The Serpent

by David Drake

  From experience I knew that even redirecting a blow like that could be a numbing experience. Osbourn responded quickly, striking sideways at Stokes’s abdomen. Stokes blocked the blow easily with his shield but it kept him off-balance.

  Stokes had to struggle to withdraw his weapon from the stone floor. When it came he lurched backward. Osbourn had been waiting for that and hacked off Stokes’s right foot while his shield was hopelessly out of position.

  Stokes flailed wildly with his weapon as he fell backward onto his left side. He was still dangerous, just as the giant had been. Stokes rose onto his knees with his left hand, trying to lift his torso from the floor instead of advancing the shield.

  Lord Osbourn stepped in, using his shield to block the swipes of Stokes’s weapon. Then he stabbed down with clinical precision, through the Count’s collarbone and into his chest cavity. Stokes collapsed onto his face.

  Osbourn stepped back and switched off his weapon and shield.

  I turned and said, “Sir! Treasurer! What did you just see?”

  A dozen people besides Irene and Treasurer Keames had by now entered the large entrance hall, though I wasn’t sure that most of them could hear Keames when he said, “The warrior from Dun Add challenged Count Stokes. Count Stokes attacked him. The warrior from Dun Add defeated the Count.”

  “Go out and tell everyone you meet what you just saw,” I said loudly. “The warrior is Lord Osbourn of Madringor. And now, Osbourn, let’s go into Master Beddoes’s domain and free Lady Marlene. That’s what we came to Midian to do, after all.”

  * * *

  “Greetings, your lordships,” Master Beddoes said, stepping out from behind a couch that probably doubled as a place to sleep.

  “We’re here to free Lady Marlene,” I said. “Where is she?”

  The room was the same untidy jumble of furniture, books and artifacts that I’d seen before. Guntram and Lady Irene had entered behind Osbourn and me. The Count’s corpse in the doorway seemed to have blocked any potential spectators.

  “Count Stokes brought the lady here by force,” Beddoes said. “She wasn’t injured but he threatened her with his weapon.”

  “Where is she?” Lord Osbourn demanded.

  Beddoes turned from Osbourn to me and said, “I’ll trade her to you, Lord Pal. In exchange for the key you have no use for.”

  “By the Almighty!” Osbourn shouted. “I’ve killed five men today! Do you think I’ll hesitate at a sixth?”

  The frame that displayed Ancient artifacts was indeed a wonderful device. But in a sense, what Louis or Guntram—or me a tiny way—did was more wonderful, in teasing out the purposes the Ancients had built into artifacts which had been worn to pebbles; and in the case of Louis, sometimes improving the device beyond what it originally had been, because he understood the principles which underlay the operation.

  Stokes had forgotten he was dealing with the honor of the Commonwealth, not just a couple of wandering warriors. He was—had been—a very big man on Midian, and he thought that made him bigger in the wider world than perhaps he should have.

  I said, “Lord Osbourn, I never want to consider killing a man because I find it the simplest answer to a problem. It certainly may be the correct answer, but not just the simplest.”

  I took the key out of my purse and handed it to Beddoes. “I’d appreciate learning how it works,” I said. “But that’s not required. Marlene’s safe return in.”

  “Of course,” Beddoes said, nodding. He sidled over to his converter and paused beside a stack of codices on top of a large table. He reached over to the converter and went into a light trance. The pile of books on the table shifted into Marlene. She was on the edge and would have fallen off if Lord Osbourn hadn’t leaped to that point and caught her.

  Osbourn straightened. He didn’t push Marlene away, but the sudden rigidity of his body caused her to twitch apart from him in surprise.

  “Lord Pal,” he said. “I misspoke. Please forgive me.”

  “You’ve shown exceptional judgment as well as skill this morning,” I said. “This confirms the high opinion of you which the Leader and I share.”

  Master Beddoes cleared his throat for attention. When I looked toward him, he said, “You asked how the key works, your lordship.” He held it out toward me. “I suggest that you or Master Guntram demonstrate it yourself.”

