel's latest exploits, which he'd had in a recent letter from Dom.

He left out the part where Dom had said I'm going to petition Uncle Baird to swap you for Kel. The Lioness can keep you. I can't see how anyone would argue that that's anything but an improvement for the family. Cleon would only have laughed.

-

Midwinter at Pirate's Swoop, with Neal safely and distantly deposited back at the palace, was the best curative Alanna could ask for for her temper.

She made it all the way to the second night of festivities before she vented to George. "And he always says whatever he's thinking, never mind who's listening. He's convinced he's right even after you've proved him wrong. And he never lets you forget even the smallest mistake -- "

George made it about that far into her rant before he started laughing.

Alanna scowled at him, which made him laugh harder, great howls of laughter and even -- Goddess bless -- tears.

"What is so funny?"

"Lass," George fought to breathe long enough to talk. "Do you've any idea how many times I've heard people say the exact same about you? How many times all of your friends have heard the exact same about you?"

Alanna crossed her arms. "I've earned the right to be ornery and difficult a hundred times over."

"Sure," George humored her. "So what was your excuse when you were a little scrap of a thing picking fights with your fellow pages?"

"Don't make this about me." She pointed a warning finger at him.

He gently took hold of her finger, and her whole hand, and turned it upside down to kiss the inside of her wrist. "It's already about you," he said. "Why do you think he's so irritating to you? 'Cause it's like looking in a mirror. If Raoul'd taken him, they'd probably get along like a house on fire."

"Well, he didn't," Alanna said. "He got the good squire."

George gave her that look that meant she was being a ridiculous noble. "Are you telling me you'd swap?"

"No," Alanna said immediately, and was surprised to find she meant it. "I'm not letting Queenscove beat me."

"Well, there you go," George said. "Besides, Queenscove needs you. You're the only one who can teach him how to be the kind of knight he needs to be."

Alanna sighed. "Because it's hard to be a knight and a healer, I know."

"Who said anything about healing?" George asked. "The lad clearly needs someone who can teach him how to survive running his mouth off. I can't think of a better person than you."

"You're walking a thin line, Cooper," Alanna said, but let him pull her into an embrace.

-

"Neal!"

Neal sat straight up in his bedroll, his right hand grabbing for the dagger kept under his pillow and his left hand calling up his Gift. When Alanna barked at him like that, there was either a fight on their hands or a medical emergency, and he'd learned to be ready for either.

Lapdogs got treats when they performed tricks; Neal just got a slightly lower chance of pain and mockery.

His blinking eyes took in that it wasn't yet dawn. Alanna was standing near the campfire, which was being stoked back to life by one of the Riders they'd been traveling with for the last two days. The Group Commander was holding a cup of water up to the lips of a battered, exhausted young woman. The rest of the Eleventh Rider Group, Trollwatch, was breaking camp.

Neal slid his dagger back into its holster, since they did not look to be under immediate threat of attack, and pulled himself out of his bedroll. He jammed his feet into boots without bothering with the laces or a change of clothing. The Lioness was not particularly patient with anyone who fussed with their clothing during an emergency, even judging by the standards of her usual amount of patience.

"What sort of party are you throwing for us, my lady?" he asked the Lioness. "Or is it meant to be a surprise, in which case, forgive me for being gauche enough to ask."

"Someday I am going to string you up by your tongue." She hardly even sounded annoyed when she said it. Neal wondered if she were getting used to his smart comments, and what he would do if she were. He could be more obnoxious if he really put his mind to it, he supposed. "Hurrok attack in the village of Cedar Brook. See what you can do for the messenger, I'm going to try to contact another Rider's Group, or the Own."

"Wouldn't want to hog all the fun," he said to her departing back. She either didn't hear him or didn't care to respond. Preferably the former. Neal wasn't sure how he felt about a situation too serious for Alanna to snap at him about his attitude.

He introduced himself to the Cedar Brook woman and explained that he was going to see to her injuries. She gave no sign of having heard him, but the Rider Commander was already leaving to oversee the Group's preparations, so there was nothing for Neal to do but proceed.

