Quillifer the Knight

by Walter Jon Williams

  And indeed the shadows grew long before we ceased our explorations and I helped you to dress. I was less dextrous than was usual, as I had the full use of only one hand, but you forgave that fault as you forgive all my faults.

  And then I kissed you and returned to my library, where I looked down at my unfinished letter to Elvina, and I thought that Elvina seemed farther away than ever.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  I finished that letter to Elvina with the hope that she would not hate me forever and sent it by courier. I also wrote to Lord Barkin to thank him for representing me so well, and to Lord Edevane to inform him that I would be returning to Duisland.

  Traveling in a hired carriage and changing horses at each post, Rufino Knott and I traveled to the coast on the road that had been repaired for the convenience of Queen Berlauda. I found a ship to Bretlynton Head, and from there visited my manor at Dunnock, just to make sure all was in order and to collect my rents. Less money awaited me than I had expected, for, due to the great storm, the harvest had been poor. Yet there had been enough to prevent hunger, as there was in Fornland.

  One foggy morning before my departure, one of my tenants came running to me to tell me that a ship had blundered into the Races in the fog, and was now caught in one of the ferocious tidal storms that tore twice each day through those toothlike stony cays.

  From Dunnock there is no way down the steep cliff, but on a neighbor’s estate there was a ravine that led to the beach, and I rang the fire bell in my old tower and brought as many of my servants and tenants down that ravine as I could. By the time we gained the sand, the fog had lifted, and we saw a small galleon caught in one of the great foaming whirlpools. Even as we watched, the galleon spun away from the whirlpool, struck hard on one of the stony half-submerged ledges, and began to sink.

  We had no boats, and even if we had, no boat would survive in the Races once the tide began to rage and foam. I sent men galloping to my neighbors to find any boats that could be brought to the scene when the tide slackened, and in the meantime we could do nothing but watch the ship founder.

  A few of the sailors, clinging to wreckage, were carried near enough to some of the cays to clamber onto the rocks, and these were later fetched off at slack tide by some fishermen. The rest we were forced to watch as they drowned or were swept out to sea, and to hear the growling tide as it overpowered their screams and cries for help. Seven men survived out of a crew of sixty, and the ship and its cargo were strewn over the stony bottom where no salvager would dare go.

  I made the survivors as comfortable as I could, had their wounds bandaged and their broken bones splinted, and then carried them to Bretlynton Head. The sailors were taken in by a monastery until they were fit to return to work, and I took ship to Selford.

  Kevin Spellman was at his family’s house in town, to attend the launch of our new ship to replace Royal Stilwell, lost on Gannet Island ten months before. I lodged with Kevin and his parents, and was present when the great 850-ton galleon shuddered down the ways into the Saelle, the water foaming beneath its tumble home as it shouldered broadside into the water and sent a great swell across the river that crashed into the wharves and piers and ships on the far side, sending out a long, shuddering echo that sent seabirds whirling into the sky.

  Sea-Drake, intended for the trade to Tabarzam and back, still lacked its upper masts, many of its fittings, its guns, and its crew, and would spend at least another six weeks in Selford fitting out before taking on its cargo and beginning its long voyage abroad. I had named the ship after the great serpent I’d seen at the storm’s outset the previous summer, and from one of the shipyard’s expert carvers had commissioned a magnificent coiling figurehead that would soon be brilliant with rainbow paint and gold leaf.

  While Sea-Drake fitted out, I busied myself expanding my ink empire. My self-created master ink-maker at the works in Howel, having trained his own replacement, had come to Selford and begun setting up a new factory. He had brought with him a suitable number of Mountmirail’s grinding machines, and I approached the business in the same manner as I had in Howel, by securing a near monopoly on oak galls. By the time I left Selford in July, Q Sable Ink was being sold at every stationer’s in the city. Since all the government ministries were headquartered in Selford, the market for ink was even greater than in the winter capital.

  I began to think of red ink, blue ink, green ink, and even silver and gold ink, and sent my master inker to experimenting in order to produce these.

