Free The Given Sacrifice by S. M. Stirling Page A

supposed to be a
bribe
, after all. It’s
recognition
, it bestows honor, not just revenues.”
    “True, and with Matilda . . . and Rudi . . . good lordship means a lot. They like
     me personally too, oddly enough, and more understandably they like Delia . . . your
     lady mother.”
    “Ah . . .” Greatly daring, Lioncel cleared his throat. “My lady? Do
you
like the High King?”
    He’d seen them working together, but his liege wasn’t a demonstrative person. He was
     fairly sure that she regarded the High Queen as something like a younger sister, but
     he couldn’t tell with Rudi Mackenzie. The ice-gray eyes considered him, and there
     was a very slight nod of approval.
    “Yes, I do,” she said. “And as you may have learned by now, I’m not given to easy
     likings.”
    He nodded. A couple of hours would be enough to learn
that
, much less a lifetime. It took him an instant more to realize that Tiphaine was making
     a dry joke.
    As if I were a grown man,
he thought with a mixture of pride and, oddly, a faint sadness.
    “More importantly, we . . . respect each other. While he was living up here part-time—”
    That had been part of the peace settlement after the Protector’s War; the Mackenzie
     heir had come north, and Mathilda Arminger had spent time every year in Dun Juniper.
    “—I helped teach him the sword, among other things. You’d be too young to recall most
     of that, and mainly it was at court, not Ath.”
    Lioncel nodded; he had vague memories of visits, no more. Tiphaine’s face went a little
     distant, as if looking into time.
    “He’s really extremely good. Mathilda always tried her hardest and she’s better than
     average. But Rudi . . . he’s a natural, and he soaked up technique like a dry sponge
     does water. The only man I ever sparred with as fast as I was. A bit faster, now;
     he’s at his peak and I’m a little past mine. And even experts usually can’t strike
     full force without losing either speed or precision. I can, but so can Rudi . . .
     and he’s
extremely
strong.”
    Another pause, and Lioncel nodded soberly. He’d had glimpses of the High King fighting
     with his own hands during the tag end of the great battle, the savage scrimmage around
     Martin Thurston’s banner, and it had been . . .
    Frightening
, he decided. Even on that field of wholesale butchery, even if you’d been raised
     among swordmasters.
Like some pagan God of war come to life.
    “Most men remember grudges; Rudi never forgets anyone who does him a good turn,” Tiphaine
     went on. “And he always returns loyalty. That was obvious even when I first met him,
     when he was younger than Diomede is now.”
    Her eyes met his. “You’ll start out with his favor, for my sake and your parents’,
     but to keep it, you’ll have to
earn
it. Never forget that.”
    “I won’t, my lady,” Lioncel said seriously.
    “Good. Because when he has to be, the High King is . . . well, you’ve heard the saying:
Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent?
He won’t spare himself in the kingdom’s service, and he won’t spare
you
, either. Which brings us back to the grant. What’s the
realpolitik
reason? Remember that that usually coincides with good lordship, if you’re thinking
     long-term. The higher your rank, the more careful you have to be about decisions,
     because the easier it is to break things.”
    He resisted an impulse to adjust the collar of his jerkin, suddenly grown a little
     tight.
    “Ah . . . well, that grant, it’s just idle land right now, not settled manors. No
     annual revenues, no knights or sergeants owing service. The Crown will get the Royal
     mesne tithes without having to pay anything upfront if
we
develop and settle it, full tithes since we’re tenants-in-chief. And we’ll have to
     see to the roads and rails and patrols at our own expense, too, which means more trade
     and the dues on that. What did they say in the old days . . . all