He placed a hand on the woman's shoulder, appraising her physical state. She was dehydrated -- he wasn't sure how to help that, except to gesture for a passing Rider to bring her another cup of water. She had a cracked rib that was causing bleeding inside of her. He knew, at least in theory, how to fix that. And she was -- he couldn't put a word to it; cold and tired didn't seem adequate. Neal was cold and tired; this woman felt like she was halfway missing from her body.

He'd bother Alanna about that when she reappeared. In the meantime, internal bleeding was dangerous, and he focused his powers on healing the tears inside her.

It wasn't the first time he'd done such a task. He'd been getting pretty good at that, if the bleed was a minor one. This wasn't so different, except in scale. So he summoned the green fire of his Gift, lowering his hand to the woman's side --

-- and felt a sharp shock run through him, like lightning had just struck his fingers. His own Gift had recoiled on him.

"Now I see why Father complains about people who fight healings," he muttered, wiping tears out of his eyes. They stung, and it took several seconds of concentration before he could see the woman's face clearly.

"Look, I'm trying to help you," he told her. "You need to let me or you're never going to get any better, understand?"

The woman stared at him with blank eyes.

"Are you going to let me heal you or not?" he demanded.

She blinked again, and nodded.

"Fine," Neal said curtly, and turned his attention back to the uppity, overgrown bruise that thought it could beat him.

And yet still he could feel the woman's body, refusing to heal.

Maybe if he just forced it. He gritted his teeth and jammed as much of his Gift forward as he could --

-- this time he stumbled back several steps from the force of his Gift bouncing back at him. He tried to inhale and found himself as winded as if Kel had just used him for throwing practice.

"She's in shock," Alanna said behind him.

Neal straightened up as much as he could under the circumstances -- about three-quarters of the way -- and tried to sound composed and intelligent. "Oh." In truth, he felt like the biggest fool in Tortall. Just because he hadn't had a full healer's training didn't mean he was some illiterate bumpkin. He should have guessed it was shock.

Surely the Lioness must think he was an even greater idiot than she had previously. Any moment now, she would tell him so.

Except she just stepped forward to place a hand on the woman's shoulder and gestured for Neal to do the same. Up close, he could sense how she worked on the woman's heart and lungs, easing her pulse and her breathing until she began to ease out of her shock.

"Treat the shock first," Alanna said to him in a low voice. "It gets in the way of the rest of the healing, and it can take a nasty turn. Don't try to force a healing on someone. You want a sharp blade, not a heavy mallet."

Neal found his voice again. "Yes, my lady. It's an inspiration just standing beside you. Why, I -- "

"Stow it," Alanna told him. "If it's really that clever, tell me after we've dealt with the hurroks. Somehow, I think you'll have decided against it by then."

"What if it is that clever, but I forget it?" Neal demanded.

"Tash," Alanna called to one of the Riders. "Get Squire Nealan an journal to write in." She gave him a wicked grin as he sputtered; she'd never called him by his full name before. "But see to the cracked rib and the bleeding first."

He'd not yet recovered from his sputtering before she dashed off again, or he would have asked her if she were feeling quite sane today. Despite the last few months of healings, he hadn't seen to a broken bone by himself. Why should he be ready to now, when he'd just made such a hash of treating the woman's shock?

"It's a test," he told his patient gloomily. "The professors at the university used to do the same thing. They'd set you up for failure and watch to see how you handled it."

"M'lord?" the woman asked, confused.

"Never mind. Just sit still while I see to your rib. And please refrain from fighting me on this, or we'll end up with matching injuries."

Neal did his best to shove down any thoughts about Alanna. She was probably hiding behind a tree somewhere, ready to step in again when he made his next mistake, but he couldn't think about that.

