by Iain Banks
"I think we know the main thing, which is that he is dead," Adlain said. From beyond a line of servants by the windows, a woman's screams could be heard. I imagined it was the Duke's wife.
"Who was in the room?" Quettil asked his Guard Commander.
"These two," Polchiek said, nodding at a young man and woman, both hardly any older than myself, both quite handsome and with their dress in some disarray. Each was held from behind by two of the armed servants. It was only now starting to occur to me that there had been a particular explanation for the great numbers of servants at the ball, and for the fact that many of them looked somewhat coarser than one expected of servants. They were really guards. That was why they had all suddenly produced weapons at the first hint of mischief.
The young woman's face was red and swollen with crying, and held a look of blank terror. A wail from beyond the windows drew her attention and she stared in that direction. The face of the young man at her side looked almost as bloodless as the body of Duke Walen.
"And who are you?" Adlain asked the young couple.
"Uo-Uo-Uoljeval, sir," the young man said, swallowing heavily. "A squire in the em-employ of Duke Walen, sir."
Adlain looked at the young woman, who was staring straight ahead. "And you, madam?"
The young woman shivered and looked not at Adlain but at the Doctor. Still she did not say anything.
Eventually the young man said, "Droythir, sir. Her name is Droythir. Of Mizui. A chambermaid to Lady Gilseon. My betrothed."
"Sir, can't we let the Duchess in now?" the Doctor asked the King. He shook his head and held up one hand.
Guard Commander Adlain jerked his head back as though pointing at the girl with his chin and demanded, "And what were you doing in here, madam?"
The young woman stared at him as though he'd spoken in some utterly unknown language. It crossed my mind that she was indeed a foreigner. Then the young man started to weep and said, "It was only for his pleasure, sirs, please!"
Through his tears he looked in turn at each of the faces watching him. "Sirs, he said he liked such sport, and would reward us. We knew nothing, nothing until we heard him cry out. He was there. There, behind there, watching us from behind the screen there. He knocked it over when he — when he-" The young man looked round as best he could at a screen lying on the floor near one corner of the room, by a door, and started to breathe very quickly.
"Calm down," Adlain snapped. The young man closed his eyes and slumped in the grip of the two guards. They looked at each other, then at Adlain and Polchiek, who was also, I thought, distinctly pale and haggard.
"And there, was a dark bird," the young woman said suddenly, in a strange, hollow voice. Her eyes stared straight ahead out of her pale, sweat-sheened face.
"What?" Polchiek said.
"A dark bird," she said, looking straight at the Doctor. "It was very dark because the gentleman wished only for one candle to light us, but I saw it. A dark bird, or a nightwing."
The Doctor looked puzzled. "A dark bird?" she said, frowning.
"I think we have learned all we can from you, madam," Quettil said to the Doctor. "You may go."
"No," the King said to her. "Stay, Doctor."
Quettil's jaw worked.
"Were you doing what I think you were doing?" the King asked the young woman. He glanced at the Doctor. The orchestra faltered in the ballroom.
The young woman turned her empty-looking face slowly towards the King. "Sir," she said, and I knew she did not realise who she was talking to. "Yes, sir. On the couch there." She pointed to a couch in the centre of the room. A candelabrum holding one extinguished candle lay knocked over nearby.
"And Duke Walen was watching from behind the screen," Adlain said.
"It was his pleasure, sir." The young woman looked down at the man kneeling weeping by her side. "We saw no harm in it."
"Well, there was harm, madam," Quettil said quietly, his voice hardly more than a breath.
"We'd been doing it a while, sirs," the young woman said, her empty, staring eyes directed towards the Doctor. "There was a noise. I thought it was somebody trying the window doors again, sir, but then the old gentleman cried out and the screen came tumbling down and I saw the nightwing."
"You saw the Duke?" Polchiek asked her.
She swivelled her head towards him. "Yes, sir."
"You saw nobody else?"
"Just the gentleman, sir," she said, looking back to the Doctor. "In his shirt. He had his hand up here." She shrugged on one side only, and looked down to her left at the top of her chest near her shoulder. "He was crying out that he'd been murdered."
