Inversions c-6

by Iain Banks

  UrLeyn regarded him for a moment. "You ask me to trust your mistrust," he said quietly.

  "Now the Protector does put it better than I could have."

  UrLeyn smiled. "And why would any of the Sea Companies wish me dead in the first place?"

  DeWar dropped his voice still further. "Because you are thinking of building a Navy, sir."

  "Am I?" UrLeyn asked with seeming surprise.

  "Aren't you, sir?"

  "Why would anyone think that?"

  "You turned over some of the Royal Forests to the people, and then recently introduced the condition that some of the older trees might be thinned.!

  "They're dangerous."

  "They are healthy, sir, and of the age and shape for ships" timbers. Then there is the Mariners" Refuge in Tyrsk, a naval college in the making, and-"

  "Enough. Have I been so indiscreet? Are the Sea Companies" spies so numerous and so perceptive?"

  "And you have held talks with Haspidus and Xinkspar about enlisting, I'd imagine, the wealth of one and the skills of the other in the formation of such a Navy."

  UrLeyn looked troubled now. "You know about this? You must eavesdrop from a great distance, DeWar."

  "I hear nothing that you would not expect me to hear through simple proximity, sir. What I hear, without searching then x out, are rumours. People are not stupid and functionaries have their specialities, sir, their areas of expertise. When an ex-admiral comes to call, one may guess it is not to discuss breeding better pack animals for crossing the Breathless Plains."

  "Hmm," UrLeyn said, looking out at the people gathered around them but not seeing them. He nodded. "You can draw the blinds in a brothel, but people still know what you're doing."

  "Exactly, sir."

  UrLeyn slapped his knee and made to stand. DeWar was on his feet first. "Very well, DeWar, to humour you, we'll meet in the painted chamber. And we'll make the meeting more private even than he has asked for, just me and him. You may eavesdrop. Are you mollified?"

  "Sir."

  Fleet Captain Oestrile, ambassador of the Kep's Haven Sea Company, dressed in an ornate rendition of a nautical uniform, with long turned-over boots of blue hide, trousers of grey pike-fish skin and a thick, high-collared frock coat of aquamarine edged with gold — all topped by a tricorn hat embellished with angel-bird feathers — strode slowly into the painted chamber in the palace of Vorifyr.

  The ambassador walked down a narrow carpet of gold thread which ended at a small stool set a couple of strides from the front of the only other article of furniture which the gleaming wooden floor supported, namely a small dais topped by a plain chair on which sat the Prime Protector, First General and Grand Aedile of the Protectorate of Tassasen, General UrLeyn.

  The ambassador took off his hat and executed a small bow to the Protector, who motioned the ambassador to the stool. The ambassador looked at the low stool for a moment, then unbuttoned a couple of buttons at the lower edge of his coat and sat carefully, laying his extravagantly feathered hat to one side. He had no obvious weapons, not even a ceremonial sword, though around his neck was a belt supporting a stout cylinder of polished hide, with a buttoned cap at one end and finished with inscribed gold filigree. The ambassador looked round the walls of the chamber.

  The walls were painted in a series of panels depicting the various parts of the old Kingdom of Tassasen: a forest full of game, a dark and towering castle, a bustling city square, a harem, a pattern of fields sectioning a flood plain, and so on. If the subjects were relatively mundane, the artwork was almost definitively so. People who had heard of the painted chamber — which was rarely opened and even more rarely used — and who expected something special, were invariably disappointed. The paintings were, it was generally agreed, rather dull and unexceptional.

  "Ambassador Oestrile," the Protector said. He was dressed in his usual style of the long jacket and trousers he had made the fashion. The old Tassasen chain of state, with the crown removed, was his only concession to formality.

  "Sire," the fellow said.

  UrLeyn thought he saw in the ambassador's manner a little of what DeWar had meant. There was a sort of empty gleam in the young man's gaze. An expression which included such open eyes and such a wide smile in such a young, shiningly smooth face ought not to be quite as disquieting as it somehow contrived to be. The fellow was of average build, his hair was short and dark, though red-powdered after some fashion UrLeyn did not recognise. He sported fine whiskers for one so young. Young. Perhaps that was part of it, thought UrLeyn. Ambassadors tended to be older and fatter. Well, he should not talk of changing times and changing roles and then be himself surprised.