Instead, he concentrated on the woman's rib. He imagined himself as small as a dust mite, running tiny hands along the bone to find the break. There it was. He funneled his Gift through his imaginary fingers, till it was coming through as thin as thread, and wound it around the bone to keep it from moving and damaging the surrounding tissue any worse. Then he filled the bone, from the inside out, to repair it.

After the bone, there was the flesh around the bone, the broken veins, all the associated trauma. This was more familiar; he'd treated Kel's bruises enough times when Joren's gang or her monster of a gelding had been at her.

When he'd finished, he opened his eyes to find that the sun was breaking over the horizon, and someone had left two plates of food beside him.

"Is it all right if I move, m'lord?" the woman asked.

Neal started, and realized she'd asked him twice before he'd registered it. "Yes. Yes, that's fine. You've been as lovely as a field of daisies in May." He felt lightheaded and reached for the further plate. "Eat that, you'll need it."

She bobbed her head and began wolfing down her breakfast. Neal decided that she had the right idea, and fell on his own plate as though it were a king's banquet, rather than lukewarm sausage and potato.

When he'd finished, he waved down the nearest Rider, the one Alanna had named Tash.

"You don't really need me to bring you a journal, do you?" Tash asked him. "'Cause truth be told, we aren't much of writers, us in Trollwatch."

"Forget that," Neal told him. "That was simply Lady Alanna thinking she was funny. Where is she, by the way?"

"Rode off to meet with the Own," Tash said.

Neal thought that if he were standing, he'd have stumbled as hard as he had when his Gift recoiled on him. "Pardon?"

"They're sending a squad to help with the hurroks," Tash said. "She's gone to meet 'em down the road to start planning the attack. We're supposed to catch 'em up when you're done."

"Well, let's be off, then," Neal drawled, covering up the confusion in his voice with sarcasm. "Although the Lioness if famed throughout the kingdom for her patience, that's no reason to keep her waiting."

"Are you sure you don't need a healer?" Tash asked. "You sound a bit loopy, Squire Nealan."

"Loopy? Me?" Neal asked, feigning outrage. "Why, what noble wouldn't want to sleep in the dirt, wake before dawn, work a healing, and ride off to fight violent immortals instead of living in a castle and spending all day reading books in a quiet, cozy library?"

Tash shrugged. "When you put it like that."

The Riders had finished breaking camp while Neal had worked on the village woman, so they were mounted up and riding out the moment he was done eating.

On the road, Neal slipped back into moroseness. He couldn't imagine what Alanna had been playing at. Nor did he imagine she would tell him; he'd just have to suffer in ignorance. It would be no good asking her, he told himself firmly. The Mithrans say there are some things men are not meant to understand.

Too bad Neal had never been comfortable with ignorance.

"Why exactly did my lady abandon me while I was healing?" he demanded of Alanna, once they'd caught up with her and set off again for Cedar Brook.

"Was I supposed to stay and watch?" Alanna asked him. "I admit, Aly used to ask me to watch her when she'd do acrobatic tricks, but I had thought you were more mature than a small child." She grinned at him. "On second thought, of course you're not."

"What if she'd bled out?" Neal asked. "Or fought the healing and knocked me out? What if I'd broken the rest of her ribs?"

"Are you likely to assault someone you're supposed to be healing? I thought Cavall beat chivalry into you better than that."

"I could have messed up," Neal said, face heating up, "again."

"You didn't, though, did you?"

"No, but I assumed you would stay in case I messed up!"

"I told you I was leaving it to you. Why would I say that if I were staying?"

"I thought you'd be watching," Neal said. "To catch me if I messed up."

"Who does that benefit?" Alanna asked him. "If I'm going to watch you, or guide you, you'll know it. I have no intention of spying on you to pounce on your mistakes."

Neal scowled at his mare's neck.

"If I hadn't thought you could handle it, I wouldn't have asked you to," Alanna said.

"And what possible evidence did you have that I could handle it?"

"I'd be a poor teacher if I couldn't gauge your abilities. Do you think I'm a poor teacher?"

"No," Neal admitted.

"Do you want me to spy on you?"

"No!"

