by David Drake
I was just getting to the clump of houses that were as much of a town as Beune has—there’s a bigger gathering in the south of the node, but it’s not very big—when somebody called “Pal!” behind me. “It’s Pal come back, isn’t it!”
It was Gervaise himself, not his son, and it was a mercy that he hadn’t given himself a heart attack running up from the field after me. My initial reaction was to wince, but I caught myself before I could snarl, “I’m in a hurry, Gervaise, and I don’t have time to socialize!”
I did have time to socialize. I had all the time I wanted to take. Yes, I needed to report to Jon about what’d happened on Christabel, but a few hours’ delay wasn’t going to matter so you’d notice.
“Hi, Gervaise!” I called back. “I’m here to find a dog, but I hope you’ll let me use a corner of my old barn and some blankets tonight—and that Phoebe will feed me one of her great meals.”
Gervaise started to clasp me like the old friend he was, then drew back in horror as he realized that I was the great Lord Pal. God alone knows the sort of stories about me that must be going around Beune now.
Some of the stories might even be true, but I hugged Gervaise and said, “Tell Phoebe to set another place for dinner. I’ll be down when I’ve finished my business with Demetri.”
It was early evening before I showed up at Gervaise’s place with my new dog, Sam. I’d taken him out on the Road, then into the Waste at the place I’d generally gone prospecting for artifacts when I lived in Beune.
I’d searched till I found something—a walnut-sized scrap that’d probably turn out to be nothing when I took the time to really study it. Most of the Ancient artifacts were no more than the old bone buttons you turn up when you’re plowing.
The Ancients had powers beyond those we can even imagine—but they had buttons too. After tens of thousands of years travelling in the currents of the Waste, even complicated artifacts can get ground to the level of buttons.
The kids were lined up on both sides of the path in order by age. They were bigger than I remembered from a year ago when I was here last. The eight-year-old girl—her name might be Cassie, but I don’t swear to it—grabbed my left hand in both of hers and said, “Pal, do we have to call you ‘Lord Pal’ now, like Mommie says?”
I squeezed her hands between mine, and said, “Not for me, dear. But you should do whatever your mommie says.”
Gervaise and Phoebe came out onto the porch. He looked glum; she glared at him in cold fury and said, “Lord Pal, I’ve never been more humiliated in my life! Gervaise didn’t tell me but three hours ago that you were coming to dinner, and then he didn’t know just when you’d be here! There wasn’t time for anything but a curry with the cold beef from Sunday!”
I hopped onto the porch, embraced her, and said, “Phoebe, I’ve never had anything in Dun Add as good as your curries! And Gervaise wasn’t a prophet when I left here, so I don’t know why he’d have predicted I’d be coming here today. I sure didn’t know it before he ran up to me.”
It was a wonderful dinner. What I’d said about Phoebe’s curries was the truth—the truth for me; Master Fritz might’ve curled his lip, but he wasn’t eating it.
We were at the big table that’d come from my mom’s family, pulled out with extra leaves so there was plenty of room for me with the whole family—except the two girls serving. Gervaise and I both drank more than maybe we ought to’ve, but it seemed the best way to show Phoebe that I wasn’t offended—and to remind all of them that I was their neighbor Pal, not some exalted person from Dun Add.
I hadn’t drunk too much to make sure that I got to the barn instead of being put in the couple’s own bed. The kids carried the bedding, though, and Phoebe herself made the bed up.
Gervaise carried the lamp, an Ancient artifact that Master Guntram had given Phoebe when he first visited Beune, looking for me. It’s a toss-up whether Phoebe values the lamp or the long table higher. It’s for sure than she’d rather give up anything but her children than lose either one of them.
I slept later in the morning than I’d planned before the drinking started the night before, but I still got up and got going despite anything Gervaise and Phoebe could say. I was glad I’d been raised on Beune, but I was glad I’d gotten away also. Beune was a wonderful place to grow up, but it wasn’t my home anymore.