  The Duchess of Roundsilver had given birth just before I arrived in the city, and I was able to congratulate their happy graces in a visit to the Roundsilver palace, and present to the week-old Marquess of Ethlebight the beautiful sapphire that I had originally planned to give to Berlauda’s child. I also informed their graces that I planned to form a joint-stock company to build the canal from Ethlebight to Gannet Cove, and that I hoped Their Graces might subscribe, and help in attaining a monopoly from the crown.

  “You must be careful who you talk to, Quillifer,” said the duke. “For if the wrong person gets wind of this, he may form his own company and snatch your prize out from under you.”

  “That would be difficult,” said I, “for last summer I took the liberty of buying the sole right to purchase Gannett Cove, and to forbid other purchases, for ten years. They may sell to me, or not at all, and there is no other deep-water harbor on that coast.”

  The Roundsilvers looked at each other and laughed. “That is very well!” said His Grace. “I will of course be delighted to become a subscriber! But you must go to Ethlebight and get pledges from our friends there—I will provide letters of introduction, if you like.”

  “I wonder if Wenlock will join?” I asked. “He may hate me, but I think he loves a good profit.”

  “He will try to destroy you if he can,” said her grace.

  “Only if Edevane lets him off the leash,” said I, “for I think Wenlock is now Edevane’s lap-dog.”

  All these developments took place to the constant drumming of rain, for the spring had turned wet and cold, and the summer that followed was no better. My crooked finger ached continually. It was obvious that the crops would drown and the harvest would fail. The previous year’s harvest had resulted in hunger, but this year’s would produce famine. The Spellmans and I sent orders to Sea-Holly, Able, and our other merchant ships to venture abroad and purchase grain for the relief of hunger at home.

  In years of bad harvests some landowners came to the relief of their tenants and neighbors by employing them on building projects so they could afford to eat, so I wrote to my bailiff at Dunnock to build a watchtower overlooking the Races to alert the manor to any ships in danger, and also to investigate a limestone outcrop on a part of my property to see if stone might be quarried there for the tower, and also for paving the roads in the district.

  While in Selford I received word that my privateer Ostra had captured two ships returning to Thurnmark from abroad, and that these were awaiting the judgment of the prize court in Ferrick. Once the court had ruled, and the crown had taken its twenty percent, the ships and their cargoes would be mine to dispose of as I liked. Without waiting for the ruling, Ostra had returned to the low-lying coast of Thurnmark to look for more captures.

  I left Selford on Sea-Drake, its hold loaded with wool, ingots of tin and iron, blocks of steel suitable for turning into knives and swords, and a cargo of fine cannon made in Selford’s foundries. The cannon I could sell anywhere in the world, for Duisland’s cannons were prized, and the metals also. The wool would be sold in Varcellos, and exchanged for fine wines and brandies that would delight the palates of the Candara Coast. The great ship, traveling always in bad weather, made slow progress down the coast to Amberstone. As we neared the city, we could hear the thumping of guns and the chime of bells far out to sea and, as there was no enemy fleet in sight, reasoned that either we had won a great military victory, or that Queen Berlauda had delivered her child.

  We did n
ot put into Amberstone to take part in the celebrations, because the captain wanted to make some adjustments to the rigging and to re-stow the cargo in order to improve the ship’s speed and handling. But as soon as we came to our mooring, the celebration surrounded us in the form of boats full of cheering, half-drunken citizens, and an anchorage heavy with gunsmoke. From the oarsmen of one of the boats we learned that Berlauda had given Duisland and Loretto a royal heir, the infant Prince Aguila.

  I went onshore to toast Aguila’s birth, though I wondered if I might also be toasting the death of the former heir, Princess Floria—for Lord Edevane, who had such a talent for anticipating the wishes of the monarchs, might try to rid Aguila of a rival.

  These thoughts darkened my merry-making, so next day I took a coaster to Ethlebight, where, after running aground in the main channel and waiting four hours for the tide to take us off, we finally made the port.

