A Path to Coldness of Heart

by Glen Cook

  “No. How about you with the Deliverer?”

  “Ethrian. His mother’s optimism seems justified but the process will take longer than she hopes.”

  “Let me know what works.”

  “Does Old Meddler know?”

  “I don’t know. What do you think?”

  “I think not. Not yet. Will you free Ragnarson?”

  “I haven’t decided.”

  “Kavelin has begun to recover. Him being here might do more harm than good.”

  “I must go.” She dared not say that they had made a huge mistake.

  Inger would know that Bragi lived before sunrise. All Kavelin would know within days. It might no longer matter if she sent him home. The possibility would alter the political climate anyway.

  The chubby man looked bland and indifferent and small. He understood what he had overheard.

  Almost idly, he told Varthlokkur, “Two men tried to kill me on my way out here. I didn’t recognize them. They were Wessons. They didn’t have unusual accents and they didn’t say anything that explained why. I marked them with tracer spells.”

  Varthlokkur said, “You’re good at that, aren’t you.”

  “Everybody has to be good at something.”

  Mist retreated into the house. That was the last she heard.

  ...

  “The Vorgreberg portals have to be considered compromised,” Mist told her technicians. “I expect them to be destroyed. Get replacements into place before that happens.”

  She dismissed her bodyguard. He needed rest and family time, unlike his Empress. She relaxed a few hours herself, then chose another lifeguard to accompany her to the Karkha Tower. She was not surprised to find Lord Ssu-ma visiting. He had a lot of free time. He spent much of it with Kuo. She invited herself to join him, Wen-chin, and the Old Man.

  They were surprised to see her so early in the day.

  She said, “They don’t see it themselves but things are coming to a head in Kavelin. And Varthlokkur is in the middle of it.” She explained.

  Shih-ka’i asked, “Might his slips have been deliberate?”

  “No. He’s lost the habit of caution. He doesn’t need to watch himself at home. The news should cause fundamental shifts but I can’t guess what those might be.”

  Shih-ka’i suggested, “Ask Ragnarson.”

  “He’s farther removed from today’s reality than I am.”

  Wen-chin and Shih-ka’i were playing shogi. Each had made one move since the Empress arrived. It was Wen-chin’s turn. He spoke for the first time. “Ask anyway. You know him well. You judge his response.”

  “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  ...

  “There is a shift underway,” Wen-chin observed.

  “Uhm?” Shih-ka’i focused on the board. He was the superior player but was in a bad position this time around.

  “Just years ago we were all playing games of empire. That ends tomorrow, when you execute the treaty with Matayanga. The whole world will be at peace.”

  “You think?”

  “Consider. In Kavelin one pretender’s ambition is to catch a criminal. The other waits like an ambush predator, showing no ambition whatsoever. Rather the same situation prevails in Hammad al Nakir.”

  “True. As far as we know. The west is caught up in the doldrums of peace. North and south, they’re interested only in harvests and their burgeoning mercantile ventures.”

  “Peace?”

  That came from the Old Man, who drowsed in a western-style chair while disinterestedly watching the game. He began to shake. He made a brief whimpering sound, then slipped away to hide inside himself.

  Shih-ka’i said, “His fear could be justified. Old Meddler must be livid. But even he can’t chivy an exhausted world into another round of butchery. Generations have to pass.”

  “Let that be true. Will you yield?”

  ...

  Ragnarson was at his little desk when Mist arrived. He did not look up. “I can’t remember the color of my mother’s eyes.”

  “Blue, I expect. They’re all blue up there, aren’t they?”

  “You’d think. But my mother wasn’t Trolledyngjan. My father brought her back from a raid on Hellin Daimiel.”

  “Then they were brown, or darker. Does it matter?”

  “Not in the history of empires. I wanted to capture what I remember about the people I’ve lost. The memories have begun to get away. Those people shouldn’t be forgotten. So. To what do I owe the honor?”

  “I visited Kavelin last night. When I came back I rested till people would be awake here.”

  “Did something happen?”

