Lord of Mountains: A Novel of the Change

by S. M. Stirling

  Then he went on in a professional tone: “All’s well here?”

  “Good barracks and good rations, Chief, and we’ve got the guard rosters set up with the Lady Regent’s household men. Naught for you to worry about.”

  Rudi shrugged. “Best to make sure. Carry on, then.”

  Carrying on included detailing a half-dozen of the archers to follow the High King and Queen, but they tactfully stayed out of conversational range, if you spoke softly. All of them had a shaft on the string, and the last two took turns walking backward.

  Mathilda frowned slightly. “Rudi…this is a pretty good place for the conference…isolating everyone from their hangers-on and factions can help…but why did you pick Timberline especially?”

  She glanced at the Sword, and he shook his head. Still slightly damp, the darkened red-blond locks swirled around the shoulders of his jacket.

  “Did the Sword tell me to, you mean? Possibly. Possibly not, the puzzlement of it, for it’s often difficult to tell what’s…that and what is my own soul’s promptings.”

  He frowned as well; there were times when he didn’t feel like himself anymore. And other times when he did, but like a house that had had a whole new suite of rooms added. “I…just felt that it was right, somehow. There’s something here that I…we…need.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  TIMBERLINE LODGE

  CROWN FOREST DEMESNE

  (FORMERLY NORTH-CENTRAL OREGON)

  HIGH KINGDOM OF MONTIVAL

  (FORMERLY WESTERN NORTH AMERICA)

  NOVEMBER 6TH, CHANGE YEAR 25/2023 AD

  One ritual Sandra had brought over into the modern age was a cocktail hour before dinner; that was not a Society legacy, and the Corvallans had the same habit, so Rudi assumed it was some custom of the ancient world. He hoped it made them feel more at ease as he sipped his—it was in a conical glass on a stem.

  This one was a mixture of whiskey, sweetened cream, coffee, anisette and absinthe, served ice-cold; tasty, and with a hidden punch like a war hammer you didn’t see until it hit you on the neck-flare of your helmet. His mother-in-law called it a Moloko Plus, and claimed for some reason that it was appropriate in a time of battle and war. He could see why. A few of these would certainly prime you for violence.

  There were about a score and ten of folk attending, though some were swift replacements for those killed or wounded in the Battle of the Horse Heaven Hills; not enough to account for all the communities which now made up Montival, but some of the smaller ones let the Mackenzies or Mount Angel or one of the others they trusted hold a watching brief for them. Standing in the warmth of the towering hearths and chatting as folk nibbled on crackers topped with potted shrimp or pats of spiced goose liver or slivers of smoked salmon and capers was pleasant, but he was sharp-set enough to be pleased when the gong sounded and the musicians struck up a slow march on viol and rebec and hautboy, and he gave Mathilda his arm and led her in in a flash of silk and jewels.

  Though the Sword cradled in my other arm is a bit unorthodox, he thought mordantly. Still, I will not let it far from my grasp the now; not when Cutter assassins might crawl out from under the table or drop from the ceiling. It would warn me so, now, or guard me at least. Its usefulness grows. Also its presence is a reminder to the reluctant of what and Who stands behind me, and that They are Montival’s patrons.

  Long, colorful tapestries covered other sections of the walls in the great dining hall, done with scenes of the forests and mountains or the hunt, in thread that caught the firelight and lamplight with glints of silk iridescence or with the gleam of gold and silver. Or modeled on dreams from some romaunt where ladies rode unicorns through fields of asphodel, with miniature dragons on their wrists in place of hawks.

  His mother was in an arsaid now, the long wrapped tartan skirt and plaid that older Mackenzie women favored for formal occasions. She wore a green shift of fine embroidered linen with lace cuffs beneath it; both were of her own weaving. A headband bearing the Triple Moon was on her brow, confining her greying red hair, and she sat with some folk from Corvallis.