  “Where do you suggest we do that?” I asked calmly. Beddoes had something in mind, but I was hanged if I could see what it was.

  Beddoes held out the key to me. “Anywhere there’s a door,” he said. He gestured toward the door at the back which I knew led to the alley. “That one over there’s probably the closest.”

  I took the key and went to the door. I tried it and found it locked as I expected. The keyhole was an ordinary one. “This key won’t fit,” I said, looking over my shoulder toward Beddoes.

  “Try it,” he said and I did. The hollow key entered the opening, though I was sure that it was too thick to enter the hole for the key shaft. I successfully tried to turn it and felt something engage. I used the key itself as a handle and pulled the panel open. Instead of the alley and passing citizens, the room beyond reminded me of Master Sans’s Underworld as Lady Irene and I had seen it.

  The furnishings were sparkling crystal, probably diamond as those of the Underworld had been. On the tops and shelves were bales of fabric and devices for purposes I couldn’t for the most part even guess at.

  I recognized a frame like the one which Beddoes used to identify Ancient artifacts, however. I thought it very likely that more of the hundreds of devices were of similar value.

  I stepped into the area beyond the door. It wasn’t a room or an enclosure of any type. On all sides but that of the doorway by which I’d entered, it was a bubble in the Waste. Even without touching the artifacts, I could sense their power. This was the most remarkable place I’d ever seen.

  I wanted to get out. I’ve spent many hours prospecting in the Waste. I’m not afraid of it: just careful. This was unfamiliar and therefore frightening.

  I started to back out and collided with Guntram. “No!” I said. “Get out of here!”

  I resumed backing but didn’t turn my head until I saw from the corners of my eyes that I was back in Beddoes’s workroom. I sighed with relief.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Guntram, who’d skipped back out as I’d ordered.

  I took another deep breath and muttered, “I’m not sure. I didn’t like the way it felt. I remembered Master Sans being eaten by a thing from the Waste when he was caught in the open. That whole room, place, is open.”

  Lady Irene, carrying her bundle of yarrow stalks, stepped around me and Guntram. I couldn’t have stopped her and didn’t see any reason to try. She looked around the alcove in the Waste, lifted and shook out with her free hand a swatch of fabric which seemed to have a rose embroidered on it, then set it down again. She came back out.

  “The key makes that magic with your sticks unnecessary,” Beddoes said. He took out the key and waggled it at Irene, then nodded toward me.

  Beddoes glowered at her, then walked into the alcove himself, holding the key ostentatiously up in his right hand. He first looked at the frame that I’d noticed on the nearest shelf. He looked back at me and said, “Lord Pal, superstition has cost you a great deal.”

  “Your instincts have proved good in the past,” Guntram said quietly to me. “You’re correct to trust them now.”

  “Thank you, friend,” I said. “I’ve gotten along thus far, and getting rich has never been a goal.”

  Lady Irene slammed the alley door closed. The alcove in which Beddoes stood vanished.

  “He made a point of keeping the key with him,” I said. Beddoes wasn’t likeable, but the place he’d gone into had bothered me just to be in. He didn’t deserve to be abandoned there—even if it had been possible to get him out.

  Of course if I’d been a woman who’d been badly treated by most of the men in her life, I might feel more
harshly than I did about the kidnapping of Lady Marlene.

  “Yes,” Irene said. “Master Beddoes can open a door to somewhere. But not, I hope, back to here.”

  “In my brief glimpse of the place he went into,” Guntram said, “I didn’t see a door. Did you, Lord Pal?”

  “I didn’t,” I said. The drawbolt on the alley door was still closed in its staples on the jamb, despite my having opened it moments before. I slid the bolt open and raised the latch, then tugged the panel open normally. The pair of men passing by in the alley glanced at me on their way into a tavern whose swinging door closed behind them.

  I banged the panel shut again, looked back to find my companions, even Irene, staring intently at me. I jerked the door open. The alley was still outside. I closed and latched the door.

  “Maybe Beddoes understands what’s happening,” I said to Guntram. “He knew about the key already before he met me. He’d read about it somewhere.”