Neither was Dun Add, but it was the place I’d stay in between Jon deciding where he wanted a Champion to go. My home was the Commonwealth of Mankind.
Sam and I got to know each other on the way back to Dun Add. His mother was one of Buck’s littermates. He was eighteen months old, not a puppy but still pretty young. He probably had more hound in him than Buck did, but when he was dry you saw the long fluffy hair instead of the rangy lines. Sam was mostly brown with some black, and his paws were white.
Sam had slept at my feet the night in Beune. On the Road he was active and alert, and he caught little oddities in the look of the Road and the Waste as well as Denison Lad had. The changes aren’t really optical, so until you’ve gone somewhere with a dog you don’t know how he’s going to present them.
I would send a messenger to Beune to pick up Lad and bring him back to Dun Add. He’d be a wonderful dog for most any warrior. I’ve realized, though, that my value to the Commonwealth wasn’t in how well I fought.
Oh, sure: I could fight and Lord Clain could fight a whole lot better; and the Leader himself was a fine warrior. But I was somebody Jon could send out when he needed something unexpected dealt with—fixed. Clain as Chancellor was more valuable than Clain as a Champion—or even two Champions, because he was about that good.
And without the Leader, there wasn’t a Commonwealth.
Sam was curious and smart and happy to go anywhere I did. He was my dog until something happened to one or the other of us. It’s the sort of job where things happen, of course.
The messenger I was sending to pick up Lad would be bringing a gift for Phoebe. Half her questions during dinner had been about what the women were wearing in Dun Add.
All the Consort’s ladies in waiting had feminine accomplishments—including sewing. A dress—or a selection of them; I could afford to send a whole pack train—would be coming to Phoebe. I’d have to guess at her size, but Phoebe herself could let out or take in fabric if I told the dressmakers to allow for that.
I hadn’t dreamed of offering pay for my meal, but in Beune nobody lives off his neighbor’s work without giving something back. When I was a kid, that’d mostly been help in haying or the little errands a kid could do. Now I could do things for my neighbors that nobody else in Beune could—so I would.
I was ten days getting from Beune to Dun Add. My first journey had taken nearly thirty, partly because I’d had to ask directions which, especially before I got farther in toward the center of the Commonwealth, hadn’t always been very good.
Mostly, though, I’d been travelling with others at their speed. A lone traveller was at risk, but I’d wanted company more than I did protection against real dangers.
I had a better appreciation of the real dangers now. Monsters living in the Waste could take me at any time, but they were rare everywhere, even on the shifting border between Here and Not-Here. A Spider like the one I’d met at Castle Ariel could snatch me up for its larder, unseen except for the clawed feet which reached out of nowhere to paralyze me. A Shade could leap from behind as I walked the Road, leaving only my shrunken skin for a later traveller to find.
Even so, it would need to get home with its first stroke or I’d cut it to collops. Monsters do exist—but so do Champions.
Regardless, nothing worse happened to me on the journey home than an innkeeper trying to cheat me. I considered options—and hiked three more hours to the next node, where I found lodging in a smith’s toolshed. Other choices might have led to somebody, maybe a lot of people, dying. I didn’t want to kill anybody over an ove
rcharge of about sixty Dun Add coppers.
I arrived in Dun Add about the middle of the afternoon, not long after a rainshower.
The first thing I did in Dun Add was to walk Sam up to the stables. I wasn’t sure how he’d react to the scent and sound of so many dogs in the same place, but he stayed calm though alert. I told the ostler that I hoped to take Sam out for a run in the morning, but that until I reported to the Leader, I couldn’t guess at how long a stay it would be.
I thumped Sam in the ribs, told him I’d be back as soon as I could, and went over to the Chancellor’s suite. The receptionist—the same fellow I’d met most recently—passed me back to the Clerk of Here, but she didn’t have any news either. I told her about Gram and Christabel.
I started back, feeling more than a little downhearted, when Lord Clain called, “Pal? Come in to my office if you would.”
That was polite; but when the Chancellor politely requests, the only proper answer is, “Yes sir!”
