The Serpent

by David Drake

  “I don’t care if you tell him anything you please,” she said. “I saw him kill that giant. Is that the way he usually behaves?”

  “I think he’d do pretty much the same any time a giant attacks,” I said, “but I’ve only seen the once. But you want to know if he’s brave. He is. That’s pretty much of a given for anybody in Jon’s Hall of Champions. You get knocked around a lot getting there, and to get up in the morning knowing that’s going to happen takes something more than just courage, let alone skill.”

  “You see…” Marlene said. I thought she was blushing. “Irene didn’t know anything about Lord Osbourn’s background but she said you would. And that you wouldn’t lie to me.”

  “I wouldn’t lie to pretty much anybody,” I said. “What do you want to know?”

  “Lord Pal,” she said, “is Lord Osbourn married?”

  I frowned at her. I wasn’t sure what she was going to ask, but it sure wasn’t that. “No, ma’am,” I said. “Who’s been saying he is? They can take it up with me. From anything I’ve seen, he doesn’t even have a regular girlfriend.”

  “Nobody said that,” the girl said. “I was just wondering. And he really is noble? He’s not just putting on a show of being Lord Osbourn?”

  “Ah,” I said. I finally understood what this was about. I was the phony, not Osbourn.

  “Lord Osbourn’s grandfather is the Count of Madringor,” I said, “and he dotes on the boy. As a matter of fact, that was the problem when Osbourn came to Dun Add. He had money but no more sense than most sixteen-year-olds and he got in with a bad crowd. The fellow who was supposed to be looking after him wasn’t doing his job.”

  That was me. I hadn’t volunteered to mentor the kid, but I hadn’t put my foot down when May told me I had to do it. If I’d refused, May would probably have dumped me—it was really important to her.

  So instead, I’d done a half-assed job and told myself it wasn’t my fault when he got off the Road. That he got straightened out was luck and the help of the Almighty—who I didn’t really believe in—and mostly the kid’s own grit and determination when he finally got set on the right way again.

  I helped set him right. Better late than never.

  “A bad crowd?” Marlene said.

  “Drink and gambling mostly,” I said, “though there were women too. I said he was off the Road. But that’s in the past. If I wasn’t sure of that, I wouldn’t have let him come here escorting my friend Guntram the first time, before we thought to try Lady Irene to get you free.”

  The last of the servants were out of the boat. Marlene nodded to me and turned around.

  Osbourn and Lady Irene had made it most of the way back but had stopped again. When Marlene faced toward them they came on the last of the way; she was carrying a dried yarrow stalk which looked to me exactly like the rest of the bundle.

  The two women went together into the boat. Osbourn walked over to join me. “She’s interested in you,” I said before he had a chance to speak.

  “How do you mean?” he said. “Because I’m sure interested in her. She’s the loveliest girl I’ve ever seen in my life. And she’s so nice.”

  “She seemed to be,” I said, though of course we hadn’t had enough time around her to make a real assessment. “She asked if you were married.”

  “Why on earth did she ask that?” Osbourn said.

  “It seemed odd to me also,” I said. “Given that the lady herself is married. But I assured her that you weren’t and that your grandfather was a count and well off, and that you were just as brave as you’d looked when you charged that giant.”

  “Good grief,” Osbourn muttered in a voice close to prayer. Then he said, “I don’t think her marriage to Count Stokes really counts, do you?”

  “My opinion scarcely matters,” I said. “I’m not a priest or a lawyer. I can tell you that Count Stokes thinks they’re married.”

  “Did you see him skulking when the giant came for Marlene?” Osbourn said. “What sort of man does that?”

  “One with better sense than you and I have,” I said, but I felt the same disdain that I heard in Osbourn’s voice. Reasonably a man without the training and equipment Osbourn and I had would have committed suicide if he’d gone up against that giant.

  But love wasn’t reasonable, and as a man I couldn’t see any comparison between Osbourn and Count Stokes. Further, it seemed to me that Marlene felt the same way about it.