"Then stop feeling sorry for yourself," Alanna told him. "You did handle it, didn't you?"

"After messing up twice," Neal retorted. "And it took me an hour. You must be so proud to have me as you student."

"More than you'd think, anyway," Alanna told him, and kicked her mount into a trot before he could quit gaping at her long enough to make a comment.

He should have pressed Tash for that journal. That moment was surely worth recording for future historians.

-

Cedar Brook was bad. Worse than Alanna expected.

The woman who had stumbled into their camp in the dark hours of the morning had reported three full-grown hurroks and a smaller young one. Alanna didn't know if the woman had been mistaken, or if she'd been addled by shock, or if more of the things had arrived in the time that it took for help to reach the village.

There were at least five of the adults that Alanna could see, and two adolescents.

"Target the little ones first," she yelled at Neal over the sound of battle. She didn't know what was worse, the screams of the human villages or the distinctly inhuman screech of the attacking hurroks.

"Sure, let's have the enraged mother immortals attack us," Neal said. His eyes were wide and the color had drained out of his face, but his bow was raised before she'd even spoken.

"Since they're already attacking? Yes," Alanna said. "If they're angry and worried about their young they won't think as clearly."

Neal nodded.

"And stay close," Alanna told him.

She couldn't spare him as much attention as she would have liked. In addition to minding her targets and protecting herself, she had to keep an eye on the villagers, many of whom were unarmed.

He stayed close, though, enough for her to see that he targeted the hurroks' delicate wings without being prompted, and enough for her to steer her mount into his, pushing him out of the way of a diving hurrok just in time for the creature's claws to miss him.

"How shall I ever repay you?" Neal asked, clasping at her outstretched hand to keep himself in the saddle.

"Stay alive," she told him, "or your father is going to be such a pest."

Neal snorted but did, at least, obey the command.

When only two of the hurroks remained, they tried to flee. Archers from the Rider group took down the large one; two more arrows shot down the adolescent. Alanna noted that Neal's was one of them.

But the trouble wasn't over yet.

"Search for injured," Alanna order him. "Anyone who can make it, send to the town center. Trollwatch will set up a relief camp. Anyone who can't be moved, do what you can and yell for me."

Neal nodded. There was blood on his face, not all of it hurrok. Alanna frowned and reached out, fingers landing on his forehead, where her Gift found a long shallow gash. It only took her a second to burn out infection and staunch the bleeding. She didn't heal it completely, wanting to save her Gift.

"There," she said gruffly. "Just a scratch. Head's too thick for anything more than that."

"I trust you'd be fit to assess such matters," Neal said, but without his usual attitude. He looked almost green as he dismounted.

Alanna followed suit, slowly, and let him pick the direction he was walking before she headed in the opposite. After their conversation that morning, she didn't want him to think she was hovering over him, even if she felt a little uneasy about him picking his way through a battlefield alone.

Her own search for survivors kept her mind too busy to worry about Neal for long -- a small mercy. She'd found three dead, patched up two more enough for them to make their way back to the village center, and was arguing with another who insisted she see to his scrapes immediately and never mind that there were others in greater danger than he, when she heard someone yelling.

"Lady Alanna!" "Lioness!"

She looked over and saw two Riders waving frantically at her, pointing off toward the far side of the village.

"Village center now or your cursed arm can rot off for all I care," Alanna told the man, and took off toward the Riders.

"Squire Neal said -- " "The squire needs you -- "

"I see him," Alanna said. "Keep searching."

She could see Neal, and the body he was crouched over, and the cloud of green magic around them both. Too big, too much; he was trying to use brute force to push the healing through, and she had half a mind to tell him off for making the same mistake as before, until she got close enough to see his patient.

Tash was curled up on the grass, not moving. Alanna didn't need to see his wound, didn't need to reach for her Gift. The amount of blood on the ground told her what she needed to know.

He had a minute left, at most, and nothing anyone could do for him but pray to the Black God.

