Free The Seer King: Book One of the Seer King Trilogy by Chris Bunch Page A

grandness of somehow leading a forlorn hope, coming to the notice of a general and being promoted on the battlefield. But truthfully I knew my most likely fate would be to end my days as a hard-bitten sergeant, such as I met from time to time in the villages. Still more likely was that I’d be taken by Isa on the battlefield in blood, or in barracks from one of the diseases all armies carry along with sutlers and whores.
    In theory, I should have been able to apply for one or another of the lycees that produce officers, since our family is more than noble enough to qualify. But the old proverb applies, and my family, and in fact the entire district of Cimabue, was far out of sight and mind of the powerful ones who ruled the army from Nicias.
    I didn’t care. I suppose this must be counted another of my failings, that I’ve never been one to think highly of someone merely because the Wheel’s turnings makes him the son, or her the daughter, of a grand family. In fact, in spite of my former titles, and my marriage, being around such people makes me a bit nervous, although I’ve learned to disguise it.
    I’m far more comfortable in a barracks, tenting, on the hunting field, or in a common tavern and with the people of those places than in a palace with the grand.
    So the thought of being one more spearman or archer didn’t disturb or shame me, although I thought I could prove myself a good enough horseman to be allowed into the cavalry.
    But once again luck intervened.
    My father may not have had a priest, but someone did owe him a favor, a retired domina named Roshanara, who’d been my father’s regimental commander at Tiepolo. I do not know what deeds my father did that day — he would never tell tales of his exploits — but evidently they were memorable.
    One day, not many months before I was to take the colors, a messenger arrived at the estate. He carried an elaborate scroll that, once its wax seals had been broken and we scanned it, offered me an appointment at the Lycee of the Horse Soldier, just outside Nicias.
    This is considered the most elite of the various service schools, attended only by the sons of the noble rich and descendants of particularly well-connected and high-ranking officers.
    None of us had any idea how this could’ve come to pass. My father said at one time there were five cadet postings made available by lot to all applicants, but since I’d sent no letters to the lycee that was an impossibility.
    The explanation, of course, was Domina Roshanara, and his letter came in the next post. He said he’d not only named me for consideration to the lycee since he had no children of his own nor friends’ children he took seriously enough to propose, but he’d also set aside a sum sufficient to see me until graduation. I could see my father’s mustaches begin to bristle, but he read on, through Domina Roshanara’s rather weak explanation that he’d heard the harvests had been exceedingly bad in Cimabue, and this was to be looked at not as charity, but as one way to make the army they both so loved stronger.
    My father looked very unconvinced, and was, I thought, about to explode and growl something about that would be the last damned time he saved any damned superior’s sweetbreads, when my mother took him into another room. I know not what she said, but when they came back my attendance at the Lycee of the Horse Soldier was settled.
    The school would commence after the Time of Dews, when soldiers would return from the field, campaigning during the ensuing Time of Births and Time of Heat not being common practice. That was not long distant, and I would need considerable time for travel, since Nicias is far from Cimabue. I spent the short time left with my father, learning all the details of lycees he could remember. Even though he’d not been able to attend such a lycee, but had gone through a training college in our own state, he’d heard many many tales from officers who had, and, he added