Lord Morseth is physically large—taller and at least as bulky as Clain—but Lord Clain filled the office with his presence in a way that Morseth had not. Clain nodded to the armchair on my side of the desk and took the straight chair on his.
“I have something to report from my patrol, sir,” I said. “Lizardmen invaded Christabel through a well there and were expanding their slaving operations to Gram. I think they were using a device that permitted them to keep to a straight line while marching through the Waste. I suggest that you send out a thirty-man garrison and also one of Master Louis’s top Makers to gather up the hardware the lizards left behind and bring it to Dun Add for proper examination.”
I shrugged and explained, “I couldn’t spend more than a moment there after I, well, dealt with the immediate problem.”
Clain had taken out a notebook when I started speaking. He jotted brief notes—signs, not even complete words as far as I could tell. He looked at me and said, “Do you know anything more about these lizardmen?”
“Nothing, sir,” I said. “Nor did Mistress Toledana. And I told people on Christabel and Gram that they could expect administrators and tax assessors in addition to the troops who’d be protecting them.”
Clain made more notes. “Yes, they certainly can,” he muttered.
Then he looked at me again and said, “I gather you’re responsible for me being recalled from my estates, Lord Pal.”
“Ah,” I said. I didn’t hear any emotion in Clain’s voice. “I wouldn’t say that, sir,” I said.
“That was how the Leader put it to me,” Clain said. “I think I’ll accept Jon’s opinion on the question.”
I swallowed. “Yes sir,” I said. I hadn’t been asked a question, and I was damned if I was going to volunteer an opinion if I didn’t have to.
“You did the Leader a considerable favor when you acted as Lady Jolene’s champion during her trial,” Clain said with the same massive lack of emotion. “I’m sure he would grant any request you put to him, Pal. And so would Jon’s friends; one of whom I am. Is there anything you would like to ask for?”
“No sir,” I said, lowering my eyes. “All I want is to help the Commonwealth in whatever fashion the Leader—and you, sir, as Chancellor—want to use me.”
Clain looked at me and through me. “When I was your age,” he said, “life was very simple. It seemed hard, though. How do you do it, Pal? Just doing the right thing naturally? I haven’t noticed that you spend a lot of time in chapel.”
“No sir, I don’t,” I said. This wasn’t stuff I liked to talk about, and Lord Clain was in a funny mood. “I just, well, try to do the right thing the way my mom taught me. It isn’t, well, magic.”
“What if there’s something you really want to do, Pal?” Clain said, leaning toward me. “And you aren’t sure that it’s right.”
I smiled at that. “Sir,” I said, “if I’m not sure, then I know it bloody well isn’t right. Because I know how hard my mind works to fool me when it’s something I really want. And if it can only get me to ‘maybe,’ then it’s flat wrong.”
Clain’s expression didn’t change. “What if she really wants it too?” he said softly.
I swallowed. “Sir,” I said. “What she wants is her business. But it doesn’t have anything to do with my business.”
I cleared my throat and said, “Sir? The Aspirants’ Tournament was held a few days ago, wasn’t it? Do you happen to know how Lord Osbourn did? And also his roommate, Master Andreas?”
Clain straightened, nodding firmly as if trying to shake the previous subject out of his head. “Andreas did pretty well,” he said, “given his equipment. Won two, lost two. He’ll be bloody lucky to do any better with the shield he’s got, though.”
I took a deep breath. I was pretty sure of the answer to the rest of it, but I had to ask. In a steady voice I said, “And Lord Osbourn, sir?”
“Osbourn didn’t make minimum level on the machines,” Clain said. “He may have watched the tournament from the sidelines, but I’m not sure he bothered.”
Clain shrugged. “Look, Pal,” he said. “The best advice you could give Osbourn now is to go home. He can come back when he’s ready to work. I don’t care how good you are, if you spend all your time drinking and on your back—or on a girl—you’re not going to make a Champion. There’s too many people here sweating blood to get in.”