And there was Neal, trying to hold him to this world through sheer bloody-mindedness. Like a man bailing out a sinking barge with his bare hands.

Neal heard her arrive and looked up. She'd thought his face was pale before; she'd obviously been wrong.

"You're here -- I need your help -- I don't know what to do, show me what to do."

Alanna lowered herself slowly, reaching out for Neal with one hand and Tash with the other. Neal never babbled. He talked, endlessly, but always knew what he was saying.

He never asked for help, either, and it felt like a slap that he would do it now when she couldn't give him any.

She sent a small twirl of magic down to Tash, to ease his pain, whatever of it he might still be feeling.

"What are you -- no," Neal started, and Alanna gripped him, hard enough to hurt, trying to get him in control of himself.

"Neal."

"No. Show me what to do, I can help, we can fix him."

"Neal, there's nothing to fix. He's dying."

"You're giving up, you mean," he said, nastily. "I thought -- you were supposed to be stubborn, but you're just giving up."

Well, she'd tried soft, or as soft as she could get. If he wouldn't listen to Alanna, maybe he'd obey the Lioness. "Queenscove," she barked. "Let him go. There's nothing you can do for him and you're wasting your strength."

His magic flared, bright enough to hurt her eyes, before it blinked out of existence.

"What's the point," he ranted. "What's the gods cursed point of studying this damn magic if you can't even do anything -- "

"You do what you can," she told him. "Until you can't anymore."

He reached up and rubbed at his face, Tash's blood smearing across his cheeks. It mixed with his own blood, with the hurrok blood. With his tears.

She thought about warning him off, reminding him of infection, but held her tongue at the last second. She knew, sometimes, how to pick her battles.

"Go to the village center," Alanna said. "Start on the minor injuries. I'll finish the search."

Neal lowered his hand, rested it against Tash's wrist for a second as though checking for a pulse. There was none.

"No." He stood abruptly and continued out in the spiral pattern he'd been on.

Alanna watched him go, debating whether she should follow him or not. Part of her wanted to chase him down and drag him back to the village center by the scruff of his neck, but she didn't know whose interests that would serve. Would that be looking out for her squire? Or was she just angered that he'd goaded and disobeyed her?

He'd been upset. It wasn't fair to hold anything he'd said just now against him. And Raoul would have cautioned her against ordering to do something she knew he wouldn't.

Still, she wasn't convinced that Neal would be prepared, in terms of his emotions or his Gift, to handle another serious injury.

But if she didn't let him go now, he'd be no more ready for the next battlefield.

She resumed her own search, but kept her ears open, just in case.

Tash was the only one to die under healer's hands, but they found four more dead villagers before the search was done, and the King's Own was down two men. Healing up all of the wounded was a long, tiring task, and by the time the sun had set Alanna was ready to sleep for a week.

Instead, she accepted a plate of food from the village innkeeper with a muted 'thank you' and dragged her creaking bones over to sit beside Neal.

He'd chosen a spot far from the inn's fire, at an empty table, and was scowling at his food like it had personally offended him.

"Eat that," Alanna told him.

He transferred the scowl to her for a second before looking away. "I'm not going to apologize."

"I know better than to hold out for an apology from you, whelp," she told him. "You should still eat that."

Neal stabbed at a bit of pork. "I don't want it."

"The two facts are unrelated."

Neal pulled a face and took the smallest bite of all time.

Alanna turned off her scrutiny, since he was (grudgingly, barely) doing what she'd told him to, and began eating her own dinner. She needed it as badly as Neal, after all.

It took him a good ten minutes before he threw down the fork and demanded, as passionately as though they were mid-argument, "So that's it? Sometimes we just let them die?"

"Sometimes," Alanna told him. "Not every time. Not even most of the time. But sometimes."

He deflated as quickly as he'd started up. "Is it always this -- this awful?"

Alanna found her own appetite had fled as surely as Neal's had. "Always," she said slowly. "Sometimes it gets to be a relief, when they're dead before you get there. And sometimes that's worse. You think, what if I'd gotten here a little sooner? And then you blame yourself for that, too."

