It was the lot of all God’s creatures to struggle and grow strong, to find their place in the Universe and to live a life according to His will—so said the Inquisitoria. The ancient and revered Imperator, he of Godlike will and power and wrath, God’s living embodiment in the known and unknown Universe, had decreed that this be so. This is the story that every child was told, and perhaps the story was true.
But over the centuries, Mankind, or so the Inquisitoria told them, had grown both arrogant and complacent on this world. Men had ignored the will of both God and Imperator and had attempted to achieve their own dominion over the earth and sky, to go their own way without care for the will and charge of their rightful masters.
And so, had been nearly destroyed.
Even today, the places of the Ancients were filled with sparse, sickly growth, stunted and misshapen animals and the ghosts of the dead. To enter such places was to die a slow, miserable and lingering death.
Serfs, however, were cheap, and prisoners even cheaper. Serfs and prisoners could easily be spared.
“What else have you found?” the Primate asked.
Alejandro Garcia frowned. “Nothing yet.”
Blake Pierce sat at a small table in a sidewalk café under the shade of an awning, drinking a glass of spiced, sweetened wine. He watched as Thierry Jorge Garcia rode along the street, his men trailing behind and to either side. The former Irina Archer rode next to him. None of them noticed Blake, sitting by himself at the side of the road, or if they did, they ignored him. And why not? Blake Pierce was nobody in particular.
Blake had not known that Irina and Thierry would be riding here today. It was unexpected, but searching inside of himself, he found the sight of them to be less disturbing than he would have thought. Time, it seemed, did heal at least some wounds. He found himself gratified at this realization.
Blake had last seen Irina ten years before, at the funeral of the sadly and prematurely deceased Terence Sergei Allen. His supposed body had been cremated and the ashes buried with the usual pomp. Blake, disguised, his new face not yet fully healed, had been watching from the back of the crowd. A scatter of low-voiced mutterings greeted Irina’s entrance, which Irina ignored. Accompanied by her oldest brother, her father and mother, she had greeted the Allen family with quiet dignity, taken her seat in the third row and even shed a silent tear as the eulogy was read.
Her beauty had only grown in the decade since, as had many rumors, particularly the widely reported rumor that in addition to being Thierry’s wife, Irina had also become his father’s mistress, and occasionally, that of the Primate.
Watching her ride by felt…strange. Blake had difficulty putting a name to his muted feelings. He sighed.
“This seat taken?”
Blake glanced up. A tall man with auburn hair, green eyes and broad shoulders stood grinning down at him. “Donal,” he said. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
“And I’m here.” The man called Donal slid into the seat, caught a serving girl’s eye and pointed at Blake’s glass. She brought over a second glass, which Donal filled from the bottle in front of Blake. He tasted it and wrinkled his nose. “How can you drink this stuff? It’s pure sugar with a little grape juice mixed in.”
“The natives seem to like it. When in Rome…”
“Donal raised a skeptical brow. “Where is Rome, anyway? I’ve always wondered.”
“A mythical city, supposedly: eternal, inhabited by Gods, demons and men, powered by the will of the Holy, where the faithful go to pray and have their wishes granted.”
Donal shrugged. “Mythical, indeed.”
The two men sipped companionably for a little while, then Blake said, “Have you heard from Sebastian? Rolf? How about Etienne?”
“Sebastian, the last I heard, was fighting in the marshes with the Duke of Casena, against the Wolves.”
Blake wrinkled his nose. “Corsi is a formidable opponent.”
Four years before, Donal and Blake had fought on the side of Sienna, one of Venecia’s many city-states, against Benedetto Corsi, and his company, Corsi’s Wolves, the most respected, if not quite the largest such company on the continent. Their own commander, finding himself surrounded and seeing no point in sacrificing his men in a hopeless cause, had negotiated a swift retirement from the field. Benedetto Corsi had taken the city and declared himself Duke of Sienna.
“Etienne has retired from active campaigning. He’s joined his father’s banking firm. I have no idea where Rolf is.”
