A Heroine of the World by Tanith Lee

Author:Tanith Lee [Lee, Tanith]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: DAW
Published: 2022-01-04T00:00:00+00:00

4

No cannon did we hear at Gurz. Not one stray enemy soldier marauded in our woods and pastures that early summer, though Kahrulan’s letter, (the eighth), came with black uniforms. They would say nothing of any import, nor did his letter say anything. It was playful. He did now reproach me. Either your tender words to me are war torn, or stolen, to be browsed by some other lonely man, or you are a heartless nymph mured up in your stream or bush, and kindly only to it, nor able to write. It was a fact, I had not written.

The estate was self-sufficient. The work went on about fields and orchards already showing their fruits, the lavish vineyards and groves. The Lake swarmed with fish. They said it was a kindness to catch some, giving others a chance to live.

Now and then, infrequently, travelers brought news. Some peasant families fleeing in our direction from the war zone, some horse thieves who had done badly in the vicinity of the guns. Once a carriage of ladies and gentlemen who were hastening to Krase from the other end of the land, to have a part in the “glory of the siege,” as onlookers.

The white lilac guarding Vulmardra’s temple had come and gone, when one tenth of the Charvish and Allied army sat down before Krase Holn.

They got up again on Yellow Rose Eve—uncelebrated in the Sazrath—midsummer.

For my part, there might have been no siege, no war.

It was to be called the Treaty of Three. The Eastern Potentality, the Charvro Alliance—now including that country which had been my own, swallowed by friend if not by foe—and the Empire of Saz-Kronia. It was signed simultaneously at the hour of three o’clock in the morning, at Sablic Baslia on the Eastern borders, Zoli on the southern, and within the palace of the Kronian capital.

The Emperor’s advisers had been vociferous, the subject princes and monarchs of his dominions equally so. Even those who had clamored for war were declaring that, in order to gain an ultimate victory, there must be truce and respite now.

A month after the Charve cannon were wheeled into Krase behind donkeys, each wreathed in flowers, after the kissing and drinking in the streets, the fraternizing and vows of kinship, Kahrulan sent a ninth letter. It gave me these details lightly. He had been at Baslia, and would have a narrative for me, if I liked historical frivolities. Had he not told me all would be well?

Out here in the world we are all in love. Charves with Kronians, Kronians with Charves. How can it be we ever fought with such adorable neighbors? We feast them in all our capitals and carve up the East for their lunch.

His language was unguarded. It came to me, his position had altered, he was in some form of power.

From ill-understood books I had once read, I began to consider intrigues of all sorts. Secret alliances and unpublished treaties. It was all conjecture. But he had known how the scenario of the drama would proceed.

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