  One was Ed Finney, an influential yeoman they knew well from long seasons of guest-friendship stretching back to the terrible years, and Juniper Mackenzie had known his father even before that. There were a few rather lost-looking Faculty types from the city itself, and she was putting them at their ease, something for which she had a gift; they were probably a bit spooked at the neo-feudal splendors all around. Corvallis kept up more of the old ways than most.

  To an unhealthy degree, perhaps, he thought. That world is gone. If you try to hold to it, what you hold changes in your hands; its time is over, save as myth and legend. The past has its power, but it must give way to the future, and our memory of the past changes with the needs of the living.

  One of the Corvallans was drawn a little apart, looking as if he was accustomed to a train of flunkies rather than a single secretary. He did consult the notes and files she offered rather often, not ostentatiously but as if it were a reflex born of long habit.

  It was a good idea to get them all here, where there is an excuse to keep it down to the principals rather than hordes of hangers-on and minor players before whom the leaders must posture, Rudi thought. Hard enough to get a score of folk to agree on something, and them all men and women of power and place used to having their own way. Impossible if it were a hundred, not without taking time we don’t have right now, or without organization beforehand we haven’t had time for yet.

  Chancellor Ignatius was keeping himself awake, but only by dint of extraordinary self-discipline. His monk’s tonsure showed occasionally when his head dipped a little, and the face above the plain dark Benedictine robe was gaunt as he gave his monarch a rueful smile; the golden chain of office looked a little incongruous against it. Being Lord Chancellor of a realm only a few months old in the midst of a major war was wearing on him harder than the Quest through frozen wilderness, battle and flight had done.

  The more so as it was composed of contumaciously independent groups many of which had been—literally—at each other’s throats until a few years ago. Rudi suppressed a slight twinge of guilt at what he—and the man’s own iron sense of duty—was doing to his friend. The pile of paper he and Matti had had to wade through themselves was only a tithe of what landed on Ignatius’ head, and all of it life-and-death important to someone.

  I’ve sent smiling lads and lasses to their deaths by the thousands already, or crippled them. I’ll use him up if I must; yes, and myself. That I don’t like it means little save to me, for I will do it nonetheless.

  One of the Corvallans spoke, in a tone that hid aggression under a show of respect:

  “Now that the enemy is defeated, ah, Your Majesty—”

  “The enemy isn’t defeated, Professor. They’ve lost a battle, not the war, albeit it was a whacking great battle of unusual size,” Rudi said, a slight dryness to his tone. “’tis the end of the beginning, and perhaps the beginning of the end, but not the end itself, if you take my meaning.”

  Professor Tom Turner was a plump and prosperous man in early middle age, dressed in an expensive but understated jacket and trousers with an apricot-colored silk cravat and diamond stickpin. Rudi frowned—

  Professor Turner, he suddenly knew; the Sword was hanging from the back of his chair. Chairman of the Faculty of Economics—the Guild Merchant, they’d say in most places. And a banker; in fact, he helped reinvent the trade after the Change, when things had settled down enough. One with his thumb in any number of pies. First National Bank of Corvallis, right enough. And Ignatius says we have to go through him for some of the loans we’re raising, this bond-issue thing. Otherwise it’ll all be done through Portland and Astoria, and that wouldn’t do at all, at all. Especially since those houses are so closely linked to the Regent. Men fear the subtle webs of the Spider of the Silver Tower, and not without reason.

  “They’re retreating from our lands,” Turner said.

  “That d
epends on the meaning of our, wouldn’t you say?” Ignatius replied. “They’re retreating towards the old Boise border. If we let them go, there’s nothing to stop them coming back later. I suggest reading the reports on the situation in the occupied CORA territories to illustrate what that would mean.”

  “The tyrant of Boise is dead,” Turner pointed out. With a trace of unction: “Slain by our heroic leader.”

  “He’s dead. The Prophet is not, and Martin was but the Prophet’s hand-puppet,” Rudi said. “I freed him as much as killing him…and the Prophet will be using another to control his realm. We must not let him consolidate his control there.”

  Ignatius nodded: “It is their intentions towards us in the long term which matter, not their immediate capacity to carry those intentions out.”