  “I doubt he knew very much,” Guntram said. “By taking the key with him he prevented us from opening the door to rescue him.”

  “He used my friend Marlene to bargain with!” Lady Irene said. “I didn’t mean to kill him, but I don’t care if he dies.”

  Osbourn and Marlene came closer when they heard her name. I looked at them and said, “I guess I don’t care either. But—”

  I thought of the wizened corpse I’d ordered to be buried on Winslow, having pried the shrunken fingers of his right hand open to take the key. I hadn’t been able to guess why he’d died with it in the Waste. Now I wondered if a closing door had left him in the middle of the Waste with an enormous treasure of Ancient artifacts, but no way to return to Here. That alcove might not have been a deliberate trap; but it was surely a trap nonetheless.

  “I’d rather he hadn’t died that particular way, though. But it’s too late to worry about now.”

  I opened the alley door again and stepped out of the palace. I was in the way of folk walking through the tight space. I just wanted to be out of the building, though I knew that the opening onto the Waste wasn’t really part of the palace.

  After a time, Guntram called from the doorway saying, “Pal, what should we do next?”

  I opened my eyes and turned from the coarse brick wall of the building behind the palace. My hands were gritty from pressing against the wall. I rubbed them together, then crossed back into the palace during a break in the sporadic traffic.

  “Next,” I said, “you and I, my friend, will sort through Master Beddoes’s workroom and decide what we’re going carry back to Dun Add with us. I very much doubt Master Beddoes will be returning, and if he does we’ll have kept his artifacts safe for him.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Back in Dun Add

  While we were on Midian the local problems were the only thing on my mind, but as we neared Dun Add I kept thinking about Lady Hope and her sister. Irene was interested only in what was happening at her school while she was absent and took her bundle of yarrow stalks straight back to that property. As for me, I left Baga and Guntram to sort out the contents of the boat and went straight to Lady Jolene’s suite.

  There were two Champions present, neither of whom I knew well: Lord Trapson and Efrit of Steinholm. Trapson was sitting with Lady Beatrice. They’d known one another before coming to Dun Add and had gotten to know each other better here. For the most part the ladies in waiting didn’t pay a lot of attention to matters outside their personal orbit, but one asked as I was kissing Lady May in greeting, “Were you able to free the imprisoned bride?”

  “Lady Marlene is free,” I said, “and probably married to Lord Osbourn of Madringor by now. But speaking of women in distress, do any of you know how the lawsuit over the Count of Laferriere’s will has gone?”

  I thought Lady Beatrice might respond but unexpectedly the Consort herself volunteered, “Jon mentioned that the Council of Five is to deliver its judgment this morning. It’s still before noon, isn’t it?” She turned to see where the light through the Oriel window was falling. “Yes, you’ve still got time, Lord Pal. If you want to go.”

  In truth I did, but I checked with May and only when she shrugged did I say, “I think I will run down to the court and see that it’s taken care of.”

  The auditorium could be entered on three levels, but the top was the ordinary access for spectators, which is all I was. I went down to that end of the corridor and the ushers nodded me through the entrance. I took a seat to the side three rows down, low enough down to avoid any chatter in the hall.

  The leader in the center of the facing wall said, “Is the secretary of the Council of Five ready to announce a judgment in the matter of the Count of Laferriere’s will?”

  He didn’t shout, but the court’s acoustics were so good that everyone in the room could hear him.

  “We are, your lordship,” said Lady Noonen, a wizened woman and a noted legal scholar said. She was seated directly below Jon, facing the sisters and the clerks acting for them. “Will the parties please rise?” a steward beside Noonen said.

  The sisters, on opposite sides of the ground level, rose. I had a better view of Joy on the opposite side than I did of Hope directly below me. Joy was a lush blond, seated between two clerks whom I recognized as living in Dun Add, though I didn’t recall their names.

  “The unanimous judgment of the council is in favor of Lady Hope of Laferriere,” Noonen said. “The council will appoint commissioners to divide the decedent’s property equally between the parties.”