  Guntram had gone off with Irene and Osbourn but he came back only now. He walked over to us and said, “Would either of you care to view Master Beddoes’s workroom with me? He said you both were welcome to join me.”

  “Sure,” I said. “The things he’s showed us already certainly left me interested in seeing more. Are we to go right now?”

  “I’m hoping to,” said Guntram “But I came back to check with you first.”

  “Lord Osbourn?”

  “I’ll let the two of you take the tour,” Osbourn said. “I’ll stay back here with the boat, if that’s all right. I’m not a Maker, after all.”

  Back with the boat. And with Lady Marlene. “Well, it’s fine with me and I doubt Master Beddoes will notice your absence.”

  “We’ll see you when we get back,” Guntram said and began leading me toward the Count’s palace.

  “Let the women know where we’ve gone if they ask,” I called to Osbourn.

  They wouldn’t ask. In particular Lady Marlene wouldn’t ask when she realized that Lord Osbourn was still here.

  CHAPTER 13

  A Realm of Wonder

  We walked to the castle at as brisk a pace as Guntram could manage. He really was in good shape for an old man; but he was an old man.

  “Do we need a guide?” I asked Guntram as we approached the entrance archway. The gates had been removed and though there was a slot in the ceiling of the high gatehouse from which a portcullis could fall, the streaks of rust on the stone made it clear that it was rarely—if ever—used. A dozen or so of the sort of folk who gather to watch strangers were doing so here. Four of them were in blue uniforms, but they seemed as mildly interested as the civilians.

  “I think I can find the workroom,” Guntram said, turning right at a cross corridor. “I visited it when I was here before, though that was just a glance. It’s part of the Count’s suite on the ground floor.”

  Civilians drifted about the hall, sometimes talking to one another. At the end of the hallway was a door with an arched entrance where two more guards stood, looking slightly more alert than those at the gate.

  “Eakins,” Guntram said to the older of the guards. “Master Beddoes invited us to see his collection.”

  The other guard, a fellow of about my age, stiffened and said, “Well, you better get a pass from the Chamberlain before you expect to go through Lord Stokes’s room.”

  “Rives, don’t be a prick,” Eakins said. “This is the Maker from Dun Add who was here two weeks ago. If you want to take it up with Stokes that’s fine but I’m letting him through.”

  Rives grimaced and looked at me. “Master Guntram and I are both Makers,” I said. “Would you like me to prove that by causing your earring to crawl into your ear instead of hanging from it?”

  The guard started back as I hoped he would, reaching up protectively to the simple ring hanging from his left earlobe. It was recently manufactured gold. Not an Ancient artifact. I could with some difficulty separate the ring into a thin gold rod, but I couldn’t animate it. The Ancients made metal servitors, but I didn’t have that level of skill.

  Guntram glanced at me in puzzlement.

  Eakins gestured us through the doorway with a smile. Guntram glanced at me but said nothing until we were alone, whereupon he murmured, “I would appreciate it if you taught me that trick.”

  “If I ever learn to do it I will happily tell you,” I said.

  Several servants watched us as we walked to another door in the back wall of a sparsely furnished room. It opened promptly at Master Beddoe
s’s pull.

  “I saw you were coming,” Beddoes said, gesturing with a thin sheet of copper on which a white bead glowed faintly beside a blue one. Lines were scribed on the copper but they were concentric circles rather than a map as I first thought.

  “This is only a small thing, of course,” he said, waving the sheet again.

  “How do you adjust the people it tracks?” Guntram asked. He reached out and waited for Beddoes to give him the artifact. Instead Beddoes turned away and walked deeper into the large hall into which the door opened. It was a busy room with upholstered furniture as well as the shelving and tables piled with artifacts that I’m used to in Makers’ workrooms—certainly including my own.

  They varied from organized—like Louis’s and those of the Makers who worked in his shop to as disorganized as my own and that of Guntram. Organized is clearly better in theory, but though the Makers working for Louis can turn out weapons and shields in quantity very fast—and at the top end (Louis himself) can refine those weapons to channel enormous amounts of energy in a small package, it may take a mind like mine or Guntram’s to convert an umbrella into a functioning shield. It wasn’t a very good shield, but by the Almighty it was a shield. Only my lack of skill kept me from refining my vision into something more functional.