  Turner spread his hands. “Except that the League of Des Moines is attacking them too. We’ve been hearing how rich and powerful they are off in the Midwest; let them have the rest of the fight.”

  Ignatius shrugged and went on: “And the High Kingdom claims Boise, New Deseret, Montana, and the lands of the Seven Council Fires of the Lakota tunwan…the Sioux.”

  “Well, that’s another matter. Defending ourselves when we’re attacked is one thing. Going out to annex foreign territory is another. I thought the High Kingdom was supposed to establish peace?”

  Rudi chuckled; there were more types of fencing than the sort you did with a practice sword in the salle d’armes. His voice was calmly reasonable as he went on:

  “Lasting peace, my friend, is not the same as beating off an attack. We’re no longer facing the prospect of being overrun and destroyed, but we’re a very long way indeed from winning the peace and establishing the kingdom securely. Half-done is well begun, but only if you go on to finish the job. Our children will have their own problems; I will not leave them mine as well to solve all over again.”

  Ignatius nodded. “In fact, Professor Turner,” he said dryly, “The People and Faculty Senate of Corvallis haven’t formally joined the High Kingdom of Montival at all. Just…acted and talked as if they had.”

  Edward Finney grinned; he was a sixtyish man with a farmer’s weathered face and a still-strong body the shape and texture of an oak stump. His family’s knowledge and aid had helped dozens of others set up their own steadings in the years after the Change. They were well-to-do and often chosen to represent their rural district in the city-state’s popular assembly, in which they spoke for the rural interest as a whole. In Corvallan terms that meant he was part of the Faculty of Agriculture. Though without the mystic power of tenure, which meant something like mana in Corvallan dialect, and marked the inner circle of power. Oddly, it was usually restricted to people who studied things rather than the ones who actually did them.

  “Some people, and I won’t name names, like for example Thomas Turner, keep putting off the formal declaration,” he said. “Last time it was because so many of our citizens were away fighting…which is chutzpah, I’d say.”

  The guests were seated at an oval table, hollow-centered. It was quite new, and deftly avoided the too-provocative Association habit of dividing upper and lower ranks with a ceremonial salt-cellar. Rudi cast an eye down at it, and Mathilda inclined her head very slightly towards her mother, who in turn waggled her eyebrows even more infinitesimally.

  Well, yes, of course I thought of that, it said, as plainly as words.

  The staff brought out the first course, also without the flourish of trumpets usual at a banquet in the Protectorate, something he’d always considered a prime example of what his mother considered folderol. It was hot beaten biscuits and butter and bowls of soup made with chicken sausage simmered with wine, broth, garlic, tomatoes, spinach and tortellini. However grand in scale Timberline was basically a hunting lodge and didn’t go in for the fantastic elaboration of court cuisine that you often got in Portland or at Castle Todenangst. Rudi was thankful for that too—in his experience, the pasties in the shape of castles and complex sauces full of spices from oversea were as much a matter of status and appearance as genuine appeal to the taste.

  And all that was somewhat wasteful, which made him uneasy, particularly right now; the Mother-of-All wanted you to enjoy Her bounty, but that didn’t mean she would appreciate a spendthrift treatment of the good things won with the toil and sweat of Her children. A wise man didn’t court bad luck, or tiptoe around the borders of hubris.

  Everyone made their own small ritual; which in a few cases was none at all, apart from a polite pause while the others finished. Rudi made the Invoking pentagram over his bowl and murmured:

  “Harvest Lord who dies for the ripened grain—

  Corn Mother who births the fertile field—

  Blessed be those who share this bounty;

  And blessed the mortals who toiled with You

  Their hands helping Earth to bring forth life.”

  Then he picked up his spoon eagerly; the talk died away for a while. He finished the soup with relish, ate another biscuit, sipped at the glass of dry white wine, and spoke cheerfully:

  “Now, we have won a whacking great battle. The enemy’s in retreat; we have to harry them out and pursue them to their home over the mountains and there scour the CUT off the land and bring the folk into the kingdom. They aren’t the enemy, just his dupes and tools, to be rescued as much as fought. To do that, we need different arrangements. We’ve been using an emergency levy of the whole. That won’t do for a long war fought far away. We can’t take that many hands away from the land and workshops forever; we need to trim each contingent to those willing and able to campaign for some time, staring at snowmelt, which means preparations must start now.”