  "Your journey?" UrLeyn asked. "I trust it was unexciting?"

  "Unexciting?" the young fellow said, seemingly confused. "How so?"

  "I meant safe," the Protector said. "Your journey was safe?"

  The fellow looked relieved for a moment. 'Ah," he said, smiling broadly and nodding. "Yes. Safe. Our journey was safe. Very safe." He smiled again.

  UrLeyn began to wonder if the young fellow was entirely right in the head. Perhaps he was young for an ambassador because he was some doting father's favourite son, and the father was blind to the fact the lad was soft in the brain. He didn't speak Imperial very well, either, but UrLeyn had heard a few strange accents from those who were of the nautical powers.

  "Well, ambassador," he said, holding his hands out to each side. "You asked for an audience."

  The young man's eyes went wider still. "Yes. An audience." He slowly took the belt from round his neck and then looked down at the polished hide cylinder in his lap. "First of all, sir," he said, "I have a gift for you. From the Fleet Captain Vritten." He looked up expectantly at UrLeyn.

  "I confess I have not heard of Fleet Captain Vritten, but continue."

  The young fellow cleared his throat. He wiped sweat from his brow. Perhaps, UrLeyn thought, he has a fever. It is a little warm in here, but insufficiently so to make a man sweat like that. The Sea Companies spend much of their time in the tropics so it cannot be that he is unused to heat, sea breezes or not.

  The captain undid the buttoned end of the cylinder and withdrew another cylinder, also clad in gold-inscribed hide, though its ends appeared to be gold, or brass, and one end was tapered by a series of shining metal rings. "What I have here, sir," the ambassador said, looking down at the cylinder, which he now held in both hands, "is a seeing-piece. An optiscope, or telescope as such instruments are also known."

  "Yes," UrLeyn said. "I have heard of such things. Naharajast, the last Imperial mathematician, claimed to have used one directed at the skies to make his predictions concerning the fire-rocks which appeared in the year of the Empire's fall. Last year an inventor — or someone who claimed to be an inventor — came to our palace and showed us one. I had a look through it myself. It was interesting. The view was cloudy, but it was undeniably closer."

  The young ambassador seemed not to hear. "The telescope is a fascinating device… a most fascinating device, sir, and this one is a particularly fine example." He pulled the device apart so that it clicked out to three or so times its compacted length, then held it up to one eye, looking at UrLeyn, then round the painted panels of the room. UrLeyn formed the impression he was hearing a memorised script. 'Hmm," the young ambassador said, nodding his head. "Extraordinary. Would you care to try it, sir?" He stood and held out the instrument to the Protector, who motioned the ambassador to approach. Clutching the hide instrument's protective cylinder awkwardly in his other hand, the captain stepped forward, offering the eye-piece end of the device to UrLeyn, who leant forward in his chair and duly took hold of it. The ambassador let go of the thicker end of the instrument. It began to fall to the floor.

  "Oh, heavy, isn't it?" UrLeyn said, quickly bringing his other hand round to save the device. He had almost to jump out of the chair to keep his balance, going down on one knee towards the young captain, who took a single step back.

  Ambass
ador Oestrile's hand suddenly held a long, thin dagger which he swept up and then brought swinging down. UrLeyn saw this even as his knee hit the dais and he finally caught the seeing-piece. With his hands full, still off-balance and kneeling beneath the other man, UrLeyn knew instantly that there was nothing he could do to parry the blow.

  The crossbow bolt slammed into Ambassador Oestrile's head an instant after glancing off the high collar of his coat. The bolt lodged in his skull just above his left ear, most of its length protruding. If either man had had the time and inclination to look, they would have seen that a small hole had appeared in the painting of the bustling city square. Oestrile staggered back still clutching the dagger, his feet slipping on the polished wooden floor. UrLeyn let himself fall back against the chair, putting both hands to the eye-piece end of the telescope. He started to swing it back behind him, thinking to use it as a club.