  “A lot of nothing. But Varthlokkur was there, helping Inger hunt somebody who tortured and raped a little girl. Kristen’s faction is sitting in Sedlmayr, waiting for Inger to eliminate herself. Nobody is talking politics anymore.”

  “Same here. I don’t like being locked up but the lack of pressure is nice. They’ve stopped killing each other, haven’t they?”

  “Yes. Do you want to spend the rest of your life here?”

  “No. But I don’t want to be the man you locked up, either.”

  “I’ll see you soon.”

  Once she was gone, he added, “I won’t be your tool, either.”

  ...

  Mist found Shih-ka’i tearing his hair, figuratively. He and Wen-chin were involved in the same game. He would not yield.

  Mist said, “Ragnarson seems indifferent to what’s going on in Kavelin, evidently because everything has collapsed into peace. He seems inclined to stay away.”

  Shih-ka’i said, “Amazing, the impact a good harvest can have.”

  Mist nodded. The world was drifting into pacifist indifference.

  She would not complain. She was fond of peace herself.

  Something was happening, down below the level of consciousness. The world and all its warlords were putting their swords aside.

  That contradicted human nature.

  Mist left the Tervola to their game and the attention of the now unnaturally alert Old Man. She went to an empty apartment, told her lifeguard, “Wake me in three hours.”

  She had to rest before meeting with the Matayangans.

  ...

  Mist wakened with the future fixed in her mind.

  †

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  YEAR 1017 AFE:

  PEACEABLE KINGDOMS

  Varthlokkur had gone to bed, supposedly exhausted. Babeltausque dragged the Queen out of Josiah Gales’s arms to report.

  Inger looked old and tired when she came out. Nathan Wolf arrived moments later. Colonel Gales pretended to arrive from his own quarters less than a minute behind Wolf.

  Babeltausque said what he had to say concisely. “I did my best to remain invisible.”

  Never mind somebody tried to murder her sorcerer, Inger fixed on the critical point. “Bragi is alive?”

  “And they’re thinking about dropping him on us.”

  “Should I cheer or cry?”

  “Your Grace?”

  Inger said, “Tell me your new ideas for finding the treasury.”

  He told her. And began to grow mildly disaffected because she showed no concern about the assassination attempt.

  She was a Greyfells for sure.

  The meeting did not last long. Bed called out to everyone.

  Babeltausque did not fall asleep immediately. He ought to be hunting those killers. And caring for Carrie. He had to get her out of there. He should move her in here. She was no secret, now. Why should he hide her?

  They would talk but nobody would do anything. Inger needed him too much.

  ...

  Josiah Gales perched on the edge of a chair beside Inger’s bed. He had not yet recovered enough to do much but hold her. He did not recall being beaten while captive but he had a testicle that would not stop hurting. There were occasional blood spots on his small clothes. His urine sometimes had an odd brown color to start. When he sat to defecate, dark
, dense blood leaked from his penis. He was frightened.

  Inger asked, “What do you think about what Babeltausque said?”

  “About the King? We should keep that quiet. About new places to look for the treasure? Some of those have been checked already, the well several times. Throwing money down a well was the kind of thing Derel Prataxis would have considered funny.”

  “Derel wasn’t by himself. You always ignore Cham Mundwiller. He had a bizarre sense of humor, too.”

  “Which is why we’ll drain the sewage deposits.”

  “Nobody has done that yet. Right?”

  “Not yet. I need to go. I’m feeling weak.”

  “If you must. I so miss you. But I don’t want to lose you. Take care of yourself, Josiah.”

  ...

  Only five people were supposed to know what had happened between Varthlokkur and Mist. The wizard was one. He discussed it with no one. The others would claim that they had told no one. They would not be lying.

  There were, as ever, those who lurked within the castle walls, eavesdropping. Word that the old king was alive got out via a maid whose politics were those of indifference.

  King Bragi’s survival was not all she reported. Treasure hunting enjoyed a surge in popularity. That ended when the Queen’s men began harassing the hunters. One stubborn band gave up only after the Queen’s sorcerer demonstrated a willingness to boil them inside their own skins.