“Well…” I said as I got to my feet. “Thank you, though that’s not what I hoped to hear. I’ll be back tomorrow to see what Jon wants with me.”
I needed to get home. But first, I needed to examine the training machines.
I got to my house on South Street before dark, but I was later than I’d meant to be. I hadn’t sent a messenger to say that I was back on Dun Add, but Dom bowed when he opened the door for me and said, “Good evening, sir. Her ladyship has ordered dinner laid on the third floor and is waiting there.
I hadn’t known what to expect, but it wasn’t this. “I’ll go up to her,” I said. I skipped up the stairs, wishing that my gut liked the situation better than it did.
The table had been set in the big room on the third floor, normal when we were entertaining. I saw Master Fritz standing behind a serving table on which food kept warm in chafing dishes over small oil lamps. Elise was with him, and May stood behind the place set at the far end of the table.
The surprise was that the table was at its full twelve-foot length, and the places were laid at opposite ends. My gut had been right to flutter.
“Hi, love,” I said cheerfully; I hoped cheerfully. “I wasn’t expecting a full dinner tonight.”
“Friends in the palace informed me that you were back,” May said. She was wearing a gray gown with lace on it like patches of mist. Her voice was as soft and as cold as the northern lights. “I thought you might be coming here tonight, so I made ready to receive you whenever you chose to arrive. It’s my duty as your companion, after all.”
“Look, I don’t need you hanging around for whenever I show up,” I said. “I mean, I appreciate it, but I don’t need coddling.”
“When would you like to be served, sir?” Master Fritz said.
“Well, right now, I suppose,” I said. I pulled out my chair and sat. I wanted to leave the house and come back in another life, but I’d get through this.
Fritz cut me roast beef—on the rare side, which is how I like it—so thin that I swear I could’ve read through the slices. Elise then began placing greens on the plate—vegetable marrows, I’d learned to call them.
“How did your trip to Nightmount go?” I asked May. I didn’t actually know, but I knew that if there’d been a real problem, Clain would have said something when I saw him.
“Well enough, I suppose,” May said. She’d allowed Dom to serve her, but she hadn’t started eating. “Morseth and Reaves appeared satisfied with their part of the business. And certainly the Duke and his courtiers could scarcely have been more attentive to Jolene and myself
.”
I knew that was supposed to make me jealous, but it was a polite answer to the question which I’d asked. I folded another square of roast beef and chewed it stolidly.
“I suppose you know that you got what you wanted while we were gone,” May continued. “Lord Osbourn was eliminated from the tournament. Because he had no one to help him get a better weapon.”
I swallowed carefully, because my throat was so dry. I could choke myself if I wasn’t careful. Looking up I said, “I didn’t want that to happen. And Lord Osbourn didn’t need my help in buying a better weapon, though I’d have willingly helped him if he’d allowed it.”
“I suppose it didn’t occur to you that a gentleman might be embarrassed to ask for a loan of money?” May said in a nasty, sneering tone.
I put down my knife and fork. The chair skidded behind me, but I didn’t knock it over. “Osbourn has five thousand Dragons,” I said in a voice that crumbled in my throat. “A top weapon would cost him fifteen hundred, and a decent one could be had for five hundred. If he’d bloody practice, five hundred would be enough!”
“I suppose it’s no surprise that you don’t value family ties the way we do,” May said. “Seeing that you don’t have family yourself!”
Get out of my bloody house!
But I didn’t say that, didn’t say anything for a moment.
I thought, I’m not going to let her chase me out of my own house! It’s not right!
But then it all ran out of me. Not the anger, but the determination, the unwillingness to accept an insult. A completely unfair insult.
I’d chosen to walk three hours rather than to kill a grasping innkeeper. A lot more was at risk now than I’d been facing then.
“I’m going to stay at the palace tonight,” I said as I left the room.
I got to the front door before Dom did and let myself out. I didn’t look back.
CHAPTER 12
A Puzzle That Doesn’t Involve Human Relationships