"How do you keep doing it?"

Alanna sighed. Raoul was wrong, she thought. She couldn't teach Neal what he needed to know, not here. He needed a true healer, or a priest.

Or maybe no one could teach him.

"Good question," she said. "Next question?"

Neal kept his eyes low, and spoke no more.

-

"It's nice enough, I suppose," Neal said.

"Don't let my father hear you say that," Roald warned him.

"Why ever not?" Neal asked. "I said it was nice."

"And that's exactly what he was hoping for. All the money and time spent, and the arrangements made to get the Grand Progress off the ground, he was really hoping that people would think it was 'nice'."

"I should think the king wouldn't even concern himself with the opinions of so lowly a person as myself," Neal said. "It's not like he's one of these sensitive types, always concerned with what people think of him."

Alanna snorted so loudly they could hear her two horse's length ahead, riding next to Harailt of Aili.

"Do you have something to share, oh wisest of lady knights?" Neal asked, as he and Roald nudged their steeds forward.

"You've lived at court your whole life," Alanna said. "If you haven't heard any of the good stories about Jonathan yet, that's your fault. I don't see why I need to enlighten you."

"'The true measure of a knight is his generosity'," Neal quoted. "Of course, Garett of Meron was a reactionary who probably intended his comments about knights only to refer to the male sex, but as he used a neutral term the reader has the option of interpreting it for his, or her, self -- "

"If you talk in the next hour, you will regret it," Alanna warned him.

Neal drummed his fingers on pommel of his saddle, until his horse twitched the muscles in her neck in irritation.

"Master Harailt, surely you must have an opinion on Meron," Neal said.

"How long was that, thirty seconds?" Roald asked. "You'd think he could last at least a minute."

"I think no such thing," Alanna said darkly. "Thirty seconds might be his best yet."

"I think the wisest course of action," Harailt told Neal, "is for me to stay out of this particular debate."

"But surely an academic of your standing must always be willing to speak the truth and stand by his convictions," Neal argued.

"An academic should devote his time to proper study," Harailt countered. "Not gossip."

"But only think, what is gossip to us is priceless insight into our times that future historians would sell their children to have. Consider Rynn of Amelien, who wrote in The Fall of the Thanic Empire that the letter of a butcher to his client provided him key context to interpret the emperor's last decree. Although Glast of Marmist thought Amelien was too liberal in his reading of --

"Neal," Alanna called to him. "For every historian that you name, you owe me an hour of sword practice. And I will collect on those debts."

"I am being censored," Neal proclaimed loftily. "My ideas threaten the establishment, who thinks that they can silence me."

Alanna glared at him, darkly.

"They think correctly, as it happens," he said, and spurred his horse onwards, though not before Roald laughingly called him a coward.

"You spar with her and see how you like it!" Neal called over his shoulder, and nearly collided with a supply wagon.

-

"I'm glad you're amused," Neal said icily. "Why, it salves my wounded pride to know that my gaffs have cheered such a noble soul as yours."

"If Yamani ladies terrorizing you can teach you to think before they act, your pride can go take a hike for all I care," Alanna told him. "I need to get one of those fans for myself. Then I can throw it at you when you need a reminder to keep your ego in check."

"There are not enough fans in the Yamani Islands to keep my ego in check," Neal grumbled.

Alanna laughed, but let the subject drop. She felt remarkably good-natured today, even toward her squire. The Progress grated on her, but the chance to see the lady squire that morning had cheered her considerably.

As had Neal's theatrical sighing about beautiful women tormenting him. Alanna wouldn't admit as much aloud, even to George, but she was beginning to think there were times when Neal's dramatic airs were as good as a Players' show.

They were inspecting a merchant's wares when Neal spoke again. Alanna had been swinging a heavy broadsword around to test its balance, and had made an appreciative noise.

"Looking for a new sword with which to skewer your enemies, my lady?"

"Not particularly," Alanna told him. "But it's never too early to look for Midwinter gifts."