  ...

  Varthlokkur followed Mist’s suggestion.

  Phyletia Plens had lived a life of constant sorrow. Little good ever happened to her. Because he had suffered the childhood that he had, Varthlokkur felt all of her pain.

  Sad Phyletia had not been strong. Not like the son of the woman burned in Ilkazar. Phyletia did not fight back. The one time she found the will to take charge of her destiny she ran off with the man who became her death.

  Varthlokkur’s new line of investigation did not take him where he expected. It exonerated the butcher Arnulf Black, in part. Again. He had used Phyletia but had not been involved in what happened to her later. Likewise, the apothecary Chames, whose behavior was so odd and shrouded and deceptive that he needed interrogation out of sheer curiosity.

  The true villain was known to the neighborhood as a good man. He was a priest at the only church. Phyletia Plens was one of dozens of children who had found refuge in his rectory. Most had survived. Many remained in the neighborhood. Interviewed, most refused to talk.

  Varthlokkur followed the Plens story minute by minute till he found the night when the priest lost control, hurt her badly, and had to be rid of her in a hurry. Other children might wonder about the noise.

  Varthlokkur had Radeachar collect the priest, then let Inger know what he had learned.

  Father Ather Kendo confessed to fourteen murders. Thirteen involved the torture deaths of girls between eleven and thirteen. The other had been a boy who stuck his nose in, wrong place, wrong time, and saw something he should not have. Of surviving victims there were scores.

  Father Kendo died forty hours after his capture, in fire, screaming, by popular demand. But first they nailed him to a sign blessing those victims whose names he remembered.

  The interrogations of the priest and his surviving victims produced the names of a dozen adults whose crimes against children were only slightly less obscene.

  ...

  Dahl Haas said, “Something has changed in Vorgreberg…”

  A Mundwiller youth interrupted. “Remarkable news! King Bragi is alive! He’s a prisoner in Shinsan. But they’re going to send him back.”

  The first part was not news. The rest? Neither Dahl nor Kristen knew how to take that.

  Dahl said, “Sounds like they want us to think he’ll be their puppet.”

  “They wouldn’t send him back if they didn’t see an advantage.”

  Their nipping at the news did not last. Ozora summoned them.

  The old woman said, “Fortune has played a prank. Just when we’re headed toward the end of the harvest, with the weather turning, when neither we nor the Queen can do much, we get this news.”

  Ozora paused. Neither Kristen nor Dahl had any response.

  “All right. Tell me what’s going to happen.”

  Kristen said, “I couldn’t guess. Bragi being alive will touch every Kaveliner—and our neighbors, as well. The response is beyond me. I’m out of touch.”

  Dahl nodded. “I expect nostalgia. People longing for the good old days. But these days are pretty good, despite us and Inger. Yeah, we have a civil war going. Technically. But nobody has killed anybody since…” He stopped. The last known casualty had been Sherilee.

  Ozora agreed. “All true. How will the news affect Inger? And Varthlokkur?”

  Dahl said, “I couldn’t guess about Inger. She’s unpredictable.”

  Kristen said, “Let’s just sit tight. Somebody could be blowing smoke.”

  Dahl added, “Maybe the news will get Inger to do something dumb.”

  Ozora said, “Then passivity remains our strategy. You two try to stay invisible.”

  Later, in private, Kristen said, “Ozora has begun to regret having taken us in.”

  “She’s afraid your father-in-law will come back all blood and thunder and slavering after revenge.”

  They made love for a long time.

  Afterward, Kristen asked, “Revenge on who?”

  “Interesting question. Once upon a time the answer might have been Kavelin, for having failed him. But, assuming Mist wouldn’t send a crazy man back, nobody, now. Anybody he’d have a real beef with is out of play. By now, he must realize that he failed Kavelin, not the other way around.”

  ...