  I stayed at the Spellman house in Ethlebight, and spent the evenings with old friends, while my days were occupied in meeting the principal people of the district. Because my father had been an alderman, I already knew the other aldermen, the mayor, many of the foremost merchants, and most of the officials of the guilds; but I knew few of the gentry and none of the nobility beyond Roundsilver and Wenlock. Most proclaimed themselves willing to endorse the canal scheme, except for a few who I suspect intended to launch their own company. These I hoped would go to the expense and trouble of surveying the route, and only then discover that they could not purchase the fishing village at the terminus.

  I visited Sir Cecil Greene, the member of the Burgesses who had spoken out to the displeasure of King Priscus, and found he was willing to introduce the necessarily legislation in the Burgesses to allow the canal company to purchase land and the necessary right-of-way. “Though you may wish someone else to introduce this bill,” he said, “for Their Majesties love me not, and may refuse assent out of spite.”

  “I might introduce it myself,” said I gloomily, “for Lord Edevane wishes me to run in a by-election in Hurst Downs.”

  “Where exactly is Hurst Downs?” Greene asked. And after I told him, he said, “At least there will be another vote for the canal scheme.”

  “Yet Edevane may exact a price,” said I. “I fear he will wish me to perjure myself, and provide evidence against his enemies.”

  “Then you must refuse him,” said Greene. “Once you are a member of the Burgesses, you will be immune to prosecution by the crown.”

  “That immunity did Sir Edmund Tryon little good,” said I. “His head now ornaments a pike.”

  Greene was firm. “The viceroy cannot rule the Burgesses through terror. The lower house represents the people, and the people are the foundation on which stands the edifice of the nation. We are greater than the monarchy.”

  I hope the headsman will agree with you, I thought. Still, I thought the next session would go better without the presence of Priscus and Berlauda, and that whoever managed the Estates on behalf of the crown would prove better at negotiation than the monarchs.

  Well, you know what became of that hope.

  I enrolled a great list of subscribers in Ethlebight over the months of July and August. I did not ask for money, for as yet the project had no budget. If you rode a horse from Ethlebight to Gannet Cove, it would be about eighteen leagues, and with relays of horses you might do it in a day; but the canal necessarily had to divert around rocky hills and forests, and would be something like twenty-five leagues. It would have to be dug about two yards deep and fourteen yards wide, and there would have to be good towpaths on either side, and stables and fodder for the mules that would draw the barges. An aqueduct would be needed to carry the canal over a steep river valley, and in addition there would be ten or twelve locks to carry the barges up and down hills, and down to the final destination in the cove—and I did not know how to build a lock, nor did anyone in the kingdom. All the locks in Duisland were in Bonille, they were of ancient Aekoi manufacture, and no one had ever built a new one.

  But, I thought, the first thing would be to pass the bill through the Estates, and gain royal assent. Once that was obtained, I could raise funds and find an engineer at the same time.

  I received a letter from Lord Edevane that Sir Silvanus Becket had been made Baron Becket and a member of the House of Peers, and that I would be expected in Hurst Downs for the by-election to fill his seat. The election would be in mid-September, so in the middle of August I took ship to Bretlynton Head, and again I arrived to the tolling of bells. I saw moored beneath the castle the galleon Sovereign, just returned from the Candara Coast, and I saw that its yards were cockbilled and askew, with ropes’ ends trailing, and the flag at half mast, drooping over the poop. I went at once to see Captain Gaunt, and from him learned that Queen Berlauda, weakened after childbirth, had died very suddenly of a fever that had also struck Queen Arletta, though not fatally.

  This left Priscus sole monarch of Duisland, for Berlauda had crowned him her co-equal, with the infant Aguila first in line of succession. But I wondered how Duisland would accept this foreign autocrat now that he was not wedded to the rightful queen, and I wondered whether this would be good for Floria, or the reverse. For it would not be very long before some bright spark suggested to Priscus that a solution to his problems in Duisland would be to marry Floria.