  “A standing army,” someone said.

  “For now. And it’ll be necessary to make my position a matter of settled law and make sure that everyone contributes as they’re able, now that the most desperate part is past. The burdens must be fairly shared, and seen to be such. Nor can a war be run by a committee. Not well, at least. I will consult and seek advice, but decisions must be made without trying to sit in the middle between everyone’s opinions, and they must be made in good time—by me.”

  “Ah…” Turner cleared his throat. “Ah, Your Majesty, there is the problem that Corvallis has always been attached to, ah, the heritage of Republican government…”

  “Odd that you should say that,” Sandra Arminger said, delicately patting her lips with a linen napkin, speaking in a clear conversational voice that carried to the whole table without seeming loud. “As I remember it, Professor Turner, just before the Protector’s War—”

  What everyone else calls the War of the Eye, Rudi thought, hiding his amusement as he broke another biscuit and spread butter to melt into its steaming interior. Everyone who isn’t an Associate, or at least everyone who lives outside the Protectorate.

  His mother-in-law’s glee was even better concealed, but he knew her well enough to see the sheer artist’s pleasure in her bland brown gaze. She had always felt outmaneuvering a political opponent was among the rarest of life’s pleasures; if you could destroy him at the same time, that was the whipped cream on the blueberry tart. Best of all if you could demolish him with his own words. Rudi didn’t share the catlike joy she took in it, but there was no denying the technique was useful or that she was the mistress of it.

  Juniper Mackenzie sighed slightly and rolled her eyes even more inconspicuously; she and Sandra had shared the raising of Mathilda and Rudi for more than a decade and cooperated at need as heads of State, but you couldn’t really say they were friends and most certainly not soul-mates. The smooth voice continued:

  “— we, that is Norman and I, had a little conference with you in Portland in the ninth Change Year, and you were most willing to consider accepting Chartered City status for Corvallis, within the Association, under my late husband’s protection. Eager, even.”

  She sipped demurely at her wine. “I have the notes of the conversation in my files, as a matter of fac
t.”

  When Sandra Arminger mentioned my files, strong men blanched, and for good reason; perhaps the fabled mystic Internet of pre-Change times had been more thorough…and then again, perhaps not.

  “That’s a misrepresentation of my position at the time!”

  She went on, with a little cat smile of amused malice:

  “Including a signed letter from you to that effect. Paper and ink are so inconveniently lasting, aren’t they?”

  Turner wilted a little as glares shot at him from up and down the table. However much enthusiasm there was for the High Kingdom, everyone remembered the wars against the Association and the desperate fear they’d bred in the old days, not to mention those who’d lost kin and friends. Sandra had slipped the knife in at the most opportune moment, too; early enough to discredit him with many of the others, but late enough that the shock of it would be vivid for the next little while.

  She could have used it to blackmail him out of opposition beforehand…but then again, that wouldn’t have been as effective in the long run. The problem with coercing an enemy into acting like a friend was that it didn’t stick longer than it took them to find wiggle room. Putting your boot on his neck did solve the problem for good and all, rather more often.

  Of course, it’s far from the most final of Sandra’s solutions. She’s fond of that When a man causes you a problem, remember, no man, no problem maxim. I most surely do not altogether like this public flaying of even such a man as this; but then, I don’t like putting men to the sword on the field of battle either, and something like that is the alternative. Should Sandra be powerless against her enemies just because she hasn’t my reach or weight of arm? She’s spent the last twenty-five years ruling men of violence, wrapping them in nets of wit and wile they can’t cleave with cold steel.

  Mathilda leaned close and murmured in his ear:

  “And she’s even making use of the way everyone else felt about the Association then without it injuring her position now. Go Mom!”