#utrs

Part 11

Bowing low from waist, Lyrela let the tent flap fall down. When she realised that Lyel was blearily opening his eyes one at a time, she muffled a laugh and straightened, ringing out her hair. The water pooled at her feet, soaking through Lyel’s carpet. She peeled off her leather vest, dumping it on the ground next to her puddle and strode over to her brother. Had he been awake, he would have made her take her boots off, but he had barely lifted his head off the table, when she slapped a small leather case down in front of him

Lyel mumbled a question at Lyrela, who flicked him on the nose with the case, waking him up properly. “What do you want?” he asked, groggily heaving himself off the desk.

“A letter from your friend,” Lyrela told him as she moved the pieces back into their places on the map. Lyel managed a grateful smile, before he let out a loud yawn. “How long have you been asleep?”

“What time is it?”

“Both of the suns are down.”

“Damn. It’s late.”

“The Old Sun should rise in the next couple of hours, if I’m right.”

“I was awake when the New Sun set.”

Lyel looked down when he spoke, refusing to look into his sister’s eyes as he admitted his guilt. He didn’t want to see her look at him pityingly, like she knew why he was doing this to himself, and then roll her eyes, saying, “go to sleep. Read the message in the morning. I’m sure it’s just a report, nothing especially interesting.” He didn’t want to look into her eyes and let he convince him that she did understand and see the disappointment that flew across her eyes with every lie he told her, as he agreed to sleep and open the letter the next day.

Part 10

As it was, Lyel was drooping over his map, jumping each time his head fell far enough to hit the table. The logical part of his brain said he should sleep: a horse can carry a man with ease, but the man must still be in control and no one could control a horse in their sleep. Except, perhaps, his sister, Lyrela. He hated not bringing her with him, but she would be safer behind enemy lines and he couldn’t send her into battle at the same time as himself – not until he had an heir.

Lyel wasn’t sure how long he slept before she entered his tent, water pouring down her face, as though a bucket had been thrown over her, not raindrops, but his head was resting on the Tesh River, and he’d knocked over a wooden piece, with a scythe and a bird etched on the top – a piece for the Banished Men – into the middle of a field the opposite side of the map from their actual camp.

Part 9

The flaps of Lyel’s tent smacked in the wind, as though they were trying to distract him. The soft auburn carpet was pegged down, so it wouldn’t move, and all of the dark furniture set up as though it had always been in a field of Ocaenygis, instead of unscrewed and lain flat in on of the old wooden war chests that Lyel’s warriors had been lugging around since the start of the civil war. The tent rose up to a slight point in the centre of the roof and Lyel could hear the rain beating against the waxed canvas and running down it, like the water actually had feet to run all over the tent roof with, and had chosen to stop as hard as each droplet could. It was so loud that Lyel half expected the roof to fall in and soak him.

He stared at the map in front of him with blank eyes that only seemed to be able to see the intricate rivers and roads along the Ocaenynis-Home of the Banished border and entirely unable to pick out the wooden pieces he had left in place to mark the position of his men and the Banished Men’s strongholds. He snorted at the thought of the Banished Men patrolling their settlements in this weather. At least his warriors had the good sense to let their dogs do the work for them.