Brown - Daughter of Independence

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Once again, thanks to those who fill the breach and strengthen the walls without word of complaint: partner and always first reader Alison Tokley, wise and intuitive editors Cate Paterson, Brianne Tunnicliffe and Julia Stiles. And thanks as well to those who first cross no-mans-land on my behalf, my agents Tara Wynne and Russell Galen.

Also by Simon Brown

The Chronicles of Kydan
Book 1: Born of Empire
Book 2: Rivals Son

About Simon Brown

Simon Brown has been writing for over thirty years. His novels and stories have been published in Australia, the US, Russia, Poland, Japan and the UK. He lives on the New South Wales south coast with his wife Alison and children Edlyn and Fynn.

About Daughter of Independence: The Chronicles of Kydan 3

A first-class trilogy. The Chronicles of Kydan has all the traditional fantasy ingredients expertly mixed with new ideas. GARTH NIX

In the new land, everyone works together to bring Kydan the wealth and strength it needs to survive the inevitable confrontation with the old world. Strategos Galys Valera believes the key to defeating the Hamilayan Empire is buried in the papers left behind by her dead lover, Kitayra Albyn... but can it be found in time?

Across the Deepening Sea, Empress Lerena Kevleren is forging her power base made from human sacrifice and her overwhelming control of the Sefid, the source of all magic, before turning her gaze on Kydan.

This final confrontation between old and new, magic and freedom, and between empire and a growing nation state, will determine the fate of millions - not least the brave band of colonists who set out from Hamilay to settle Kydan with courage and hope in their hearts.

T heyll be out of work soon, Warden Kadburn Axkevleren said to no one in particular.

Strategos Galys Valera followed his gaze and looked down on Karhay, the northernmost of the three delta islands that made up the city of Kydan. From their vantage point in the Citadel they could see Hamilayan colonists building cottages, laying down bluestone for a road, and finishing a stoutly built wall that surrounded two-thirds of the island. Land that only a year ago had been reserved for grazing cattle and sheep was now a new settlement, an extension of the original Kydan that would shelter and protect all the colonists from Hamilay.

No, Galys told herself. Not colonists. Not any more. We are all Kydans now. Our citizenship has been paid for with blood. We have twice defended this city from attack and earned the right to call it our home.

And Kadburn was right. The newcomers were almost finished with building homes and streets and drains. What to do with them next? Some had already gone on to other occupations, mainly farming the new fields established on the north shore of the Frey River, but the majority had no trade to move into, no business to take up or resume. At least, not yet.

Unless somethings done, Kadburn said, well have several hundred jobless workers on our hands. I wish I knew what Maddyn had planned to do with them all.

Galys said nothing. She did not know for sure what the late Prince Maddyn Kevleren had planned for the colonists he had led to the New Land, for he had died untimely and had not confided in anyone, not even Kadburn who had been his closest companion, his Beloved. But she could make some guesses from the tradespeople he had enlisted for the expedition as to what industries he had intended to establish. Furthermore, she was not without ideas of her own, ideas she did not want to discuss with anyone before she had raised them with Kydans prefect, Poloma Malvara, since they would affect all Kydans, not just the recent arrivals from Hamilay.

She looked from Karhay to Herris, the middle island and the one the Citadel dominated from the high ground in the east. Here, too, was bustling activity. Farmers worked their plots in the Saddle beneath the Long Bridge, ploughing the soil and redigging irrigation channels. On the main street south of the Saddle were dozens of stalls, with weavers and potters and bakers and metalsmiths all calling out for attention and hawking their wares to passers-by. The street was filled with carters wheeling goods and supplies to stalls and private houses. The Kydans themselves dressed in bright colours, and from the heights of the Citadel reminded Galys of a flock of exotic birds. The new settlers from Hamilay mostly still dressed in their old plain woollen breeches and tunics, making them look mundane and ordinary compared to the citys original inhabitants.

Galys did not let her gaze settle, though, and moved on to the third and most southerly of the delta islands. Kayned had never been properly settled by the Kydans: it was hard, uneven ground, covered in heavy scrub for most of its length and mangrove swamp at its western end. It was visited only by those brave enough to risk crocodile and sea snake to set traps for crayfish and prawns, or to cast nets for the small fish that darted in between weedy banks or the slimy roots of the mangroves. But as far as Galys was concerned, the fact that Kayned was uninhabited and uncultivated was a point in its favour, for if Poloma agreed to back her ideas for the citys future it would become the centre of an entirely new industry, one never seen before in the New Land.

She was distracted by the sound of steel clashing against steel in the Citadels courtyard below, and glanced down to see one of the militia companies training with swords. Native and newcomer together, working side by side for the common good. They seemed proud to be wearing the new uniform in the old-world style, with the gold from the old Hamilayan uniform mixed with the vibrant red that so many Kydans used in their own clothing.

And they were busy working side by side elsewhere, Galys knew. The military engineers that Maddyn had brought with him from Hamilay were diversifying, becoming civil engineers in charge of projects building roads and new irrigation channels, supervising construction teams of old and new Kydans.

The city does have a future, she said.

Oh, aye, Kadburn agreed automatically. They work together well, native and colonist.

We are a people now, Ensign Lannel Thorey said with absolute sincerity, his accent making the Hamilayan words sound strangely singsong. Not native and colonist no more.

Kadburn looked askance at the ensign, but Galys noticed that Lannel did not seem to notice, or ignored the slight entirely. She understood Kadburns suspicion, but she herself no longer had any doubt about the mans loyalty to the cause of a unified Kydan, not after fighting by his side to save the city. Kadburn might never forget that Lannel had once killed one of the colonists and subsequently tried to murder Poloma Malvara, but that had happened when the city was divided between itself. The magnanimity shown Lannel by the colonists after his arrest, partly because Lannel had not intended to kill his victim, had gone a long way to healing the breach and allowing Kydan successfully to defend itself against Numoya Kevleren and his invading army.

Galys looked meaningfully at Kadburn; the Beloved took the hint and nodded stiffly. You are right. Ensign, he said. We are one people now. And not native and colonist any more.

Yes, that is what I say, Lannel said, his expression slightly puzzled as if he did not understand why Kadburn felt the need to repeat what had already been stated.

*

Arden carried a yoke in each hand, and at the end of each yoke was a full water bucket. Other water carriers moving up and down the newly completed road to the river, each burdened with a single yoke across their shoulders, enviously glanced sideways at him, wishing his strength was theirs. He did not seem to notice them, however; his brow was furrowed and his gaze directed to the ground in front of him. When he reached his destination he stood as solid as a statue while the buckets were lifted off the yokes and their water carefully poured into wide-mouthed cement barrels, each laboriously turned by a gang of five. Other workers were taking ready cement and adding it to the framework for storehouses and a new mill in preparation for the first harvest of wheat already planted on the north shore of the Frey. When the four water buckets were empty they were hung again from the yoke, and Arden turned to head back down to the river.