  Despite the mourning bells tolling in the city, I spent a pleasant night drinking wine with Captain Gaunt in his great cabin, and hearing the tales of his voyage and back. I told him that Sea-Drake had been launched and was already on its way to Candara. He opened his strongbox and showed me the gems he had bought on my behalf in Tabarzam, as fine as I could have wished, and when I left the ship next morning, I took that strongbox with me.

  From a tailor in Bretlynton Head I ordered mourning apparel, then rode to Hurst Downs and Dunnock. I inspected the half-built watchtower overlooking the Races, and viewed the limestone outcrop, which was even now being sawn and wedged into blocks. The large slabs were used in the construction of the tower, and the smaller ones would be crushed to improve the surface of the roads on my estate, and in the district generally.

  In Hurst Downs I dined with the new-made Lord Becket and the other leading men of the district. Becket, a stout, gray-haired man with a large estate and a deer park, had already informed his guests that I was the crown’s choice for their representative, which made them wary, and they seemed a little startled by my youth; but I had the advantage of wealth and a royal office, and a certain reputation as a soldier and dragon-slayer, and so in the end they raised little objection to my candidacy.

  They told me frankly, however, that they resented having to pay for what they called “Priscus’s war.” In that war they saw no advantage to themselves or to their country, and to raise more taxes in a year when the crops had failed was nothing short of madness. Their own wealth depended on the yearly harvest, and this year they would have to borrow in order to meet their obligations. To squeeze more money out of them in order to send yet another army to Thurnmark was, they thought, preposterous.

  I agreed with them, but felt their cause was helpless. There was very little precedent for the Estates defying the monarch in any matter the monarch felt truly important; and I knew that Priscus and his family were in need of troops, and as they were involved wholly in killing the enemy, they would hardly trouble themselves if they had to kill a few members of the Estates. I spoke frankly of this to my hosts in Hurst Downs, and I think they appreciated my candor. At the election, I was duly elected their representative in the Burgesses.

  So I, with Rufino Knott, returned to Bretlynton Head, got my mourning garb from the tailor, then took passage up the Dordelle to Howel and Rackheath House. The passage upstream was bleak, the river a gray, sullen, and torpid flood, often turned white with the impact of sudden cloudbursts. The constant summer rains had burst the banks of the Dordelle in numerous districts, and the implacable waters now carried full-grown trees with their spreading branches a
nd entangling roots, along with derelict watercraft, wooden piers torn from their pilings, and entire houses that had been carried away from their foundations. These unusual hazards lengthened the journey and delayed my reunion with you. For we two had sent letters back and forth all summer, and I knew that you and Countess Marcella had been recalled to join Floria in Howel. Floria had declined the scant hospitality of Longres Regius, and sent instead magnificent presents to her sister and the infant Aguila.

  I had barely hoisted my flag over Rackheath House when you arrived at my door in a litter. When your name was announced, Goodman Knott was still unpacking my chests and hanging my clothes in my dressing room, a maidservant was lighting the fire in my study, and Master Stiver was in the act of presenting to me the household accounts for the months since my departure. I fear that I offended Master Stiver when I ran from his presence to your arms, and I kissed your noble brow, your cheeks, and your lips in front of half a dozen startled servants. You were dressed in deep mourning, and that perhaps made our embrace all the more surprising.

  “All business is postponed till tomorrow,” I proclaimed. “Bring a decanter of sauternes to my study.”

  The study was smoky from the fire that had just been lit, and we stayed only till Knott brought the sauternes and some glasses. We spent the next several hours on Lord Rackheath’s great canopied bed, and we scarcely needed to draw the bed curtains closed, for the wine and our ardor kept us warm.

  “How is Her Highness?” asked I, after we had reached a stage of temporary satiation. Your cheek rested on my shoulders, with your warm, massy, myrrh-scented hair spread across my chest.

  “She mourns, I think sincerely.” You reached across me to fetch your glass from the stand, and I took the opportunity to kiss your fingers. “Berlauda stood between Floria and Priscus. Now there is no defense, and the king will have his way.”