Blake shrugged. “So,” he said, “you’ve been in Lausanne for nearly a year. What’s the news?”
“Just rumors, I’m afraid. Nothing substantial.”
“There are always rumors. Rumors sometimes turn out to be true. What do these rumors say?”
“They say that the armies of Fomaut will be invading Trebizond in the next two months.”
Blake’s glass paused half-way to his lips. “Trebizond is well-defended.”
Donal shrugged. “As I said: a rumor.”
Blake considered what his friend had told him. Trebizond was a nation of high mountains and narrow passes. Beyond the public roads, Trebizond’s terrain was well known to its own citizens and a mystery to all others. The public roads were patrolled by the King’s soldiers, who were well-trained and not prone to tolerate nonsense from strangers.
Donal, an old friend from many campaigns, had taken a position as a sergeant with the Primate’s army. Blake gave him a moody look. “And what do you think of these rumors?”
“I suspect that the rumor about Trebizond has been deliberately spread, to deflect attention from the real target, but there is no doubt that the Primate is preparing for war. Someone, somewhere, is going to be invaded.” Donal sipped his wine. “I would bet on Bretagne. They’ve already taken Ardonne. The next province over is Rhodia, flat, fertile and ripe for the plucking. Fomaut has been grabbing small chunks of Bretagne for a hundred years.”
This made sense. Bretagne, composed mostly of farmland, was much smaller than its neighbors and more difficult to defend.
Donal grimaced. “There is another rumor—the Primate has been forming a secret army.”
Blake frowned at his friend. “He already has an army. He can have as many armies as he’s willing to pay for. What’s the secret?”
Donal shrugged. “No idea.”
Blake had last been in Fomaut three years ago. Outwardly, the place had changed little. Shops, cafes, taverns, cobblers, tanners, blacksmiths, small businesses and merchants of all types. The streets were clean, beggars forbidden. You could buy anything in Fomaut, including any of a dozen different flavors of narcotic and an attractive young man or woman to while away your evenings. The Primate had no objections so long as the taxes on each transaction were paid.
For ten years, Blake Pierce had wandered the seven nations of the world. Every few months, he would visit a cathedral, confess his sins, hand a priest a written report of what he had seen and what he thought about it, and go his way.
For over a year after the sad demise of Terence Sergei Allen, Blake Pierce had lived in a compound under the palace of the Viceroy. The place was like nothing Blake had ever seen or heard of or ever could have imagined. The air, by some unknown alchemy, was always the same temperature, cool and fresh. The walls gleamed. Sometimes, they changed color. Light shone down from the ceilings. Corridors opened up into rooms larger than caverns, some of them filled with gardens and high above, what appeared to be wispy clouds and blue skies. Voices and images that emanated from no obvious source snapped into existence and then vanished.
It was the Viceroy’s most secret domain, part headquarters, part retreat and part school, he was told, a school for spy-craft. Here, the Viceroy’s agents were taught their trade—how to be inconspicuous, how to change one’s appearance, what to look for, what sort of information might be significant, how to fight, how to hide, when to run, how to kill swiftly and surely and in ways that could not be distinguished from natural causes.<
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Terence, unlike most of his classmates, the majority of whom were military and eager for advancement, and who saw being an agent for the titular ruler of the world as an opportunity to better themselves, was not entirely happy to be there. He was intelligent, however. He could recognize reality, and he had recently had his nose rubbed in the fact that his own rash behavior had circumscribed his choices. He learned what he was supposed to learn, and after he learned it, was then let loose upon the world.
The Viceroy kept a light rein on his network of spies. He trusted them (or perhaps he trusted them not at all, since they knew very little other than what they, themselves observed). They kept their eyes open and went where they pleased. Rarely was Terence given an actual assignment, other than to observe and report. Only once, in fact. He had been instructed to kill a man who had unearthed a cache of forbidden knowledge from an ancient scriptorium, something to do with the manufacture of artificial light. Blake might have rejected the assignment. The Viceroy did allow his agents to reject an assignment, so long as they did not reject too many. In this case, however, Blake had been happy to comply. The target loaned money at usurious rates. If the client could not pay, a member of his family would be made to suffer, and if the money was still not forthcoming, to disappear. He also had a fondness for little boys, none of whom seemed happy to be in his service.