"The door behind him," Adlain said. "There, behind where the screen was. Was the door open?"
"No, sir."
"You are sure."
"Yes, sir."
Quettil leaned towards the King. "My man Ralinge will make sure this is the truth," he murmured. The Doctor heard this and glared at the Duke. The King only frowned.
"Is the door locked?" Adlain asked Polchiek.
Polchiek frowned. "It should be," he said, "and the key should be in the lock." He crossed the room to the door, found that there was no key, looked to the floor for a few moments, then pulled and pushed at the door.. He felt inside a fat pouch at his waist, pulled out a ring bristling with long keys and eventually found one which he tried in the door's lock. The lock clicked, the door opened inwards and a couple of armed guards dressed as servants looked quizzically in, straightening when they saw their Commander, who spoke briefly to them and closed and locked the door again. He returned to the group round the table. "The guards have been there since a little after the alarm was raised," he told Adlain. His big, clumsy-looking fingers fumbled with the ring of keys, trying to fit it back into the pouch at his waist.
"How many keys to that door are there?" Adlain asked.
"This one, one for the palace seneschal and the one which ought to be in the door, on this side," Polchiek told him.
"Droythir, where was this dark bird you saw?" the Doctor asked.
"Where the gentleman was, ma'am." Suddenly her face seemed to collapse and a look of uncertainty and sadness wrote itself across her features. "Perhaps it was just a shadow, ma'am. The candle, and the screen falling." She looked down. 'A shadow," she murmured to herself.
"Let the Duchess in," the King said, as one of the guards dressed as a servant approached Quettil and muttered into his ear.
"The Duchess has fainted and been taken to her room, sir," Quettil told the King. "However, I am told there is a young page who may have something to tell us."
"Well then, bring him in," the King said, sounding annoyed. Droythir and Uoljeval were pulled back towards the centre of the room by those holding them. The young man staggered to his feet, still weeping quietly. The girl stared ahead, silent.
Feulecharo approached from the doors, looking smaller than I had ever seen him look, his face almost translucent, his eyes bulging.
"Feulecharo?" Adlain said. He looked round the others. "Page to the late Duke," he said by way of explanation to those who needed it.
Feulecharo cleared his throat. He looked nervously round us all, then saw the Doctor and gave me a small smile. "Your majesty," he said, bowing to the King. "Duke Quettil, sirs, madam. I know something — very little, but something — of what happened here."
"You do?" Quettil said, his eyes narrowing. The King shifted from one leg to the other, winced, then nodded in appreciation as the Doctor brought up a chair for him to sit in.
Feulecharo nodded towards the far corner of the room. "I was in the corridor, behind that door, sirs, earlier."
"Doing what, might one ask?" Quettil said.
Feulecharo swallowed. He glanced at Droythir and Uoljeval, who had been brought forward again to the side of the table, their arms still held behind them. "I had been asked by the Duchess to…" Feulecharo licked his lips. "To follow the Duke and see what he was doing."
"And you followed him here?"
Adlain said. He knew Feulecharo a little, and sounded purposeful but not unkind.
"Yes, sir. With the two young people." Feulecharo glanced at Droythir and Uoljeval, neither of whom responded. "The Duchess thought perhaps there was some arrangement between the young lady and the Duke. I watched them enter this withdrawing room, and found my way to the corridor outside. I thought I might hear something, or see something through the keyhole, but it was blocked."
"By a key?" Adlain asked.
"I think not, sir. Rather by the little shutter on the far side. However," Feulecharo said, "I had with me a small metal mirror and thought to see something under the bottom of the door."
"And did you?" Quettil asked.
"Only a single light, like a candle flame, Duke Quettil. I could hear the young man and woman making the sounds of love, and sense some movement, but that was all."
"And when the Duke was stabbed?" Polchiek asked.
Feulecharo took a deep breath. "Just before that, sir, I think, I was hit on the back of the head, and rendered unconscious. I imagine for just a few minutes." He turned and held his hair up at the back, exposing a scab of glistening, half-dried blood and a large lump.
