The Youngest Knight

As Chris and Jerry approached, Fredric spoke.

"My son, Jerry, and Timothy, a knight in my service."

At the manor, Chris was going by the alias Timothy. A sullen, middle-aged gaze slid past Jerry and Chris. The man set down his cup.

"It is a dangerous place. May I take it you mean to bring the manor's heir?"

The two of them were not the only ones present. Fredric's eldest, Jim Calmer, sat there as well, and the word heir had just come out of the visitor's mouth—a remark to make everyone in the room uncomfortable. Jim's expression, in particular, turned foul.

Fredric said, "The more dangerous the place, the easier it is to win merit."

Jerry, listening, clenched his fists in excitement.

A place to win merit? Has a territorial war broken out?

He pictured himself cutting an enemy knight down in a single stroke and basking in Count Tren's praise.

Jerry was delighted. Chris felt only dismay.

Something's gone wrong. Ah. This is a problem.

Jerry asked, "Father, what is it?"

"Even I don't know the details."

Fredric grinned, baring his canines. "All I know is that they need our swords."

The combativeness of his youth had come alive in him, and he looked ten years younger. Jerry grinned along with him.

"That's all we need."

"Pack. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠We leave first thing tomorrow."

Chris asked, hoping the answer would be no. "And I...?"

"You're coming, of course."

Damn it.

Chris swore under his breath.

Late that night, Chris practiced drawing attribute mana out of the mana around him. About six-tenths came away bearing an attribute, and of that portion, ten percent scattered before he could hold it.

He peered closely at the wood-attribute mana. He focused, and focused, and focused again, until the grains made themselves felt. Some were large and some small, some sharp and some round, some hard and some soft.

He sorted them by size, then by hardness, and at last by shape, gathering and scattering them again and again by every measure he could think of.

Next he practiced wind-attribute mana. He gathered the wind's mana, converted it into magical power, and manifested it in the world. A wind arrow took shape in the empty air and hung there, drifting.

At a gesture from Chris, the arrow traveled from one wall to the other—sometimes fast, sometimes slow—until its strength ran out and it faded.

When he had first begun, he had thought it best to gather mana of a uniform size. Small grains with small, large with large, pointed with pointed, flat with flat: that was how he had built his arrows. Strangely, an arrow made of grains alike in size and shape proved weaker than one in which they were mixed. Pointed, round, soft, hard—the jumble had the greatest power. The difference seemed to lie in cohesion. Grains that were only round bound poorly and often leaked away in a trickle, while the other shapes clung fast to one another and would not come apart.

With a master, it was the sort of thing a man could learn in a day. Making what one had learned real, of course, was a problem of another order. Even with a master, practice would devour a great deal of time before mana could be handled with any skill and magic brought forth. Still, it would have saved him far more time than beating his head against bare ground, as Chris was doing.

When he grew tired of working the wind, he gathered fire-attribute mana. Between large grains that were pointed and hard, he packed small ones that were flat and soft, raising their cohesion. Into the spaces that still would not fill, he set wood-attribute mana. Wood fed fire, and the power grew stronger for it. That, too, was something he would have known at once if he had had a master.

He arranged the grains according to their use, bound them, compressed them, planted a direction in them, converted them to magical power, and lit them.

He did not know a proper incantation, so he called it whatever he liked. Even then, he did not forget one thing: he had to pour his will into the words.

The ball of fire that sprang up before him swelled. When the heat in the room climbed at a furious pace, Chris snuffed it out and called on water-attribute mana to bring the temperature down.

After working through all six of the great manas, he finished by training Iron Body. That training always ended with mana entering the pit of his stomach. There was clearly something in the stages beyond, but Chris did not know it. Tom claimed he had taught him the whole of Iron Body. Chris did not believe him.

When the training ended, it was past four in the morning. He slept about four hours, rose, ate, and packed. He owned little, so it was quickly done.

At the lord's hall he found Jerry. A change of day had not burned off yesterday's excitement; his face was still flushed. He looked as though he had been too worked up to sleep.

"You're late. How about a bout this morning?"

"The count has summoned us. It would be awkward if one of us were hurt, wouldn't it?"

"Fair enough."

Two hours later, a company of soldiers departed Calmer Manor. Chris climbed onto a baggage wagon and glanced back at the manor as it receded.

If it gets dangerous, I'll slip away.

He did not think he would be coming back.

Count Tren, whom Baron Calmer served as his liege, was one of the five most powerful lords in the Albar Kingdom. His domain was so vast that five days of travel still did not bring the count's hall into view.

Broader than a fair-sized duchy.

Chris envied the count.

How fine it would be to hold a domain like this.

No. Even a domain an eighth that size would be splendid. If I distinguish myself in a territorial war, could I be granted land?

Not for any ordinary merit.

On the sixth day they came to a village of single-story buildings huddled together. Beyond it a castle rose with oppressive grandeur: Oltrin Castle, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠seat of Count Tren's house. The first count, they said, had been named Oltrin, a meritorious retainer of the Albar Kingdom's founding.

Calmer Manor's force passed through the village toward the castle. The place had grown up from the poor pushed out of Oltrin, and from those who had gathered out of every quarter looking for work, and the road was wretched—filth and mud churned together, thoroughly foul. The children, even so, were bright. The slum children cried that a knight had appeared and trailed after the column, singing as they followed the wagons.