Blake had enjoyed slipping a knife between the man’s ribs.
Miramar was not quite what Blake had been expecting. Most of it was newer, for one thing, the original buildings having been constructed a mere seven hundred years before, by Lord Montoya’s grandfather, and expanded, since then, in a variety of styles. It was circled by a moat and lay in the center of a flat plain. Not the easiest place to defend, Blake thought, but difficult to sneak up on. Nevertheless, the walls were stout and would not be easily breached.
Miramar lay less than two kilometers from the ruins of the old keep, whose name had been lost, or deliberately expunged. Legend had it that the old keep had been inhabited by a family of sorcerers, who had grown arrogant and challenged the Primate of the time, which turned out to be a mistake. The shattered towers of the old keep now rose in grim, moldering piles from the edges of the plain, covered by moss and centuries of dead leaves. The First Baron Montoya, a loyal adherent of the Primate, had been granted the land, the title and permission to build his own castle.
“They weren’t really sorcerers,” Emilio Montoya said. “There is no such thing as a sorcerer.” He squinted down into his wine cup. “Or so we are told.”
“You believe otherwise?”
“I believe that they were strong at the weaving of soul-stuff. Very strong. It is said that the first of their line built the keep himself, in less than a week, using nothing more than a pile of stone and the resources of his mind.”
“That seems unlikely,” Blake said.
“Quite,” Lord Montoya said. He shrugged. “I have another assignment for you, Blake.”
Blake looked up. “Yes?”
“The High Table is meeting next week. I’d like you to be in charge of the bodyguard detail.”
Blake nodded. “Of course, if you wish.”
Emilio Montoya grinned. “News of your little escapade in Valandraud has travelled widely. The fact that you’re in my service has reflected well upon us both, and you, of course, are now an object of curiosity.”
The escapade in Valandraud had, in Blake’s opinion (an opinion he kept firmly to himself), been stupid, dangerous and absurd. Not for the first time, he wondered if returning to Fomaut had been a mistake. Irina Archer was a long-ago part of his past, and the sight of her had brought back memories he did not enjoy dwelling on.
Notoriety, depending on the mission, could be a help or a hindrance. Blake Pierce was a ronin, a wandering mercenary. Such men did, on occasion, find a situation that they preferred to make permanent, and ceased to wander. Blake had been offered several such positions during his career, all of which he had refused, but when seeking the next commission, a reputation for competence and dependability was always an asset. Notoriety it would be.
Aside from the idiocy at Valandraud, his commission at Miramar had so far gone much as expected. Drill the troops. Train the trainees. Keep watch for threats, real or imagined. Follow orders.
He had acted as a bodyguard on many prior occasions. It was not his favorite duty. For one thing, the actions of a determined assassin could never be entirely predicted. For another, the actions of the body one was guarding could also not be predicted. The most frustrating part of the assignment was a client who insisted on ignoring advice (or orders) and exposed themselves to unnecessary risk. A part of the job, however.
The Montoya family maintained a large house in town, behind its own stone walls. There was no reason to expect trouble but such an expectation (hope, rather) did not diminish the need to be prepared for anything. One never knew when trouble would strike, or from which direction, like an arrow in the dark, it might come.
Blake, perhaps from having been born to wealth, and perhaps also to having been born a younger son with few expectations of his own, had always found the urge to rise in the estimation of the world to be a difficult concept to comprehend. He didn’t understand it, frankly. When one had enough to live in luxury, what was the point of striving for power over one’s fellow men? He recognized that many felt differently. Many, many men, and not a few women, lusted after power with every fiber of their being.