The King looked at the Doctor, who went forward and looked at the wound. "Oelph," she said. "Some water, please. And a napkin or something similar. Is that a bottle of spirit wine there on the floor? That, too."
Feulecharo sat in a seat while his wound was cleaned and inspected. Adlain looked closely at the injury. "That certainly looks to me like it might knock a fellow out for a moment or two," he said. "You would agree, Doctor?"
"Yes," she said.
"And when you woke up, what was there to be seen then?" Polchiek asked Feulecharo.
"Sir, I could hear the commotion in the room and people crying out. There was nobody else in the corridor where I was. I was very dizzy and went to the privy to be sick, then I went to find the Duchess, and that was when I heard that the Duke had been murdered."
Adlain and Polchiek exchanged looks. "You did not sense anybody behind you when you were hit?" Adlain asked.
"No, sir," Feulecharo said, wincing as the Doctor dabbed some spirit wine on his wound. "I was concentrating too sorely on the mirror."
"This mirror…" Polchiek began.
"It is here, sir. I had the presence of mind to retrieve it before I made my way to the privy." Feulecharo dug into a pocket and pulled out a coin-sized piece of highly polished metal. He handed it to Polchiek, who passed it round the other men.
"Is the Duchess Walen a particularly jealous woman, would you say, Feulecharo?" Adlain asked, turning the small mirror over in his fingers.
"Not especially so, sir," Feulecharo said. He sounded awkward, though that may just have been because the Doctor was holding his head forward while she completed the cleaning of his wound.
"You have told us everything of the truth, have you not, Feulecharo?" the King asked gravely.
Feulecharo looked at him as best he could with his head still bent forward by the Doctor. "Oh, yes, your majesty."
"When you were hit, Feulecharo," the Doctor said, letting go of his head, "did you fall against the door, or to the floor?"
Quettil made a tutting noise. Feulecharo thought for a moment. "I woke up resting against the door, ma'am," he said, then looked at Adlain and, the others.
"So if somebody had opened the door into the room," the Doctor said, "you would have fallen in too."
"I suppose I would have, ma'am. I would have required being put back into the same position after it had been closed again."
"You are hiding nothing from us, young man?" Quettil asked.
Feulecharo seemed to be about to speak, but then hesitated. I had thought him more intelligent than that, but perhaps the blow to his head had addled his brains.
"What?" the King said sternly.
"Your majesty, sirs," Feulecharo said in a dry, strainedsounding voice. "The Duchess thought the Duke might be seeing the young lady here. That was what exercised her jealousy. She would not have minded so much, perhaps not have minded at all if she had known it was only to… to watch others." Feulecharo looked round the men in the room, avoiding my eyes and the Doctor's. "Why, she would have laughed to have known what was going on in here, sirs. No more. And there is nobody she would trust more than me. I know her, sirs. She would not cause such a thing to be done." He licked his lips and swallowed hard again, then looked despondently at the mound of table cloth covering the body of the Duke.
Quettil opened his mouth to say something, but the King, watching Adlain and Polchiek, said, "Thank you, Feulecharo."
"I think Feulecharo should stay here, sir," Adlain said to the King. "Guard Commander Polchiek might send men to his quarters to search for a weapon, or the missing key for the door." The King nodded, and Polchiek spoke to some of the servant-guards. "Perhaps," Adlain added, "the Guard Commander would open the door again and we'll see if young Feulecharo left any blood there."
The guards went off to search Feulecharo's room. Polchiek and Adlain returned to the door.
The King looked at the Doctor and smiled. "Thank you for all your help, Vosill," he said, with a nod. "That will be all."
"Sir," the Doctor said.
I heard later that they looked all through the Duchess" apartment as well as Feulecharo's. Nothing was found. Some blood was discovered on the outer surface of the door into the corridor, and on the floor beneath. A good part of the rest of the palace was searched soon afterwards for the murder weapon, but it was never discovered. The missing key turned up, innocently enough as far as could be told, in the key cabinet of the palace seneschal.