  People differ in outlook. That doesn’t mean that Guntram is right or Louis is right. Louis is what the Commonwealth needed to survive. But my sort of mind has been darned useful to the Commonwealth when a large army isn’t the best solution.

  Though my friends Morseth and Reaves would say brute force was always the best way even if other ways might work. As I said, people differ.

  “Take a look at this,” Beddoes said. He handed me a dozen pebbles strung on nickel wire. I dipped into a trance and found all the pebbles were bits of quartz, occasionally with other elements besides the silicon.

  I passed the strand to Guntram, who gave it a similar cursory scan, then returned it to Beddoes when he gestured.

  Beddoes fitted a last pebble onto the wire and dangled a string of diamonds from his outstretched index finger. “This is waiting for Lady Marlene when she becomes Countess of Midian,” he said proudly.

  “That’s remarkable!” I said. I reached out for the jewelry. Beddoes hesitated an instant but passed the string over to me. I couldn’t detect any difference in the crystals from those of the string of pebbles I’d checked a moment before.

  I handed the necklace to Guntram, who asked, “Is there a quicker way to change the jewels than by going into a Maker’s trance?”

  “It’s not possible to change the jewels at all,” Beddoes said. “And why would anyone want to? What is more precious than a diamond?”

  “The lady might prefer a chain of brilliant rubies,” Guntram said mildly. “Depending on what outfit she was wearing.”

  “That’s between her and the Count, it seems to me,” Beddoes said, taking the necklace back without ceremony. “It’s not a job for a Maker.”

  Guntram rotated a dull ring he was wearing on his left little finger. The stone was a chip of Blue John, a brittle, bluish-brown stone which could be polished into attractive cups but which had no real value as a gem. I’d never seen it worn as one except this ring of Guntram’s.

  “Sir?” I said to Beddoes. “Did you prospect the capstone crystal in the Waste yourself?”

  “The Waste?” he repeated. “No, that’s insanely dangerous! I never go into the Waste. I found this—the capstone as you called it—in a load of streambed gravel being dug for concrete. I saw it through my viewer, much as I did the key that you’re carrying. I hope that you’ve reconsidered and are ready now to sell the key to me so it can be where it belongs?”

  “Your viewer has found you some wonderful pieces,” I said. “But I think I’ll examine the key myself at leisure. After we get back to Dun Add.”

  Guntram murmured, “May I glance at this for a moment?” and whisked the necklace out of Beddoes’s hand. He rubbed the capstone with the Blue John ring.

  “Hey, there!” said Beddoes. “What did you do?”

  Guntram handed over the necklace. “I touched the capstone with a bit of fluorite, which is much softer than the diamond. The fluorite may have smeared a little on the capstone, but it’s unharmed.”

  “Well, don’t do that sort of thing,” Beddoes said, turning his back on Guntram. To me he went on, “Now, look at this. It’s my real find!”

  He pointed to a nondescript ashlar which was covered with pink stucco on one face. “I found this built into the side of a shop on the high street,” he said.

  I could tell with a quick scan that it was an Ancient artifact, but I hadn’t the faintest notion of its purpose.

  Beddoes said, “It’s a transformer. It converts things into other things of equal mass! Look at this.”

  He moved a small stack of codices from a nearby table onto a spot directly on front of the indicated block on a larger table. The title of the one on top wasn’t on the cover and I couldn’t make our what was scribbled on the book’s fore-edge. “This is one of the palace cats,” Beddoes said. “I changed it last week. It’s perfectly all right now as you’ll see.”

  Beddoes touched the block and went into a shallow trance. I glanced at Guntram and found to my surprise that he was in a trance also. I figured he was seeing at a molecular level what Beddoes was doing. I was more interested in what was happening in Here as I saw it with my own eyes.