Chris went to the company cook, paid him, and bought a heap of bread—plain loaves, with no cream or cheese or meat inside. Even so, it was bread the slum children had likely never tasted in their lives. In his own years as a slave, Chris had never once eaten bread like it either.

"Line up!"

He planted himself in front of the children and shouted. They came swarming in. No line formed. Hands simply thrust out, grabbing at whatever they could reach.

Chris seized one of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠them and flung him high into the air.

"If you don't line up, you'll be sorry!"

"Aaaah!"

The child sailing through the sky screamed, and the rest flinched in fear. Chris caught him as he fell. The boy staggered and collapsed in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a heap. It was a wonder he had not wet himself.

"Line up!"

This time they did. Chris broke the loaves in half and handed the pieces out.

"Hoard it and it turns to shit. Some bigger boy from the neighborhood might take it off you, so eat it here."

He said it while pointing at the hulking youths loitering nearby. The children took the warning and began wolfing the bread down on the spot. It vanished in an instant.

"Go home."

They scattered, laughing. Chris beckoned the big boys prowling the edges of the crowd.

They approached warily, watching his face. He gave each of them a coin.

"Don't bully the little ones."

A boy missing his front teeth, which left him looking vacant, grinned.

"Sir Knight, we don't bully them."

Beside him, a boy whose teeth had rotted black added, "We're not bad people."

Chris smiled. "Sure you aren't."

The boys smiled with him.

"What's the count like?"

"For a noble, he's a good man."

"He's all right, in his way."

"I hear he's a Sword Master."

From the street talk, he seemed at least not to be a man like Alex.

The gap-toothed boy asked, "Is a territorial war breaking out?"

"What makes you think that?"

"A lot of soldiers have come."

"How many?"

The gap-toothed boy counted on his fingers, then grinned foolishly. An unschooled boy from the slums could hardly be expected to count properly.

"How many groups like ours have passed through?"

"More than ten heaps. Not as many as a hundred."

That put the number somewhere between three hundred and three thousand. Chris guessed roughly fifteen hundred. He gave the boys who had answered him two more coins apiece and took his leave.

As they climbed toward the castle gate, he saw forces waiting to enter: the men of Calmer Manor and of Rohan Manor. The mood was anything but ordinary. The two groups were quarreling over who would go in first.

Over nothing at all.

Chris could not see the sense in fighting for the privilege of entering first. He went to Aaron, the senior knight, and suggested they might yield—and received a stern lecture for it. Baron Calmer and Baron Rohan, he was told, had been rivals and on bad terms ever since their days serving as knights under Count Tren.

A contest of pride between rivals.

Caught between them, the gate captain was in a bind. While the argument grew steadily fiercer, time passed, and a third group appeared.

When Viscount Cashew arrived, the barons' men split apart and opened a path. From the look of it, the viscount stood higher than either baron. Chris asked Aaron and learned that House Cashew was hereditary nobility, and held land of its own.

That was a different order from the manors of nobles whose titles died with them. Where each of the two manors fielded a little over thirty soldiers, Cashew's force numbered more than two hundred.

"What are you doing?" Viscount Cashew asked. He was all smiles, as if he already had a fair idea.

So Calmer Manor and Rohan Manor get along badly enough that other nobles know it.

The gate captain, who had been stuck uncomfortably between the two parties, came scurrying over and poured out the story.

"Quarreling over a thing like that."

Cashew scolded them as if they were children. Calmer and Rohan, both older than he was, looked sheepish. They also seemed a little angry.

"I was bored. This is rather well timed."

Well timed? What is he talking about?

Chris studied Cashew's oblong face, long as a cucumber. The viscount's thin lips parted.

"A duel between barons would be going too far. Settle it with a spar. How does that strike you?"

At the suggestion, Calmer's and Rohan's expressions turned grave. The blow to the loser would be serious. This was not a thing to decide as if it were a game.

When the two could not easily make up their minds, Viscount Cashew opened another path.

"From what I hear, both your sons are remarkably skilled. How about having the two of them fight?"

The heirs against each other? This ought to be entertaining.

Chris rubbed his palms together and licked his lips.

Jerry Calmer stepped forward at once. "Gladly."

Baron Rohan's son, Abel Rohan, met him without giving an inch. "Very well."

A match between heirs would not shake things as hard as one between the lords of the manors, but the aftermath would still be no small matter. The loser would lose all face. A spar between the sons might even prove graver in its result than one between the fathers. Many expected that Calmer and Rohan, being old, would retire within five years—which meant that within five years Jerry and Abel would be the new masters of their manors, and the grudge would be handed down through the generations.

Aaron approached Baron Calmer and whispered. Calmer nodded.

"Let's settle it with knights in our service."

Baron Rohan agreed at once. "Let's."

Jerry said, "Father, I'll do it."

Abel said, "Leave it to me. I'll bring back the victory."

They glared at each other like goats meeting on a single-log bridge.

Both barons ignored their sons. Calmer asked, "Whom will you send out?"

"A senior knight would be a bit much... I hear a new knight entered your manor a few years ago?"

At that, the eyes of Calmer Manor's soldiers swung toward Chris. His brow twitched.

Wait. This isn't about to land on me, is it?

A bad feeling never failed to come true.