Emilio Montoya enjoyed playing the game, but he wasn’t a fanatic about it. Lord Montoya was a fair employer and a just ruler of his own little corner of the world, who took advantage of his opportunities. Blake had established this much about Emilio Montoya before ever accepting his commission. He wouldn’t work for a man who could not be trusted.
Chapter 15
The next week passed swiftly. By now, Blake Pierce was a known and respected presence in Miramar. Only once did anything unusual occur. A rider, masked and cloaked, arrived after dusk on the third day before they were to leave for the city. He asked for an audience with Emilio Montoya, which was granted. The two vanished into a private office and emerged an hour later. The rider rode away. Lord Montoya seemed glum at dinner, but his good mood returned by the morning. Blake would mention this meeting in his next report to Varanisi but had no idea what it was about. It worried him.
Another thing that worried him was Davida Montoya, Emilio Montoya’s oldest daughter. Davida Montoya had big, dark eyes, the sort of eyes a man could gaze into and get lost in. She had straight, black hair, red lips and a lush figure.
All of Emilio Montoya’s men pined for her, but she ignored them all. According to rumor, she had remained untouched by any man, a rarity at her age. She was seventeen years old.
Davida Montoya seemed to have developed a crush on Blake Pierce, following his movements with dreamy, puppy-dog eyes, drifting in his wake as he made his daily rounds.
He was flattered but she made him…uncomfortable.
She was, however, her father’s daughter, which meant that she was intelligent and perceptive and willing to take calculated risks in pursuit of what she wanted.
He was in the stables, running a curry brush down the flanks of his favorite horse, Loki. By now, he trusted Miramar’s staff. The horse was well groomed and well fed, but still, Loki was Blake’s horse. A man’s life might depend on the bond between himself and his horse. Blake rode him at least every other day, curried the horse himself whenever he had the time and brought him frequent treats.
“I want to talk to you,” Davida Montoya said.
He hadn’t seen her approach. They were alone, the gaggle of grooms and stablemen curiously missing. “Yes, my Lady?” he said.
“Don’t call me My Lady. It annoys me.”
He knew it did. Perhaps that was why he did it. “Would you prefer ‘Miss Davida?’ Or perhaps ‘Little Miss?’”
She narrowed her eyes at him, then slowly grinned. “Do I make you uncomfortable, Blake? Is t
hat why you’re being difficult?”
“Frankly? Yes.”
She was wearing a bright red dress, very sheer, which did nothing to conceal her figure, which was ample. She sat down on a bale of hay and crossed her legs. “You’re not like the other men, here,” she said. “The rest of them would jump at my attentions.”
Blake shrugged.
When it became apparent that Blake had nothing further to say, Davida sighed. “Why have you been avoiding me? Why do I make you uncomfortable?”
“It has been my experience that the men of Fomaut take offense, easily—and you are my employer’s daughter.”
She grinned. “Is that all? Father loves me and wishes me to be happy.”
Regardless of a nation’s customs, human nature remained the same all over. Fathers almost always loved their daughters, and yet tended to look with suspicion, and sometimes unreasoning hatred (sometimes justified hatred), at the men they became involved with. “I wish you to be happy, as well, which is why I’m avoiding you.”
Davida shrugged. “Let me be blunt,” she said. “You’re an attractive man. I want you to be my first.”
He stopped currying Loki and stared at her. She raised an imperious brow and stared back. A number of possible rejoinders flew through Blake’s mind. Finally, he settled on, “I don’t think that would be wise.”
“I think it would be perfect. Your social position is inferior to my own, so you won’t be giving me any trouble if I decide to discard you. You’re not a citizen of Fomaut and will presumably be moving on, sooner or later, so there won’t be any messy emotional entanglements. A nice, no frills, physical relationship. Perfect.”
He blinked, startled. “That doesn’t seem very romantic.”
“Spare me. I’m not looking for romance.”
He sighed, replaced the curry brush in its cubby and sat down on another bale of hay, carefully keeping his distance from Davida. Loki looked at Davida, then turned his head and looked at Blake, with what Blake imagined to be disapproval.
The Towering Flame Page 10