  The stack of books on the table became a three-colored cat who looked startled, then jumped to the floor and paused to lick her right foreleg. I reached down to rub her with my knuckles. She twisted away at my touch: not angry, but I was a stranger.

  “She certainly seems all right,” I said, looking up. “That’s another unique find, Master Beddoes.”

  “It is indeed,” said Guntram. Then he said, “Look at your necklace, Master Beddoes.”

  Beddoes was still holding the string in his right hand. It was now of perfectly matched rubies instead of diamonds.

  “What!” Beddoes said. Then he snarled at Guntram, “What did you do, you fool?”

  “Since the capstone now had the option of projecting corundum rather than merely diamond,” Guntram said, “I set it to do that. It can as easily be sapphire if you would prefer that…or you can return it to its diamond form.”

  “Yes, return it, then,” Beddoes said. “The diamonds are far superior. And please, Master Guntram, do not meddle in that fashion in the future. I can’t say how Count Stokes might respond if he learned what you had done.”

  “Of course,” Guntram said. “What I did was out of place.”

  He lapsed into a trance again. Guntram certainly had been wrong in choosing that very public method of proving Beddoes was wrong that the stones of the necklace couldn’t be changed by a Maker, but Beddoes’s assertion of his own exceptional skill was grating—even to me. I could imagine how much more irritating it must be to a Maker as learned as Guntram.

  I noticed that Beddoes’s workmanship wasn’t very good. The viewer that identified Ancient artifacts was a huge find—and the one which made all the others possible. The transformer had been retrieved whole rather than being built up from a scrap the way I’d worked on Beune. The result was extremely good, but it couldn’t be duplicated without another viewer. Beddoes was holding a string of diamonds. What Guntram did was repeatable and teachable—I was pretty sure that I could have switched the jewels from rubies to diamonds myself now that I’d been told what was involved. It seemed that was beyond Beddoes’s skill. But Beddoes had found the capstone which made the whole operation possible.

  “Thank you very much, Master Beddoes,” Guntram said. “You truly have remarkable holdings here.”

  Which he certainly did.

  I murmured appreciation, then said, “Sir, is there a way directly into town from here without going out the palace entrance?”

  “Why yes,” Beddoes said and led us through the hall to a door in the room’s sidewall. />
  “You must realize by now that the key belongs with this collection,” he said as he bowed us out.

  I nodded and smiled politely, but I didn’t speak before we went into a busy street.

  “I think Master Beddoes has very modest skills,” I said quietly to Guntram as we paused to look at a collection of scarves. I try to bring something home for May when I go off, and a pretty scarf of foreign workmanship was easy to carry. “His viewer is unique and wonderful, though. I wonder what it would have accomplished on Beune?”

  “Based on my visits to Beune,” Guntram said, “I don’t have the impression that the region has a great quantity of Ancient artifacts. The boundary between Here to Not-Here changes fairly frequently on Beune, does it not?”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “Not in living memory, but if you dig down for a root cellar you can find a layer when Beune was Not-Here. Does that make a difference?”

  “It may,” said Guntram. Then he said, “Master Beddoes wasn’t forced to do low-level work the way I was by my master and you were by lack of an alternative. As a result various things we consider obvious don’t leap immediately to his mind.”

  He paused and added, “Master Beddoes is quite talented, though his attitude makes it hard for me to like him. His lack of practice on low-end work makes it easy to discount his real ability to understand the purpose of large assemblages.”

  I chose a scarf and said, “Let’s get back to the boat and see how Lord Osbourn is getting on.”

  The shopkeeper was happy to take Commonwealth silver. We went out a gate beside the castle rather than within it.

  CHAPTER 14

  Coming Down to Cases

  When Guntram and I got back, six servants were under a marquee pitched near the boat. They sat on collapsible chairs and six more were set up in the shade of the boat itself where Lord Osbourn and the two women were sitting. They jumped up when they saw us. Lady Irene noted that I was carrying a small packet of the rough cloth in which the huckster had wrapped the scarf I’d bought for May and insisted I show it to her. That wasn’t something I’d planned to do and I hesitated.