"Yes, one does wonder what you'll be giving Kel this year."

Alanna shot Neal the dirtiest look she could manage.

Neal just smiled at her. Perhaps she was over using her glares, if he had become so easily inured to them in only -- Goddess bless, it had been nearly a year, hadn't it?

"Oh, I'm sorry, am I supposed to be pretending ignorance?" Neal asked, and clapped a hand to his chest. "Gods all bless, who could possibly be sending the first openly female page in a century all of these gifts? Who could it ever be, who would want her to succeed but couldn't commit openly to aiding her? Someone of taste and wealth, who knows about knight's training, and how women could strengthen themselves to match their male cohort? Who could there ever be that meets all of those criteria? No one comes to mind. Truly, this is the greatest unsolved mystery of our era."

"Are you finished yet?" Alanna demanded.

"For the moment," Neal sighed regretfully. "Though if you begin chucking Yamani fans at me, why, I may find myself inspired to new rhetoric."

Alanna crossed her arms. "You haven't been blabbing, have you?"

"Would I ever? -- Don't answer that."

"I mean, have you told Kel?"

"No," Neal said. "I do believe, as your squire, that I'm honor bound to keep your secrets, aren't I? And how lucky for the pair of us that I have all these years of practice at it."

Alanna ground her teeth. She was feeling foolish, which made her feel annoyed, which made her want to be moving. She set off again, walking through the displays of goods on offer to the nobles and commoners attending the Progress.

"I suppose Kel must know anyway," Alanna said. "If it is as obvious as you insist."

Neal got an odd look on his face. "I wouldn't be so sure," he said, noncommittal.

Of all the things that irritated her about her squire, the fact that he could play politics when he chose to was one of them-- even though he usually chose not to.

"Out with it, squire," Alanna growled at him. "If you keep a thought to yourself, I'll have to assume you've been brainwashed by enemy mages."

Neal looked away so quickly and guiltily that Alanna felt a pang in her heart. She wasn't sure what she was about to hear, but she was sure it was going to be the gods' own truth, not played up for effect.

"Kel thought -- " Neal's voice caught. "This was years ago, when she was still on probation. She told me that she thought that you didn't care about her. Or that maybe you resented her, because you wanted to be the only lady knight. Since you'd never come to see her, or spoken to her."

"Oh," Alanna said.

"I quickly disabused her of the notion," Neal said, regaining some of his usual vigor. "Though in the process I may have rather tarnished her opinion of the king. No more so than he's done himself, of course. So she knows that the reason you've never been to see her because you're not allowed to. But -- she doesn't value herself the way other people would. I think it would never occur to her that, even if you don't not care, you would care enough to sponsor her from a distance for so many years."

There was a lump in Alanna's throat. It was rather difficult to talk through.

"I wanted to see her after the big exams," she said.

"To ask her to be your squire," Neal finished for her. "And who could blame you? She's clearly the superior squire." He cleared his throat before adding, irreverently, "and you would have been good for her too, I suppose."

"Not that," Alanna snapped. "I just wanted to talk to her. To let her know that someone was rooting for her. That someone wanted her to succeed, even if all of the knights who could take her for a squire were too fatheaded to do so."

"Sure," Neal said, not buying a word of it. "I'm sure you never even considered asking her to be your squire. The thought simply never crossed your mind."

"All right, it did," Alanna admitted. "I knew I couldn't, but I still wished I could. And then I thought, well, Baird's foolish son could probably use some looking after, and here we are."

"Here we are," Neal echoed. "And how lucky for me that you thought that."

The lump in Alanna's throat was returning. "Lucky for the pair of us," she said.

Neal looked thunderstruck. She'd seen him surprised or gratified before, but it was always exaggerated, a Player's mask. It was another thing entirely to see him look so honestly pleased with something.

There was only so much of that she could stand. It wouldn't do if he got all mushy on her.

"Come along, Queenscove," she said gruffly, and dragged Neal along to look at the fletcher's stand.