  It was raining, a late autumn drizzle that seemed colder than it was. Inger sat in her coach, shivering despite being buried in a mound of comforters. Josiah Gales, sharing, shook constantly. She raised a window cover, leaned out to see if any progress had been made. She saw only the droopy misery of her driver and team. “I should have waited in the castle.”

  Gales nodded. “It waited this long. A few days more means nothing.”

  Inger ground her teeth. Josiah was like this all the time now. Always with the sharp word. Wachtel said he was in constant pain. She thought that he had had plenty of time to get better.

  She would not tolerate this much longer.

  A lie to herself. Josiah was all she had. Sickly Josiah and sickly Fulk. And maybe Nathan Wolf. So pathetic.

  Babeltausque opened the door. “I was right! We found it! Uh… I think we found it. We’re dragging it out now.”

  “I want to see this. Umbrella, Colonel.”

  Gales dug one out of the stuff piled on the seat opposite. He handed it to the sorcerer. He would not leave the coach himself.

  Babeltausque was too short and too wide to keep Inger sheltered. She took the umbrella. Out of earshot of Gales, Babeltausque murmured, “I think the Colonel is sicker than he pretends.”

  Startled, she said, “Oh?”

  “He picked up something ugly while he was a captive. Wachtel doesn’t know how to fight it.”

  “Do you?”

  “No. I don’t do serious healing.”

  They neared a half-acre farm pond that had not featured on the sorcerer’s original list. It lay a mile from the nearest city gate. Though not a cesspool it was nasty enough. Cattle and hogs watered there. Neither species was shy about evacuating while drinking. The pond had been in place for decades. Its bottom consisted of several feet of noisome mud.

  “Is he dying?” Inger asked.

  “I don’t know. He is getting weaker. Varthlokkur might be able to turn that around.”

  The wizard had not returned to the Dragon’s Teeth. That made everyone nervous.

  “Would he help?”

  “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask. He is the one who can. Try making a deal. Ah! Here it comes.”

  Nathan and several soldiers had been dragging the pond by casting grappling hooks. Now they w
ere working something that kept getting away. Inger expected their optimism to be wasted. That could be anything.

  Nathan went into the cold water, retrieved something. He swished the mud off, headed for his sovereign.

  “It’s a chest.” He held up a plain box four inches high, six wide, and sixteen long. It stank. So did Wolf. “It might be teak.”

  It was. Inger said, “We’re in the right place. There should be a little ceremonial scepter in there.”

  Wolf fumbled the simple latch. “Sorry. My fingers are so cold they won’t work right.”

  He got the box open.

  “Damn!” Inger swore. “Damn it all to hell! What the…?”

  The prophesied scepter was there but in an ugly state of decay.

  Babeltausque said, “It was a fake.”

  “It wasn’t when Fiana was queen.”

  “Then Bragi was a crook.”

  Wolf said, “Someone was.”

  Inger snapped, “Drain the pond, Nathan. Muck it out. Find the rest of the treasure.” She had a feeling that this would not turn out well.

  Feet wet and freezing, the rest of her damp, Inger clambered back into the coach. Josiah asked, “Bad news?”

  “So it seems.” She explained. “The jewels were junk. They’d partly melted. And now I’m remembering that only two men, one very old, carried the treasure away. How much could they lug, real or fake?”

  “I hoped they’d taken mostly gold.”

  “I’m expecting fool’s gold now.”

  Varthlokkur had warned her that she would be disappointed.

  ...

  Members of the castle garrison tagged along wherever Varthlokkur went. He shook them off when so inclined. They expected that and did not resent it.

  Why had he come out in this cold rain? Whatever he did was sure to come a disappointment.

  He let his tails see him enter Arnulf Black’s butcher shop. That pathetic villain had been questioned by Babeltausque, who declared him a bleak pervert whose need was to humiliate the weak and build himself up by tormenting the helpless. He abused his girls but did not murder them. Even the weakest eventually ran away.

  In that impoverished quarter Black had no trouble finding replacements.

  Varthlokkur left the shop. His shadows did not see him go. They had other things on their minds.