Master, I knew Feulecharo and did not think him capable of the killing of the Duke. The King may have been overly lenient in not allowing the two lovers Droythir and Uoljeval to be put to the question by Ralinge (though I believe both were shown the chamber and had the instruments of excruciation explained to them), but I do not believe any further truthful information would or could have been extracted from them.
Polchiek might have preferred that a scapegoat was found, and Quettil fumed and raged in private for moons afterwards, they say, but apart from taking one of Polchiek's two small estates away from him, he could do no more. Polchiek had filled the ball with extra guards and by all accounts done all he could to ensure that nothing untoward occurred.
Feulecharo was lucky, I think, that he was the third son of one of Walen's more wealthy barons. Had he been of more lowly birth, instead of just two sickly brothers away from a not inconsiderable title, he might have found himself enjoying the hospitality of Master Ralinge himself. As it was, it was generally accepted that his good family name made it almost unthinkable that he could have had anything more to do with the murder of the Duke than he had claimed.
16. THE BODYGUARD
"I wish I could go too, Mr DeWar. Can't you ask my father? He thinks you're clever."
DeWar looked embarrassed. Perrund smiled indulgently at him. From his pulpit the chief eunuch Stike looked down, fat and frowning. DeWar wore riding boots. He carried a hat, and a heavy black cape lay folded over the couch at his side next to a pair of saddle bags. The Protector had decided it was time to take personal command of the faltering war in Ladenscion.
"You're better off here, Lattens," DeWar told the boy, and reached out to ruffle his red-blond hair. "You have to get well. Being ill is like being attacked, you see? Your body is like a great fortress that has been besieged by invaders. You've repelled them, you've seen them off, but you have to be good, and marshal your forces and rebuild the walls, refurbish your catapults, clean your cannons, restock your armouries. Do you see? Only if your father feels that great fortress is going to be all right can he leave it to go and fight the war. So that is your duty. To keep getting better. To get well.
"Of course your father would rather stay here with you if he could, but he's like a father to all his men, too, you see? They need his help and guidance. So he has to go to them. You must stay, an
d help your father win the war by getting better, by repairing the great fortress. It is your duty, as a soldier. Do you think you can do that?"
Lattens looked down at the cushions he sat upon. Perrund patted his curls back into place again. He played with a loose thread of gold at the corner of a cushion. "Yes," he said in a small voice, not looking up. "But I really would like to go with you and Father, really I would." He looked up at DeWar. "Are you sure I can't come?"
"I'm afraid so," DeWar said quietly.
The boy sighed heavily and looked down again. DeWar smiled at Perrund, who was looking at Lattens.
"Oh," Perrund said. "Come, sir. Is this the General Lattens who won so well at catapults? You must do your duty, General. Your father will be back before too long. And Mr DeWar." She smiled at DeWar.
"For all we know," DeWar said, "the war may be ended by the time we get there. That is sometimes the way with wars." He fiddled with his big, waxed hat, then set it aside on his dark cape. He cleared his throat. "Did I tell you about when Sechroom and Hiliti parted? When Sechroom went off to become a missionary?"
Lattens seemed not to hear for a moment, but then he rolled over on his side and stopped humming and said, "No, I don't think so."
"Well, one day the two friends had to part. Sechroom had made up her mind that she would become a soldiermissionary, taking the message of Lavishia to far-off lands and teaching the peoples there the error of their ways. Hiliti had tried to talk his friend out of this, still believing that it was the wrong thing to do, but Sechroom was adamant."
"What?"
"Determined."
"Oh.,
"One day," DeWar continued, "not long before Sechroom was due to leave, they went to one of their special places, which was on an island. This island was a very wild place where people went to get away from all the riches of Lavishia. There were no streams of wine and sugar water, no ready-cooked game birds hanging in the house-trees, no perfume fountains, no piles of sweet-rocks, no-"
"People wanted to get away from sweet-rocks?" Lattens asked incredulously.