  Ambassador Oestrile gave a roaring bellow of pain and rage, put one hand to the crossbow bolt and gripped it, shaking his head, then suddenly threw himself forward again at UrLeyn, dagger first.

  With a resounding crash DeWar burst through the thin plaster panel depicting the city square. A wave of dust rolled out across the gleaming floor and plaster shards scattered everywhere as DeWar, sword already drawn,

  thrust the blade straight at the ambassador's midriff. The blade broke. DeWar's momentum carried him onwards so that he side-charged into the ambassador. Still roaring, the ambassador was toppled to the floor with a thud, waving his dagger. DeWar threw away the broken sword, spun to one side and drew his own dagger.

  UrLeyn had dropped the heavy telescope and stood. He drew a small knife from his jacket and took shelter behind the tall chair. Oestrile reared to his feet, the crossbow bolt still in his skull. His boots struggled to find purchase on the polished wooden floor as he stumbled towards the Protector. DeWar, bare footed, was on him before he'd taken half a step, coming quickly up behind him, putting one hand over his face and pulling his head back with fingers stuck into the man's nostrils and one eye. Ambassador Oestrile screamed as DeWar sliced his dagger across the man's exposed throat. Blood sprayed and bubbled as the scream was drowned.

  Oestrile crashed to his knees, finally dropped the dagger, then fell sideways, neck spurting blood on to the gleaming floor.

  "Sir?" DeWar asked UrLeyn breathlessly, still half watching the body twitching on the floor. Sounds of a commotion came from outside the chamber's doors. Thuds sounded. "Sir! Protector! General!" a dozen voices babbled.

  "I'm fine! Stop breaking the damn door down!" UrLeyn shouted. The commotion became a little less intense. He looked at where the painted plaster scene of the busy city square had been. In the little cupboard-sized room which had been revealed behind there was a stout wooden post with a crossbow fastened to it. UrLeyn looked back at DeWar, and put his own small knife back in its pocket sheath. "No damage done, thank you, DeWar. And you?"

  "I am uninjured too, sir. Sorry T had to kill him." He looked down at the body, which gave out one final bubbling sigh and then seemed to collapse in on itself a little. The pool of blood on the floor was deep and dark and still spreading viscously. DeWar knelt, keeping his dagger at what was left of the man's throat as he felt for a pulse.

  "Never mind," the Protector said. "Took some killing, too, did you not think?" He gave an almost girlish chuckle.

  "I think some of his strength and his bravery came from a potion or some such drug-brew, sir."

  "Hmm," UrLeyn said, then looked to the doors. "Will you shut up!" he yelled. "I'm perfectly all right, but this piece of shit tried to kill me! Palace guard?"

  "Aye, sir! Five present!" shouted a muffled voice.

  "Get Commander ZeSpiole. Tell him to find the rest of the diplomatic mission and arrest them. Clear everybody away from those doors, then enter. Nobody but the palace guards are allowed in here until I say so. Got all that?"

  "Sir!" The commotion intensified for a while, then began to subside again until there was almost no noise in the painted chamber.

  DeWar had unbuttoned the failed assassin's coat. "Chain mail," he said, fingering the coat's lining. He tapped the garment's collar. "And metal." He gripped the shaft of the crossbow bolt, strained, then stood and put one bare foot on Ambassador Oestrile's head, eventually pulling the bolt free with a delicate crunching noise. "No wonder it was deflected."

  UrLeyn stepped to the side of the dais. "Where did the dagger come from? I didn't see."

  DeWar crossed to the tall chair, leaving bloody footprints. He lifted first the telescope and then the hide cylinder it had been transported within. He peered into the case. "There's some sort of clip at the bottom." He inspected the telescope. "There is no glass at the large end. The dagger must have nested inside the device when it was inside the case."

  "Sir?" a voice came from the door.

  "What?" UrLeyn shouted.

  "Guard Sergeant HieLiris and three others here, sir."