  There was no outcry, but Lady Hope bent to hug Mistress Loong’s shoulders. A local clerk, Master Toshi, was seated on her other side. Lady Joy sat down and one of her clerks hopped to his feet and announced, “Lady Joy of Laferriere asserts her right of appeal to combat.”

  “Noted,” said Lady Noonen, as she made a notation on the tablet before her.

  I got to my feet and walked down the side aisle to where Lady Hope sat with her legal team. Master Toshi was speaking to Hope and Loong, probably explaining appeal to combat to visitors not familiar with Commonwealth practice.

  Toshi stopped and looked up at me. “Milord?” he said, calling the attention of the two women to me. They looked over at me.

  “I just came over to offer my services as a Champion,” I said. “If Lady Hope hasn’t already engaged someone, that is.”

  “Lord Pal!” said Toshi reverently. “I saw you defeat Lord Baran!”

  “I don’t understand,” Hope said. “You are a clerk, Lord Pal? I thought you were a Maker.”

  “I’m not a clerk,” I said. “But I’m a specialist in the kind of law you need right now. Master Toshi will explain the details to you. But you may want to get other representation.”

  I turned and walked back up the aisle toward the door I’d come in by. I really hadn’t meant to do that, but it was the right decision.

  “She accepts if she’s sane, Lord Pal,” Master Toshi called after me.

  * * *

  I went directly back to Jolene’s suite to tell May. I didn’t know how she was going to take it since I hadn’t mentioned what I was planning. I wasn’t planning it.

  The Council of Five had looked at the evidence and come to a decision. Lady Joy decided she wouldn’t accept the decision and was appealing to force, which was within the law—but wasn’t right, in my opinion. If she wanted force she’d get it.

  One of the guards in the corridor called, “Lord Pal’s back already,” and the door opened immediately from the inside guard pushing it. May was beside him and kissed me firmly before guiding me into the suite. To the assembly I said, “the council found for Lady Hope. Lady Joy immediately appealed to combat. I volunteered to Lady Hope that I would represent her if she wished. I hadn’t expected this result and I acted without discussing the matter with anyone, including my friend Lady May.”

  I dipped my head to her in apology. “You did the right thing, Pal,” she said, to my relief. “As you usually do. You couldn’t let a nice lady be robbed.”
/>
  Lord Trapson said, “Who’s your opponent, Lord Pal?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t really care. The clerk didn’t say, though they must’ve had something in mind since they were prepared to appeal as soon as the verdict was announced.”

  That made me think about my challenge as leading to a real fight, which I hadn’t done when I made it. When I fought on behalf of Lady Jolene no member of the Hall of Champions would stand with me. Jolene wasn’t guilty of poisoning Lord Baran’s friend, but she certainly was having an affair with Lord Clain. With Clain far from Dun Add—but nobody knew exactly where—only an outsider like me would take Jolene’s cause, and no warrior would back me. Makers from Master Louis’s shop brought me water and sponged my arm overheated from holding my weapon while I fought the stronger man.

  Now I was a significant player in Dun Add. There were no political limitations on this combat. I could ask any warrior in Dun Add to stand on the sidelines and coach me.

  My two closest friends among the Champions were Morseth and Reaves. I decided I would ask one of them at my earliest opportunity.

  The door opened to admit one of Jon’s personal couriers, who went immediately to kneel beside the Consort and whisper in her ear.

  He rose to leave. Jolene unexpectedly got to her feet and said, “Lord Trapson raised a question and now there’s an answer. Lady Joy of Laferriere has named Lord Morseth as Champion for her appeal of the Council of Five’s judgment.”

  Lady May was holding my arm. Her grip suddenly tightened hard.

  My chest tightened also. May noticed my expression and said, “Are you all right, Pal? Morseth is a potent warrior. Do you doubt you can beat him?”

  “I can beat him,” I said. “Only, a part of me isn’t sure I want to.”

  * * *

  Before I left Jolene’s suite I took May aside and murmured to her, “I won’t be going straight home, love. I want to stop at Lord Morseth’s house and chat with him.”