  "Come in," UrLeyn told them. The guards entered, looking warily about. All looked surprised at the hole where the city painting had been. "You have not seen that," the Protector told them. They nodded. DeWar stood cleaning his dagger on a piece of cloth. UrLeyn stepped forward and kicked the dead man in the shoulder, sending him flopping on to his back.

  "Take this away," he told the guards. Two of them sheathed their swords and took one end of the body each.

  "Better take a limb each, lads," DeWar told them. "That coat's heavy."

  "See to the clear-up, will you, DeWar?" asked UrLeyn.

  "I should be at your side, sir. If this is a determined attack there might be two assassins, the second waiting for us to relax when we think the attack has failed."

  UrLeyn drew himself up and took a deep breath. "Don't worry about me. I'm going off to lie down now," he said.

  DeWar frowned. "Are you sure you're all right, sir?"

  "Oh, I'm fine, DeWar," the Protector said, following the trail of blood as the guards carried the body to the doors. "I'm going off to lie down on top of somebody very young and plump and firm." He grinned back at DeWar from the doors. "Proximity to death does this to me," he announced. He laughed, looking down at the trail of blood, then at the black pool of it by the dais. "I should have been an undertaker."

  5. THE DOCTOR

  Master, it was now about the time of year when the Court works itself into the most excited and febrile State as everyone prepares for the Circuition and the move to the Summer Palace. The Doctor was busy with her preparations just as everybody else was busy with theirs, though of course in her case there might have been expected to be an added excitement given that this would be her first Circuition. I did all that I could to help her, though I was constrained in this for a while by a slight fever which kept me in my bed for a few days.

  I confess I hid the symptoms of my illness for as long as I could, feeling that the Doctor would think me weak, and also because I had heard from the apprentices of other doctors that however kindly and pleasant their masters might be with their paying patients, when their own devoted helpers took poorly they were, to a man (which naturally they all were), notoriously brusque and unsympathetic.

  Doctor Vosill was, however, a very agreeable and understanding doctor to me while I was ill, and tended to my needs as though she were my mother (which I do not think she is quite old enough to be).

  I would not record anything beyond my brief infirmity, and might even have skipped over it entirely, save to explain to my Master why there was a gap in my reports, but for the following, which struck me as possibly shedding some light on the Doctor's mysterious past before she appeared in the city two years ago.

  I was, I freely confess, in a strange state at the height of my sickness, devoid of appetite, sweating freely and falling into a state of semi-unconsciousness. Whenever I closed my eyes I was convinced I was seeing odd and vexatious shapes and figures who tormented me with their manic and incomprehensible shiftings and cavortings.

  My greatest
fear, as may be imagined, was that I might say something that would reveal to the Doctor the fact that I had been charged with reporting on her actions. Of course, given that she is obviously a good and trustworthy person from all that I have seen and reported so far (and so evidently devoted to our good King), it may be that no ultimate damage would result from such a revelation, but however that may be I will of course heed my Master's wishes and keep my mission a secret.

  Be assured then, Master, that no word or hint of that assignment was transmitted by me, and the Doctor remains none the wiser regarding these reports. Still, while that most precious confidence remained locked well within myself, other of my normal inhibitions and self-constraints had slackened off due to the influence of the fever, and I found myself on my bed in my cell one day, while the Doctor — who had just returned from treating the King (he had a bad neck around this time, I think) — was washing my muchsweated upper body.

  "You are too good to me, Doctor. A nurse should do this."

  "A nurse will do this if I am called away to the King again.

  "Our dear King! How I love him!" I cried (which was sincere, if a little embarrassing).

  "As do we all, Oelph," the Doctor said, squeezing water from a cloth over my chest and — with what seemed like a thoughtful look — rubbing my skin clean. She was crouched at the side of my bed, which is a very low one due to the constraints of space within my cell.

  I looked into the Doctor's face, which seemed sad just then, I thought. "Don't fear, Doctor. You will keep him well! He worries that his father was the stronger man and he died young, but you'll keep him well, won't you?"